Apple is sending out the an update for iOS 5 devices including the iPhone 4S that is supposed to fix the battery life and other glitches.
The software update adds multitasking gestures to the original iPad, resolves bugs with cloud documents and improves voice recognition for dictation for Australians.
iPhone4S owners will get an update notice that it is available. You can also go to Setting> General> Software update and check for the update.
The update is 55.5 MB and will download faster over Wi-Fi depending on your network.
The update is available for the iPhone 4S, iPhone 4, iPhone 3GS, iPad, iPad2 and 3rd/4th gen iPod Touches.
The main improvements on the iPhone 4S are the processor, camera and radio (see comparison of all iPhones).
iPhone 4S owners reported that they believe the battery drain is from corrupted data imported from MobileMe, iCloud or Google. Some have reported that deleting contact data and reloading it has fixed the problem.
Smoke & Mirrors, the iPhone battery issue is one where the hardware is mismanaged by the kernel. The dual core processor is going to take up battery life especially when multi-tasking. The iPhone battery isn't new and improved, the best this or any other software update can do is to throttle the dual core processor more efficiently when the phone is idle. Heavier iCloud users, email and browser checkers/surfers aren't going to see any appreciable gains.