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The iPhone X phones are all quite expensive, so if you could attach a monitor, mouse and keyboard and have a full desktop computer would make absolutely sense. Or imagine something looking like a MacBook, but just having screen, keyboard, mousepad and a slot where you plug in your phone. (With a desktop, it's fine to have the phone on the table, but with a laptop-like design, you'd want the phone stashed away in a safe place, so you can use just the laptop).

I think this might all become reality once Apple has a good number of iOS apps optimised for desktop use. Currently this is "optimised for desktop on x86-64/macOS", but once that's done they just add another switch "optimised for desktop on arm/iOS".
Assuming Apple transitions from Intel to ARM CPUs for the Mac platform, it would actually be “optimized for desktop on ARM/MacOS. The same MacOS we have now. But running on a different architecture, as Apple has done twice before.
 
It's not about the tech company but its potential customers.

iPhone and Windows both skipped 9 supposedly because 9 is an unlucky number in Japan, although it could have been for other reasons too.

Even your username references ancient superstition surrounding numbers.
Well, Apple did release the iPhone 4, and the number 4 is uber bad luck in Chinese and Japanese culture.
 
Though the Dex experience is suboptimal, I can easily envision an iPhone that switches effectively from iOS when handheld, then to full-blown MacOS when used with monitor/keyboard/mouse.

Maybe it’s three years out but of course it’s completely feasible, technically. Obviously it isn’t going to match a higher wattage CPU in sustained performance. But it would be well suited to MS Office-like, bursty and other less demanding workloads. (Similar to the 12” MacBook.)

Sure, it's an interesting vision (like I said, Ubuntu and Microsoft have also had it). It's also possible existing approaches were basically sound, but slightly ahead of their time.

For now, Apple seems to prefer the different approach of Continuity — separate devices that try to smoothly exchange information, with several levels of iteration (Handoff, then Universal Clipboard later on, soon Sidecar).
 
I can’t believe they will put an upgraded A12 in the new XR as the fact that the XR had the same processor as the XS and the XS Max was a major factor in making it the best seller. If they don’t do the same this time then it might not make it as successful as the old one.
 
I can’t believe they will put an upgraded A12 in the new XR as the fact that the XR had the same processor as the XS and the XS Max was a major factor in making it the best seller. If they don’t do the same this time then it might not make it as successful as the old one.
Uh, what? This is a new processor.
 
I can’t believe they will put an upgraded A12 in the new XR as the fact that the XR had the same processor as the XS and the XS Max was a major factor in making it the best seller. If they don’t do the same this time then it might not make it as successful as the old one.
It's the same SoC for all new iPhones I think.
 
I realize that the iPhone XR successor may be in some ways (camera, screen) a step down even from the original iPhone X (or at least a lateral move as the XR tech improves), but for me I think it may be a real consideration as a previous 6 Plus and 7 Plus owner for a slightly wider screen (I think in many ways that the XR size is the sweet spot in the lineup) as the X can feel a bit small. While I know the XS Max is about the same body size as the prior Plus models, I don’t really want to go putting something of that size back in my pocket all the time and with iPhones now full screen I can’t imagine the top of the XS Max is all that easy to use one handed.

I'm still on my 8+, so I'm right there with ya but double check those dim's. The physical size of the XR is < 2mm narrower and < 7mm shorter. It's mainly the screen that's smaller. And the resolution of that screen is smaller than than the XS. Choosing between these 3 phones is a paradox of choice for sure.
 
I'm still on my 8+, so I'm right there with ya but double check those dim's. The physical size of the XR is < 2mm narrower and < 7mm shorter. It's mainly the screen that's smaller. And the resolution of that screen is smaller than than the XS. Choosing between these 3 phones is a paradox of choice for sure.
I haven’t checked out the XR in person really and with the 2019 edition about to drop, obviously will wait on the new dim’s, screen type and res specs before considering. Thanks for the heads up. Good idea to compare to the X for res and to the X and older Plus models for body comparison.
 
I think most iPhone users would gladly trade the processing power for a cheaper iPhone price.
XR and its younger brother.

The XR displays as much on-screen information as the XS Max and has the same SoC, but is much, much cheaper, particularly if you want more than 64 GB.

It's unlikely Apple will be able to do anything with those higher Geekbench scores that any of the Android flagship smartphones can't do.
The SoC upgrades are likely partially for the camera, AR, gaming etc.

That along with the RAM upgrades also are good for device longevity.
 
By having 33% more cores ;)

Most apps and especially websites will benefit more from single-core. Almost zero apps will use the 855’s eight cores.
It's a big-little architecture. Four small cores are generally reserved for low power mode. There are advantages for both 2 and 4 big core architectures. You are correct about the web browser scenarios although Chrome and Mozilla browsers now support some forms of multithreading in their rendering engines. On the other hand, having very power hungry cores may be one reason why Apple screw up the power management in the infamous case where they had to introduce throttling in older phone models because the phones were crashing because of power usage spikes when the battery charge levels were still at above 30%.
 
It's a big-little architecture. Four small cores are generally reserved for low power mode. There are advantages for both 2 and 4 big core architectures. You are correct about the web browser scenarios although Chrome and Mozilla browsers now support some forms of multithreading in their rendering engines. On the other hand, having very power hungry cores may be one reason why Apple screw up the power management in the infamous case where they had to introduce throttling in older phone models because the phones were crashing because of power usage spikes when the battery charge levels were still at above 30%.

Say what? Apple cores are more efficient that anything ARM, Samsung or Qualcomm have. Anandtech has already proven this with their extensive deep dive into all three processors. Some quotes:

"Apple’s small cores are just such an incredible contrast here: Even though the absolute power isn’t that much bigger than the Cortex A55 cores, the Tempest and Mistral cores are 2.5x faster than an A55, which also results in energy efficiency that is around 2x better."

"Apple’s SoCs have better energy efficiency than all recent Android SoCs while having a nearly 2x performance advantage. I wouldn’t be surprised that if we were to normalise for energy used, Apple would have a 3x performance lead."

Seriously, where do you come up with this stuff?
 
Say what? Apple cores are more efficient that anything ARM, Samsung or Qualcomm have. Anandtech has already proven this with their extensive deep dive into all three processors. Some quotes:

"Apple’s small cores are just such an incredible contrast here: Even though the absolute power isn’t that much bigger than the Cortex A55 cores, the Tempest and Mistral cores are 2.5x faster than an A55, which also results in energy efficiency that is around 2x better."

"Apple’s SoCs have better energy efficiency than all recent Android SoCs while having a nearly 2x performance advantage. I wouldn’t be surprised that if we were to normalise for energy used, Apple would have a 3x performance lead."

Seriously, where do you come up with this stuff?

I was talking about the big cores. The excerpt you quoted is about the small cores. The simple scenario where Apple CPU may be at disadvantage is when the CPU needs to use a single BIG core. Apple's BIG core is way bigger than Qualcomm's BIG core and probably is more power hungry. But again, any design involves tradeoffs.
 
I was talking about the big cores. The excerpt you quoted is about the small cores. The simple scenario where Apple CPU may be at disadvantage is when the CPU needs to use a single BIG core. Apple's BIG core is way bigger than Qualcomm's BIG core and probably is more power hungry. But again, any design involves tradeoffs.

No, the one excerpt is about the small cores. The other is about the SoC overall.

Yes Apples big cores can take more power when running wide open, but they are still more efficient than anything else on the market when you compare power consumed to work performed.
 
""there's nothing obviously wrong with the result."

One thing obviously wrong with it is that it appears to reflect LPDDR4 at the exact same speed as today's iPhone.
This is not absolutely dispositive (Apple could be avoiding LPDDR5 because not enough can be supplied to meet their needs) but it is a red flag.

It is also possible that, with rebranding higher-end iPhones as iPhone Pro, Apple will feel free to provide more differences between them, especially when this is forced on them. So, eg the iPhone Pro could get the limited supplies of LPDD5, while the iPhone XRnext gets LPDDR4.
It's not clear how much segmentation for the SoC itself makes sense (as opposed to eg RAM and flash) but one can imagine ways they might do it: For example THIS phone could be getting what is essentially a slightly faster A12 (maybe a few bug fixes, nothing more), while the Pro phone gets the real A13. (cf the way iPads are split into the Pro models that get the super cool SoC, and the non Pro models get a phone SoC).
Then next year the mid-range iPhones (ie iPhone XRnext_next) gets A13 while iPhone Pro gets A14.

A business model like this actually makes a whole lot of sense...
 
And that's why Android tablets are garbage - nobody takes them seriously. The iPad Pro and Apple making specialized SoCs for tablets is why we have all sorts of useful software on iPads that doesn't exist on Android (like Adobe bringing over full-blown Photoshop to the iPad). Just because Android tablets are useless doesn't make the iPad useless.

Your example of "all sorts of useful software" is an app that doesn't even exist yet?

Being specialised is why it took until 2019 for an iPad to even connect to an external hard drive, while Android tablets have fully featured OSs.
 
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Your example of "all sorts of useful software" is an app that doesn't even exist yet?
If you're talking about Photoshop, it's been in beta since last year. There have even been Photoshop for iPad previews published already.

I suspect the release version is going to be announced in the next 1-2 months, at either the September event, or else a separate October/November event.

BTW, LumaFusion on the iPad is making major inroads. There is nothing even remotely comparable on the Android side.
 
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Your example of "all sorts of useful software" is an app that doesn't even exist yet?

Being specialised is why it took until 2019 for an iPad to even connect to an external hard drive, while Android tablets have fully featured OSs.

I mentioned Photoshop because I know it’s a sore point for many who pretend the iPad is a “toy”. Even without Photoshop iOS is still light years ahead of Android on tablets. We currently have Apps like Pixelmator, Affinity or Procreate, which have nothing on Android that’s even close. Also LumaFusion mentioned above.

But hey, if you think there are comparable Apps on Android then why not list them?
 
I mentioned Photoshop because I know it’s a sore point for many who pretend the iPad is a “toy”. Even without Photoshop iOS is still light years ahead of Android on tablets. We currently have Apps like Pixelmator, Affinity or Procreate, which have nothing on Android that’s even close. Also LumaFusion mentioned above.

But hey, if you think there are comparable Apps on Android then why not list them?

Adobe Premiere Clip
FilmoraGo
KineMaster
PowerDirector
Aviary Photo Editor
Bonfire
Snapseed
 
Standalone Apple Watch already exist when it debuted with Series 3 using cellular capabilities.... You can easily keep you’re iPhone at home while answering calls or text when traveling away from home. I do it as much as I can... I highly doubt Apple creates a Apple Watch that isn’t tied to the iPhone.

Think of it as iMessage, whereas it locks users to the iPhone... Apple Watch tied to the iPhone, gives a similar approach to iMessage... locks in the user.

Being able to briefly untether your watch is a FAR cry from it being “standalone”!
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204641
The instructions for updating it begin with “make sure your iPhone is on the latest version.
Standalone would imply that you could own and use an Apple Watch, WITHOUT owning/using an iPhone... which you simply cannot.
It is my understanding that the Apple Watch doesn’t have its own # registered on a network or anything, rather it does a fancy “cloning” of your iPhone SIM & passes the calls/messages/notifications sent to that device... so, if you canceled service on your iPhone, your Apple Watch would not do that anymore.
That is, by definition, a companion device (with limited autonomy), again... NOT a standalone device.
 
Being able to briefly untether your watch is a FAR cry from it being “standalone”!
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT204641
The instructions for updating it begin with “make sure your iPhone is on the latest version.
Standalone would imply that you could own and use an Apple Watch, WITHOUT owning/using an iPhone... which you simply cannot.
It is my understanding that the Apple Watch doesn’t have its own # registered on a network or anything, rather it does a fancy “cloning” of your iPhone SIM & passes the calls/messages/notifications sent to that device... so, if you canceled service on your iPhone, your Apple Watch would not do that anymore.
That is, by definition, a companion device (with limited autonomy), again... NOT a standalone device.

I already tried to explain it. I was accused of "lying" and "taking things out of context" just for copy pasting Apple's own website. Good luck.
 
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