Why I chose the iPhone 4s over the iPhone 5

The iPhone 5 was released in late September. I was not eligible for an upgrade until October. I like the rest of the iPhoneiacs were looking forward to something new to be obsessed with. The iPhone 5 was presented to us as the next best thing, greatest iPhone yet...
Then it was released...
I will not say that the iPhone 5 is bad, but I will say I would not pay the $199 for the 16 gig version, but I would pay $199 for an older phone with more capacity. Here is why. For almost every selling point Apple tries to feed us on the iPhone 5, I can almost find a reason against it.
Lets list them.

• The iPhone 5 has a Larger Screen. I actually thing large screen phones is a con. Your goal is to use one hand while scrolling through web pages. For my hands, the 4s's screen is the perfect size. Also, I you want the latest iPhone 5 commercial talking about the new screen, notice how long of a thumb the model has. That's a long thumb.
• The iPhone 5 has a new smaller power/data connector. You can plug it in either way.. I had 2 iPhones in the past and have 2 iPods. That means, I have 4 wires that can be used amongst those devices. The extra wires come in handy as I can leave one in my car, my office as well as at home. By upgrading to the 5, I would need to go an by more 2 more cables at least.
• The iPhone 5's camera can shoot panoramic photos. Yes that is true, but that is not an iPhone 5 only feature, that is a feature built into iOS6, which can run on the iPhone 3Gs, 4 as well as the 4s. Also, even if it was not a built in feature, there are apps in the app store, that you can download (some free, other not) that will add this capability to your phone.
• iPhone 5 has LTE. With cellular data plans no longer allowing for unlimited data consumptions, I do not want any incentives to consume my cellular network. I am around WiFi pretty much all day, either in my office or at home.
• The iPhone 5 is light and thin. Have you held this thing?!?!. It is really light and really thin. This thin that it may slip out of your pocket sitting in a chair and so light that you won't even notice it fell. I like a little weight to my phones so I know they are there when I am not holding them.
  This leads me to my next CON.
• The iPhone 5 has an aluminum back. These phones are coming scratched out of the boxes because of the aluminum back. The paint is coming off much sooner than you would expect. Apple says this is normal and to put a case on it. Which will add weight to the phone to the fact that the phone is to light will be negated by putting a case on it.
• Purple Photo Phlare. Don't get me started, i never seen a purple photo flare on photos taken with my previous iPhones.
  

So needless to say, I went to an iPhone 4s, which I believe to be Apple's best iPhone. If things keep going this way for Apple, the iPhone 5 may be renamed to Apple Vista.

Require a password for every App Store purchase

I have a 4 year old, a 1 year old and an iPhone. Therefore I am at risk for unwanted App Store purchases. To combat this I can do one of two things: 1. disable the App Store completely or 2. force the App Store ask me for my Apple password before each purchase.

Option number 1 is not really an option but rather a lock down of one if the major selling points of the phone. Option number 2 is more manageable.

Here are the simple steps to help save you time and money.

Step 1: go to Settings
Step 2: go to General
Step 3: go to Restrictions
Step 4: go to Require Password and change from 15 Minutes to Immediately

Note on step 3, if you have not setup a 4 digit pin, you will be asked to do so. Make the pin something you easily remember as you will need this pin to change or set any restrictions going forward.

Facebook Camera, an Intragram lovers review!

I heard yesterday that Facebook has released a new app for iOS called Facebook Camera. I immediately thought the end of Instragram is here. At first I was hesitant to give it a try due to my devotion to Instragram even though Facebook recently acquired it. However taking a look at the few screen shots in the App Store, I thought I would give it a try.

When I first launched the application, it already new who I was to facebook.  I had the option of changing accounts if it was not correct, but it was so I just accepted and moved on.  The main page if just like you would expect from an Facebook app. Other people lives on display, right in font of me.  But this was different, this was peoples lives in photo's and photos alone.  No status updates, no one complaining what would seem about nothing since they didn't say why they were pissed or upset, just photos.  At first I thought, ok, this is similar to Pixable.  Except in Pixable, photos are categorized by activity, these photos were just laid out in newest-to-oldest fashion.  Along the top of the home screen you have two area's of options.  The first option allows you to take a new picture, or select one from your Camera Roll.  You will need to "scroll" the news feed down to view your entire collection.  Or you can just click on one of the pictures that you can see from your camera roll to expand the entire collection.  If you want to use an existing photo, just press on it and you will be presented with a new screen allowing you to add filters, crop and tag people in the photo.  When you are done with your options, just click the blue pencil-and-paper icon on the lower right and you can then post it to Facebook.  OR, you can add another photo in the same upload.  This is something that I have not seen from any other Facebook posting app, including Instagram.  You always had to add one photo at a time.  This will be a big time saver.

All in all, Facebook Camera is well designed.  It has just as many, if not more filters then Instragram, although I do wish they included the "filtered-blur" feature that i have come to abuse with Instagram.  Keep in mind that if you want to save a copy of any photo you alter in the app, you will need to enable the "Save Filtered Photos" option which can be found in the Settings for the app.  NO not those settings, you will need to leave the app, and head to your iOS setting, scroll to the bottom where your apps are listed, select, of all things, "Camera" and then turn this option on.  Speaking of settings, the only settings available to you within the app are limited to Log Out, Help and Privacy and Legal mumbo-jumbo.  Is Facebook Camera the Instagram kill??  Well that for Facebook to decide.  The fact they are released their own photo app makes me thing that they will blend the two applictions more and more and then Instagram will be like Poloroid.

Kill those apps!

Ever wonder how many apps are currently running. You can see a list of your apps by double-clicking you home button. If you want to kill those apps, press and hold the screen. Your screen will look similar to the screen to the right.

Press the red cicle in the top left of the running apps to kill them.

This can help save your battery by kill apps that you do not go back to all that often. Although, I am in the opinion that if you keep going back to an app, like Facebook, do not kill it, keep it in your recent apps list. I believe that killing it and then restarting it, requires more battery power then just letting it sit idle.

iOS5 cool keyboard

If you have iOS5, then here is a neat trick for you. You can have a keyboard that looks like this below.

Here are the steps to get there:

Group MMS

My wife got her first MMS today on her phone with multiple recipients.  As she responded to the sender, she unknowingly responded to the rest of the recipients.  Some of which she did not know.  That was followed by text messages "who are you?".  She blew it off but then laster tonight she received another MMS.  Again she replied back to the sender and it went to everyone else, this time including me.

My brother has a BlackBerry and when someone sends him an MMS in which there are multiple recipients, we all get his response.  I figured this was the same thing.  When I got home, I looked at her phone and saw that the message was labeled as Group MMS.  I looked at the message to see if there was a simple way to just respond to the sender or a way to selectively remove people in the response... No Luck.  I called my brother-in-law and asked him if he has this issue on his AT&T iPhone.  He said no.  After doing some digging I found that solution.

By default, Group MMS is enabled.  This allows you to do just this, reply to all recipients on an MMS.  I disabled it and the problem went away.

Here are the screen shots of the screen I needed to go through to change this.  First will need to get to Settings, then click Messages, then slide the Group Messaging toggle to Off