Yesterday i said that apple would need to come out with a few surprises otherwise their unveiling would be big let down (given the fact we’d already seen what was going to be revealed thanks to gizmodo). Were there any surprises? No, not really…
Stuff we already knew
We knew it had a 960 x 640 display. We knew it was smaller & thinner than the old 3GS. We guessed it had better battery life. We knew about the HD video, front facing camera… so there was nothing new… that lost iphone was indeed the real deal.
Facetime
There were plenty of rumors about video calling and apple today announced ‘facetime’ which is basically video calling between two iphones (iphone 4 only) over wifi only. When i heard about that i was pretty underwhelmed. What are the chances that (a) you’re friend will have an iphone 4, (b) you will both be using wifi?
This feature might have sounded good in the apple offices where everyone has an iphone and wifi, but it’s an immediate fail (in my opinion) in the real world. Yes it’s nice, it’s pretty cool, but it’s just not practical. Video calling will eventually catch on, no doubt about it but this iphone 4 won’t revolutionize it the way it could have done. Maybe it will do in years to come.
That’s about it
So Jobs today confirmed everything we already knew and didn’t really surprise us at all. Disappointing. Apple saved facetime to the end of their conference… it was obviously their killer / x factor / surprise feature but i feel it was a huge letdown.
Still, now that it’s all been confirmed, the iphone 4 hasn’t lost any of it’s shine. The fan boys will continue to hype until June 24th when it’s released in the US / UK. You might think i’m joking but i honestly wouldn’t be surprised to see people start queuing immediately. Some people would book two weeks holidays to go and sleep in an apple queue and be first to get whatever the latest apple toy is.
It will be July before the iphone 4 reaches irish shores. ‘July’ is the only date we have. That probably means July 31st for Ireland 😉 It’s priced at $199 for 16GB version, $299 for 32GB version. No doubt that will become €199/€299 in ‘our’ money. Along with a minimum €40/month (18 month) contract of course…
If all goes according plan i’ll be getting one but i await more information like a release date & prices.