Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
Let's be honest here, the iPhone 4s > any other iPhone
- Thread starter Kjos
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
I had a 4s and it was a great phone at the time. I then had a 5s and it was even better!
Now I have the 6+ and I could never go back to those tiny screens. The regular 6 would also be a huge improvement on the 4s hands down. Plus iOS8 is very good.
the iP4s was released at a time when Android phones were already 4G LTE. It was terribly slow compared to the androids.
----------
----------
It's got to be a joke. The iP4s was behind the androids from the first day it was released. Screen was terrible and it was slow.
The iPhone 4 with that slick rear glass casing was beautiful. But if we're being honest here.. every new phone is miles better than the previous iteration. This is technology not collectors items.
Let's be honest here: When someone starts a thread with "Let's be honest here," they're totally not being honest here.
I remember the iPhone 4S fondly. It had 4G HSPA+ which, when you think of LTE in some places isn't that much faster. Granted, if you are with a phone company that doesn't support anything nearly as fast as LTE, it would be miserable.
My 4s is still chugging along however I do want to upgrade. The screen is too tiny to do anything really, at least for my bad eyes. As a basic phone for talk, text, and occasional FaceTime it's great. Design wise I still like it but it's ready for retirement. As soon as I decide between the 6 and 5s I'll be ditching the 4s. Maybe I'll keep it for backup purposes.
If my 4s screen wasn't cracked from my step daughter and I didn't already upgrade to iOS 8 or even 7, I would probably sell my 6 and go back to using it again.
That phone just always worked. No issues, never rebooted the whole time I owned it, never respring, no issues!
That phone just always worked. No issues, never rebooted the whole time I owned it, never respring, no issues!
I actually returned my iphone 6 plus to buy a 64gb 4s. I don't want a big phone, I want it to be small so it doesn't feel awkward in my pocket. I think it's a more functional design vs. the 6 because it's easier to hold. The 5 has those god awful bevels that cut into my fingerprints when I hold it.
My only gripe with the 4s is not the phone itself, it's the fact that Apple locks me into ios 8. It's too slow and buggy on the 4s. I may go back to the regular iphone 6, but I will be jailbreaking on day 1 so that I can downgrade whenever I want.
At the time, HSPA+ made sense. Verizon was the only company with any kind of significant LTE footprint. AT&T was just rolling it out on some places, Sprint was foolishly banking on WiMAX, and T-Mobile was touting how its HSPA+ system was enough because it worked everywhere you got 3G service (if you could even get a 4S to work on T-Mo at that time, I don't recall anymore). And yes, it was beautifully designed, albeit extra fragile due to the glass back.
But once the carriers really got LTE coverage going, the 4S was a dinosaur. The 5 and especially 5S outpace it in so many key areas it's not even funny.
I understand that the 6/Plus isn't everyone's cup of tea. But if I wanted to stay with an iPhone and didn't want a 6/Plus, I'd only consider a 5S. TouchID is such a boon, the camera's fantastic, it's got LTE and 64-bit architecture, plus the A7 chip which will still be powerful for a while. Plus it's also beautifully designed and less fragile than the 4 in terms of drops.
But once the carriers really got LTE coverage going, the 4S was a dinosaur. The 5 and especially 5S outpace it in so many key areas it's not even funny.
I understand that the 6/Plus isn't everyone's cup of tea. But if I wanted to stay with an iPhone and didn't want a 6/Plus, I'd only consider a 5S. TouchID is such a boon, the camera's fantastic, it's got LTE and 64-bit architecture, plus the A7 chip which will still be powerful for a while. Plus it's also beautifully designed and less fragile than the 4 in terms of drops.
The lack of LTE is a deal breaker in and of itself. Screen size is another issue as well but that obviously is user specific. I still prefer it's glass/rounded build. I would have loved it scaled up to the 4" screen size. I'm still not completely sold on the larger screen of the 6. I think I would be with a slimmer bezel. No way I could go back to a 3.5 but 4" would be debatable. The 4S was a good phone but the lack of LTE to me was a big mistake on Apple's part. At the time it had a pretty big battery life hit but the upside was worth it.
I finally upgraded. Even though I was jailbroken, there were still restrictions such as low battery life, because it'd die when I came back home, and keyboard supported and launchers. Granted, you can use keyboards on ios 8 now. But, SwiftKey is still a bit laggy, for me anyway, even on the iPad air. And the small screen, I love my new phone with its 5.5' screen. It's a dream.
The 4/4S were works of art...
...and like any good art, they pretty much belong in a museum.
Don't get me wrong. I had a 4, and still think that was the prettiest phone Apple has made to date. And it worked well, for the time. As another person mentioned, no unexpected resprings or reboots on that hardware or version of iOS.
But would I go back to it? No. WAY too slow, even on wifi. The screen is too small (and I'm not on a 6/6+, but a 5). The back glass was stunning...and fragile as hell. And don't get me started on Antennagate on the 4, because yes, I held it wrong. (Plenty of others didn't, including my husband, who nonetheless saw more dropped calls than he experienced before or since that phone.)
Mine acts as a sometime iPod. It's really not useful anymore for much beyond mail, texting, and music. But it's lovely to look at.
...and like any good art, they pretty much belong in a museum.
Don't get me wrong. I had a 4, and still think that was the prettiest phone Apple has made to date. And it worked well, for the time. As another person mentioned, no unexpected resprings or reboots on that hardware or version of iOS.
But would I go back to it? No. WAY too slow, even on wifi. The screen is too small (and I'm not on a 6/6+, but a 5). The back glass was stunning...and fragile as hell. And don't get me started on Antennagate on the 4, because yes, I held it wrong. (Plenty of others didn't, including my husband, who nonetheless saw more dropped calls than he experienced before or since that phone.)
Mine acts as a sometime iPod. It's really not useful anymore for much beyond mail, texting, and music. But it's lovely to look at.
You could bring an unlocked iPhone to T-mobile back then but it was reliant on jailbreaking and then unlocking it, which itself depended on the bootloader. Jailbreaking was a bit more complicated back then and you had to make your own ipsw's to prevent updating the bootloader on accident until the unlock worked on the current version. They were only sold as carrier models so you had to find them on the used market unless you broke contract. Making sure that you were buying the right iOS version, the right bootloader, and doing this all on craigslist years ago was a major hassle. I don't think very many of us did it for T-mobile to care, so if you were able to pull it off you got rewarded with a $10 dollar a month, "non-supported device" data plan
Unfortunately, it was only compatible with 2G maximum speed because it didn't have the 1700 bands until iPhone 5.
Although I do agree that this thread is a joke, when you say it didn't have 4G, the 4G networks were not widespread at the time. For example in UK we only started having 4G in one network on 2012, and rest of networks by the end of 2013. It would have been useless for majority. And you have to compare it's speed to the Android phones released on 2011 (if you find any around)
The galaxy nexus was certainly a speedy phone for 2011. Also, we in the US didn't get 4G lte till 2012 on ee
