Tag: iphone 4

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Apple at 50 and the iPhone

iPhone
Image by Jan Vašek from Pixabay

Apple started back in 1976, though I am old enough to remember 1976, my personal history with Apple begins half way through their fifty year history in 2001.

I have already written about my computing for personal and professional reasons, the iPad, and the iPod; this post is about the iPhone.

I have used a range of iPhones over the years, some through work and those that I bought for personal use.

I now have an iPhone 17 Pro Max and the main use case I got for this was the photographic capabilities which have made dramatic improvements over the years.

I have also used the iPhone 13. It’s interesting that in the early iterations of the iPhone there was often very good reasons for upgrading, with the more recent versions, the improvements have been marginal at best. You notice the improvements when jumping from something like the 13 to the 17.

I didn’t buy the first version of the iPhone, mainly as it didn’t have 3G, which I felt was important for how I was using a phone.

I did get the iPhone 3GS. I liked it, but it was a secondary phone and I kept the Google Nexus One going for a few years.

Through work I then got an iPhone 4. The iPhone 4 is what the iPhone should have been from day one. Finally, the iPhone came of age. It is one of the best phones I have ever used. The camera was better than ever before, and the phone also came with a front facing camera. At the time the iPhone 4 was one of the best phones I had ever used, and I was really pleased with it.

My next iPhone was the iPhone 5S. I also had a work phone in the iPhone 6 Plus for a while, and I replaced my dependable Google Nexus One with an iPhone 6S Plus. Later in a different job I had the iPhone 8, but the iPhone 6S Plus kept me going for a few years.

I then had an iPhone 13 for a few years, but now I have the iPhone 17 Pro Max, which I am hoping will last a few years.

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Compare iPhone 4S with iPhone 4

Useful video comparing speed of iPhone 4S with the iPhone 4.

I remember when I had a work 3G and I went out and got a home 3GS the speed difference was certainly very noticeable.

I am at this time tempted to upgrade my home 3GS to the 4S, mainly because of the camera, but the speed it appealing too.


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QR Code Vino




So are QR Codes going mainstream?

A few weeks back I mentioned how I had seen one for the first time on mainstream television. Now as I was opening a bottle of red wine (present from a friend) I noticed the QR Code on the back of the bottle.

I have found in the past that the iPhone is not the best phone for reading QR Codes and in the end I found that the best QR Code application was Optiscan.

Optiscan lets you create, scan and share QR codes straight from your device.

Having tried a few free apps, I found that if you have an iPhone 3GS then this app works the best. As the camera in the iPhone 4 is better, you can have more success with some of the free apps, however (as I have it already) I use Optiscan on my iPhone 4. I like how fast it is, how it can capture virtually all QR Codes I aim it at and the subsquent actions I can then take. For example it is very easy to e-mail my history of scans so I can use them on a desktop computer.

So though I have had very few issues with Optiscan with other QR Codes, I did find scanning the QR Code on the bottle quite a challenge. It took a fair few attempts to get it captured, but once I did it bought up a URL which then opened in the mobile browser.

Impressed it was a mobile version of the website and in French!

However one click and I was in the English version.

Now there wasn’t much on the site, no more than was on the bottle really.

However at least if I wanted to buy the wine myself I now had a record of it on my phone. Much easier with a QR Code than typing in an URL on the phone (which to be honest is the point of QR Codes really).

So that’s a TV programme on cooking, a bottle of red wine, wondering where my next encounter with a QR Code will be!

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iPhone Portable Wifi Hotspot


One of the real benefits of running Froyo on my Google Nexus One has been the facility to use it as a portable wifi hotspot. I’m not sure how long I will be able to do this for now, as T-Mobile have recently changed their terms and conditions on using their network for internet. I do have a Web n Walk Plus extra on my (legacy) T-Mobile contract. Though if T-Mobile decide to withdraw that, I need to think about how I can connect to the internet whilst mobile. Instead of the Google Nexus One, I can always use my MiFi, with which I use a PAYG Three SIM card.

In the US, Apple have announced they are going to release a new version of the iPhone for the Verizon network. Now I am not going to use that, but in the detail, it has emerged that the Verizon iPhone will now be able to do a similar portable wifi hotspot trick that a Froyo Android device can do. Before this “tethering” with the iPhone was restricted to a single device and didn’t work with the iPad. An iPad would work with the iPhone acting as a portable wifi hotspot.

So at this time, I am thinking that if Apple (as is expected) release a new iPhone in the summer, and the UK telcos play along, I will be able to use the iPhone as a portable wifi hotspot. What would be nicer if they added it as an upgrade for the existing iPhone 4.

Update

According to MacRumors and other sites it looks like that Apple are prepping a 4.3 upgrade that will allow existing GSM iPhones to have the portable wifi hotspot feature.