The good news: I successfully downloaded iOS 7—and a week early, no less.
The bad news: I lost all my contacts.
Such are the consequences of trying to be one of the first people to use Apple's de rigueur operating system. Earlier today I stumbled upon a post on Lifehacker that revealed a way to upgrade to iOS 7's final version. It won't be available to the public until September 18 but I couldn't wait. Fun fact: I often suffer from bouts of impatience.
And to my surprise—I've really got to stop being so pessimistic about shit—the update worked. Well, almost.
After following the instructions (here) and waiting a few minutes for the phone to restart, I was greeted with a simple "Hello" on my iPhone 5. The sleek font filled my screen and I marveled at the possibility of what would happen next.
As promised, everything is true: There is a new universal search function as well as iTunes Radio, photos are grouped into collections, and the camera app is equipped with a number of effects to enhance images (life always seems a little more tolerable with a filter, right?).
But here's the thing: I lost all my contacts. Apple has yet to release iTunes 11.1 (it will do so next Wednesday), and to successfully transfer all your information—phone numbers, old photos, etc—you'll need the most recent version of iTunes. Twitter's app was a little buggy at first, too, but seems to be working fine now.
No matter, though. Losing my contacts, which I'll just manually replace over the next few days, was all worth it. Jony Ive's design is stunning, and the new camera features are more impressive than originally reported. There's a more seemless flow to iOS 7 than previous iterations, and it's undeniable.
So go ahead and download iOS 7 today if you want. But be forewarned: you might lose that precious selfie you've been storing in your photo gallery all these months.
[via Lifehacker]
