Rating: Starting at $200 on contract with AT&T and other vendors, worth the investment for any novice video editor.

Summary: Having a new iPhone 5s, base model of 16 gb, I had wondered what might be my focal point 30 days out. Let’s start with features I had not expected from the phone. First, I had wanted the gold color but, let’s be real at 3 am in the morning, on day of ordering online, silver works just fine. The gold color, while alluring, had offered no enhancement in taking calls, pictures and video. Having spent a considerable time between phone upgrades, I had fancied the open functionality of Android sharing files, customization, and Google integration; however, I hadn’t expected any changes to Apple’s closed mindset. Also, a larger screen, while appealing, hadn’t provided as a deal breaker after coming from an iPhone 3GS. As far as fingerprint sensor, being the first iteration, I had lowered expectations but, amazingly the sensor remains functional for someone with an active lifestyle. For any Droid fanboys, it had offered a convenience, not a panacea in security. The sensor had served only as means to slow someone down. As always with security, physical possession, like in other security scenarios, had provided a means for unraveling any technical protective measures regardless of platform. So that brings me to other impressions for voice calls, audio, microphone, screen and speed, all had improved. The LTE performance on AT&T’s network had quietly impressed my ears while streaming Joe Satriani.

At the heart of the matter, the iPhone 5s had embedded a dual core 64-bit A7 processor though, that’s not the measure of the value for me. The measuring stick had come in the form of handling 1080p video. My iPhone 5s had exported in 30 seconds a 5 minute project versus, expected hours on a used MacBook. So what had squeezed that performance out? Well, Apple had written iOS 7 and iMovie for 64 bit optimization plus, other programming tweaks. The knife’s sharp blade was the supporting GPU, the PowerVR Series 6 chip. For example, within 30 minutes, I had dragged and dropped 90 various clips for the Florida Caverns to begin. Then, I had mixed down over 24 minutes of this video of the Florida Caverns in hours. Exporting the final cut, that had taken the aforementioned 30 seconds for a 5 minute project. During that process, I had acclimated myself to the newer, simpler interface for iMovie. If I had wanted to reimport or use different transitions, just quick double tap on some app icons. Moving different clips around, even with 9o imports, had remained a snap. Without those aggregate software and hardware elements, I had anticipated painful editing experience of recent raw video for weeks. Instead, days had become hours, hours into seconds.

So the above had brought me back to a question, “Does this phone make sense for you?” If you had desired a means to quickly mix down 1080p HD video, perhaps. Since purchasing this device, a few co-workers and friends had purchased this phone and complimentary hardware via the iPad Air. So far, none to my knowledge, had leveraged this video editing potential of this solution. From my perspective, that time savings and ease of use, had made all the difference to posting on WordPress. Without it, I had shuttered the thought for producing content like slow moving molasses.

Read More:

Apple iPhone 5s performance review: CPU and GPU speed compared to top Android phones (benchmarks)(phonearena.com)

Florida State Caverns Park @ Marianna, Florida: Part 1 (GarzaFX)

Florida State Caverns Park @ Marianna, Florida: Part 2 (GarzaFX)

Does Apple just suck? Or does Android suck less? (GarzaFX)