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Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

techcrunch.com

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Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#461

Post by cremnob »

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #193
siglesias wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Ads of multicolored devices featuring content that matches the enclosure? Who would've thunk it? http://cl.ly/image/1U3i2F2v2r43

Those are all just staged for ads (unless you think you can't listen to the Beatles Red Album on a blue nano and vice versa) except for the latest one, which came out after the Nokia devices. I'm sure someone did it before (I seem to recall IE5 letting you change the interface to match the early iMac colours) but your comment (and a quick glance at the linked image) is misleading as it stands. http://en.wikipedia.org…

He's pointing out that Nokia's claim of copying them with colors (lol) is weak.

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#462

Post by arrrg »

crusso wrote: post #222
danabramov wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Now that Jobs is gone Seriously, what does this have to do with the point you're making?

Jobs was the entire reason that their product offering was so focused. Look back at the mess that was Apple's product offering smorgasbord before Jobs returned and took his hatchet to it. Without visionary leadership, most big companies are unable to resist the temptation to take the kitchen sink attitude toward product development. The coherence of Apple's product strategy will most likely decrease as we move furthe…

This seems more focused and less confusing than prominently selling last years’ model (which Apple has previously done).

From a consumer perspective it seem extremely hard to differentiate between different years’ iPhone models. This new clear (also visual) distinction makes it easier and provides more guidance for consumers. It’s a bit more work for Apple (what with them having to make two iPhone models every year) but for the consumer it should be much easier to understand.

The 5C stands out and makes it really clear that Apple has something that costs a bit less than their flagship. Yeah, it’s just the 5 repackaged – but I think it’s really important signalling and should make Apple’s lineup much easier to understand for consumers.

There’s still the 4S to muddy the waters, though. Ah, I guess that’s some Jobs-era legacy mess. Selling a two year old model is really lame and confusing after all :-)

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#464

Post by VeejayRampay »

bobbles wrote: post #381
VeejayRampay wrote: post #365

"According to Apple, the processor is more than twice as fast as the A6, with a 40x CPU performance bump. Graphics are said to be 56x faster." What does that even mean? I'm getting tired of claims like these. They're obviously non-sensical and groundless and they should be publicly shamed for it. But that'll never happen I guess.

2x as fast as the A6 for CPU and GPU. the 40x CPU and 56x GPU numbers are referencing the 5S against the original iPhone (as a 'look how far we've come' retrospective)

Do they mention the baseline being the iPhone 1 in the article? Anyway, thanks for the explanation.

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#465

Post by mpclark »

derefr wrote: post #341
jonhohle wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In this case, the L2 cache is part of the A7, so that would be fair. I would guess this means it's also only stored in NVRAM local to the SOC and not persisted to the general flash filesystem.

I would guess they just tacked a bog-standard TPM chip into their SoC design. Biometric (fingerprint) sensors and TPM chips go together; see any enterprise-targeted laptop from the last five years.

Quite. It'll be a little hardware black box that nobody can see into, one that just gives a 'yes' or 'no' answer.

Additionally -- if things are like they used to be when I was in the biometrics world in the mid-90s -- the fingerprint template will be small and work like a one way hash; if you have the template you cannot reconstruct the fingerprint from it. It wouldn't really be very useful to the NSA or anyone else.

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#466

Post by cheald »

logjam wrote: post #440
cheald wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're talking about it, aren't we? We haven't forgotten this issue, distracted like children by the latest shiny toy. Even in the face of the things that traditionally kill news stories, we're talking about it. Change starts by making enough people aware of and angry about the issue that the politicians can't afford to support these programs any more. If we're just distracted the next time $TECH_TOY or $NATURAL_DISAS…

Oh brother. We care about legitimate privacy issues but now you are suggesting that becoming the equivalent of the Westboro Baptist Church on these matters will somehow be effective . It won't. The adolescent libertarian smell combined with semi-hysterical, semi-supported outrage on this issue is rapidly beginning to stink.

Sigh. I'm not advocating in any way for being obnoxious douchecanoes for the sake of desperately screaming for airtime. I'm saying that this is an important issue related to the topic of discussion, and that I'm not going to let the fact that talking about it annoys some people dissuade me from talking about it.

We know that the NSA has their hooks into US hardware and software vendors. At this point, it's difficult to trust the promises that US-based companies make about security and privacy because we know that they're being compelled to lie. That's an extremely important variable in the discussion of a new piece of internet-connected hardware that collects biometrics. Dismissing discussion of it as "annoying" is juvenile and myopic.

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#467

Post by jlgreco »

logjam wrote: post #440
cheald wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're talking about it, aren't we? We haven't forgotten this issue, distracted like children by the latest shiny toy. Even in the face of the things that traditionally kill news stories, we're talking about it. Change starts by making enough people aware of and angry about the issue that the politicians can't afford to support these programs any more. If we're just distracted the next time $TECH_TOY or $NATURAL_DISAS…

Oh brother. We care about legitimate privacy issues but now you are suggesting that becoming the equivalent of the Westboro Baptist Church on these matters will somehow be effective . It won't. The adolescent libertarian smell combined with semi-hysterical, semi-supported outrage on this issue is rapidly beginning to stink.

Talking about privacy implications of a new device in a discussion about said new device is now the equivalent of picketing the funerals of soldiers because you don't like gay people?

I am a fan of hyperbole, but at least keep it coherent... At the very least, cheald is on topic while they are notoriously not.

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#468

Post by mikeash »

dragonwriter wrote: post #406
mikeash wrote: post #367

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, hackers could compromise your gym's systems, steal your fingerprint data, and then use it to... mooch off your gym membership?

Or to generate an artificial fingerprint that can fool scanners, and then use that to access an other service or data you have/use that is "secured" with fingerprint as the single authentication factor. Since fingerprints can't be changed, he more widely they are used for authentication, the more likely that they will be compromised and the less useful they are for authentication.

That's a good argument against using fingerprint scanners as the only choice for authentication. They're not very secure, because they can potentially be stolen and faked.

However, it's not at all an argument against using fingerprint scanners as an optional choice for authentication, just because the scanner could be used to steal your fingerprint.

Fingerprint theft is a problem regardless. You can't really target systems that enable that theft, because it's an ever-present risk. Instead, worry about systems which fail due to such theft.

Fingerprints are fine for a gym, because who cares if somebody fakes yours. They're fine for a smartphone for many people, because it's intended to stop casual theft, not be an impenetrable barrier. Fingerprints should definitely not be used (at least on their own) for, say, nuclear launch authorizations or other things of similar import, because they can be stolen and faked.

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#469

Post by eli »

pilif wrote: post #102
cwilson wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple specifically stated that your fingerprint is stored and encrypted only on the A7 chip, and not iCloud or anywhere else. It's mentioned in the video as well: http://www.apple.com/iphone-5s/videos/#video-touch

Yes. And how exactly do we check this? Why is it that we can still trust Apple? For all we know, the data gets sent directly to the NSA or, if it doesn't, there might be some secret backdoor that will make the device send the data at a later point. The last round of leaks was specifically talking about backdoors with all bigger US companies in order to circumvent encryption. That's what I means by "we have to conside…

If you don't trust the iPhone not to steal your fingerprints then you probably shouldn't own an iPhone -- fingerprint reader or not. I mean, that's sort of obvious, no?

Re: Apple Unveils The iPhone 5S

#470

Post by mncolinlee »

shurcooL wrote: post #400
mncolinlee wrote: post #227

Still no NFC. It's an underrated technology for pairing devices. Real investments and more hardware would follow if Apple jumped in the pool with everyone else.

Chicken and egg.

Does that make Apple the chicken in this metaphor?
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