The iPhone 4S launched Oct. 14, just a week and a half after it was unveiled. Now, on Wednesday, Samsung and Google are expected to unveil the Nexus Prime smartphone and Ice Cream Sandwich, the latest version of Android. (As Mashable's Ben Parr put it, "the invite itself features the iconic Android character in the form of an ice cream sandwich. You do the math.")
Apple has set a bar that might be impossible for Google and Samsung to jump, though ... not only in terms of subjective values, like "coolness" or user experience, but in terms of hard numbers and specs.
Preorder record
For the third year in a row, the iPhone 4S sold out in preorders before launch day. It broke the iPhone 4's server-crashing record of 600,000 orders in a single day by selling more than 1 million smartphone preorders, and for the first time it will be available on three carriers at launch. The only top-tier U.S. carrier that Google and Android will have to themselves is T-Mobile, and it's unknown which carriers will have the upcoming Nexus Prime.
Weekend sales record
The iPhone 4S sold more than 4 million smartphones over its opening weekend; "the most ever for a phone," according to Apple senior vice president Phil Schiller. No single Android device has ever mustered such sales numbers.
Operating system upgrade numbers
Apple's news release does not state whether the numbers are record-breaking or not, but more than 25 million Apple devices have been upgraded to iOS 5, the latest version of Apple's operating system for smartphones and tablets. New versions of Google's Android operating system typically take months to reach widespread adoption, and then it's usually through new hardware sales; older handsets receive upgrades infrequently, if ever.
Siri
The iPhone 4S' "intelligent assistant" has left many Android enthusiasts nonplussed, insisting that voice command features have "been on Android for some time" in the form of Voice Actions. But as Tim Bajarin of PCMag explains, Siri may have made history as the first real natural language interface in a computer ... just as the first Macintosh did by introducing the computer mouse to the masses. It's unknown if Google has any plans to top Siri, but it's possible that it will have to if the feature catches on the way that the mouse did.
Performance benchmarks
The iPhone 4S trounced every one of its Android competitors when it was benchmarked. This may be the one area that Google and Samsung will be able to beat it in; Motorola and Verizon's upcoming phone, expected to be called the Droid RAZR, is already being billed as faster than the iPhone 4S. Raw power hasn't been enough to put any one Android phone over the top in the last year and a half, though, and that's not expected to change anytime soon.
Jared Spurbeck is an open-source software enthusiast, who uses an Android phone and an Ubuntu laptop PC. He has been writing about technology and electronics since 2008.
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