iPhone 4S
Same body as the iPhone 4 with the dual-core A5, an 8 MP camera shooting 1080p, and the launch of Siri.
Released October 14, 2011 · Discontinued September 9, 2014 · From $199 (16 GB, with contract)
Apple announced the 4S on October 4, 2011. Steve Jobs died the next day. The phone went on sale on October 14 into a week that was about something other than specifications. The case was the 4's, unchanged. Behind it sat the dual-core A5, roughly twice the processing speed and up to seven times the graphics of the A4, along with an 8-megapixel camera shooting 1080p video through a redesigned five-element lens that made it the camera most owners actually used. Siri was what Apple sold it on. It came out of a company Apple had bought in 2010, shipped as a beta, and did rather less than the advertising implied. It also put voice assistants on the industry's roadmap for the next decade. The 4S ran iOS as far as 9.3.6 and sold over four million across its opening weekend.
Reviews & Reception
Siri took the coverage. Reviewers found it genuinely useful and clearly unfinished, which is roughly what Apple said by labelling it a beta, and the camera drew near-universal praise.
It isn't perfect, and is labeled a beta, but it has great potential and worked pretty well for me, despite some glitches.
Siri does much more. It offers too much to fully describe here, but it isn't a simple voice-command system.