I spent today looking a 3GS on Pay and go for my son, I was shocked at the prices.

Vodafone - Online £315
In Store £440

CPW - Online didn't have any
In Store £440

Three - Online £299
In Store £450

O2 where to only operator that had the same price in store £320 and most were more interested in selling you a contract. and when you the the 3gs is £320 unlocked from Apple

Stores need to make a profit so there is little in it for them in-store PAYG.

I've just bought an Acer Liquid from Expansys on-line for £80.
Not an iPhone but surely better than a 3GS. I guess it is time to sell my San Francisco.

That's very subjective, My opinion is that IOS5 runs alot better on lower spec devices than Android. Android need at least 512MB of memory to be usable.

Obviously a non multi-tasking operating system works on less memory though many feel IOS 4 was extremely detrimental to their iPhone 3G.

Acer are useless at software so hopefully it won't have too much bloatware to remove.

iOS is a multi-tasking OS. It's kernel is derived from Mac OS X.

What makes the difference is that, unlike the early versions of Android, it is capable of managing device resources properly.

That's an interesting way of putting it. There is good and bad to it if you wish to elaborate.

The major bad on the Acer is that the high resolution 3.5" screen is far too small for my taste. Lack of HDMI is just to be expected

Going back to 3GS shop pricing, store prices are often higher on many goods, Acer included.

Try Gumtree maybe ebay

Prices could be between £150 - £300 probably somebody selling a new one a little cheaper than the shops.