Ahh, the iPhone. The phone that gets a lot of attention from the consumers. Currently, there are two iPhones for sale, the iPhone 3GS and the iPhone 4. They both have their ups and downs and I’ll go over it.

Design

iPhone 4 on it's side

When it comes to design, the iPhone 4 has the most substantial change of any other iPhone. The iPhone 4 now has a glass front and back with a stainless steel band around the phone. With those materials, the phone feels noticeably heaver and feels more premium in your hand. The major draw back with the glass back and the glass front is that the phone is way more fragile and feels delicate in your hand.

iPhone 3GS

The 3GS has the traditional curved plastic back with tapered edges and a chrome bezel, but it’s a little thicker. The drawback of the plastic back is that it scratches easily and it does feel a little cheap. Although, I personally like this design better because I can get a better grip on the phone.

Performance

The Apple A4

WIth the iPhone 4, you get the Apple A4 processor, which the iPad has and 512MB of RAM instead of the 256 from the 3GS. When I tried the iPhone 4 at the Apple Store, I didn’t really notice a difference between my 3GS. The only difference I noticed were the animations, but thats it. Overall, I find the performance to be the same.

Screen

The AMAZING Retina Display

When it comes to the screen, the iPhone 4 just owns the iPhone 3GS. The iPhone 4 has the “Retina Display”, which has an amazing resolution of 960×640 with a crazy 362ppi. With that kind of ppi, the screen is amazing. First, you can’t see the pixels at all and the icons, text, and graphics looks like it has been painted on to the phone. The Retina Display also uses the LED and  IPS technologies, which are found on the iPad. Overall, you have to go into an Apple Store and experience it.

Small Image = Low Resolution Screen

The iPhone 3GS’ screen has a 320×480 LCD screen with a ppi of 164. The screen is still crisp, but compared to the 3GS, it’s a pixelated mess. The screen does not use IPS or the LED technology. I personally like the lack of IPS because I don’t really want people to look at my screen.

Camera

The iPhone 4 has a new 5 megapixel camera with LED flash and it records video in 720p at 30 fps. Although the megapixel count isn’t as big as the EVO’s, but it by looking at the photos from the iPhone 4, they look awesome.

The iPhone 3GS has a 3 megapixel camera with VGA recording. The picture quality on the iPhone 3GS is alright, but not as good as the iPhone 4. The video recording is pretty good on the 3GS, but once again, not as good as the iPhone 4′s HD recording.

Conclusion

Overall, both the 3GS and the iPhone 4 are great phones. They both have their ups and downs. If you have the iPhone or the iPhone 3G, you should definitely upgrade. The improved performance and the dramatically improved screen is going to enhance your experience. If you have the 3GS, I would wait. For me, the screen is still good, the performance is still zippy, and I like the old design better.

Note: All images were from Apple.