Apple has historically made a big deal out of long battery life in its portable devices. I think, if the battery is going to remain relatively small, this must indicate that the device will be very efficient.
We are getting to the point with smartphones where higher specs - more cores, better GPUs, more vRAM, are starting to show minimal returns. The 4S is significantly more powerful than the 4 but, when the most popular apps are messaging services, skype, Tiny Wings and a bunch of note taking and organisational apps, the difference rarely shows up to the end user. Even when you do play high end games, does anyone feel that the graphics in games like Infinity Blade are poor? Does Real Racing 2 look ugly to you? The current hardware still has lots of potential - Real Racing 3 looks amazing and that will be running on the hardware currently in the 4S and 3rd Gen iPad. There's no need to ramp things up even more - after all, this is still a smartphone, not a home console or a laptop. People don't need quad core CPUs to read e-books, play Angry Birds and watch YouTube clips. But a slimmer device with good battery life? That's something that we can all appreciate.
I think Apple's new iPhone will eschew faster, bigger and more powerful and, instead, opt for slimmer, lighter and more efficient. If you're looking for an iPhone you can boast to your friends about and compare GeekBench scores, this isn't the phone for you. Wait, what am I thinking, people who boast about GeekBench scores don't have any friends! 😉
If we assume the new iPhone will carry the smaller, 32nm A5 chip and will include the lower powered IGZO screen and the new generation LTE chipsets, then it's reasonable to think that the battery life on this device will be better than on the 4S while increasing performance a modest amount within a smaller, lighter product. Think about it this way, Apple refused to have LTE early on precisely because the battery life would be badly impacted. They made the same choice about 3G on the first iPhone. Do you really think that same company would go ahead and design a device with terrible battery life? That just doesn't make sense.
#MissingThePoint
Slimmer and lighter has absolutely nothing to do with being "more efficient." They're literally two different topics that are relatively unrelated.
You want more efficient? How about being able to efficiently manage power so that my phone can stay on for over a day? And I'd like more efficient speeds (like 4G LTE) without sacrificing battery life. I know that's a lot to ask (it's not), but don't tell me that a thinner phone is better than either of those. I fail to see a purpose for having a thinner phone at all, quite frankly. Apple opted out of 4G LTE for the 4S and that battery life still sucks, so I fail to see where the worthwhile tradeoff took place. Not to mention the Droid RAZR Maxx absolutely pummeling the 4S in terms of battery life and thinness. If they figured out a way to do it, and Apple procures only a marginally better battery this time around, people have a right to be upset. If you think Apple has revolutionized the 4G LTE chipsets, you're just wrong. It's still a battery hog, and that tiny battery being forced to power an even bigger Retina Display to boot has the potential to be disastrous.
And if you think that quad core processors have nothing to do with battery saving, then you literally don't know what you're talking about. While the results vary and experts agree and disagree on the implementation of quad core chips and their ability to save battery, the results aren't minimal at all. Quad core processors are more efficient, and can deliver an overall better experience when the OS is optimized to utilize them properly. So when you're playing Angry Birds or whatever fun games people play nowadays, your phone works even LESS than it did, saving you more battery. If you want efficiency, you should laud speed improvements that can slice load times in half.
I've got plenty of friends, and I'll still run benchmarks on a phone, donk. It's called following up on company claims and ensuring that what I've paid for is worth the price I'm paying for it. If the performance sucks, then why the hell would I buy the phone when there are viable options out there with better battery life, bigger screens, faster processors and yes, thinner bodies? Those same "losers" who run those scores actually protect you and plenty of other blind, ill-informed, zombie-like consumers from getting duped out of your money. You should be thanking them, not bashing them.
I do work on my phone all day, and I'm constantly on the move, so why wouldn't I want better battery life? Because let me tell you, sending off lots of emails and writing articles throughout the day with the screen on constantly kills the battery. And it's frustrating having to carry around a connector just in case the phone dies. Who wants to do that?
The company DID design a phone with terrible battery life, and it's the 4S. And plenty of other phones do it too, but to think Apple is exempt from the rule is stupid.
