MacRumors

With media members in attendance at Apple's iPhone 4S event having had the opportunity to spend some time with the new hardware following the presentation, hands-on reports and first impressions are beginning to come in.

Engadget highlights the improved internal specs of the iPhone 4S, noting that everything "just feels zippier".

We were able to spend a few quality moments with the refreshed iPhone 4 here at Apple's campus, the Sprint flavor no less, and as you might expect... it's an iPhone 4. But S-ier. Much in the same way that the 3GS improved the overall experience of the 3G, the 4S does likewise compared to the existing 4. The dual-core A5 chip is a laudatory improvement, and whisking about pages, loading the camera application and launching -- well, just about everything -- just feels zippier.

Engadget was also impressed with the Siri personal assistant feature, describing their attempts to "psych it out" without success, as Siri "never faltered" in bringing up the requested information and transcribed voice input perfectly.

The BBC has also posted a brief video hands-on with the iPhone 4S, showing off a demonstration of the Siri functionality.

Finally, SlashGear also spent some time with the iPhone 4S and similarly found it to be very quick, with webpages rendering "instantly" and pinch-to-zoom being "silky smooth". SlashGear was also impressed with Siri's performance.

Apple’s new voice-control assistant, Siri makes promises that we’ve learnt to be wary about over the years, but after a brief test we’re surprisingly impressed. Easily activated, with a new microphone icon on the regular on-screen keyboard, Siri managed just what it did on-stage during the keynote. We could ask it local information, such as the weather or to find nearby stores, while online searching and complex questions for Wolfram Alpha were handled with little delay. Speed can be the killer for services like this – people just won’t wait if their phone takes 30 seconds to look up an answer – but Siri delivered in just seconds.

Apple will begin taking pre-orders for the iPhone 4S this Friday, with the device going on sale in the first batch of countries on Friday, October 14th. Pricing comes in at $199 for 16 GB, $299 for 32 GB, and $399 for 64 GB on contract, with both black and white models available in all capacities.

Apple already posted the video stream for their iPhone 4S introduction today. Amongst the product introductions:

- Two New Apps: Find My Friends and Cards
- iPod Nano Updated, Price Reduced
- iPod touch Now Comes In White, 8GB Model Now $199
- Apple Introduces iPhone 4S with A5 Chip, Faster Graphics, Siri Voice Assistant
- Siri Voice Recognition Arrives On the iPhone 4S

Apple has built significant antenna upgrades into the iPhone 4S, saying in the press release announcing the phone that it is the first phone to intelligently switch between two antennas to send and receive. We spoke to Spencer Webb, owner of AntennaSys, about the antenna history of the iPhones. He wrote extensively about the AntennaGate issues with the original iPhone 4 last year.

"With the iPhone 4," Webb explained, around the steel band "we had one cell antenna at the bottom. On the top, we had another antenna for GPS and Wi-Fi." This turned into Antennagate.

With the Verizon/CDMA iPhone, Webb believes Apple's designers "moved the GPS and Wi-Fi antennas beneath the back glass and turned the top antenna into a second antenna for the cell phone." This brought spatial diversity to the iPhone. This design helps solve the Antennagate problem, because the phone can switch between the antennas depending on signal conditions.

"If you cover up an antenna, you're probably not covering up both antennas," Webb explains. "Spatial diversity on the receiving side is required for use with the Verizon network."

The Verizon iPhone had 'receive diversity' -- it used two antennas for receiving data, but may have only transmitted on the bottom antenna. With the iPhone 4S, Apple claims to have both 'send and receive diversity' for GSM and CDMA. They're using this diversity as the solution to the antenna problem.

"The iPhone 4S may indeed be the first phone to have diversity on both the send and receive sides, and that is a decently big deal. They still have the antenna around the rim, though, so it's evolutionary, not revolutionary."

Image via This Is My Next

As one of the main features of the iPhone 4S, Apple today introduced Siri a personal assistant that can
answer questions and perform for tasks for users based on voice input.

Siri on iPhone 4S lets you use your voice to send messages, schedule meetings, place phone calls, and more. Ask Siri to do things just by talking the way you talk. Siri understands what you say, knows what you mean, and even talks back. Siri is so easy to use and does so much, you’ll keep finding more and more ways to use it.

Apple covers a number of examples of Siri's flexibility on the feature page and describes them in its iPhone 4S press release:

Siri understands context allowing you to speak naturally when you ask it questions, for example, if you ask “Will I need an umbrella this weekend?” it understands you are looking for a weather forecast. Siri is also smart about using the personal information you allow it to access, for example, if you tell Siri “Remind me to call Mom when I get home” it can find “Mom” in your address book, or ask Siri “What’s the traffic like around here?” and it can figure out where “here” is based on your current location. Siri helps you make calls, send text messages or email, schedule meetings and reminders, make notes, search the Internet, find local businesses, get directions and more. You can also get answers, find facts and even perform complex calculations just by asking.

Siri is launching as a beta with support for English (US, UK, and Australia), French, and German. Additional languages and features will be added in the future.

Apple today officially introduced the iPhone 4S, the company's next-generation iPhone offering a completely redesigned interior with a number of new features.

Apple today announced iPhone 4S, the most amazing iPhone yet, packed with incredible new features including Apple’s dual-core A5 chip for blazing fast performance and stunning graphics; an all new camera with advanced optics; full 1080p HD resolution video recording; and Siri™, an intelligent assistant that helps you get things done just by asking.

One of Apple's most highly-touted features for the iPhone 4S is its camera, which checks in at 8-megapixels and contains a host of improvements over the iPhone 4's camera.

iPhone 4S includes an all new camera with the most advanced optics of any phone. The 8 megapixel sensor has 60 percent more pixels so you can take amazing high quality photos with more detail than ever. iPhone 4S includes a new custom lens, a larger f/2.4 aperture and an advanced hybrid IR filter that produce sharper, brighter and more accurate images.

Apple also notes that it has completely redesigned the antenna system for the iPhone 4S, making the device the first phone to intelligently switch between antennas for sending and receiving. The iPhone 4S is a world phone supporting both GSM and CDMA technologies, and also supports HSDPA download speeds of up to 14.4 Mbps, twice that of the iPhone 4.

Talk time over 3G comes in at eight hours on the iPhone 4S, with the device also offering six hours of 3G browsing. The iPhone 4S also included Bluetooth 4.0 for improved short-range wireless interfacing.

The iPhone 4S will launch on Friday, October 14th in the United States, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan and the United Kingdom, with pre-orders beginning this Friday, October 7th. The iPhone 4S is available in both black and white and comes in three difference capacities: 16 GB ($199), 32 GB ($299), and 64 GB ($399). All prices are for on-contract purchases.

The iPhone 4S will debut in an additional 22 countries by the end of October. Those countries include: Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland.

With the announcement of an October 12 ship date for iOS 5, Apple today posted the Golden Master (GM) release of iOS 5 to developers this afternoon, with a build number of 9A334.

Apple notes that users "must use iTunes 10.5 beta 7 to install iOS 5 GM seed on your devices. iOS 5 GM seed is not available via over the air software update" and encourages users to back up their devices via iCloud before installing the GM.

Apple posted a GM seed of Xcode 4.2 as well, and notes that the GM seed "can now be used to submit iOS 5 applications to the App Store for review."

Apple today announced modest changes to its iPod touch lineup, dropping the price of the 8GB model from $229 to $199, breaking the important $200 price barrier.

iPod has revolutionized the way we listen to music and with over 320 million sold is the world’s most popular music player,” said Philip Schiller, Apple’s senior vice president of Worldwide Product Marketing. “iPod touch, now available in both black and white, is the best selling iPod ever, and with iOS 5 and iCloud it is better than ever.

Beyond the availability of a white version of the popular media player, no other changes to device's hardware or specifications were announced.

The updated iPod touch is compatible with iOS 5 and is scheduled for release alongside the latest version of iOS on October 12. It will also work with iCloud, Apple's revamped cloud service formerly dubbed MobileMe.

Apple announced updates to the iPod nano today with user interface changes to improve navigation and 16 clock faces to facilitate its use as a watch. Its fitness features have also improved with Nike+ compatibility out of the box with no requirement for additional accessories to track walks and runs.

The nano's interface now sports larger icons for easier navigation. The new clock faces include a range of designs, including one mimicking an analog Mickey Mouse watch to classic digital and Roman numeral designs.

Nike+ compatibility for tracking walks and runs no longer requires a dongle that was part of an accessory kit sold separately. The updated nano is now capable of tracking distance traveled, pace, time and more out of the box.

The updated nano will cost $129 for the 8GB model and $149 for the 16GB model, down from $149 and $179, respectively. Both are available starting today. The available colors for both capacities are silver, graphite, blue, green, orange, pink, and red.

At the iPhone 4S launch event today, Apple launched two new apps: Find My Friends, and Cards.

Cards is an iOS version of the greeting card-maker built-in to iPhoto, but with a twist -- instead of printing and shipping cards to the user, who then has to buy stamps, address and mail the cards -- Apple takes care of printing, mailing, and postage and sends the card directly to the recipient, with a push notification going to the senders iPhone upon delivery.

As iOS SVP Scott Forstall explains, "you create the card on your iPhone, and we'll do the rest."

Users will take pictures, design the card (choosing from 21 different designs), customize the greeting and Apple takes care of the rest. Cards will cost $2.99 each when mailed within the US, $4.99 internationally. The Cards app itself will be a free download, launching October 12th, with iOS 5.

Apple's "Find My Friends" feature was hinted at earlier this year, and has now arrived as an App to locate (with permission) users' friends and family with iOS devices on a map, much like Google Latitude.

Users can easily set privacy controls including only sharing location during certain times of day and more. “At the end of the day, location sharing stops automatically. Easily locate friends and family, temp sharing options, simple privacy controls…”

Find My Friends is free with iOS 5 and will launch October 12.

Cards image courtesy This Is My Next

Find My Friends image courtesy GDGT