iPhone Air • Hacker News Board

Re: iPhone Air

#141

Post by rplnt » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 6:36 PM UTC

whichdan wrote: post #62

o_m wrote: post #53

This will be the replacement for my iPhone 13 mini. Although I wish they would make another mini instead.

I wonder if the thinner profile will make it more comfortable in smaller hands (both in terms of reach and center-of-gravity), but I'm skeptical.

It's actually not that thinner (1.9mm compared to 12 mini) so I doubt it will. And it definitely can't make for the huge size difference (134mm of extra width).

Re: iPhone Air

#142

Post by yalogin » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 6:36 PM UTC

As much as I want this to succeed because Apple makes great products, I don't know who asked for it. People have voted unanimously with their wallets that bigger screens with longer battery life is what they want. The trend to thin down phones stopped around iPhone 8 or so, when the big screen was introduced. Since then we have seen many cycles where the phones got bulkier with larger batteries and screens. No one complained.

Re: iPhone Air

#143

Post by rich_sasha » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 6:37 PM UTC

I'm always impressed how Apple can name so many products with so few words. Recycling Mac[Book] / Pad / Pod, Air, Pro, and 'i' (hardly even a word) gives you basically their whole product lineup. iPad Pro, MacBook Air, AirPods, iPhone Air, iMac Pro. AirTag must be the only one that has a unique word in it.

Re: iPhone Air

#144

Post by JBiserkov » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 6:37 PM UTC

browningstreet wrote: post #55

StephenSmith wrote: post #45

Who actually wants a thinner iPhone?

It's half a folding phone.. they did the R&D, might as well offer it as a halo product.

It's 1/3 of a folding phone, the Huawei XT / XTs is the benchmark to beat ;-)

https://www.gsmarena.com/huawei_mate_xt_ultimate-review-2808...

Re: iPhone Air

#145

Post by diddid » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 6:37 PM UTC

iPhones last killer feature was usbc. These are all good and appreciated upgrades for someone with no phone, but my wallet is happy none of it is really that interesting and enough to warrant an upgrade. Right now I don’t know what they could do to get me to want to. Folding? Even more zoom? Even more battery? Return of the headphone jack???? I won’t lie, a headphone jack might…

Re: iPhone Air

#146

Post by hu3 » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 6:38 PM UTC

intothemild wrote: post #66

"a breakthrough design" They copied pixel.

It really looks like a Pixel:

https://store.google.com/product/pixel_10_pro

To be fair, their announcements where close apart. There's a chance Pixel copied iPhone.

Re: iPhone Air

#147

Post by amluto » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 6:39 PM UTC

dwedge wrote: post #52

I guess Apple finally listened to all the people saying they want a smaller phone, and totally misunderstood what that meant

They nailed it. Big horizontal dimensions so it’s hard to hold in one hand (yes, I realize that many users want this, but many users don’t want this), a big thick camera so it doesn’t actually fit well in slim pockets (but lots of young people seem to like their phone sticking out of their pocket?!), and super thin everywhere else so a high capacity battery doesn’t fit. Nice job!

Seriously, Apple has not attempted a narrow high-end phone since the iPhone 5. The 12 and 13 minis were not positioned as premium phones and they did not have great cameras or battery life. If Apple had tried for a 13 Pro Mini and it didn’t sell, then maybe I’d believe that their market statistics were worth something.

Re: iPhone Air

#148

Post by minimaxir » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 6:39 PM UTC

The bumper is back! I was one of the weirdos who liked it unironically for the iPhone 4 back in the day, antennagate prevention aside.

https://www.apple.com/shop/product/MH004ZM/A/iphone-air-bump...

It's $39, but if it's indeed rigid as the description implies, then it may be a legit option for drop protection without compromising the thinness.

Re: iPhone Air

#149

Post by astrange » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 6:39 PM UTC

aurareturn wrote: post #58

It has A19 Pro. A19 Pro has matmul acceleration in its GPU, the equivalent of Nvidia's Tensor cores. This would make future Macs extremely viable for local LLMs. Currently, Macs have high memory bandwidth and high VRAM capacity but low prompt processing speeds. Give it a large context and it'll take forever before the first token is generated. If the M5 generation gets this GPU upgrade, which I don't see why not, the…

A19 supports MTE: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45186265

Which is a very powerful feature for anyone who likes security or finding bugs in their code. Or other people's code. Even if you didn't really want to find them.

Re: iPhone Air

#150

Post by elAhmo » Tue, Sep 09, 2025, 6:39 PM UTC

My old 13 pro is quite thin and uncomfortable to hold in hand without a case. Why would someone push so hard for a thinner phone? Boosting about extra battery if SIM slot is removed, while doing insane over-engineering to shave a few millimeters is quite a tell.

I know Apple is super successful and will have another great set of quarters, but this is quite disappointing.