I got the iPhone 5 yesterday. The deal with SoftBank worked out; they had a plan where Sachi could actually keep her data plan at a bit less than half price. It involved her using my old iPhone 4 and canceling her own phone’s contract—which suited her, as her phone’s home button was glitchy anyway. Mine has the repaired screen, but you can’t tell the difference. My new plan costs 1000 yen a month more for the LTE (which I haven’t seen yet, just 3G so far), and allows free tethering from January 15th n

First impressions: the thing actually does seem considerably thinner. Looking at the specs, it’s about 20% thinner, and you really do see that. I imagine they lost a good deal of it getting rid of the back glass. The new backing does come across as stylish, but it is reported that it is very easy to scuff this and have the coloring scraped away. I have no idea how it happened, but I already have a small ding which shows lighter color on the back edge. This will probably show wear & tear real quick. I’ll have to start looking for cases, I suppose. Kinda defeats the purpose of the thin profile though…

As expected, the slightly larger screen is… well, only slightly larger. You don’t even notice it after a few minutes.

The new connector is very small, and I had to stop myself from check which side was up before plugging it in. Definitely a lot easier to plug in; I never liked the larger connector, to be honest, and don’t have any peripherals that require the old cable—I just have a bunch of the older cables, which are still needed for my iPad.

The phone is noticeably faster. As a test, I ran the “Action Movie” app, the J. J. Abrams special-effects app which adds disaster elements to video you take. It usually involves processing which would take some time on my iPhone 4; the 5 just zipped through it. Definitely better, though this is a jump from the 4 to the 5, skipping the 4S.

The camera panorama seems to work fine, though I have not tested it outside yet. There is definitely the possibility for straight lines getting warped, however; I’ll have to practice to see what gets the best results. I also tried the camera in low light—it did an excellent job, and the flash is also much better.

Maps is a wonky as they say. It didn’t take me long to find errors (Two locations for Higashi-Shinjuku Station, one being in a seemingly random location on a small street nowhere close to the station). The app is artfully done, but lacks details that Google Maps has, and no Street View is a marked loss. I am definitely keeping my iPad on iOS 5, and will be using Google Maps on the web as well… I’ll even get the chance for turn-by-turn directions today in my car! Apple has an embryonic technology and it will definitely improve over time—but Apple does have a history of keeping such software “free” of too much development. We’ll see how it matures over time.

Siri is as I though, a relatively useless little toy. I might find some uses for it, but right now, it just does a mediocre job of understanding me. I could not get it to understand “Shiba Inu,” for example. It also is not able to look up things on maps in Japan, a common lack outside of North America.

The new earphone buds are as I thought: not so great. One of my ears is slightly misshapen (dog attack when I was a kid); ironically, that’s the one the ear bud doesn’t keep slipping out of. I have never had a usable set of ear buds, and these are no different.

More as I use it…