Review: iPhone 5

Apple iPhone 5, a highly anticipated smartphone in literally every country in the world, was unveiled in Malaysia on December 2012. However, many criticised that iPhone 5 is not doing enough in terms of size and features to compete in the strong high-end smartphone market. There's a saying, "An Apple a day keeps the doctor away", so I guess an Apple product won't do more harm than good, right?


Exterior

Somehow the engineers working in Apple were able to decrease the thickness and weight of each successive generation of iPhone! At 7.6mm thick, iPhone 5 is the thinnest smartphone at the time of its launch. It weighs 112 grams, I compared with 4S and noticed the iPhone 5 is much lighter.

The only dimension increased is the height, now fits 5 rows of icon in the 4-inch screen instead of 4 rows in the iPhone 4S' 3.5-inch screen. However, the width of the iPhone 5 did not increase compared to its predecessor. I believe a slightly wider screen would provide better browsing experience. Note the speaker located at the bottom side of the phone, it is not the optimum position where your hand might block the speaker while holding the phone.

Aluminium back body is smooth to the touch! Has more upmarket and solid feel compared to the plastic back cover of some of its competitors.

iPhone 5 VS. New iPad / iPad 3 in terms of size!

Charger

Changing from the 30-pin connector to 8-pin lightning connector is a huge welcome! Lightning connector is more compact and can be inserted regardless of sides!

Camera

 The same but improved 8 megapixels iSight camera found in 4S made its way into iPhone 5. Now with improve low light performance, faster shutter speed and built-in panorama mode of up to 240 degrees! Video recording is in 1080p HD, but the only downside is the video can't be zoomed-in during video recording.

Somehow the longer screen of the iPhone 5 enable us to take photos of longer or higher objects compared to iPhone 4S!

HDR effect of Chin Swee Temple in Genting!

I'm impressed with the front camera's performance! The front camera can also take 6 person sitting in a row easily!

 Superb close-up shot of marmite chicken!

 However, the location of the camera lens is placed a bit near to the edge of the phone to my liking. People who are not used to it tends to have their fingers blocking a part of the photo they had captured!

Siri

Now Siri understand few more languages (including Mandarin!) compared to iPhone 4S. Unfortunately, Siri doesn't perform well in Malaysia as its database is equipped mostly with other countries' information (restaurant, sports etc.).

Game

Gaming wise, the new A6 chip provides a smooth gaming experience! Playing one of my favourite games, Real Racing 3 on iPhone 5 is smoother than iPad 3!

Conclusion

iPhone 5 is another well made Apple product. It has a sense of solidity and smoothness of processor that few can match. However, there are still room for improvement, especially with its screen size where most of its competitors are equipped with at least a 5-inch screen.

+ Performance, front camera, solid built, lightning adapter.
- Should have wider screen, position of rear camera and speaker.

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