iphone of the apple: iPhone 4S officially announced with A5 CPU

iPhone 4SWhat's this? The second coming of the iPhone 4? Sure enough, Tim Cook just pulled the covers off of the hotly-anticipated iPhone 4S here in Cupertino. On the outside the 4S looks exactly like its predecessor, but on the inside it's "all new." Apple has jammed a dual-core A5 CPU inside alongside a new dual-core GPU that supposedly boosts graphics performance by up to 7x. Up front is the same Retina display we've all come to know and love, and a glass back. That antenna around the sides (which caused many users so much trouble) has been revamped and can intelligently switch between two different sets of anntenae on the fly to avoid dropping calls based on how you hold it. Those antennas are connected to a dual-mode GSM and CDMA radio that will let Apple's handset roam the globe while enjoying either 14.4Mbps HSPA+ or EVDO.

On the back is also a new camera that sports an 8-megapixel camera with a backside illuminated CMOS sensor for better low-light performance. The lens now comes packed in a new assembly with a hybrid IR filter and sports apertures down to f/2.4. The improved visuals extend to video performance as well. The 4S can record 1080p video and has a new image signal processor for image stabilization and facial recognition, making the handset's camera comparable to many point-and-shoots. The camera is also quite a bit faster than many other smartphone shooters, needing only 1.1 seconds before being ready to take the first shot and only half a second between successive images.

As far as battery life, you're looking at eight hours of talk over 3G, and 14 hours of 2G, while web browsing over 3G cuts off at six hours. Using WiFi you'll get a respectable nine hours of web, video playback tops out at 10 hours and music at 40 hours.

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