iPhone 4S: everything you need to know

The Wall Street Journal reports today that Virgin Mobile (owned by Sprint) will become the second carrier to offer the iPhone in the US on a prepaid plan. Cricket became the first to do so when it announced that it would start selling the iPhone 4S and 4 off-contract, beginning on June 22nd. Apple and Virgin have yet to confirm the news, but the WSJ says that the iPhone will be available on the carrier "as soon as" July 1st, citing "people familiar with the company's plans."

It's not yet clear whether Virgin Mobile will be selling the iPhone 4, iPhone 4S, or some combination of the two, and there's no information yet on how much the devices will cost off contract. Cricket said it would sell the 16GB iPhone 4S for $499.99 without a contract — significantly less than what it costs to buy the device outright from Apple. Of course, just like Cricket, Virgin Mobile runs on CDMA networks, making it difficult to use the device on any other carrier. The Wall Street Journal speculates that Sprint may be using Virgin Mobile (and perhaps Boost, which it also owns) to help sell enough iPhones to fulfill the up to $15.5 billion the carrier promised to Apple, which certainly seems reasonable considering CEO Dan Hesse's insistance that "carrying the iPhone will be quite profitable." It's not yet known if Virgin Mobile's current plans will be offered with the iPhone, but for reference, the carrier has a $35 per month plan with 300 minutes of talk time, unlimited text messages, and unlimited data. We'll let you know if we hear more to confirm the WSJ report.

As he was introducing the iPhone 4S last October, Phil Schiller took care to note that while the device had dramatically improved cellular data speeds, Apple wasn't yet calling it a "4G" device. "This is what the majority of our competitors claim when they talk about 4G performance," he said, comparing the iPhone's data speeds to a number of AT&T smartphones listed as "4G" despite their lack of next-generation LTE radios. "We're not going to get into a debate in the industry about what's 4G and what isn't — we'll leave that for others to talk about."

That debate has been conclusively decided. On Tuesday, Apple issued the iOS 5.1 software update, and with it came a small but hugely symbolic change: the AT&T iPhone 4S data indicator now reads "4G." Owners of the iPhone will notice no difference in performance or data transfer speeds; the device will not magically connect to AT&T's shiny new 4G LTE network. It will simply receive a deceptive labeling change that allows AT&T to market the iPhone as a 4G device against competitive phones from Verizon — including, perhaps most importantly, Verizon's own 3G iPhone 4S. It is a triumph of marketing for AT&T, and a rare acquiescence to a poor and confusing user experience for Apple.

Speculation on the cause is running rampant; some people blame a location-based time zone setting, others find trouble with iCloud contact syncing, still others have seen a bug involving calendar reminders in the iOS 5 notification pane. These problems aren't limited to iPhone 4S users, either — many iPhone 4 users are complaining the upgrade to iOS 5 has hurt their battery life. Recommended fixes include disabling the time-zone setting, removing calendars from Notification Center, and wiping, restoring and re-syncing contacts, among many other suggestions.

Although we found battery life of the iPhone 4S to be quite impressive — and plenty of users posting strong performance — it's hard to pinpoint an exact cause without Apple speaking up. While the company hasn't addressed this issue publicly yet, The Guardian reports that Apple engineers are actually contacting iPhone 4S users directly, asking questions about usage and collecting data to try and find a solution. Additionally, some posters in the 160-page battery complaint thread in Apple's forums have noted they were easily able to get their phones replaced at the Genius Bar. Hopefully the fact that Apple's engineers are soliciting feedback is a sign that a fix is coming.

Apple's latest iteration of the iPhone has just started its second wave of international availability. However, unlike the US, these new releases are being sold SIM-free. This means that customers in Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland can now buy their new handset direct from Apple without being tied to a carrier.

In most of Europe, the handsets start at €599 (roughly $840) for the 16GB version, with a 1-2 week wait time — prices vary country by country, however. With the iPhone 4S due to hit the US unlocked in the next few months, we're getting a better idea of just how much it'll set you back.  

Sprint isn't the only new addition to Apple's stable of US carriers — Cupertino is continuing its push to get the iPhone downmarket by bringing it to C Spire Wireless, a Mississippi-based regional network (formerly known as Cellular South) with under a million subscribers. An iPhone 4S "Coming Soon" graphic now dominates C Spire's home page, and clicking through lets you sign up to be notified when more details are available — though no date is offered just yet. It's possible that this will line up with Apple's promise of wide availability of unlocked units starting in November, but here's the real question: if C Spire is in, who else will be coming on board? Cricket and MetroPCS are unlikely thanks to their reliance on AWS — a band that the iPhone doesn't support — but others like US Cellular could still get involved.

Source: C Spire Wireless; thanks, everyone!

The iPhone 4S launch weekend included the US, UK, Australia, Canada, France, Germany, and Japan; expect 22 more countries to join that list by the end of next week.

Look, I'm not going to go into great detail about what I've been doing with Siri during my testing period, but I will tell you this - Siri says some crazy stuff.

Hit the gallery below for a look at a number of bizarre items the AI-powered / voice-recognizing "intelligent assistant" lays on you on the new iPhone 4S.

Reviewing the iPhone 4S is in many ways a lot like reviewing the original iPhone 4, except that it's not. The device, which was just announced at a special event on Apple's campus, is very much the same phone the company released in June of 2010 — but it's also something completely new.

While much of that sameness comes from an identical physical appearance, and nearly identical specs (in some places), there's much that's fresh here. Besides packing the successor to Apple's custom A4 CPU (appropriately dubbed the A5) inside, the iPhone 4S also sports an upgraded rear camera, an improved antenna design, and a new internal radio that allows the device to perform double duty on both CDMA and GSM networks.

Calling it "the most successful iPhone launch we've ever had," AT&T has announced that it has taken in over 200,000 pre-orders for the iPhone 4S in the first twelve hours it was available. We'd seen plenty of reports of early-morning trouble with pre-orders as well while both Apple and AT&T ramped up their e-commerce sites for the new iPhone, which makes the number all the more impressive.

There's no word yet on whether or not stock is limited at this point, so you should still be safe to get your pre-order in now. During last year's launch day for the iPhone 4, Apple registered a grand total of 600,000 pre-orders across all carriers for the iPhone 4 and AT&T sold out by this point in time during the day. Of course, there's always the launch day option — and launch day lines — on October 14th.

AT&T and T-Mobile have led the charge over the past year to brand their upgraded HSPA+ networks as "4G," even though such networks historically don't fall into the "4G" definition -- and considering that AT&T is in the process of rolling out LTE concurrently, it can be a confusing message for customers to hear. That said, there's no sign of AT&T's network branding effort slowing down, but here's a bit of a shocker: the carrier is apparently "working with Apple" to change the indicator in the iPhone 4S (which tops out at 14.4Mbps, up from the iPhone 4's 7.2Mbps) to show "4G" in the status bar as well. That's surprising considering Apple's general reluctance over the past four years to bow to carrier pressure on... well, pretty much anything — and what's more, the indicator will require an iOS update to enable.

We've reached out to AT&T for comment; more on this as we get it.

We just got finished with the Apple live event and I had some brief hands-on time with the new iPhone 4S, so I thought I would share my thoughts. This isn't a review or really even a preview, because there wasn't much time to really get a good impression of the phone as a whole. However, I did get a chance to use the new Siri features, as well as get a feel for the performance of the phone — read on below to hear my thoughts.

There's nothing really notable, physically, about the iPhone 4S in comparison to the iPhone 4. Do you have an iPhone 4? Pick it up. Look at it. Turn it over. There, you've just done an iPhone 4S hands-on. Congratulations!

On the antenna front, Apple looks to be trying to avoid a repeat of the iPhone 4 drama with a new system that "intelligently" switches between antennas, promising better call quality. Don't expect top-of-the-line data speeds: the new model supports 14.4Mbps HSPA, better than the 4′s 7.2Mbps but not as speedy as the newest 21Mbps HSPA+ and LTE devices on the market. Happily, there won't be separate models for CDMA carriers - the device is advertised as a true world phone, meaning that regardless of what carrier you're on, you should be able to roam on GSM around the world. Battery life is promised at 8 hours on 3G (up from 7 hours), 6 hours of 3G browsing, 9 hours of Wi-Fi browsing, 10 hours of video, and 40 hours of music.

As for pricing and availability, it'll come in three configurations: 16GB for $199, 32GB for $299, and a new 64GB setup for $399, all on a two-year contract. Pre-orders kick off on October 7th with retail availability following on October 14th. Apple has also confirmed availability of the iPhone 4S in Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Japan and the UK on the 14th as well, with pre-orders beginning on October 7th.