In terms of specs, performance, and features, the iPhone 5 is Apple’s best to date. This doesn’t mean it’s as good as it could be, however. There were a few egregious omissions from the keynote presentation – features that we not only want in our iPhone, but that we feel are overdue.
NFC for mobile payments
Instead of building NFC into the iPhone, Apple would rather have you use its Passbook system, which lets users store tickets, gift cards, boarding passes, and the like. It can handle some (but definitely not all) of the tasks that you might use NFC for. For example, you can’t use Passbook to wirelessly send money to a friend via PayPal. NFC also lets you beam content between devices just by tapping them together. Samsung’s Galaxy S III takes advantage of this feature.
An improved texting solution on the keyboard, like Swype
Swype is something of a mainstay on Android phones. Instead of tapping out your texts letter by letter, you can drag your finger over them without lifting it. The end result is that you get your message out much more quickly.
SD card support for extra storage
We’d like to be able to extend our device’s storage capability beyond the 64 GB maximum. History suggests that external SD card support isn’t going to be in a mobile Apple device any time soon.
A 128 GB option
The iPod Classic offered users 160 GB of music and video capacity. Many people (ourselves included) had no problem filling it right up. Now that the iPhone is an easy replacement for your old iPod, we’d love to be able to carry the same amount of content around with us without having to pick and choose what stays at home.
Non-proprietary dock connection
We’ve never understood why our iPhones can’t use a standard USB port and a standard USB cable to sync. Now the iPhone 5 introduces a new micro-dock connection requiring the use of its own special cable. If you want to use your old sync cables, you have to buy this $29 adapter.
A micro-HDMI port
Once again, if you want to get video off of your phone, it requires the use of a special adapter. The Kindle Fire HD and several Android phones use a micro-HDMI port, letting you run a cable straight from your tablet to the television. This makes it easier, better, and more affordable for the user.
Replaceable battery
The battery life on the iPhone 5 has seen some nice improvements, but for the power users who are glued to their phones all day, it won’t suffice. We’d love to be able to carry an additional fully-charged iPhone battery that we could pop in whenever the first one bites the dust.
While we’re at it, better battery life!
The iPhone 5’s battery life is about the same as the iPhone 4S’. Yes, it has a bigger battery, but the new 4G LTE radio and bigger screen use up a lot of that extra power.
We wish Apple had included a better battery in the iPhone 5 like the one on Motorola’s Droid Razr Maxx. The Razr Maxx can last several hours longer than the iPhone 5.
