Apple iPhone 4

“So should you buy the Verizon iPhone? If you're an iPhone die-hard who hates AT&T, well, sure. This is your saviour. If you're a satisfied Verizon Droid owner: No. The iPhone 4 is good, but so are Verizon's other top-of-the-line smartphones. If you're looking at your first smartphone, the iPhone is a great choice.Finally, a note about the rating: The Verizon iPhone 4 gets four stars, even though the Droid X, HTC Incredible and AT&T's iPhone all received 4.5 stars. The difference is seven months, and innovation. When those phones were released, they offered breakthrough features and advanced the state of the art. While Verizon's iPhone 4 is an excellent smartphone, it's the same phone we've had on AT&T for seven months. It's just on a different carrier.”

“The iPhone 4 has, once again, reinterpreted Steve Jobs's original concept, maintaining a core look and feel, yet changing and improving almost every aspect of the experience. We've described some of the new iPhone's problems, but in practice they are more than balanced by how much it does very well.The refreshed design is the purest example of Bauhaus style in mass production today. It is clean and elegant, with no wasted lines or curves. Every visible part of this phone has a function and every function has a beautiful form, the only nod to ornamentation is the Apple logo on the back.The iPhone 4 feels like a luxury item — and it is. Starting with the iPod, Apple created a niche of affordable luxury consumer electronics. This new iPhone is just the latest expression of that.The hardware inside improves the experience, most of all the Retina Display, but also the A4 processor. Using the iPhone 4 is a fast, fluid experience. (We said this about the 3GS, and again about the iPad, and it's even more true today.) Attention to details abounds, a secondary microphone helps cancel background noise on your end of a call, while a revised speaker enclosure adds some resonance to increase volume. The battery life is definitely improved, the iPhone 4 can make it through a complete diurnal cycle, just like a portable phone should!The new camera is the first iPhone camera that isn't embarrassingly behind the competition — in fact, it's really quite nice! Of course, it can't replace a good digital SLR, but it may actually displace the snapshot cameras we routinely carry around, it's a big plus for the new phone. HD video capability is also an upgrade from earlier iPhones. (The next improvement we'd like to see is image stabilization. Maybe next year.)Most of our complaints about the iPhone 3GS's software have been remedied with the iPhone 4, but you don't have to buy an iPhone 4 to get these improvements, because iOS 4 is a free download for every iPhone 3G and 3GS owner. (But it's the end of the line for the original iPhone, which doesn't run iOS 4.)A few missteps mar the great upgrade. We have our doubts about using glass for both front and back, which all but guarantees that glass will hit the ground when we inevitably drop the phone, and its antenna reception issues are troubling, to say the least. But even with a weak 3G signal, the iPhone 4 moves data faster than an iPhone 3GS, and a decent case should mitigate the risks of a drop while also helping with the reception issue.”

“Apple's fourth-generation smartphone really is its best yet, notwithstanding controversy about external antennae. In our tests, reception was outstanding. Its screen is the highest resolution of just about any screened gadget, with amazing colour and definition. An HD video/5Mp stills camera is joined by front-facing camera for Facetime video chats. Longer battery life (up to three days in real-life use), faster processor, multi-tasking OS and an incredibly responsive multitouch display are adjuncts to what is still the easiest and most intuitive phone ever made. An unrivalled smartphone against any other.”

“An impressive new design, amazing new display, key features like multitasking, and an attempt to mainstream video calls, along with hundreds of other little improvements combine together to make this a substantial upgrade and clearly the best iPhone ever. Our usual smartphone expert’s advice still holds true — pick your network first. If AT&T is the best carrier in your area it’s almost a no brainer. Unless you’re allergic to apples, this is the phone to get. Internationally, iPhone 4 will be on multiple carriers in most countries so the odds are good you’ll find it on your carrier of choice. Then it comes down to device.iPhone 4 is still limited in ways that frustrate power users, and may be flawed to the point of having serious issues, so that’s something you’ll want to consider before buying.If you currently have an iPhone it’s certainly more compelling an upgrade from the iPhone 3GS than the iPhone 3GS was from the iPhone 3G, and a great cross-grade for anyone on another platform whose willing to sacrifice control to gain usability. If you have an iPhone 3G or iPhone 2G, and you can afford the upgrade, do it. You’ll find the difference is night and day.”