The next-generation iPhone, unveiled on Tuesday in California, is worth buying though I must admit it surprised and excited me less than its predecessors.

In Apple’s once-a-year iPhone refresh event, the company introduced a new flagship model, the iPhone 5S, with a fingerprint scanner, improved chip and a camera with image stabilization and burst mode. It also introduced the brightly colored iPhone 5C line, with a relatively affordable price and almost the same features as the iPhone 5.

Both new iPhones will be in stores next Friday in nine regions, including China, and the iPhone 5C will be available for pre-order tomorrow. It’s the first time an iPhone will be available in the Chinese mainland from its initial launch date.

Many people have complained online about the new iPhones, citing their small screens, their lack of “revolutionary” innovation and especially the high price of the cheaper model iPhone 5C.

In the domestic market, it will be priced starting from 4,488 yuan (US$712), similar to a Samsung or HTC high-end phone and more than double the latest Xiaomi model costing 1,999 yuan.

They have reason to complain after waiting almost a year for the new iPhone.

During that time, rival models, like Samsung Galaxy S4, HTC One, Nokia Lumia 1020 and even Xiaomi 3, have lifted people’s expectations toward Apple, the company that rewrote the smart phone industry under legendary former chief executive Steve Jobs, who died in 2011.

To be fair, the post-Jobs Apple has lost none of its flair for great theater in unveiling new products, even though most of what was announced was well-heralded in the blogosphere.

Talking about price, I can’t agree more with Tony Cripps, principal device analyst at research firm Ovum, who said, “Anyone expecting Apple to come truly down market with the iPhone 5C was fooling themselves. The day that happens is the day the company signals that it has run out of head room for expansion.”

Here are the highlights and disappointments I found with the new iPhones.

Early China debut

For the first time, Apple held a satellite event in Beijing hours after the US unveiling, underscoring the importance of the Chinese market.

Apple has enough reasons to do that.

China is now one of the top three global markets for Apple by revenue. In the past, it often took several months for local consumers to get their hands on the new products. They often spent several hours lining up to buy new iPhones after the delayed mainland debut.

Two of Apple’s carrier partners — China Unicom and China Telecom — have already said they will carry the newest iPhone models within days of their launch.

Sales of Apple’s iPhone will greatly increase in China when Apple signs a deal with China Mobile to introduce iPhones.

Fingerprint scanner

On the iPhone 5S, it’s a stainless steel detection ring built into the “home” button, which is able to read a user’s fingertip for log-in or iTunes purchase authentication. Apple calls it Touch ID.

It will certainly save a good deal of time not to have to type in a personal iPhone password or Apple ID for buying applications or music on iTunes. I stopped setting up passwords to avoid typing them in each time. Apple perfectly resolves that nuisance in the iPhone 5S.

It also will build legitimacy for the technology in mainstream consumer electronics, although privacy concerns are bound to rear their heads in these newly paranoid times. Previously, the fingerprint technology was confined to high-end computers. It’s not just rampant tech for tech’s sake; rather, it’s truly useful and enhances the user experience, Apple said.

Chinese people obviously liked the feature. They joked online, saying that thieves couldn’t use stolen iPhones unless they cut off the user’s fingers.

64-bit technology

The iPhone 5S includes a new 64-bit “desktop-class” system-on-a-chip dubbed A7, which has twice the general-purpose and floating point registers of its predecessor and is up to twice as fast at performing CPU tasks. It makes the graphics performance in the 5S 56 times better than in the original iPhone released six years ago.

It’s the world’s first 64-bit architecture mobile device. Before that, the technology was used only in high-end desktop computer and some laptops.

By comparison, Android phones are based on 16-bit and 32-bit architectures. It’s like comparing a BMW (Apple) to a bicycle (Android), according to Chen Wenhao, a tech website editor.

Drawing less attention but equally interesting is the iPhone 5S’ motion co-processor called M7, which can scan skin layers and measure motion data continuously with accelerometer, gyroscope and compass support. Apple has cooperated with Nike to produce shoes supporting sports measures with the new iPhone.

It really fires the imagination to think how the motion sensor can be linked to the burgeoning community of health and fitness application developers. It could replace functions of wearable computing devices, like the Jawbone UP. It also gives sports fans a strong reason to choose the iPhone 5S.

Disappointments

Screen, design and battery are far from perfect. The iPhone 5S will be available in black, white and gold, while the iPhone 5C comes in five color options. Besides color and the fingerprint scanner on the iPhone 5S, it will be difficult for most people to distinguish the new iPhones from the predecessor iPhone 5.

High-end consumers are increasingly looking for distinctive devices and won’t be happy to accept similar or dumped-down versions of former flagships like the iPhone 5. The problem is especially serious for Apple, which launches new flagship models once a year.

The iPhone 5S and iPhone 5C still have four-inch screens. It’s hard to imagine persuading a user of the Samsung Galaxy Note 2, with its 5.5-inch screen, to transfer loyalty to the smaller iPhones. By the end of this year, screens of 5 inches or more will probably become standards in the mainstream smartphone market, even at the 1,000-yuan price level.

The new iPhone 5S features a battery supporting 10 hours of 3G talk or 10 hours of web browsing — a 20 percent increase from the iPhone 5. But the increment hardly seems sufficient for heavy users who require one or even two charges a day.