WWDC '10 is upon us and the juicy details for the iPhone 4 have been officially released. Your wallet may be crying preemptively at the thought of upgrading, but the full run-down of features is just too hard to ignore and you'll be chomping at the bit just to make it yours.
Quite literally everything has been given a kick in the pants and if it hasn't been upgraded it's likely to be an entirely new gadget to make your smart-phone experience even better.
Weighing in at a fraction heavier than the 3GS, the feature packed device is just gorgeous to look at with its slimline design that utilizes a glass and metal case that's even more resistant than the previous iterations. At 9.3mm thick, it'll feel much less cumbersome to hold (also in part thanks to the clean, flat surfaces) and the aluminosilcate glass is 30 times harder than plastic and will be treated with an oil-resistant coating.
The 3.5 inch display will feature four times as many pixels per square inch, with a total resolution of 960 x 640 pixels and has been dubbed the 'Retina' display. Apple claims that at this dense resolution the pixels will be so small that they'll be individually indistinguishable, allowing for sharper and smoother text and image displays. Even better still, the display will feature the IPS (in-plan switching) technology used for the iPad and LED Cinema Display for a wider viewing angle. While it doesn't feature the same rich contrast of an OLED display, this is should be a vast improvement over the current displays.
Of course, one the iPhone 4's biggest additions will be the improved camera which now weighs in at 5 megapixels and an added LED flash for clearer low-light photography and video capture. Speaking of video, you'll now be able to capture HD footage with your iPhone 4 and an App will be available on launch to quickly and easily edit your footage together complete with scene transitions.
A VGA camera on the screen-side also heralds the addition of iPhone to iPhone video-chat, though more specific details on how this will operate are yet to be released and it's presumed that Wi-Fi may be required for the video component.
iBooks will also be launching with iPhone 4 and will be available for free from the App Store and gives you access to the iBookstore. PDF viewing will also be natively supported using this app.
With all of these new features you'd expect the battery to be taking a hit in its uptime, or in the very least maintaining the status-quo, however thanks to the compact internal design of the iPhone 4 a larger battery has been squeezed in (and at their release keynote, Steve Jobs joked that they may be able to squeeze a slightly larger one in - can you smell what they're cooking?). The increase in battery life is significant, with 7 hours of talk time using the 3G network easily trumping the 5 hours for the iPhone 3GS and an extra 33% of audio playtime being added (40 hours up from 30 hours).
Gamers also haven't been neglected and while the improved display will probably keep some developers guessing on how to rename their higher-resolution games for the iPhone 4 (seeing as HD has already been used for the iPad), the addition of a gyroscope to compliment the accelerometer and compass will give developers unprecedented levels of accuracy in control fidelity.
The processor has also been upgraded and will feature Apple's custom A4 chip from the iPad which means that you'll be loading up your games faster than ever before.
While all of these features definitely mean that consumers can look forward to an even better mobile platform, they'll also need to be on the look out for the new iAd's which will feature interactive elements (such as the above Toyota ad) to help promote products. Whether this ends up being intrusive or not is something to keep an eye on.
For a detailed breakdown of the differences between the 3GS and 4G you can check out a handy chart available at Engadget.
