Smartphone

Arguably even more exciting than today's announcement of the new iPhone 5 are the steals and deals you can soon get on the older iPhone models. If you've been looking for an upgrade or wanting to switch to an Apple product, the iPhone 4S or iPhone 4 may be a better and certainly more affordable option than the iPhone 5. The iPhone 4S is now $99 with a two-year contract on AT&T, Sprint, and Verizon, and the iPhone 4 is free with a two-year contract on some carriers. A free software download for iOS 6 is available on Wednesday, Sept. 19, giving the older models many of the same features as the iPhone 5 — minus the dent in your wallet.

If you're doing that last-minute dash for gifts, sometimes the holding off on your purchases shopping tactic is not going to be applicable to your situation. Don't give yourself a hard time if you're a late shopper; a lot of people are as well. Don't worry, there are ways to stay savvy while doing some procrastinating shopping. For example, you can take advantage of free shipping day today, and another tip is to use your smartphone as a comparison shopping tool when you're out in the stores. This way, you'll be less swayed by tempting "Get it for 70 percent off!" types of signs.

In fact, retailers are really nervous about customers using smartphones to comparison shop, because they might lose market share due to this burgeoning consumer trick, according to The Wall Street Journal. You don't even have to do it manually; there are shopping apps out there that will do the work for you. Such apps include TheFind, RedLaser, Save Benjis, and Amazon Mobile.

We've heard about credit cards becoming more high tech, with companies installing buttons on cards that will let you choose between using reward points or credit. A revelation yesterday by Google CEO Eric Schmidt spoke volumes about where credit card technology is heading — straight to your phones. Schmidt said the Near Field Communications chip in the yet-to-be released version of the Android will enable mobile payments and may very soon "replace your credit card."

This isn't much of a surprise because our cell phones are rapidly becoming almost essential to our lives. We can do practically anything on our phones, from finding our way with GPS to checking the weather and communicating with friends. Here are three pros to the credit card smartphone:

Lower Fraud Risk: When you're making a payment with your phone, you'll have to be there in person with your phone, according to Schmidt. There will also be more security obstacles to face when you're accessing your phone. For example, the traditional credit card does not require you to input a pin number to access it, but many people already program pin code access on their smartphones.

For more benefits of a credit card smartphone, read after the jump.

This might be common sense for some, but there are a lot of texting programs that don't charge you a cent for messaging your friends who use the same app.

My personal favorite is WhatsApp, because you can use it on four types of smartphones: BlackBerry, iPhone, Google Android, and the Nokia phone. You'll have to pay for this (it costs 99 cents), but I think I've definitely seen more than a return on the money. There can be a few glitches from time to time, but overall it works fine and is definitely a very good tool to invest in.