Apple finally enters 5G - iPhone 12 + homePod mini announcement

[NotTheFirstDaniel]

Can't wait for Linus's take on this event and the removal of the charger. I assume they're doing a video on this since event overviews are practically just having free money being handed to you. Can't blame them for playing the game of the algorithm.

[Blademaster91]

21 minutes ago, RejZoR said:

Generally iPhone 12 is an impressive device and I'm not going to nitpick about things. But I don't like two things. Lack of charger and inclusion of pointless USB-C to Lightning cable. Come on, only device in my entire household that even has USB-C port is my PC with USB-C port on the case. Everything else has USB-A. Laptops, PC, all the chargers, USB ports in all the cars. Removing charger under pretense of ecology is really shitty. Second thing that I don't like is this obsession with sticking magnets everywhere. And they are always those super strong ones. God forbid you have steel/iron particles around you coz they'll be grabbing on to your phone. Not to mention all these magnets are a nightmare if you're wearing mechanical watches because it fucks up the heart of the watch. I know it's expected everyone's going to use Apple Watch with it, but come on.

Well if people can afford an iphone they can afford another $20-30 for a usb-c charger, but everyone is still going to buy it anyway even though you're getting no charger.

And the eco friendly claim is ridiculous, if Apple actually cared about the environment they would let the user service their own device.

8 minutes ago, RejZoR said:

It happened several times so far. Notch and removal of jack port to name two biggest ones. Yeah, it'll happen and it sucks.

I can still buy a phone that has a 3.5mm jack, but about every other manufacturer has moved on from the notch, the hole punch isn't what I would prefer vs. just having slim top and bottom bezels but a lot less annoying than a notch.

[Lord Vile]

42 minutes ago, PCGuy_5960 said:

120Hz would have been far more interesting that Dolby HDR video or whatever TBH.

Not really it's just a gimmick on phones. With just UI 120Hz isn't a game changer.

42 minutes ago, PCGuy_5960 said:

Video wise? iPhone has always been better. Camera wise, we'll see, a lot of Android manufacturers are focusing much more on their cameras.

With the larger sensor, low light improvement and processing that's just going to kill the pixel though. 

[Lord Vile]

10 minutes ago, Fooshi said:

Starting at $699

Oh, it's the Mini

Starting from $799

Oh, it's only with AT&T

$829 before trade-in, SIM-free

 

 

What in the god damn fuck is this kind of arse marketing? If this was anywhere within the EU, Apple would be hung, drawn and quartered. And the base storage option is STILL 64GB.

Uk marketing is the same, same in France just more expensive in general.

Quote

I too like to overheat and kill my battery at twice the speed, all while using twice the amount of power required at half the charging speed.

Agree, magsafe add ons seem cool though.

[Guest]

9 minutes ago, Fooshi said:

 

 

 

I too like to overheat and kill my battery at twice the speed, all while using twice the amount of power required at half the charging speed.

Let’s face it, it’s not 2010 anymore - wireless charging has come a long way. Time to ditch the  

[williamcll]

39 minutes ago, pinksnowbirdie said:

also has anyone else not noted how it sounds like all Apple is including in the box aside from the phone will be the cable?

 

and not just a standard cable...

a cable that ends in Type-C.

Not everyone has Type-C Plugs in and around their house.

Apple assumes that everyone and their mother owns a latest generation Mac with does come with USB-C

[RejZoR]

4 minutes ago, Blademaster91 said:

Well if people can afford an iphone they can afford another $20-30 for a usb-c charger, but everyone is still going to buy it anyway.

And the eco friendly claim is ridiculous, if Apple actually cared about the environment they would let the user service their own device.

I can still buy a phone that has a 3.5mm jack, but about every other manufacturer has moved on from the notch, the hole punch isn't what I would prefer vs. just having slim top and bottom bezels but a lot less annoying than a notch.

They do offer industry leading long term software support. There is no other smartphone I could think of holding onto for 5 years. I do feel that way with iPhone XR. And after almost 2 years, my battery is still at 100% and it's still as fast as it was on day 1 when I bought it (granted, I'm only charging it to 80% using Juice Watch). People whine and complain about repairing, but to this date I haven't ever had the need to "repair" anything. I never smashed a single phone and I haven't had one die on me. They always ended up in use by someone else within family until they were so old and worn out there was no point in repairing. That was never the issue. However software support is. And you only get like 2 years at best from other companies.

[PCGuy_5960]

16 minutes ago, NotTheFirstDaniel said:

It's gonna happen across all phones within the next year or so. The phone industry will follow the same 3 step cycle.

 

1) Laugh at Apple removing a necessary feature/item

2) See Apple's sales grow despite lacking the necessary feature/item.

3) Quickly adopt what Apple did and pretend Step 1 never happened

 

By Step 3 it's iPhone Event time again and the cycle repeats itself.

It's not really a necessary item, but this has more to do with convenience. I don't think anyone is thinking "I really wanted to buy an iPhone 12, but no charger in the box is a huge deal breaker." At the end of the day this is a $700+ phone, I shouldn't have to spend another $50 on something that should be included in the box. I wouldn't have a problem if they could be given to you for free as an option. 

2 minutes ago, Lord Vile said:

Not really it's just a gimmick on phones. With just UI 120Hz isn't a game changer.

Have you used 120Hz on a phone? It makes everything feel snappier and more responsive. Even 90Hz would have been a huge improvement over 60.

5 minutes ago, Lord Vile said:

With the larger sensor, low light improvement and processing that's just going to kill the pixel though. 

Probably but I think Pixel's amazing processing might still be able to make up for the hardware deficit. Have you seen what they can do with the 4a? The pictures it takes could easily be mistaken for pictures from a flagship phone.

[Belgarathian]

That IP68 rating.... 

 

[shermantanker]

I could care less about the charger. I am all wireless in my house, and most people have a seal bricks floating around anyway.

[Blademaster91]

2 minutes ago, RejZoR said:

They do offer industry leading long term software support. There is no other smartphone I could think of holding onto for 5 years. I do feel that way with iPhone XR. And after almost 2 years, my battery is still at 100% and it's still as fast as it was on day 1 when I bought it (granted, I'm only charging it to 80% using Juice Watch). People whine and complain about repairing, but to this date I haven't ever had the need to "repair" anything. I never smashed a single phone and I haven't had one die on me. They always ended up in use by someone else within family until they were so old and worn out there was no point in repairing. That was never the issue. However software support is. And you only get like 2 years at best from other companies.

There are plenty of phones that offer 3 years, and updates for another year,apps will keep getting updates, though realistically most people will replace their phone every year, or there wouldn't be so much hype over apple launch events with a slightly better phone. Having the ability to order parts and fix my own phone is a nice thing to have, because glass is glass and glass breaks.

[Lord Vile]

2 minutes ago, PCGuy_5960 said:

It's not really a necessary item, but this has more to do with convenience. I don't think anyone is thinking "I really wanted to buy an iPhone 12, but no charger in the box is a huge deal breaker." At the end of the day this is a $700+ phone, I shouldn't have to spend another $50 on something that should be included in the box. I wouldn't have a problem if they could be given to you for free as an option. 

There  idea is that people don't use the stuff anyway so they might as well go the eco route. Personally I use the included charger for my MacBook at home but I use a 3rd party fast charger for my phone, MacBook, headphones and pretty much everything else. I've had 5 iPhones in the last 12 years and used one charger and maybe 2 pairs of headphones so out of 10 included accessories I've used 3 things.

2 minutes ago, PCGuy_5960 said:

Have you used 120Hz on a phone? It makes everything feel snappier and more responsive. Even 90Hz would have been a huge improvement over 60.

I have, I also am on a 165Hz monitor right now. It's nice on UI for about 10 mins then your eyes adjust and you stop noticing. Maybe people on the android size of things are just wowed because it means the device actually has to poll the touch layer faster, which iPhone has done since at least the X polling it at 120Hz making it feel more responsive.

2 minutes ago, PCGuy_5960 said:

Probably but I think Pixel's amazing processing might still be able to make up for the hardware deficit. Have you seen what they can do with the 4a? The pictures it takes could easily be mistaken for pictures from a flagship phone.

A flagship android phone. The Pixel and iPhone stand atop the phone camera world with nothing being close enough to be in the same post code. The 4a is nowhere close to the 4 or the iPhone.

 

https://www.androidauthority.com/google-pixel-4a-vs-pixel-4-camera-shootout-1146801/

[Nena Trinity]

Counterfeit Huawei smartphone?

[Helpful Tech Witch]

1 hour ago, Noah0302 said:

No high refresh screen, I think my 3 year old iPhone X will have to do another year...

or wait untill a jailbreak. It looks like the pannel might be 120 capable, but not activated, going by some older leaks.

[RejZoR]

24 minutes ago, Blademaster91 said:

There are plenty of phones that offer 3 years, and updates for another year,apps will keep getting updates, though realistically most people will replace their phone every year, or there wouldn't be so much hype over apple launch events with a slightly better phone. Having the ability to order parts and fix my own phone is a nice thing to have, because glass is glass and glass breaks.

Maybe Android users. iPhone users keep them for ridiculously long. There are people with iPhone 6S around. And quite a lot of them. That's over 6 generations ago! People using Androids for that long are in tiny minority. And software support is not helping that. It just absolutely sucks using phone that's very much capable, but it's trash coz it's stuck on some prehistoric Android version. And fragmentation of OS isn't helping the ecosystem either. And that's a huge problem with Android in general.

 

I can safely say I can hold on to iPhone XR till Apple releases a phone without a notch. And it'll serve me great all the way to then. And we know Apple is taking a sweet time getting there, meaning it's unlikely to happen even next year. I actually never held on any phone for long literally because of shit OS longevity experience. That entirely changed when I switched to iPhone. Not only it's fast and super responsive as it was on day 1, it's getting major OS update every year without any stupid delays. And I'm not the only one who values this above all the fancy notchless designs and all the crap Android phone makers stuff into their devices just to stand out. Most of it is just gimmick to get you on board, but once you're on board, they stop giving a shit about you. Until they release a new device next year. Apple is nothing like that even though they obviously want you to upgrade every year. But you can freely choose not to and not be penalized for it. At least as far as I'm concerned, it may depend on user needs.

[FloRolf]

1 hour ago, NotTheFirstDaniel said:

It's gonna happen across all phones within the next year or so. The phone industry will follow the same 3 step cycle.

 

1) Laugh at Apple removing a necessary feature/item

2) See Apple's sales grow despite lacking the necessary feature/item.

3) Quickly adopt what Apple did and pretend Step 1 never happened

 

By Step 3 it's iPhone Event time again and the cycle repeats itself.

This also happens the other way around. 

 

Apples "Retina" displays apparently aren't retina anymore because they now need more ppi and before. Mmmhhh. 

[Nowak]

56 minutes ago, pinksnowbirdie said:

just like headphone jacks lmfao

 

Wonder what Google dropped on the Pixel 2.

[Lord Vile]

3 minutes ago, FloRolf said:

This also happens the other way around. 

 

Apples "Retina" displays apparently aren't retina anymore because they now need more ppi and before. Mmmhhh. 

Apple displays have been retina since the 4. As the phones have increased in size the resolution increases. If they want to go beyond retina because the panel cost doesn't change what's the issue with that? 

[EL02]

Believing that apple has removed the included charger for environmental purposes is just dumb. A $700 smartphone is still within the "expensive" category, adding $50+ isn't going to make things any better. I hope android manufacturers don't follow the same trend.

27 minutes ago, Lord Vile said:

I have, I also am on a 165Hz monitor right now. It's nice on UI for about 10 mins then your eyes adjust and you stop noticing. Maybe people on the android size of things are just wowed because it means the device actually has to poll the touch layer faster, which iPhone has done since at least the X polling it at 120Hz making it feel more responsive.

A flagship android phone. 

Adding 120hz or even 90hz would be a nice feature, it doesn't have to run it out of the box. They could inform the users that battery life will take a hit and let them choose. There's no excuse not implementing it for that price.

 

And yeah, they finally used a 2340x1080 oled display on their cheaper devices.

[PCGuy_5960]

22 minutes ago, Lord Vile said:

I have, I also am on a 165Hz monitor right now. It's nice on UI for about 10 mins then your eyes adjust and you stop noticing. Maybe people on the android size of things are just wowed because it means the device actually has to poll the touch layer faster, which iPhone has done since at least the X polling it at 120Hz making it feel more responsive.

My Note10 has 120hz touch polling with a 60hz screen and I can safely say that it feels less responsive than my Tab S7 with a 120Hz screen. A lot of tech reviewers who have all  the latest iPhones and Androids feel the same way about 60 vs 120Hz too.

28 minutes ago, Lord Vile said:

The Pixel and iPhone stand atop the phone camera world with nothing being close enough to be in the same post code.

In terms of just pictures, I'd say most of the top end phones right now are pretty close. Video is where the iPhones pull ahead.

31 minutes ago, Lord Vile said:

The 4a is nowhere close to the 4 or the iPhone.

 

https://www.androidauthority.com/google-pixel-4a-vs-pixel-4-camera-shootout-1146801/

I didn't say it was, just that if you showed someone a photo from the 4a and asked them to estimate the price of the phone that took it, most people wouldn't guess less than $400. The pictures it takes are amazing for what kind of hardware it is working with and that's mostly the result of good processing. It will be interesting to see how the Pixel 5 stacks up vs the iPhone.

[Lord Vile]

17 minutes ago, PCGuy_5960 said:

My Note10 has 120hz touch polling with a 60hz screen and I can safely say that it feels less responsive than my Tab S7 with a 120Hz screen. A lot of tech reviewers who have all  the latest iPhones and Androids feel the same way about 60 vs 120Hz too.

Yeah when they're constantly switching between the two, swap for a day and you wouldn't notice or care.

17 minutes ago, PCGuy_5960 said:

In terms of just pictures, I'd say most of the top end phones right now are pretty close. Video is where the iPhones pull ahead.

Nah, Samsung is probably the closest to Google and Apple and they just look cartoony and low light is nowhere near as good,

17 minutes ago, PCGuy_5960 said:

I didn't say it was, just that if you showed someone a photo from the 4a and asked them to estimate the price of the phone that took it, most people wouldn't guess less than $400. The pictures it takes are amazing for what kind of hardware it is working with and that's mostly the result of good processing. It will be interesting to see how the Pixel 5 stacks up vs the iPhone.

It's better than phones that are 600 but the £600 phones also do more in other areas.

 

Depends what they do, it's running a mid tier chipset so I'm not expecting drastic improvements on the pixel side.

[Lord Vile]

23 minutes ago, EL02 said:

Believing that apple has removed the included charger for environmental purposes is just dumb. A $700 smartphone is still within the "expensive" category, adding $50+ isn't going to make things any better. I hope android manufacturers don't follow the same trend.

What other reason would it be for? You're talking maybe a saving of a few dollars on apples end it barley effects their BOM cost.

23 minutes ago, EL02 said:

Adding 120hz or even 90hz would be a nice feature, it doesn't have to run it out of the box. They could inform the users that battery life will take a hit and let them choose. There's no excuse not implementing it for that price.

Apart from it really doesn't improve anything so what's the point in inclusing it? I'd rather have a better screen vs a high refresh one on a phone.

23 minutes ago, EL02 said:

And yeah, they finally used a 2340x1080 oled display on their cheaper devices.

Personally would have liked to see IPS. Still not a fan of OLED.

[NotTheFirstDaniel]

35 minutes ago, FloRolf said:

This also happens the other way around. 

 

Apples "Retina" displays apparently aren't retina anymore because they now need more ppi and before. Mmmhhh. 

The Retina marketing term just means that from a normal viewing distance, pixels are so small a human "retina" cant see them.

 

It's how they can keep the same/similar PPI across their products and still call them "retina". The last huge jump in PPI was from the iPhone 7 to the iPhone X if I remember.

[PCGuy_5960]

3 minutes ago, Lord Vile said:

Yeah when they're constantly switching between the two, swap for a day and you wouldn't notice or care.

I don't really get your point, getting used to it wouldn't suddenly make it less responsive. 

4 minutes ago, Lord Vile said:

Nah, Samsung is probably the closest to Google and Apple and they just look cartoony and low light is nowhere near as good,

Well idk, these 3 are pretty close TBH. The biggest difference between them is how they handle color, which is personal preference to a degree.

7 minutes ago, Lord Vile said:

Depends what they do, it's running a mid tier chipset so I'm not expecting drastic improvements on the pixel side.

Yeah, was mostly talking about the cameras. (Don't think the 5 is meant to compete with the 12 pros in most areas given that they cost like 40% more)

[NotTheFirstDaniel]

29 minutes ago, EL02 said:

Adding 120hz or even 90hz would be a nice feature, it doesn't have to run it out of the box. They could inform the users that battery life will take a hit and let them choose. There's no excuse not implementing it for that price.

Consumers are dumb. Most won't care about ProMotion either way, and they would have much worse battery life out of the box. The only way to disable ProMotion on an iPad is a toggle hidden in accessibility settings, they're not gonna shine a light on the ability to turn off their flagship feature.

 

Apple had a decision to make, it was either 5G or 120hz, and they chose 5G. Remember, on Apple's website they rate the iPhone 12 Pro Max at the same battery life as the smaller iPhone 11 Pro Max, so they obviously couldn't do both. It's much easier to market "your Netflix will be faster" than 120hz will ever be to the main public. It will come, it just got cut this year.

 

For most people, the iPhone 11 series is still the one to get, especially now that it's gonna be cheaper. The iPhone 12 series seems like a giant waste of money.