MacMost Now 618: iPhone 4S and Siri First Look

Take a look at the new iPhone 4S. It has a faster processor, new antenna design, and new camera. It also allows you to mirror the screen through a cable or AirPlay to Apple TV 2. The biggest new feature may be Siri, the voice activated assistant. It even has a sense of humor.

You can also watch this video at YouTube (but with ads).

Video Transcript: Hi, this is Gary with MacMost Now. On today's episode, let's take a look at the new iPhone 4S. So on the outside, the 4S is almost identical to the 4. In fact the only difference that I can really see is the little black lines that break up the metal case. They are symmetrical here, left and right, top and bottom; whereas in iPhone 4, they were in different locations. Presumably, this is part of the new antenna* design. Now inside of course, we have the new A5 processor, which is the same one in iPad 2 and it speeds things up quite a bit. In addition to that, there is a new antenna* design and new data chips. So, for instance, every iPhone now has CMA and GSM. So, one iPhone can actually work on all the various networks. Now of course when you buy one, you lock it to the network you're buying it from. So, it's just a matter of convenience for Apple, if they can sell one phone and have it working on all the different networks. Now presumably, if you unlock your phone or if in the future you try transferring your phone to a new network, it may be possible although too early to tell how that will really work. So right here I am demonstrating one new feature of the iPhone 4S, which is the ability to mirror the screen and have it output either through the airplay* but also through the HDMI VJA cable, the same ones that will solve for the iPad 2. So I've just got one of those plugged in and then I'm going to my video feat* so that we can actually get a direct look at the iPhone 4S's screen. You can see how I can just easily do anything in it around any app. And you can see that I can exactly see what's on the screen there. So it works with pretty much anything just to mirror the screen. Now Siri of course, is a feature that's only on the iPhone 4S not on the iPad or iPhone 4. Seems*it's a bit tricky, you have to go into â€˜Settings' and â€˜General', what's known by default and there's a saying* there for Siri and I can set some various things here. Also it's not going to work very well unless I go into the â€˜Location' settings, â€˜Location Services' and in there I see among all the rest of my apps, â€˜Siri' and that appears once I have actually set up Siri. So to use that* what I did before for voice activation, which is to press and hold the home button when it comes up and I can ask her a question, "Hello Siri". "Hello there, Gary". Then I press again when I want to ask her something else, "What would the weather be like tomorrow?" "Here's the weather for tomorrow'. I can ask her all sorts of things; a lot was shown in the Apple demos. "How was Apple's Stock doing today?" "Apple went up quite a bit today, $422". So let's try the scheduling feature here, "Set up lunch tomorrow at noon with Debby." "Ok, I set up your meeting with Debby Rosenzweig for tomorrow. Are you ready for me to schedule it?" I'm going to turn it off there and going to hit â€˜Cancel'. "Ok the, I won't create a meeting." There we go. And then there is always the basic â€˜location based' search, "Which coffee shops are nearby? "I found a number of coffee shops. 17 of them are fairly close to you." Now another thing that we get is the ability to build speech tags and have it translated. So we have the internal keyboard with Siri turned on, you'll see the microphone on the lower left-hand corner and then I can say something and it should be able to type it for me, "The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy dog". And Siri has got a sense of humor too; like for instance, "What is the meaning of life?" "Try and be nice to people, avoid eating fat, read a good book every now and then, get some walking in and try to live together in peace and harmony with people of all creeds and nations." "Tell me a joke." "I can't. I always forget the punch line." Now of course as I knew, the camera as well, it's an 8 mega pixel camera which is better than the 5 mega pixel camera in the iPhone 4. And [with this I can]* also take better video. Here's a comparison of two pictures the iPhone 4 and the iPhone 4S took the picture at the same time, side by side. So you can compare the quality, just a slight increase but the colors are definitely better, suggesting better optics. And then, here's a look at a short video. It's a 720P taken on an iPhone 4 and a 1080P taken on an iPhone 4S. So here's a quick look at the iPhone 4S that came out today. And the features, I'll have more episodes but specific features of the ILS 5 such as reminders and also I'll be taking a crucial look at some of the features of the iClub. Till next time, this is Gary with MacMost Now.

Comments: 7 Responses to “MacMost Now 618: iPhone 4S and Siri First Look”

Brian

13 years ago

Gary how do we turn on the Morroring?

Gary Rosenzweig

Do you mean AirPlay mirroring to the Apple TV 2. First, make sure you have your Apple TV 2 updated (new updates this week). Make sure you turn on AirPlay in your Apple TV settings. Then Double-tap the Home button on your iPhone 4S. Swipe left-to-right in the "recents list" at the bottom. You'll see the playback controls. Swipe one more time to get to a section that should have the AirPlay button.

Jim C

Gary - will the iPhone 4 do mirroring (with iOS5) or just Air Play?

AirPlay mirroring works only on the iPhone 4S and the iPad 2. It won't work on the iPhone 4, which has only the A4 processor.

Ron

Hi Gary.

How are you doing your iPhone 4S screen video captures?

Are you jailbreaking and then using a jailbreak app such as ScreenRecorder or ScreenSplitr ?

Please let me know of any tips you recommend for recording the screen of either iPhones or iPad.

Thanks.

No! I am just capturing the HDMI out. You could do this on the iPad 2 before, and now the iPhone 4S too. It requires that you have video capture equipment that supports HDMI. See http://macmost.com/ipad-video-screen-capture.html

Mark

Saw someone on youtube ask:

I asked it, "Should I jump off a bridge"

It responded "I found 8 bridges near you"

Comments Closed.

MacMost Now 618: iPhone 4S and Siri First Look

Comments: 7 Responses to “MacMost Now 618: iPhone 4S and Siri First Look”

Welcome to MacMost

Free Weekly Newsletter

MacMost Online Courses

Keyboard Shortcuts PDF

Connect with MacMost

MacMost Sections

Popular Tutorials

Information