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As anticipated, Apple is launching their remix of the iPhone 3G, the iPhone 3G S. As the name suggests, it’s not much different to the iPhone 3G (as would be evidenced by a name like iPhone 2.0), but rather boasts only a few improvements and fixes.

One of the biggest complaints we heard about the iPhone 3G was its poor camera and initial inability to record video. A firmware update fixed this, but many felt that this was a bit too much of an afterthought. Apple have answered this by improving it to a 3 megapixel autofocus camera with touch-focus and geotagging, up from a 2 megapixel camera with no autofocus! This means that taking great photos and sharing them (after tagging them, of course) is now easier and faster than ever, especially with the HSDPA support.

For the tech-heads, the minimum storage capacity has been improved to 16GB, but there is still no card slot for further expansion. But to be honest, 16GB should be enough for most people. The memory has also doubled from 128MB to 256MB, a welcome improvement.

Another great improvement is the CPU, which has been upgraded from an ARM 11 clocked at 412MHz to an ARM Cortex A8 clocked at 600MHz. In addition, a dedicated graphics processing unit (GPU) has been added. While the iPhone 3G already had a silky smooth interface, the addition of this dedicated graphics processor will open up many doors for application developers.

Most of the rest of the phone remains as before, including the sleek styling.

Will the iPhone 3G S improve Apple’s market share in the mobile phone arena? Probably not.

While the improvements and additions are definitely a step in the right direction, smartphones from other manufacturers are starting to come standard with 5 megapixel cameras with autofocus and geotagging. Indeed, the Samsung i900 Omnia has had this for quite some time. the recently released Omnia HD, the Samsung i8910 boasts an 8 megapixel camera with autofocus, geotagging and the same LED flash as the original Omnia. In addition, it has the ability to record HD video! It has the same CPU and GPU as the iPhone 3G S. The Nokia N97 has been out for over 6 months, and also has a 5 megapixel camera with a Carl Zeiss lens, for crystal-clear pictures.

The astute readers have always had a feeling that the selling point of the iPhone, however, was the amazing screen it has. This blew all competitors out of the water. However, the iPhone 3G S has failed to improve further on this, and as such, the new Samsung i8910 Omnia HD has overtaken it in the screen department, boasting a larger, brighter 16 million colour touch screen display. Even the Nokia N97 has a screen of the same size as the iPhone 3G S with better resolution.

Thus, it has to be said, that the iPhone series will remain a device mainly for Apple fans; more serious users will get better value-for-money with the likes of the Omnia HD and Nokia N97. And the Symbian operating systems on these two competitors, while perhaps not as sleek as the iPhone OS, provides far more customisation; a must-have for serious users.