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The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus Review: Iterating on a Flagship

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Re: The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus Review: Iterating on a Flagship

#101

Post by _0w8t »

pasta wrote: post #39
coldtea wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wish there would be more distinction between hardware and software. Just buy an iPhone and install Winedows 10 or buy a S7 and install Sailfish. That would be the antithesis of what makes the iPhone good though -- the hardware/software limited fragmentation + lock-step iterations.

But why not have the freedom to use iOS on the iPhone because you think it works best that way? A lot of people install Ubuntu on Macbooks for that reason. But right now it's very hard to install a different OS on your phone.

Do you mean MacBook Air or older MacBook Pro? Ubuntu or other Linux does not work on MacBook. There is no driver for track pad and keyboard.

Re: The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus Review: Iterating on a Flagship

#102

Post by tluyben2 »

ericd wrote: post #90
jeswin wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That reads like a comment on an Apple fansite. 1. For the same price as an iMac, you can buy a 4k display and way, way more powerful CPU, graphics and storage. 2. The superiority of the MacBook Pro is a myth, now more than ever. There are plenty of laptops today with much higher resolution and better color reproduction, and of course, Skylakes and recent GPUs. Dell XPS, Precisions, Surface Books, high-end Thinkpads,…

The missing piece in other laptops, as always, is not raw specs, but build quality, and things like a great trackpad. No one else seems to be able to nail trackpads. I really wish I could buy a different brand of laptop, but I've been spoiled by the MBP's trackpad.

I had the same feeling for years until they started making battery and memory and harddisk changes impossible. I got the chance to buy 10 second hand x220s with a bunch of unused 6 and 9 cell batteries. They give me the same feeling as you have about the quality, I run 15+ hours on them with the 9 cell, they are very cheap (I paid $80 per piece), they have excellent keyboards, they perform well for all I need them for including the latest webgl demos I have seen and, something unexpected, I cannot do without the trackpoint anymore. What a waste of muscle movement the trackpad is once you get used to the trackpoint. All a matter of taste but it also runs well enough as hackintosh and, what I like better, I can do iOS dev using OSX on qemu including installs on iOS.

Edit: but agreed, if you need a trackpad, the mb(p) beats all. The x220 trackpad is a piece of garbage and I disabled it right away.

Re: The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus Review: Iterating on a Flagship

#103

Post by gempir »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #73
nixy wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Headphone jack doesn't matter to me at all. Headphones work perfectly with the adapter that comes with the 7. The lightning ear pods also work perfectly fine. It's really a non-issue.

Can you charge and use the headphones at the same time?

Are you really that often in that situation though? I see that happen maybe like once a month or so. Sure a bit inconvenient but not a deal breaker

Re: The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus Review: Iterating on a Flagship

#104

Post by _0w8t »

op00to wrote: post #17
throwaway_45 wrote: post #13

I am surprised cell phones are still selling for 650 bucks. You can get a Chinese cell phone for 200 dollars which will do 90% of what latest apple or Samsung will do. Maybe it will be a little bit slower, but not 450 dollars slower.

When the $200 phone bursts into flames, are you able to sue the Chinese manufacturer for damages? When your $200 phone breaks, do you have to simply buy a new one rather than get it replaced? When there are security holes in your $200 phone, will the cheap skin over Android get patched? I buy Apple phones for one reason, and that's the fact that my business lives and dies through communication. With my $800 phone, I…

In Norway in Apple-certified stores you will have to wait a week or more for reparation. And they do not provide a replacement in the meantime...

Re: The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus Review: Iterating on a Flagship

#105

Post by criddell »

unethical_ban wrote: post #99
criddell wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is the price difference that significant? To me, the difference between a $1000 phone and a $400 is less than $1 per day (I keep my phones for 24 months). A buck a day is something I can afford and am willing to pay it for even a modestly better phone. I would guess a lot of HN readers are in a similar position. I wish Google would have come out with something much better even if it would have been more expensive tha…

$600 is a vacation, or more than a week's pay after taxes for me. Why would I pay $600 extra for a phone that isn't that much better? Just because you can doesn't mean you should. Hell, $600 can feed a family of four for several weeks.

If you are deciding between feeding your family or getting a phone, by all means, feed your family.

All I'm saying is if you have a little disposable income ($1 / day) then for many people a better phone is worth the price difference. I think it's especially true when you think about how many hours every day people use their phones. I can get by just fine with a 4-year old PC, but having to use a 4-year old phone would suck.

Re: The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus Review: Iterating on a Flagship

#106

Post by wtetzner »

gempir wrote: post #103
toomuchtodo wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you charge and use the headphones at the same time?

Are you really that often in that situation though? I see that happen maybe like once a month or so. Sure a bit inconvenient but not a deal breaker

I suppose people who listen to music on their phone at work might want to charge the phone while listening.

I dunno.

Re: The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus Review: Iterating on a Flagship

#107

Post by toomuchtodo »

gempir wrote: post #103
toomuchtodo wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you charge and use the headphones at the same time?

Are you really that often in that situation though? I see that happen maybe like once a month or so. Sure a bit inconvenient but not a deal breaker

> Are you really that often in that situation though?

Yeah, my phone is a business tool, and I'm on the phone frequently. Its useless if I can't be on it on wired headphones while it recharges from long phone calls.

Re: The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus Review: Iterating on a Flagship

#108

Post by coldtea »

WhitneyLand wrote: post #91
coldtea wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Moved on to wireless (2nd gen Zik Parrots, there are better wireless headphones out there, but I like those and wont buy 3 because the changes are minimal. Waiting for them to put out a Zik 4).

Don't you pay a double lossy compression penalty? 1). .mp3 or .aac throws away data 2). Transmitting over bluetooth recompesses and throws away more data I think in principle Apple could avoid one of these with AirPods if the the iPhone7 streamed .aac/.mp3 as a custom Bluetooth codec, but I haven't heard if they wen that route.

>Don't you pay a double lossy compression penalty?

Yes, in the sense that the results are doubly compressed.

No, in any meaningful sense that I would have an issue with. The headphones have the appropriate BT codecs for high definition audio (the 3 even more so, aptX et al), and the end results have been on par with my wired AT-50x.

You can try double and triple compressing a 320mbps mp3 file and you'd hardly notice any change. Of course such compression algorithms are not omni-potent, but it's close enough.

At a good enough bit rate (256 and especially 320), mp3s are indistinguishable from "CD quality" (which also throws away data in the sense that it quantizes the analog signal, but it doesn't matter there either), and all blind A/B/A tests have shown that.

In headphones that cost less than $1000, and for everyone over 40 that's even more so.

Audiophiles excepted of course, because they have magical unicorn audio senses -- even when they can't use them on a blind test.

Re: The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus Review: Iterating on a Flagship

#109

Post by my123 »

mokus wrote: post #94
ericd wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The missing piece in other laptops, as always, is not raw specs, but build quality, and things like a great trackpad. No one else seems to be able to nail trackpads. I really wish I could buy a different brand of laptop, but I've been spoiled by the MBP's trackpad.

This. The trackpad is just about the only thing keeping me on apple hardware these days, but it's a much bigger deal to me than I'd have ever expected. It seems they are the only company that can figure out how make a mobile pointing device that doesn't make me want to throw the computer at a wall.

MS nailed it with the Surface Book btw.

Re: The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus Review: Iterating on a Flagship

#110

Post by NetStrikeForce »

NetStrikeForce wrote: post #23
rimantas wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only thing that's the same is design. Yet some think that's the most important part…

> Yet some think that's the most important part… Steve Jobs definitely didn't play down that part, to the point of being as important as any other part.

Ok, I usually don't do this, but it would be good to understand why I'm being downvoted here.

Therefore it makes sense to talk about design and not downplay its importance with a comment like "Yet some think that's the most important part..."; because one of those "some" was Steve Jobs and I don't think Apple has changed its policy much in that regard.

I'm not judging if he would have released this iPhone 7 or not, I'm just saying what I've said.

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