Apple iOS 4 update due today
Will Apple's servers creak under the weight - again?
Apple is set to release the newly named iOS 4 for some existing iPhones and iPod Touches today.
The company claimed earlier this month that the software update will bring to these devices "more than 100" new features, most notably a way to allow multiple apps to run simultaneously - multitasking.
iOS4 essentially freezes background apps, allowing them to respond to incoming data and send it out, but not hog CPU cylces and thus hinder the foreground app's performance or sap the gadget's battery.
Not all iDevices will support multitasking - only the iPhone 3GS can do it out of the current crop of devices.
More useful for everyone else - and in general, we suspect - are the improved Mail app, now with a single, unified inbox; the abiity to organise apps into folders; the arrival of iBooks on small-screen iOS devices; touch-to-focus on video capture; a 5x digital zoom for still photography; face recognition in the Photos app; the ability to change the homescreen wallpaper; and, from the iPad, Bluetooth keyboard support.
Last week, the availability of iPhone 4 pre-order opportunities caused Apple's Store servers to wobble under the weight of eager enquiries.
The iOS 4 update is due to be pushed out later today. ®
COMMENTS
Get a grip
I'm sure there are features missing from both sets. Incidentally, there have been several eReaders available on the iPhone already - this is the Apple one with the library infrastructure behind it. The "tap to focus" does mean "not the centre of the screen", yes but also the ability to change the focus *while filming*.
I could understand your need to post such criticism if it wasn't free, but it is, so what's the gripe? I find it odd that so many people need to jump in to criticize people's choices on iPhone topics, but seldom do you see the opposite in HTC articles. It's almost bordering on religious - occasionally I have people coming to my door asking if I have accepted God into my life.
Consider this - do you think HTC would have such devices or that Android would exist (at least in its current form) without the iPhone?
Ah, my sides.
I thought: interesting list. This Topaz sounds pretty powerful. But, since HTC seem to release a new (and ever so slightly different) phone every week, I needed to Google it to see what it was.
It's a WinMob 6.1 phone. Dear. Fucking. God. Are you seriously trying to compare this to an iPhone? Really?
Thanks, that's cleared things up for me
If I ever happen to find myself in June 2009, I should buy an HTC Topaz.
Apphole
"Consider this - do you think HTC would have such devices or that Android would exist (at least in its current form) without the iPhone?"
Obviously not, because as we all now know Apple invented the touch screen smartphone. All those other touch screen smartphones phones that were out years before the iPhone are just figments of our imaginations / evil Google propaganda.
