The iPhone 4S

For many, the "i" stands for incredible, the "S" for supreme!by Martha J. Escobar.When Apple released the iPhone 4s on October 14th, thousands of people flooded the company's website and stores, anxious to get the latest edition.Mohammed Khan, a CCNY junior, says he received his iPhone via UPS the day of its release.  “I was so excited to get my hands on it," he says. "Especially upgrading from an iPhone 3GS.  I was most excited to see how Siri works."Khan is referring to Siri, an advanced voice recognition command system, which can do anything from find the nearest restaurant to give directions and even has clever answers to trivial questions.  "I've asked pretty much everything I can think of," says CCNY student Jessica Diglin.  "I get a kick out of [Siri.]  I told her I love her and her answer was 'Oh stop.' " Tim Bajarin, who works as an analyst with Creative Strategies, a technology consulting company, explains that Siri has "tens of thousands of answers to choose from because it is linked to a very powerful set of databases."  Being the most obvious software novelty, the voice command system seems to steal the spotlight from the less obvious upgraded features.The iPhone 4S comes with a Dual Core A5 chip (the same processor that iPad 2 has), which gives users 2 times more power and up to 7 times faster graphics.  The chip also allows better battery life, which has always been a huge complaint of iPhone users.  The operating system on the phone is iOS5, the world’s fastest operating system on a phone to date.  Add-ons include a notification center, iMessage, twitter integration, and an 8 megapixel camera.The Weekend of its release, Apple sold over 4 million of the phones worldwide.  Currently, the phone is on back order. Ordering from Apple.com will have you waiting around 2 weeks for delivery.  If ordering through AT&T, Sprint or Verizon, the only wireless carriers of the iPhone, the wait is much longer.  AT&T promises delivery within 21 to 28 days.Not everyone is lining up to get the new iPhone. Some are disappointed not to have the much-rumored-about iPhone 5. They believe the 4s is nothing but a souped up version of the iPhone 4. “I have an iPhone 4 already.  Why am I going to spend $200 on a phone that looks exactly like the one I already have?” complains CCNY student Luisa Serrano.  “New software is cool, but I want new hardware too.  I’m good.  I’ll wait till next year for the iPhone 5.”In an eerie turn of events, co-founder and former CEO of Apple Steve Jobs passed away at his home in California the day after the announcement of the 4s due to complications from pancreatic cancer relapse.  Nationwide memorials outside of Apple stores honoring Jobs have fan written messages on post-it notes: “iSad,” “iThank You,” and “iRIP,” read some.  Candles and photos of Jobs have been placed along with apples, some bitten into, and pumpkins with the Apple logo carved into them.Apple provided an email where fans could express their appreciation of Jobs - rememberingsteve@apple.com.  Khan says he sent a message. “The day after he died I wrote an email to him thanking him for the creation of the iPod," he says. "All his creations were genius, but the iPod has been with me through my best and worst times in life.  Now I’m going to write him an email from my new iPhone 4S thanking him for this too!”For those iPhone users with previous models, a simple software upgrade allows access to most of the new iOS5 feaures, except for the witty digital assistant, Siri.  The question remains: How bad do you want it?