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Impressions of the Oleopathic Screen, Picture Taking, and Voice Control on the iPhone 3GS

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img_07661After finishing a series of meetings and having a quick lunch, I got back to checking out some other features of the new iPhone 3GS.   All in all I’m still very, very impressed.   I notice on

((Quick side note: I see on Twitter that folks are saying at the moment that you can now Jailbreak your new iPhone 3GS. (UPDATE: Actually it is just the iPhone OS 3.0 not the phone.)That was quick. For the record, I didn’t jailbreak before, I doubt I will now.))

Back to some more impressions:

smudgeThe Oleopathic Finger-Print Resistant Screen: Resistant might be too strong a word. It is less of a finger-print magnet than the iPhone 3G and I think it should be said that you’ll see some finger prints. It does make them easier to clean off with just a wipe. (In the picture the 3GS is on the right.) The screen feels slightly different in a way I can’t explain. That’s not a bad thing, just a difference to note.

The Home Button can be set up to trigger several different functions. (Call up the camera, phone, contacts, go to Spotlight Search, etc…) with one or two presses. Hold it down and it will call up Voice Control. Pushing the button on this 3GS feels less mechanical than on the 3G.

hallway1Camera: I’ve dumped some pictures to this Flickr Feed so you can take a look if you’re interested. It is a cloudy gray day here and while there is one outside shot, there are quite a few from indoors. Some are from a newspaper and magazine collage that covers our office bathroom (don’t ask) and some are from things hanging around in my office. Office pictures with the 3G never came out well. I’m impressed with the quality improvement on the 3GS, but this is still a camera phone. The two pictures of the hallway demonstrate the autofocus. From what I’ve read and what I’m seeing in my usage, the focus isn’t affected that much, but white balance and exposure are.

hallway2Voice Control: Maybe it is the air conditioning in my office, maybe it is the way I talk, but I think Apple needs to go back to the drawing board with Voice Control,   based on about 30 minutes of testing. Trying to place a call with Voice Control provided some interesting results. None that I was looking for unfortunately. Trying to play a song (any song actually) resulted in me hearing Under Pressure by David Bowie, regardless of what song title or play list I asked for. It is actually quite freaky the way tht works. I’ve also tried this with the AC turned off and still have sporadic and random results.

Battery Life: I’ve been using this pretty heavily on and off since about 7:40 this morning. It is now 2:27pm here. The battery life indicator is saying that I’ve got 61% left. Supposedly the 3GS has better battery life than its predecessors, so we’ll see how that shakes out in the days ahead. BTW, you can choose to toggle a percentage indicator for battery life on or off.

Onward to testing out some Apps and seeing what works and what doesn’t.

8 Comments

8 Comments

  1. John in Norway

    06/19/2009 at 12:59 pm

    What happened to the GottaBeMobile site that used to be here? I don’t recall seeing an entry that you’ve been bought out by steve Jobs.
    I hope you’ll be giving the same coverage to proper phones like the HTC Touch Pro 2, the Nokia N97 etc.

  2. Warner Crocker

    06/19/2009 at 1:08 pm

    John,

    Same sight. Same coverage. We don’t cover every single mobile phone out there, but we do cover the ones that we use and bring out experiences to that coverage. I’m sure we’d all be happy if Steve Jobs bought us out, but then while he can’t seem to make a Tablet, he sure can make the best MID, IMHO.

  3. Sumocat

    06/19/2009 at 1:51 pm

    “Pressure by David Bowie” — I certainly hope this is some new or unreleased song or bootleg, of which I am not cool enough to know, and not “Under Pressure” by Queen and David Bowie.

  4. Warner Crocker

    06/19/2009 at 1:53 pm

    That would be the song.

  5. Darren

    06/19/2009 at 3:53 pm

    Hey, “Under Pressure” is a great song, but I wouldn’t want to listen to it over and over all day long… :)

  6. Philip Seyfi

    06/20/2009 at 5:46 am

    It’s great that you write about the iPhone etc. but I kinda agree with John in Norway :( Recently, every 2-3rd post was about the iPhone yet there was no coverage of Windows Mobile (or Android/Palm) phones at all which is a shame as some of them are far superior to the aformentioned Apple product…

  7. mrpacs

    06/20/2009 at 3:30 pm

    the release of the 3Gs is MAJOR news. I for one, would like to hear about it!

  8. Manny

    06/21/2009 at 11:02 pm

    Philip, I used to own a Cingular 8525. It was top of the line Windows Mobile when I bought it two years ago. I have never ever bought any Apple product before and always loved and stuck with Windows products. However, I finally gave in and bought the iPhone last Friday and I can honestly tell you that it blows away the competition. It is as good as they say it is and there’s no turning back now. It truly is an amazing piece of technology and I don’t mind the coverage here (although in the past, I used to ignore it).

    This site “gotta be mobile” is supposed to help us to find products that can help us become more mobile. By far, the iPhone has unquestionably helped me to become more mobile with an enjoyable and incredible gadget.

    Kudos to Apple (and that’s a first for me)!

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