Apple Just Made An Incredible Amount Of Money

[Tonylu1595]

Thats a long way away, however the companies close, not an individual though

I personally hope that no one person gets 1 trillion. That is just too much power in a person's hand.

[Ertman]

Yeah, they do support it for a few generations, but then stop.. Which kinda sucks as I have an iPad 2 and an iPad mini which will eventually not be supported (and is great IMO) as there are more and more generations coming out where people find them way better which may not be true as they're kinda making the same product over and over again and not changing much...

So are you upset that the company doesn't support their products long enough, eventhough they support their products far far longer then their competition?

Also how many years do you want them to support a product such as the ipad 2? How many years has it been since it's been released? I guess they could just support it for 1 year, that'll really get sales going.

[Psykomantis00]

explain this then.

 

 

 

 

Faster than an iphone 6, larger than an iphone 6, with more ram than an iphone 6, with a higher screen resolution than the iphone 6, with a larger battery than the iphone 6, more expandable than an iphone 6, with more sim cards than an iphone 6, with a better camera than an iphone 6, more moddable than an iphone 6.

 

All this for a launch price of 200$. Give me one good reason to spend 3.5 times as much to go out and buy an iphone 6 (or 4.5 times as much for a 6+ since it's in that size range).

 

Of course there's r&d involved and it has a cost, but it's nowhere NEAR expensive enough to even BEGIN to justify the monstrous margin they make on an iphone. They don't even spend that much into advertising anymore, they don't need to. They have legions of fanboys who will do the job just fine (I can't remember the last time I saw an apple ad on tv).

Too bad it's not as good as an iphone. 

[ionbasa]

How about app compatibility? Emulation of any kind is extremely inefficient. Who cares if benchmarks say its faster if nothing supports its architecture.

Going to chime in on x86 compatibility. There has been native x86 support in Android on versions greater than 4.0

 

Newer apps that have been updated are now compiled as 'fat' app with both ARM and x86 binaries. Older unsupported apps which have not been updated/recompiled will be ran through binary translation on the fly. This binary translator is called Houdini, is supported by Intel, and has decent performance, with Intel claiming an "unnoticeable difference":

[Builder]

Welp. Breaking my own once-a-month rule but I'm snowed the fuck in for two days so whatever.

 

I know it may be difficult for your specification-addled brains to comprehend, but did it ever occur to you that there's something more to technology besides raw specs? Shocker. Actually, I think you people know this, because you guys tend to spend a lot of money on making your desktop PCs based on 20 year old technology look as badass and sexy as is possible but with phones the moment Apple tries to make something look nice they're being vain idiots.

 

I've written so many posts about design at this point but you guys just don't seem to understand it. Specs are by nature unimportant to most people, and they should be to you too. HERESY! More important is that crucial binary state of functionality -- does it work, or does it not work? Specs are secondary. PC manufacturers have spent the last few decades trying to convince normal people that specs matter, that they always need bigger numbers. Apple is making the crazy bet that people are sick of having that shit shoved down their throats constantly about better video cards making Facebook photos look nicer and better CPUs allowing them to edit more documents in Word. (hint, it's the RAM, you lousy capitalist motherfuckers) Apple's making the bet that people will spend money for products that work with a minimum of fuss. People don't want a 3Ghz CPU and 2GB of RAM and a full Intel processor running the x86 instruction set. People don't want an operating system. In fact, people don't want computers any more. You can say all you want about the desktop PC not dying, but for most of the world, it's already dead. People want useful abstractions that make the hardware and everything else but their work transparent. They don't want to care about specs. They don't want to care about getting the latest updates. They want to cut through the bullshit and get to work.

 

That's what the rest of the computing industry has yet to realize. Computers are literally magic to all but us precious few who still can recognize them as the brilliant machines that they are. When Windows tosses a BSOD at the user, their suspension of disbelief is broken, and they get angry. Same about every part of the computing experience that makes them realize that they're using a computer. People don't want to use computers, and for the most part, they can't tell whether or not they are (ask your parents if they think iPads {or Galaxy Tabs if you must} are computers). It will become a lot easier for all of you to understand why people pay for Apple products if you can accept the fact that the rest of the world no longer wants to own a computer.

 

Holding the user's suspension of disbelief for as long as possible when they are using a computer is actually an entire field of study itself, known as user experience and interaction design. Tech people who have little contact with whom I'll call "muggles" (yeah, fuck me for perpetuating the stereotype of cis hetero white tech men as wizards, because we're discussing magic here) are FAMOUSLY incompetent at understanding user experience and interaction design. The result is known as design by committee, essentially where all the design choices are made democratically by a committee. Basically, the end result is that any artistic vision for the design of something is diluted to the point where a bunch of people who don't understand what they're voting for can agree on it. Java is a result of design by committee. (thank you, 10-line "hello world" program) Eclipse is a result of design by committee. Those two are obvious (if you can't see why or how then you need to broaden your horizons) USB is a result of design by committee. Don't believe me?

Why are there so many types? Because every new design was pushed through a committee, that's why. Why do they all suck? Because there was never a unified vision of the product as a whole. Why is it dominant? Because the best designs don't win. Look at history: VHS beat Betamax, SD beat Memory Stick, (poor Sony, again) Windows beat UNIX, (ahem) git beat Mercurial, C beat LISP, (AHEM AHEM), static weak typing beat static strong typing, and the list goes on. There is a graveyard of good design in tech that lost for other reasons such as cost or eccentricity ((I'm ) (looking at you,) (LISP)). The most popular solutions to a problem are very rarely the best ones when it comes to design.

 

Design by committee in UX (that's hipster for User Experience) often looks like a row of checkboxes. (http://limi.net/checkboxes-that-kill/) Why should Firefox allow the end user to fuck their web browser so easily? Simple, they shouldn't. An otherwise enjoyable web browsing experience can turn into an OH SHIT WHAT IS THIS UNIDENTIFIABLE COFFEE-NAMED LANGUAGE FLOWING ACROSS MY SCREEN in the click of a button. Should that be possible? The UX designer would say no. For advanced users, disabling JavaScript by default has its benefits, (I use NoScript, it's the right thing to do) but for everyone else it's baffling. 

 

As you use your stuff, think to yourself about the choices the developer made when creating the app and ask yourself "does this interface make sense?" If you find yourself answering "no" to that question quite often (and you're using Windows, not Mac) then congrats, you have a knack for UX design. You could be the next Steve Jobs or even the next Tog! (http://www.asktog.com)

 

I know there are at least a few people on this forum who care about design, and I appreciate the (slight) redesign. The typography is good. I think thread titles would look nice in an informal serif, perhaps Garamond, @

 

(and yes, that was a LISP joke, for those who can appreciate that sort of thing. I suspect the number is quite small here on LTT.)

[Mew]

The atom cpu inside the zenfone has been proven to destroy most arm chips on the market. Including the iphone 6 cpu, as hard as you may find it to believe that. There's a tablet with windows 8 that has the same cpu on the market (again from asus) that can run bf3 (goes for 300$ with a detachable keyboard btw, might want to reconsider the value of a twice-as-expensive ipad) at a playable framerate.

 

And there are multiple phones that are faster than an iphone 6, don't kid yourself...

 

Specs that aren't comparable? Come on dude... just because the screen is a bit larger (which by the way would mean it cost more to produce if anything), it doesn't change the fact that it owns the iphone in every conceivable way. And again, there's the 6+ which has the same size, and is 4.5 times (!!!) as expensive. This is not a size preference comparison, this is me trying to show you how incredibly overpriced the iphone is.

 

The price is in line with android "flagships", and that's why ALL these "flagships" are utter shit for the price. I'm not a fanboy, I won't defend android at all costs just because. There are terrible value phones with android, too. But this one, and some others, come to show exactly that.

 

In favour of android however I will say this: even if the iphone was the fastest phone on the planet, ios would prevent you from actually noticing. You're locked in in this tight ecosystem and you can do literally nothing that actually leverages the potential of a high end phone. Android is customizable, moddable, and anyone can port anything to it (for example, someone actually ported the full pc version of doom 3 to android). You can make a linux chroot and have it be a small pc in your pocket. I can already hear you saying "oh I don't care for that who needs that"... well, then may I ask why you are willing to spend 750 on a device if you don't care? because you can get a smooth and stutter free experience from a 100$ phone too nowadays.

 

 

The new ZenFone uses the Z3580, something that Intel quotes is 16% faster than the A7, which means Apple's dual core is barely slower than the atom dual core which results in Apple having a much higher IPC. There are currently no Android phone that has a cpu faster than the iPhone 6 so I don't know what you're talking about.

 

Many people don't want a bigger screen. It's like comparing a 50" tv to a 30" tv, some people buy the smaller one for a reason; the 50" isn't better because it's bigger. 

 

There is a reason why flagships sell so well and the reason is because they are usually the no compromise device. Phones like the OnePlus One may sound good on paper, but look at what it is now. It's a phone sold by an unreputable company with basically no support. I am 100% sure that the new ZenFone will have at least 1 compromise and those compromises alone will make the phone hard to recommend and thus, you won't see Asus selling much of them.

 

Unlike Android, iOS is getting heavier and harder to run with every version. And unlike Android, iOS is becoming more and more open. Things like web browsing and games demand fast performance for a smooth and enjoyable experience. 

 

EDIT: Was thinking through what I wrote while I was showering and realized I made some errors. The atom in the ZenFone is a quad core and in the Anandtech article, Intel only spoke about the performance difference between their fastest dual core and the A7 in the 5s. Based on the statements that Anandtech had on the quoted clock speeds being the turbo clocks, actual real world, non cheating results would be lower for the atom. On top of that, real world applications will not use all 4 cores which would favor the A7 greatly. And thus, no chip is faster than a fast dual core.

 

Denver is actually faster than the A8X. So technically there are phones out there that provide more performance for a similar price point. Android is also more stable than iOS as well thanks to it's open source nature. Apple does make good products but they aren't "king of the hill" in any respect. They are just good at filling the bill and selling their product. Nine out of ten average consumers will buy an iPhone simply because it's an iPhone. They don't have a clue as to what's under the hood nor do they care. It's all about the label of the product these days. iPhone's fit your average consumer better than Android devices.

 

 

Both Denver and A8X are not used in phones, only in tablets. The new X1 if scaled down, will offer great performance in a phone with good power consumption, but this year seems to be the year of the 810, and by next year, a scaled down version of the X1 would be outdated. Actually, I choose to stay with the iPhone when I renewed my contract last year because even 6 months after the 5s was released, it was still faster than any new phone that came out. Even now, over a year after release, it's still faster and better than the majority of new phones that have come out. I wanted the absolute fastest phone and only Apple could deliver.

[kuddlesworth9419]

It's only because they charge so much for their products. Other companies are more competitive. Apple doesn't need to be because they are Apple and people will always buy their stuff.

[BrianPena]

Thats a long way away, however the companies close, not an individual though

I'm willing to bet that inflation will help us out.

[ShadowCaptain]

SNIP

 

Just wanted to say great post

[Logan2012]

And no taxes will be payed on any of this.

[Psykomantis00]

It's only because they charge so much for their products. Other companies are more competitive. Apple doesn't need to be because they are Apple and people will always buy their stuff.

When you make a sub par product you have to compete. 

[Sauron]

How about app compatibility? Emulation of any kind is extremely inefficient. Who cares if benchmarks say its faster if nothing supports its architecture.

 

What if I told you there's an algorythm that converts the arm instruction set in x86 that only takes a maximum of 5% away from performance? Not only that, most apps are natively compatible with x86 now. You could have done a little bit of research at least before bringing that up.

[Sauron]

Too bad it's not as good as an iphone. 

 

Are you trolling?

[Sauron]

The new ZenFone uses the Z3580, something that Intel quotes is 16% faster than the A7, which means Apple's dual core is barely slower than the atom dual core which results in Apple having a much higher IPC. There are currently no Android phone that has a cpu faster than the iPhone 6 so I don't know what you're talking about.

 

Many people don't want a bigger screen. It's like comparing a 50" tv to a 30" tv, some people buy the smaller one for a reason; the 50" isn't better because it's bigger. 

 

There is a reason why flagships sell so well and the reason is because they are usually the no compromise device. Phones like the OnePlus One may sound good on paper, but look at what it is now. It's a phone sold by an unreputable company with basically no support. I am 100% sure that the new ZenFone will have at least 1 compromise and those compromises alone will make the phone hard to recommend and thus, you won't see Asus selling much of them.

 

Unlike Android, iOS is getting heavier and harder to run with every version. And unlike Android, iOS is becoming more and more open. Things like web browsing and games demand fast performance for a smooth and enjoyable experience. 

 

EDIT: Was thinking through what I wrote while I was showering and realized I made some errors. The atom in the ZenFone is a quad core and in the Anandtech article, Intel only spoke about the performance difference between their fastest dual core and the A7 in the 5s. Based on the statements that Anandtech had on the quoted clock speeds being the turbo clocks, actual real world, non cheating results would be lower for the atom. On top of that, real world applications will not use all 4 cores which would favor the A7 greatly. And thus, no chip is faster than a fast dual core.

 

 

 

Both Denver and A8X are not used in phones, only in tablets. The new X1 if scaled down, will offer great performance in a phone with good power consumption, but this year seems to be the year of the 810, and by next year, a scaled down version of the X1 would be outdated. Actually, I choose to stay with the iPhone when I renewed my contract last year because even 6 months after the 5s was released, it was still faster than any new phone that came out. Even now, over a year after release, it's still faster and better than the majority of new phones that have come out. I wanted the absolute fastest phone and only Apple could deliver.

 

 

Intel shared a bit of Merrifield performance data, although we weren't able to run any ourselves. Intel's data puts the dual-core Merrifield CPU performance ahead of Apple's 1.3GHz A7 by 16% in WebXPRT. Given how close the Bay Trail/A7 performance race was, Intel's numbers sound believable here.

 

Are you kidding me? You think a web app benchmark is representative of the full potential of a quad core cpu? And even the, as you said YOURSELF, it's faster, be it only by 16%, even in that. So, are you trolling or making things up when you say no cpu in an android phone is faster than the iphone's? ignore the language, but take a look at THESE benchmarks, where the tegra k1 owns the A8 even in single-threaded performance. In your benchmarks there are no tegra k1 devices, even though it had been out for some time already. Such coincidence. Even gpuwise the atom is significantly better, as it takes the a7's gpu and clocks it more than twice as high.

And the new atoms utterly destroy bay trail in every conceivable way. It's not even remotely close.

As for your edit, the fact that even the dual core variant would beat the a7 is just further proof that the z3580 is simply superior, IPC included. And regardless of what intel says about clock speeds, the performance charts aren't based on calculations, they're based on actual performance, so your argument that "it's actually slower" is just plain wrong. And 90% of the applications that ACTUALLY need the performance of a quad core use it perfectly well. Maybe that's not the case on iOS, but on android quad cores have been a thing since 2012 and developers more than caught up by now.

 

The fact that you don't want a bigger screen (which I can understand) doesn't change that having a smaller screen is not a feature that is worth paying 3.5 times as much for. And there are rumours about a 4.5" version of the zenfone 2. What would you say if that was a thing? Oh, but you'd find another "preference" argument to defend the iphone's price, I'm sure. If you wanted to buy a car, and you absolutely wanted a red golf, would you pay 80K$ for one? Even if you could get a golf plus for 20k?

 

What exactly are you basing your assumption that asus will make a compromise based on? You're scraping the bottom of the barrel. And don't even get me started on the amount of compromises iphones make, and yet you're still here defending them even using arguments that work better against you that for you. Please indicate on what exactly asus is compromising that cripples the whole phone to the point where you'd spend 600$ more on an inferior device. And before you say it, the software is not nerfed. Linus tried it live and there was no significant bloat anywhere.

Yes, there is a reason so many people buy flagship phone. it's that they know batshit about technology and they assume that spending more will automatically give them a better experience. Not true for everyone, but true for the VAST majority of flagship phone customers. These people will literally dump even 900$ on a phone and then if you asked them what their phone could do that the 100$ competition couldn't they wouldn't know.

 

Web browsing hasn't been hard to run for 2 years for pretty much anything. And keep deluding yourself on which phone is faster, when it not only is NOT the iphone and even if it was, I can't see any way, at all, in which you would be able to access the imaginary extra performance other than in a benchmark. Also, keep telling yourself that imaginary tiny performance edge is worth giving up on almost every other advantage possible and paying 3.5 times as much for.

[patrickjp93]

$18,000,000,000 != $1,000,000,000,000.

But yes, do something with it.

Apple's net worth is more than 830 billion now. Chew on that a moment.

[EmeraldKiwi]

All this money and the iWatch still only has a 4 hour battery.

[Victorious Secret]

For people wondering why Apple doesn't invest...they do. Take a look at what they put into RD on a yearly basis, it's not a insignificant amount.

But why do they hoard their billions? Why do they treat it like "end of world" money? Because it is. Steve Jobs already steered Apple through ONE bankruptcy where they mismanaged their finances to hell and nearly died. He probably vowed "never again" and it's clearly something the current leadership takes seriously as well, every company has emergency cash to wade through emergencies. Apple just has enough to last a lot longer.

And let's get this clear, apple might be the first publicly traded company to hit a trillion dollars but I don't think it's the first company period. I believe that honour lies with Saudi Aramco. But the Saudis don't share the true balance sheets of that company, everyone can make a educated guess that they passed the trillion dollar valuation a long time ago.

[Misanthrope]

Maybe it's just me being overly positive today but I actually think this is nice: I am starting to really get pissed off at some stuff from both Google and Microsoft. As bad as Apple are right now they're needed to keep the balance in the force so to speak.

[Techteen14]

Apple's net worth is more than 830 billion now. Chew on that a moment.

While that is amazing, net worth != cash reserves. Also, revenue != profit.

The new ZenFone uses the Z3580, something that Intel quotes is 16% faster than the A7, which means Apple's dual core is barely slower than the atom dual core which results in Apple having a much higher IPC. There are currently no Android phone that has a cpu faster than the iPhone 6 so I don't know what you're talking about.

Tegra K1, Tegra X1, and probably Snapdragon 810.

Also, from someone used to superior technology, here's a review of the iPhone 6.

Many people don't want a bigger screen. It's like comparing a 50" tv to a 30" tv, some people buy the smaller one for a reason; the 50" isn't better because it's bigger.

I can't imagine buying anything smaller than 5.2". My current phone is 5.5" (OPO), and I think the Note 4's size (5.7") is my personal sweet spot. I could totally see using a Nexus 6 (5.95") as my daily driver, but the Galaxy Mega 6.3 (you guessed it, 6.3") and Sony Xperia Z Ultra (6.44") are too big.

There is a reason why flagships sell so well and the reason is because they are usually the no compromise device.

Unless its an iPhone.

Phones like the OnePlus One may sound good on paper, but look at what it is now. It's a phone sold by an unreputable company with basically no support.

Spoken like someone who doesn't own one. It's better supported than 99% of other Android phones, it even has 4.4.4. It's getting 5.0 early next month. With all 5.0's bugs, I'm glad that "fragmentation" is a thing, instead of the Apple approach where everyone gets beta-level software at once. Remember iOS 8.0.1.?

I am 100% sure that the new ZenFone will have at least 1 compromise and those compromises alone will make the phone hard to recommend and thus, you won't see Asus selling much of them.

Doubt it, they're pulling a OnePlus and selling it at a fair price.

Unlike Android, iOS is getting heavier and harder to run with every version.

And that's bad because...?

And unlike Android, iOS is becoming more and more open. Things like web browsing and games demand fast performance for a smooth and enjoyable experience.

For the former, any processor manufactured by anyone in the last 3 years will be able to do this well, and I don't know why people would game on a phone, but for those people who do the Snapdragon 800 series nd Adreno 300/400 series is awesome.

And thus, no chip is faster than a fast dual core.

LOL.

Both Denver and A8X are not used in phones, only in tablets. The new X1 if scaled down, will offer great performance in a phone with good power consumption, but this year seems to be the year of the 810, and by next year, a scaled down version of the X1 would be outdated.

What, every phone has to use the same processor? What if nVidia makes a Shield phone?

Actually, I choose to stay with the iPhone when I renewed my contract last year because even 6 months after the 5s was released, it was still faster than any new phone that came out. Even now, over a year after release, it's still faster and better than the majority of new phones that have come out.

What's the point of a fast phone if the OS is so locked down that none of the apps take advantage of that speed? With my OPO, I could overclock the 801 to be faster, or undervolt it to save battery. I can also run (or design) complex apps to take advantage of all four cores if I wanted to, without having to own both a Mac and a $99/year developer key.

I wanted the absolute fastest phone and only Apple could deliver.

Brought to you by Apple. This advertisement was designed in Cupertino and manufatured by overworked child laborers in China.

Joking aside, see my last paragraph.

[Sauron]

While that is amazing, net worth != cash reserves. Also, revenue != profit.

Tegra K1, Tegra X1, and probably Snapdragon 810.

Also, from someone used to superior technology, here's a review of the iPhone 6.

I can't imagine buying anything smaller than 5.2". My current phone is 5.5" (OPO), and I think the Note 4's size (5.7") is my personal sweet spot. I could totally see using a Nexus 6 (5.95") as my daily driver, but the Galaxy Mega 6.3 (you guessed it, 6.3") and Sony Xperia Z Ultra (6.44") are too big.

Unless its an iPhone.

Spoken like someone who doesn't own one. It's better supported than 99% of other Android phones, it even has 4.4.4. It's getting 5.0 early next month. With all 5.0's bugs, I'm glad that "fragmentation" is a thing, instead of the Apple approach where everyone gets beta-level software at once. Remember iOS 8.0.1.?

Doubt it, they're pulling a OnePlus and selling it at a fair price.

And that's bad because...?

For the former, any processor manufactured by anyone in the last 3 years will be able to do this well, and I don't know why people would game on a phone, but for those people who do the Snapdragon 800 series nd Adreno 300/400 series is awesome.

LOL.

What, every phone has to use the same processor? What if nVidia makes a Shield phone?

What's the point of a fast phone if the OS is so locked down that none of the apps take advantage of that speed? With my OPO, I could overclock the 801 to be faster, or undervolt it to save battery. I can also run (or design) complex apps to take advantage of all four cores if I wanted to, without having to own both a Mac and a $99/year developer key.

Brought to you by Apple. This advertisement was designed in Cupertino and manufatured by overworked child laborers in China.

Joking aside, see my last paragraph.

 

 

Someone who gets it

[Builder]

Unlike Android, iOS is getting heavier and harder to run with every version. And unlike Android, iOS is becoming more and more open. Things like web browsing and games demand fast performance for a smooth and enjoyable experience. 

iOS is many things, but open it is not and it probably never will be. Flexible, sure. While iOS 8 may seem harder and heavier to run, it's still an extremely far cry from JIT-compiled Java.

 

It's only because they charge so much for their products.

Uh, and because they sell way more of them than like...any other company ever?

 

And no taxes will be payed on any of this.

Well, actually, no. Just no.

 

Apple's net worth is more than 830 billion now. Chew on that a moment.

omnomnomnomnom

 

And let's get this clear, apple might be the first publicly traded company to hit a trillion dollars but I don't think it's the first company period. I believe that honour lies with Saudi Aramco. But the Saudis don't share the true balance sheets of that company, everyone can make a educated guess that they passed the trillion dollar valuation a long time ago.

I'm not sure what Standard Oil's net worth is inflation-adjusted but John D. Rockefeller had between 300 and 400 billion 2015 dollars in his coffers when he died.

 

Spoken like someone who doesn't own one. It's better supported than 99% of other Android phones, it even has 4.4.4. It's getting 5.0 early next month. With all 5.0's bugs, I'm glad that "fragmentation" is a thing, instead of the Apple approach where everyone gets beta-level software at once. Remember iOS 8.0.1.?

What's the point of a fast phone if the OS is so locked down that none of the apps take advantage of that speed? With my OPO, I could overclock the 801 to be faster, or undervolt it to save battery. I can also run (or design) complex apps to take advantage of all four cores if I wanted to, without having to own both a Mac and a $99/year developer key.

First of all, what you describe is not fragmentation. 8.0.1 was not beta-level, it was complete. If you would care to learn anything about it the problem was an OTA delivery error, not a bug in 8.0.1 itself. Though I'm glad you realize it's an issue now, because literally nobody believed me when I said it was worse than #bendgate (do you guys remember bendgate? ah, good times).

 

Regardless of whether or not it was complete it's important to recognize that we in the Apple communities right now are discussing the recent decline in the quality and stability of Apple software. Marco Arment (former CTO of Tumblr, yada yada yada) wrote a piece about it called "Apple has lost the functional high ground" http://www.marco.org/2015/01/04/apple-lost-functional-high-ground

 

And though he actually regrets writing it (it sparked a media controversy that he didn't intend and led to several misconceptions about his opinions) he brings up a lot of good points.

 

I'm not sure what you mean by "the OS is so locked down that no apps can take advantage of that speed." It's pretty well known that iOS games always perform better than their Android counterparts, for one, they're statically compiled to native code using LLVM, and iOS also manages memory much better. Keep in mind that you can write apps in any language on iOS, you could even write it in ARM assembly language if you wanted the absolute highest performance. Most Unreal 4 games are iOS only, for example, Revolution 60 won't be ported to Android before UE4 support improves and fragmentation decreases. You may like the fragmentation, just realize that your favorite app developers really don't.

 

The difference between two and four cores is nearly negligible to the average user, and four cores were pretty much a mistake in mobile too. There's been a lot written on the subject. 

[Mew]

Are you kidding me? You think a web app benchmark is representative of the full potential of a quad core cpu? And even the, as you said YOURSELF, it's faster, be it only by 16%, even in that. So, are you trolling or making things up when you say no cpu in an android phone is faster than the iphone's? ignore the language, but take a look at THESE benchmarks, where the tegra k1 owns the A8 even in single-threaded performance. In your benchmarks there are no tegra k1 devices, even though it had been out for some time already. Such coincidence. Even gpuwise the atom is significantly better, as it takes the a7's gpu and clocks it more than twice as high.

And the new atoms utterly destroy bay trail in every conceivable way. It's not even remotely close.

As for your edit, the fact that even the dual core variant would beat the a7 is just further proof that the z3580 is simply superior, IPC included. And regardless of what intel says about clock speeds, the performance charts aren't based on calculations, they're based on actual performance, so your argument that "it's actually slower" is just plain wrong. And 90% of the applications that ACTUALLY need the performance of a quad core use it perfectly well. Maybe that's not the case on iOS, but on android quad cores have been a thing since 2012 and developers more than caught up by now.

 

The fact that you don't want a bigger screen (which I can understand) doesn't change that having a smaller screen is not a feature that is worth paying 3.5 times as much for. And there are rumours about a 4.5" version of the zenfone 2. What would you say if that was a thing? Oh, but you'd find another "preference" argument to defend the iphone's price, I'm sure. If you wanted to buy a car, and you absolutely wanted a red golf, would you pay 80K$ for one? Even if you could get a golf plus for 20k?

 

What exactly are you basing your assumption that asus will make a compromise based on? You're scraping the bottom of the barrel. And don't even get me started on the amount of compromises iphones make, and yet you're still here defending them even using arguments that work better against you that for you. Please indicate on what exactly asus is compromising that cripples the whole phone to the point where you'd spend 600$ more on an inferior device. And before you say it, the software is not nerfed. Linus tried it live and there was no significant bloat anywhere.

Yes, there is a reason so many people buy flagship phone. it's that they know batshit about technology and they assume that spending more will automatically give them a better experience. Not true for everyone, but true for the VAST majority of flagship phone customers. These people will literally dump even 900$ on a phone and then if you asked them what their phone could do that the 100$ competition couldn't they wouldn't know.

 

Web browsing hasn't been hard to run for 2 years for pretty much anything. And keep deluding yourself on which phone is faster, when it not only is NOT the iphone and even if it was, I can't see any way, at all, in which you would be able to access the imaginary extra performance other than in a benchmark. Also, keep telling yourself that imaginary tiny performance edge is worth giving up on almost every other advantage possible and paying 3.5 times as much for.

 

I generally don't like geekbench, but if you want geekbench results, you should go to the source, not some unreadable android source. Comparing phone SOCs to phone SOCs as comparing the K1 to the A7 just isn't fair. The 5s' A7 scores 1398 compared to the Exynos Note 4's 1176 and the 805 Note 4's 988. The iPhone 6's A8 is much faster at 1612, which is almost 50% faster in single threaded applications. Switching over to multicore, the 5s' competition is the GS5- the 5s scores 2518 vs the 2733 of the 801 GS5. So, the GS5 barely wins in a multithreaded benchmark against a super fast dual core. Now, the iPhone 6's A8 vs the Exynos Note 4 (8 core) and the 2 805 phones- the Nexus 6 and Note 4. The iPhone 6 scores 2885 vs the 3046 of the Nexus 6 and the 2968 of the Note 4. Just like in the case of the 5s vs S5, the iPhone isn't that much slower than its competition in a heavy multithreaded load, and smokes the competition in a heavy single threaded load. And like I said previously, there are no SOCs that are faster than that in the iPhones because, as your claim of "90% of the applications" actually "need the performance of a quad core use it perfectly well" is correct because the majority of benchmarks are multithreaded and pretty much all the other apps are not. And in those apps, having much higher single threaded performance gets you a better experience. But I forgive you for your misunderstanding of Apple's performance, a lot of people just are ignorant of Apple's standing. 

[Techteen14]

iOS is many things, but open it is not and it probably never will be. Flexible, sure. While iOS 8 may seem harder and heavier to run, it's still an extremely far cry from JIT-compiled Java.

This.

I'm not sure what Standard Oil's net worth is inflation-adjusted but John D. Rockefeller had between 300 and 400 billion 2015 dollars in his coffers when he died.

Holy crap! I wonder where that all went?

First of all, what you describe is not fragmentation.

Updates not coming through Google, but rather manufacturers/carriers/ROM makers (i.e. CyanogenMod) = fragmentation.

8.0.1 was not beta-level, it was complete. If you would care to learn anything about it the problem was an OTA delivery error, not a bug in 8.0.1 itself.

Ah, I didn't know that.

Though I'm glad you realize it's an issue now, because literally nobody believed me when I said it was worse than #bendgate (do you guys remember bendgate? ah, good times).

*cue joker meme*

"Galaxy Note 4, Moto X, Nexus 5 and every iPhone since the 3GS bend and nobody bats an eye"

"the iPhone 6+ bends and everyone loses their minds."

Really. A long, thin slab of aluminum will bend when pressure is applied. Not exactly rocket science.

Regardless of whether or not it was complete it's important to recognize that we in the Apple communities right now are discussing the recent decline in the quality and stability of Apple software.

WHAT? There's an Apple fan community outside of the crazies on BGR and Cnet's comments sections that AREN'T sheep?

JK, you people can be reasoned with and have my respect, even if I don't agree with you.

Marco Arment (former CTO of Tumblr, yada yada yada) wrote a piece about it called "Apple has lost the functional high ground" http://www.marco.org/2015/01/04/apple-lost-functional-high-ground

And though he actually regrets writing it (it sparked a media controversy that he didn't intend and led to several misconceptions about his opinions) he brings up a lot of good points.

I've been noticing this too, I still own an iPad and iOS 8 isn't great.

I'm not sure what you mean by "the OS is so locked down that no apps can take advantage of that speed." It's pretty well known that iOS games always perform better than their Android counterparts, for one, they're statically compiled to native code using LLVM, and iOS also manages memory much better. Keep in mind that you can write apps in any language on iOS, you could even write it in ARM assembly language if you wanted the absolute highest performance. Most Unreal 4 games are iOS only, for example, Revolution 60 won't be ported to Android before UE4 support improves and fragmentation decreases. You may like the fragmentation, just realize that your favorite app developers really don't.

Don't play mobile games, not a problem to me. With the exception of really graphically instensive games, there is no difference in speed between my iPad 3 and my brother's iPad Mini 2. Everything else runs fine.

As for fragmentation, there are literally no iOS apps that I use that aren't on Android. The reverse can't be said.

The difference between two and four cores is nearly negligible to the average user, and four cores were pretty much a mistake in mobile too. There's been a lot written on the subject.

I'm not sure where I stand on this. Yes, the difference is negligible, but I'm not sure I'd call quad-core processors a mistake.

[Builder]

As for fragmentation, there are literally no iOS apps that I use that aren't on Android. The reverse can't be said.

I'm not sure where I stand on this. Yes, the difference is negligible, but I'm not sure I'd call quad-core processors a mistake.

And there are literally no iOS apps I use that are on Android, especially not my favorites. 

 

About those quad cores...https://encrypted.google.com/search?hl=en&q=quad%20core%20on%20mobile%20is%20a%20mistake#hl=en&q=quad+core+on+mobile+worth+it

[Techteen14]

And there are literally no iOS apps I use that are on Android, especially not my favorites.

Unless you stick to stock Apple apps, that's borderline impossible.