[UPDATE] Wonderlust – Apple September event; new iPhones and watches

[Obioban]

HEIC has a ton of perks. Generally, a HEIC get you the photo, brightness data for HDR, a small movie on either side for live photos, AND depth data to add/remove/increase/decrease portrait mode in the future, all in a file the same size as a JPEG of same quality. Throwing that away would be sad.

[Dabombinable]

On 9/13/2023 at 5:29 AM, HenrySalayne said:

Note 3 from 2013 didn't have USB C, but USB 3.

As did the Galaxy S5.

[Dracarris]

6 hours ago, HenrySalayne said:

Apple has implemented a lot of disruptive processes when it comes to interoperability. Take something simple as pictures for example. iPhones export pictures in the .heic format.

No, if you're not sending to an Apple device (as everyone else has already told you, realizing just now).

[Dracarris]

2 hours ago, Dabombinable said:

As did the Galaxy S5.

So these phones had the even more-horrible variant of the abomination called micro USB ?

[Dabombinable]

10 hours ago, Dracarris said:

So these phones had the even more-horrible variant of the abomination called micro USB ?

Still USB 3.0, a direct competitor with the iPhone 6, and from 9 years ago. Kind of bullshit that at the prices Apple has the iPhone start at, USB 3.0 isn't across the entire lineup at the very least, and maybe even USB 3 10Gb on the Pro series.

[Dracarris]

3 hours ago, Dabombinable said:

Still USB 3.0, a direct competitor with the iPhone 6, and from 9 years ago. Kind of bullshit that at the prices Apple has the iPhone start at, USB 3.0 isn't across the entire lineup at the very least, and maybe even USB 3 10Gb on the Pro series.

Still a horrible connector, which I would've dumped back at the time and decided for the slower but much more sensible-for-charging lightning.

 

Today is a different story, I agree, USB3 speeds should be across the full lineup. Maybe it really is stupid planning on not including a USB3 controller in the A16 and next year all iphones will have at least the A17 and therefore USB3.

[RejZoR]

USB-C speeds on base models are at USB 2.0 specs because the chipset is only USB 2.0 capable (last year's chipset), they just swapped the charging port, electrically, it's still USB 2.0. A17 Pro on the other hand is new chip with USB 3.x interface built in. Blaming Apple for this limitation is a bit lame and just shows you don't understand anything.

 

However, going forward, it's up to Apple how they'll segregate things.

 

If going forward, they'll have regular A chipset and A Pro chipset and they'll segregate USB speeds between these two, then it'll be pretty lame, to limit 1000€ phone to USB 2.0 speeds just to artificially lift "Pro" models. If iPhone 16 comes with A17 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro comes with A18 Pro, then even vanilla models should get USB 3.x speeds.

 

But I have ugly suspicion they introduced PRO moniker for a reason and iPhone 16 won't get USB 3.0 because the regular "non Pro" chipset won't have it even when A18 will be introduced next year. A18 Pro however will have it for sure.

[HenrySalayne]

21 hours ago, dalekphalm said:

Outside of Airdrop, sending a photo from an iPhone will generally convert the photo into another format.

Obviously not or it wouldn't be problem? Maybe everybody is using their device wrong, IDK, but since I end up with .heic pictures from iPhone users a lot, it doesn't seem to be as simple.

21 hours ago, dalekphalm said:

Aside from that, HEIC is supported on many devices, and you can install the free extension on Windows, assuming your hardware vendor paid for the license (If they didn't, you can buy a consumer license for $1 and it will follow you via your Microsoft account).

"Supported on many devices" - It's actually not, because of the HEVC licensing. Not to mention basically no software (except image manipulation programs) can import this file format. It simply sucks as a picture interchange format for simple documentation.

And buying a license might always be an option on your private machine; in a business environment - good luck with that...

[Dracarris]

1 hour ago, RejZoR said:

USB-C speeds on base models are at USB 2.0 specs because the chipset is only USB 2.0 capable (last year's chipset), they just swapped the charging port, electrically, it's still USB 2.0. A17 Pro on the other hand is new chip with USB 3.x interface built in. Blaming Apple for this limitation is a bit lame and just shows you don't understand anything.

Well yes, but on the other hand they really could've foreseen the transition during the A16 design - a USB 3 controller is not exactly rocket science anymore.

1 hour ago, HenrySalayne said:

Obviously not or it wouldn't be problem? Maybe everybody is using their device wrong, IDK, but since I end up with .heic pictures from iPhone users a lot, it doesn't seem to be as simple.

Not sure how these peeps send you their stuff, but the reality is that whenever you send a photo through an Email or a messenger app, it's converted to jpeg. The only way an heic can reach you that I see plausible is when they transfer an image through Airdrop to their Mac and then onwards to you as a "dumb file" where the file type is not looked at during sending.

 

That being said, it really would be nice if HEIC would find broader adaption. jpeg is all nice and compatible with every toaster but since its creation there simply has been a lot of progress in image compression, codecs and meta data embedding. Doesn't at least Windows 10 and onwoards read HEIC natively, anyways?

[leadeater]

2 hours ago, RejZoR said:

If going forward, they'll have regular A chipset and A Pro chipset and they'll segregate USB speeds between these two, then it'll be pretty lame, to limit 1000€ phone to USB 2.0 speeds just to artificially lift "Pro" models. If iPhone 16 comes with A17 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro comes with A18 Pro, then even vanilla models should get USB 3.x speeds.

 

But I have ugly suspicion they introduced PRO moniker for a reason and iPhone 16 won't get USB 3.0 because the regular "non Pro" chipset won't have it even when A18 will be introduced next year. A18 Pro however will have it for sure.

Apple won't continue with USB 2.0, long term it's actually more difficult to because even though USB is "supposed" to be backwards compatible it's not always due to optional USB features and not to actual spec implementations often due to necessity. USB 3.0 will be the low bar on every future  A series chip, Pro might get more optional features and faster speeds etc but I really do not see USB 2.0 sticking around.

 

And I wouldn't be surprised to see USB 4.0 on the next generation iPhone Pro either.

 

You can also do things like give the non-Pro USB-PD 27W charging and the Pro USB-PD 45W charging or higher etc, as well as USB single lane vs dual lane for higher data rates. USB is literally anything but "Universal" now days heh.

[Kisai]

1 hour ago, RejZoR said:

USB-C speeds on base models are at USB 2.0 specs because the chipset is only USB 2.0 capable (last year's chipset), they just swapped the charging port, electrically, it's still USB 2.0. A17 Pro on the other hand is new chip with USB 3.x interface built in. Blaming Apple for this limitation is a bit lame and just shows you don't understand anything.

 

However, going forward, it's up to Apple how they'll segregate things.

 

If going forward, they'll have regular A chipset and A Pro chipset and they'll segregate USB speeds between these two, then it'll be pretty lame, to limit 1000€ phone to USB 2.0 speeds just to artificially lift "Pro" models. If iPhone 16 comes with A17 Pro and iPhone 16 Pro comes with A18 Pro, then even vanilla models should get USB 3.x speeds.

 

But I have ugly suspicion they introduced PRO moniker for a reason and iPhone 16 won't get USB 3.0 because the regular "non Pro" chipset won't have it even when A18 will be introduced next year. A18 Pro however will have it for sure.

My guess, is that the A17 Pro might just be the same thunderbolt logic from the M-series chips, but isn't turned on, ie, this is the chip they will put in the next SE model. Then the next Pro model will have Thunderbolt (USB4) like the iPad Pro. 

 

The iPad (non Pro) has the M1 supporting USB 3.1 , while the iPad Pro has the M2 supporting USB4 and 3.1

 

Have to remember that the distinctive feature of TB/USB4 is that it can effectively connect a PCIe device. Not a super useful thing to have if you're not doing "pro" things and would never own such devices, but it would allow an iPhone to be used as a makeshift desktop in some instances. Though I would argue an iPad is a better "ad-hoc desktop", and have used one as such, but have also used the iPhone to do emergency desktop stuff.

 

Like just following the logic, it's likely the non-Pro 15 was already "done" at the point that Apple gave in, and the physical port has been modular since the introduction on the iPad, so Apple likely always had the option to put USB on the phone and chose not to, since it appears it can be retrofitted to the iphone 14's too.

 

 

[RejZoR]

24 minutes ago, Dracarris said:

Well yes, but on the other hand they really could've foreseen the transition during the A16 design - a USB 3 controller is not exactly rocket science anymore.

Not sure how these peeps send you their stuff, but the reality is that whenever you send a photo through an Email or a messenger app, it's converted to jpeg. The only way an heic can reach you that I see plausible is when they transfer an image through Airdrop to their Mac and then onwards to you as a "dumb file" where the file type is not looked at during sending.

 

That being said, it really would be nice if HEIC would find broader adaption. jpeg is all nice and compatible with every toaster but since its creation there simply has been a lot of progress in image compression, codecs and meta data embedding. Doesn't at least Windows 10 and onwoards read HEIC natively, anyways?

Well, it is rocket science when you already have a designated chipset for the series, but you're essentially forced to change USB port (EU legislation). Chipset is a single chip with all the subsystems in it. You can't just add USB 3.x support to it. You could add external logic, but that complicates things and costs more and may not work as well as their own on-chip solution. For current generation it is what it is. USB-C with USB 2.0 electrically. For iPhone 16, it's up to what Apple will decide. They can't use same chipset again for another year, if they use A17 Pro next year for base models, they'll get USB 3.x too automatically. If they give them A18 non-Pro, it just might come without USB 3.x too.

[leadeater]

1 minute ago, Kisai said:

The iPad (non Pro) has the M1 supporting USB 3.1 , while the iPad Pro has the M2 supporting USB4 and 3.1

M1 supports USB 4.0, all M series chips are USB 4.0. I think Apple just decided to feature limit down to USB 3.1 when they put it in the iPad Air 

 

iPad Pro 5th Gen uses the M1 and supports USB 4.0 and TB 3.0.

[dalekphalm]

3 hours ago, HenrySalayne said:

Obviously not or it wouldn't be problem? Maybe everybody is using their device wrong, IDK, but since I end up with .heic pictures from iPhone users a lot, it doesn't seem to be as simple.

*Shrugs*, sorry to say, I have no idea what's going on with your friends, because it's not a problem for me. Anytime I send images to others (usually via some kind of messenger app, since that's the easiest method with broad cross platform support), it's converted to JPEG. Example, in Discord, if I upload an HEIC image, it converts to jpeg. Same with FB Messenger. I believe it automatically does that with Email too.

 

How are they sending you these images, that you keep having this issue?

3 hours ago, HenrySalayne said:

"Supported on many devices" - It's actually not, because of the HEVC licensing.

It actually is. Android 10 (and possibly 9), natively supports HEIC images. Most OEM computers will also support it (though whether the Microsoft Store extension is installed by default will vary among manufacturers). This problem will become less significant over time as people's devices age out, or until some other format becomes the dominant over HEIC (which I would also be okay with).

3 hours ago, HenrySalayne said:

Not to mention basically no software (except image manipulation programs) can import this file format. It simply sucks as a picture interchange format for simple documentation.

On Windows, once you install the extension, it will work in the built-in Photos app, as well as things like MSPaint. I haven't tested every single way you can open an image, but I also can't think of a whole lot of other examples off the top of my head. Is there specific software you're referring to here?

 

It only "sucks" because not every vendor has adopted it yet.

3 hours ago, HenrySalayne said:

And buying a license might always be an option on your private machine; in a business environment - good luck with that...

This wouldn't be an issue in a business environment, as the vast vast majority of businesses are buying computers from OEM's like Dell, Lenovo or HP, which would already have the free vendor paid license included. I just checked my Lenovo right now, and I have the free license available (I actually already installed it ages ago, or it was pre-installed).

 

With that in mind, HEIC isn't inherently the best, due to the licensing fees involved. There are comparable alternatives - I don't remember them off the top of my head, @LAwLz was it you that was talking about the other modern advanced image formats recently?

[Kisai]

1 hour ago, leadeater said:

M1 supports USB 4.0, all M series chips are USB 4.0. I think Apple just decided to feature limit down to USB 3.1 when they put it in the iPad Air 

 

iPad Pro 5th Gen uses the M1 and supports USB 4.0 and TB 3.0.

That's the point I was making, the M1 clearly supports it, but there may be reasons why it's not allowed to operate in TB mode on other devices. eg, there's not really enough bandwidth to support 4 PCIe lanes, which is less of a concern on the iPad Pro than say the MacBook Air, where someone might expect a TB dock to operate as a TB dock.

 

My guess is that the actual I/O logic on the M1 and M2 is 2 TB ports (8 PCIe Lanes), with the Pro having 16 lanes, and the Max having 32. Maybe it has steerable lanes for all I know.  But the theme seems to be that the Mac Pro has 8 ports, the Mini can have up to 4, and the MacBook Air/Pro 2 or 3. Maybe there is something else in play but it does suggest that the M series does have all USB-C ports wired as TB4.

 

Perhaps the difference with the GPU is where the TB logic lies. Or perhaps as suggested before, the M1 and M2 are still technically A16 and A17 respectively, just a different memory and i/o bus width. Since the phone's CPU is stacked under the RAM, where as the M1 it's on the top. Probably makes BYO configuration on the website easier since the phone's aren't configured differently, while the iPad's and MacBook's are. If you're not going to stick 192GB of RAM in a phone, you don't need all the pins for it. Likewise if there are no PCIe slots, then you don't need the logic for it. It may simply be that the actual CPU and GPU cores are identical and the real difference is just the IO section. The same M1/M2 is in the iPad Pro, MacBook's and MacMini, just no BYO options.

 

[LAwLz]

31 minutes ago, dalekphalm said:

With that in mind, HEIC isn't inherently the best, due to the licensing fees involved. There are comparable alternatives - I don't remember them off the top of my head, @LAwLz was it you that was talking about the other modern advanced image formats recently?

Yeah I've written about AVIF (image format based on the AV1 video format), HEIC (image format based on the HEVC video format) and JPEG XL (a ground-up image format from the creators of JPEG).

 

Personally, I am hoping that JPEG XL "wins" the war, because I feel like it's the best image format. 

Anyway, HEIC support can still be a bit hit or miss, but if you feel like you constantly have trouble because of them, you can fix it with simple means. Support for it isn't really hard to find if you go looking for it.

[Dracarris]

3 hours ago, RejZoR said:

Well, it is rocket science when you already have a designated chipset for the series, but you're essentially forced to change USB port (EU legislation).

The writing for the EU legislation was more than clear on the wall at the design time of the A16. Plus, sooner or later they anyways had to make the switch even without any legislation, and from a transfer speed point of view it was long overdue.

[leadeater]

1 hour ago, Kisai said:

My guess is that the actual I/O logic on the M1 and M2 is 2 TB ports (8 PCIe Lanes), with the Pro having 16 lanes, and the Max having 32. Maybe it has steerable lanes for all I know.  But the theme seems to be that the Mac Pro has 8 ports, the Mini can have up to 4, and the MacBook Air/Pro 2 or 3. Maybe there is something else in play but it does suggest that the M series does have all USB-C ports wired as TB4.

From memory the Mac Mini had different support allowances on the ports since you could buy it with M1/M2 and also M1 Pro/M2 Pro and more of the ports supported TB when selecting the Pro variant CPU. But you are right , each M variant higher supports more and more TB ports and connectivity I/O speeds in total across all ports etc.

 

Still the iPad Pro with the same M1 SoC had support for USB 4 while the iPad Mini with the M1 SoC was limited to USB 3.1. I think that has more to do with the USB PHY chip though as you still need one of those to drive the actual USB port and maybe it was either cheaper or physically smaller to go with a 3.1 at the time 

[hishnash]

1 hour ago, Dracarris said:

The writing for the EU legislation was more than clear on the wall at the design time of the A16. Plus, sooner or later they anyways had to make the switch even without any legislation, and from a transfer speed point of view it was long overdue.

EU law does not even apply yet,  it apply applies to new products shipping after it becomes active so these new phones this year are not even required to have USB-C  and the rule itself does not require any of the optional USB-C features (such as USB 3+) the only thing it requires is to use USB-PD and even then only requires PD if the device support higher charging speeds than the generic 2.0 speeds... lighting has supported PD for years so there is no issue there at all.

The law was just about the physical connector and nothing else, I expect you could even comply with the law by having a port that does not even have all the pins needed for full spec as all you need to support is 2.0 charging so dong need all the pins. 

[hishnash]

2 hours ago, LAwLz said:

Personally, I am hoping that JPEG XL "wins" the war, because I feel like it's the best image format. 

 

Does JPEG XL support attachments, eg depth layers, little bits of video on the side etc.    Looking through documentation and frameworks people have published I cant find any clear way one would add these.   

[IkeaGnome]

7 hours ago, HenrySalayne said:

Obviously not or it wouldn't be problem? Maybe everybody is using their device wrong, IDK, but since I end up with .heic pictures from iPhone users a lot, it doesn't seem to be as simple.

They're probably doing something in a weird way or have some odd setting. I've been on iPhone for 2 years now and never had a picture send to an Android user in a way they can't view it. Using the default messaging app. In their text I'll either pick the gallery to choose the picture to send to them, or take a picture with the in text camera mini app.

[LAwLz]

8 hours ago, hishnash said:

Does JPEG XL support attachments, eg depth layers, little bits of video on the side etc.    Looking through documentation and frameworks people have published I cant find any clear way one would add these.   

Not 100% sure what you mean by "little bits of video on the side". Do you mean saving a small video clip inside the same container? If that's what you mean, then I think the answer is no. JPEG XL supports "video", but it's from what I know more like a series of still images rather than a "video file" (with inter-frame compression and all that). So for anything that involves video, one of the video-derived image formats like AVIF or HEIC will be superior.

Call me old-fashioned, but I kind of prefer keeping video formats and image formats separate. At least in a situation like this where we have to decide if we want two formats where each one is really good at one specific thing, or if we want one format that's really good at one thing, and okay at another thing.

 

It does support depth layers though. In fact, it supports 4099 channels, and a typical RGB image will only use 3. So you have 4096 channels remaining to fill with whatever data you want. Alpha channel for transparency, depth channel for depth data, maybe a thermal channel if you got a thermal camera. In that way, the format is very flexible. 

[dalekphalm]

7 hours ago, LAwLz said:

Not 100% sure what you mean by "little bits of video on the side". Do you mean saving a small video clip inside the same container? If that's what you mean, then I think the answer is no.

I'd guess he's talking about Live Photos (I don't know what Android calls this) - basically you take an image, and it records a little extra on both sides of the shot, so you can adjust the frame being used (great for quickly correcting things like out of focus, or someone blinking without retaking the photo).

 

I don't know how iPhones do this (whether it's a series of still images, or an actual video) - but I do know that you can "export" the Live Photo as a video clip if you want. That part is much less useful (very niche), but it's neat.

7 hours ago, LAwLz said:

JPEG XL supports "video", but it's from what I know more like a series of still images rather than a "video file" (with inter-frame compression and all that).

I imagine that would still be sufficient for the purposes of a Live Photo - the primary idea behind them is to allow you to tweak which frame is used.

[Obioban]

19 minutes ago, dalekphalm said:

I'd guess he's talking about Live Photos (I don't know what Android calls this) - basically you take an image, and it records a little extra on both sides of the shot, so you can adjust the frame being used (great for quickly correcting things like out of focus, or someone blinking without retaking the photo).

 

I don't know how iPhones do this (whether it's a series of still images, or an actual video) - but I do know that you can "export" the Live Photo as a video clip if you want. That part is much less useful (very niche), but it's neat.

I imagine that would still be sufficient for the purposes of a Live Photo - the primary idea behind them is to allow you to tweak which frame is used.

The primary purpose of live photos is to have a little video on either side, to capture the essence of the moment. Tweaking while frame you use results in a much lower quality photo, and should be avoided if at all possible.

 

Live photos make going through family photos WAY better/more fun. Losing them would absolutely not be worth moving off HEIC, were it required.

[dalekphalm]

11 minutes ago, Obioban said:

The primary purpose of live photos is to have a little video on either side, to capture the essence of the moment. Tweaking while frame you use results in a much lower quality photo, and should be avoided if at all possible.

I don't agree with you here. In practice, very very few people are going to use Live Photos to "capture the essence of the moment". That might be what you specifically use it for, but Apple advertises it as a way to "pick the key photo and make edits", just like I stated.

11 minutes ago, Obioban said:

Live photos make going through family photos WAY better/more fun. Losing them would absolutely not be worth moving off HEIC, were it required.

I doubt most users would even notice or care, to be honest. It sounds like you use Live Photos in a particularly niche way.

 

With that in mind, I doubt that Apple will eliminate Live Photos anytime soon, unless they are forced to for some reason. HEIC compatibility is good enough at this point that there's little reason to eliminate it in the short term.