iPhone 4S gets thumbs up from Consumer Reports

WASHINGTON (AFP) ― Consumer Reports, the influential magazine for product reviews, gave a thumbs up to Apple’s new iPhone on Tuesday after declining to recommend the previous model because of reception problems.

“Apple’s newest smartphone (the iPhone 4S) performed very well in our tests, and while it closely resembles the iPhone 4 in appearance, it doesn’t suffer the reception problem we found in its predecessor,” Consumer Reports said.

“In special reception tests of the iPhone 4S that duplicated those we did on the iPhone 4, the newer phone did not display the same reception flaw,” it said in a post on its website.

Consumer Reports said the iPhone 4 continues to lose signal strength when a spot is touched on the device’s lower left side while in an area with a weak signal.

“Because of the flaw, we continue to omit the iPhone 4 from our list of recommended models, despite its otherwise fine performance,” Consumer Reports said.

Apple has received some complaints about battery problems with the iPhone 4S but Consumer Reports said the phone “did very well in our standard tests of battery life.”

“The iPhone 4S and new samples of the iPhone 4 have displayed no notable battery problems in additional special tests we carried out,” it said.

Apple said last week it was working to squash software bugs that have caused some iPhone 4S owners to report lower than expected battery life.

Apple said it would release a software update to address the bugs in a few weeks.

The iPhone 4S has been a hit for Apple. The Cupertino, California-based company sold more than 4 million of the smartphones in the three days after it hit the market on Oct. 4.