Latest iPhone Chips to Remain Exclusive to Pro Models for iPhone 15 and Beyond

[AppleFan735]

I was already surprised when they announced that they will continue to sell a two year old M1 Air with 0% price reduction alongside a simply redesigned Air with a $200 price hike instead of just replacing the M1 Air with the redesigned M2 Air at the same price point. So this doesn’t surprise me anymore.

Selling old designs and tech at the same price point for years on end seems to be the new pricing strategy. Then sell new designs and tech of the same lineup at premium.

 

[fuchsdh]

They chalk it up to people dont want mini phones. I think that is a trend people largely prefer larger phones but the larger problem in my view there was price not the product.
$100 less than the most popular model, for what is perceived as a lot less (screen real estate).

If it was SE level in price, it would sell like hot cakes.

I think there's a couple of issues with mini phones:

*One, the showroom floor effect. Just like people are drawn to the massive, eye-popping color of certain TVs in showrooms, doesn't mean that was the best choice for them. Screen size is arguably the most obvious feature of a smartphone, especially for populations like the elderly.
*The specific compromises Apple made for the mini—namely, the 12 and 13 are the same thickness as the larger phones, so they got correspondingly worse battery life. You can make a mini that gets just as much battery life as a larger phone, you just have to make it thicker, and I think lots of people would like that tradeoff considering the mini is still much lighter and pocketable than the larger phones. But Apple doesn't wanna do that.
*Misreading the market. Some people definitely got the mini because it was the cheapest phone, but you can just listen to the entirety of the Mac podcast sphere to find many people who wanted the mini but the lack of high-end cameras and such dissuaded them. An iPhone Pro mini would hit a different market segment than the iPhone mini, and arguably could be a more profitable one. (To be fair to Apple, fitting all that stuff in a smaller chassis can probably be difficult.)

I hope Apple sees the value in releasing a mini phone every few years just so people like me that want them can time our purchases, but I wouldn't put stock in that happening. As it is, I pull my old iPhone touch out of my drawer every so often and just wish I could get an all-screen phone that small.

 

[ghanwani]

Makes sense, it’s gotten harder and harder to recommend the pro models within the past several years.
The 12 Pro over the 12 was especially difficult to recommend.
An extra $200 or so and you got… uh… a third camera, an AR sensor that no one uses, and a frosted glass back.
Processor was the same, the screen was the same, the battery was the same, refresh rate was the same, speakers were the same, charging method was the same, regular cameras were the same… It literally was such a small difference.
Makes sense that they’re trying to make the difference a lot more impressive, especially if the 14 Pro will be going up in price

And to top it all the non-Pro models were lighter in weight.

 

[KOTN91]

Apple: Go Pro or Go home. We don't have time for non Pros.

Yupp. Why do they have to make it so heavy and ugly though

 

[jamface]

So what exactly will be the difference between an iPhone 13 and 14? Will the 14 have a 3rd camera similar to the 13 pro, but lacking in all capabilities that the 14 pro/pro max will offer?

The difference will be equivalent to the typical difference between one generation and the next, minus the chip upgrade.

 

[555gallardo]

Besides processor, how was the 13 different from the 12?

You have to wait until September for that answer.

Honestly, I don't know. Even the CPU is said to be just a moderate upgrade over iP12's, with basically all the features such as Cinematic Camera and ProMotion Display are Pro-exclusive.

 

[jamface]

Is it actually a chip shortage issue or a marketing plan?

Both

 

[_Spinn_]

This feels like a terrible mistake. Should be interesting to see why anyone would buy the non-Pro iPhone 14 this year compared to just getting an iPhone 13 right now. Besides the larger screen on the one iPhone 14 model I don't see any reason why people would want to upgrade.

 

[IsaacM]

I think at one point Apple will have to add the 3rd camera to the base iPhone because all competition will have it and then they will have a hard time getting people to upsell to the Pro iPhone.

This way they are preparing the customer base to upgrade for the better chip and not for the camera.

 

[darngooddesign]

I think at one point Apple will have to add the 3rd camera to the base iPhone because all competition will have it and then they will have a hard time getting people to upsell to the Pro iPhone.

This way they are preparing the customer base to upgrade for the better chip and not for the camera.

They could add the third camera to the base when they add a periscope zoom to the Pro.

 

[Sir_Macs_A_Lot]

I don't have a problem with this...just hope the 14 Pro has something substantial more to offer current 13 Pro users than a slightly faster chip and a new mid-model color.

 

[Velli]

It just occurred to me that this makes a good argument for not making a 14 mini. Whatever advantages the 14 has over the 13 may not carry over well to a smaller phone, so the difference between 13 mini and an imaginary 14 mini would be small. So mini fans (like me) still has a pretty decent option, only at 100USD less than last year.

 

[dk001]

Is it actually a chip shortage issue or a marketing plan?

More money in the piggy bank plan.

 

[Thebrochure]

Just go back to one iPhone model a year like the way things were run when Jobs was still in charge. This segregation model is way too car-salesmen and underhanded for me. I hate it.

 

[jav6454]

I

Sad to see, but it makes sense if Apple's differentiation strategy.

Though YoY changes in the chip don't meant much for most consumers, this makes sense.

Trickle down is the latest strategy.

Agreed, the strategy to use same chips in different phone lines makes no sense. Especially more so now that processors can easily sustain performance for at least 3 years without any pregnancies degradation with newer software upgrades.

 

[SactoGuy18]

Now you wonder if Apple is contemplating the A16 SoC with 8 GB of RAM for the iPhone 14 Pro.

 

[Darth Tulhu]

I really think we're at a point where this doesn't matter on the consumer side, at least.

As far as I'm concerned, the iPhone's capabilities have FAR surpassed what I do with it LONG ago.

That said, Tim Cook is an 'excellent' penny-pincher AND up-seller, so this rumor sounds true.

 

[nwcs]

It's been proven in cameras that downsampling a higher res file reduces noise and increases detail compared to the native lower res file..

This is a good discussion on why that is not exactly the last word: https://www.sansmirror.com/newsview...ber-2019-mirrorl/more-sampling-is-always.html

 

[darngooddesign]

This is a good discussion on why that is not exactly the last word: https://www.sansmirror.com/newsview...ber-2019-mirrorl/more-sampling-is-always.html

None of that actually talks about 48MP downsampled to 12MP vs 12MP.

Here's nice video that touches on the low light aspect.

DPReview TV: Why lower resolution sensors are not better in low light

A common belief in the camera world is that lower resolution cameras – and larger pixels – perform better in low light. In this video we illustrate why you should question that bit of conventional wisdom.

www.dpreview.com

*edit*
Here are two samples from my camera which was set to manual focus and self timer. I then downsampled the high res in Photoshop with no additional sharpening and did a 100% crop of both. Even though it was only downsampled 50%, which is less that what the phone would do, you can see that the black edges are sharper than the native low res photo.

Low Res

High Res, downsampled by 50%

 

[Lakersfan74]

Why would anyone buy a 6.1” iPhone 14 over an iPhone 13?

Why would Apple even make a 6.1” iPhone 14?

Maybe 14 has a better color option they prefer over the 13? A 14 will still be less old compared to a 13 as the years go on

 

[femike]

To get the latest chip phone with the latest features will $2700 here! I hope Apple is planing minimal support length of 10 years.
Apple really is just following any other greedy corporation under Tim Cook. Its following all their standard procedures. Will support duration for the cheap phones will be shortened? And future feature adoption rate will be reduced to a trickle then.

 

[The Game 161]

no surprises really they are trying to make the pro models the ones to get.

 

[Lakersfan74]

Makes sense, it’s gotten harder and harder to recommend the pro models within the past several years.
The 12 Pro over the 12 was especially difficult to recommend.
An extra $200 or so and you got… uh… a third camera, an AR sensor that no one uses, and a frosted glass back.
Processor was the same, the screen was the same, the battery was the same, refresh rate was the same, speakers were the same, charging method was the same, regular cameras were the same… It literally was such a small difference.
Makes sense that they’re trying to make the difference a lot more impressive, especially if the 14 Pro will be going up in price

Pro has 2gb more Ram than non Pro

 

[nwcs]

None of that actually talks about 48MP downsampled to 12MP vs 12MP.

Here's nice video that touches on the low light aspect.

DPReview TV: Why lower resolution sensors are not better in low light

A common belief in the camera world is that lower resolution cameras – and larger pixels – perform better in low light. In this video we illustrate why you should question that bit of conventional wisdom.

www.dpreview.com

*edit*
Here are two samples from my camera which was set to manual focus and self timer. I then downsampled the high res in Photoshop with no additional sharpening and did a 100% crop of both. Even though it was only downsampled 50%, which is less that what the phone would do, you can see that the black edges are sharper than the native low res photo.

Low Res
View attachment 2026920

High Res, downsampled by 50%
View attachment 2026921

I don’t have the time or inclination to debate. For the same sensor generation with only sampling being different there is not going to be a dramatic change when the larger sample is downsized to the same size as the smaller one. Believe whomever you read. It is an extremely minor issue of importance.

 

[teh_hunterer]

Then what's the point of the iPhone 14?
It would make more sense if Apple literally would just release iPhone 14 Pro with A16, and then an iPhone 13 Max with A15, so the lineup will be 13 mini, 13, 13 Max, 14 Pro, 14 Pro Max. That would make more sense.

By that logic, you could ask what is the point of any Android phone either since their chips are worse than the A15. Who knows how Apple will differentiate the 14 from the 13 though, and whether or not that will be enough.

There is no justification for Apple to even manufacture an iPhone 14 then.

I’ve never bought a Plus or Max model, it seems like I will never again but an iPhone the year it’s released. There is simply no reason to. Why would anyone buy an iPhone 14 this year? Why would anyone buy an iPhone 15 next year?

Then there's no reason for Android phones to be manufactured since they aren't more powerful than the current iPhone?