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iPhone Air

apple.com

971–980 of 1001 posts

Re: iPhone Air

#971
post #167

"Impossibly thin" is right in line with Patrick McGee's "Apple in China" who argues that the main reason for Apple's designs is to keep imitators at bay by introducing manufacturing challenges that only they can meet. Indeed impossible at the time of release. One generation after the other. He estimates this gains them about 6 months of headway. Tough world. (Yes, to be fair, there is more to this new phone than just…

The only thing where Apple is consistently ahead of the rest of the industry is the processor.

Re: iPhone Air

#972
post #187

Can someone that is actually interested in this explain the appeal? Thin on its own I get but thin with a giant bump 100% defeats the whole point for me. Seems clear at this point there is little hope of them engineering their way into thin cameras.

> Can someone that is actually interested in this explain the appeal?

It looks really cool

Yeah, it has a bump. Thicker phones have a bump too. It's still less volume in your pocket.

Also, it looks really cool.

Re: iPhone Air

#973

Clearly there is a disconnect between what commenters want and what actually sells.

Yes; the mini phones never sold very well, yet there are always commenters that ask for it. There are no small phones on the market, even the asus zenphone - which used to be the best compact android - is just a big phone now.

I searched the gsmarena and it only lists 3 modern phones:

- Sony Xperia 10 VI

- Sharp Aquos sense8

- Ulefone Armor Mini

With the last one being the only one that is actually small, the former are just "not that big".

Re: iPhone Air

#974

When a phone costs north of 1000USD something is terribly wrong. 99% of "modern" phone use is basically (doom) scrolling, browsing the web, using core apps (like maps) for directions, taking pictures and finally communicating with whatsapp and making the odd/rare old school phone call. This should not require spending 1000-1500USD on a phone. Im doing all of the above with a iPhone SE for what i paid like 300-350USD…

As you point out, it doesn't require it. Your comment is like complaining about luxury handbags when cheap ones exist too. I don't know what you're suggesting. Companies shouldn't make expensive versions of things even when there are consumers who want to buy them? You should also realize that it's people buying the expensive versions of things that helps subsidize the cheaper ones made by the same company. And it's…

Well i would never have a 50,000 dollar bag (like those red-carpet people do), so why have a 1500 phone? Is it just a status symbol? A phone!

Re: iPhone Air

#975
I love the new colors, especially Sky Blue but why do I need my phone to be wafer thin? It's an engineering marvel, and I'm definitely not complaining, but it just seems odd to make every part of the phone except the top part where the camera resides as thin as possible.

I would have gladly taken uniform thickness and a bigger battery or better transceivers any day of the week and twice on Sunday. Call me a Philistine, but all I really want out of my phone is its ability as a communications device (voice, video, email, SMS, etc) and a GPS. I spend so much time in front of a computer, that by the end of the day I want to unplug myself and touch grass.

Either way, big respect to some former undergrad classmates of mine at Apple who may have played a role in this. This new generation of Apple devices is bringing back color and personality, and I'm all for it. Same for ever-improving FaceTime cameras. The camera on the front is more important to me than the one on the back.

Re: iPhone Air

#976
post #531
post #187

Can someone that is actually interested in this explain the appeal? Thin on its own I get but thin with a giant bump 100% defeats the whole point for me. Seems clear at this point there is little hope of them engineering their way into thin cameras.

It's also not actually that much more lightweight, compared to the 6.1" iPhones.

People who have held it have said the slightly lesser weight and the slightly lesser depth combine to make it feel like a much bigger difference.

Re: iPhone Air

#977
post #187

Can someone that is actually interested in this explain the appeal? Thin on its own I get but thin with a giant bump 100% defeats the whole point for me. Seems clear at this point there is little hope of them engineering their way into thin cameras.

I think they are appealing to the Razor crowd /s

Hey, that was me at one time! But the iPhone’s technology advantages put me in the road to bigger and thicker phones.

Re: iPhone Air

#978

I have an iPhone 13 mini, just replaced the battery. If you want my money, give me an iPhone 17 mini with small width and height, I don't care about it being thinner like the Air. Also, no AI ruining the image quality of the expensive camera. I saw examples of a consumer-grade digital camera vs an iPhone 16 and the latter introduced "hotdog skin" effect and other effects that made the photos look over-processed.

I know that the iPhone Mini users are few but vocal. Instead of a yearly refresh of the mini, they should do a run every 5 years or so. Make a bunch, sell out of inventory by year 3, make a new one year 5 with updates matching the spec/price de jour. It's like a LTR (Long term release) iPhone. I know there are Apple Engineers lurking here, start the whisper campaign!

I’m not sure this makes sense on a purely hardware sales sense but with Apple moving toward increasing software profits by ecosystem users, it would seem to make sense to do a long release cycle phone to expand the ecosystem. The iPhone Mini might not justify manufacture on its own, but 30-40 million extra Apple One purchasers might.

Re: iPhone Air

#979

It is quite telling when they boast about the battery life of the other models, but the Air is just "All day battery life", and then immediately announce their magsafe power bank 20 seconds later in the broadcast!

It has better battery life than the iPhone 16 - was that terrible?

Re: iPhone Air

#980
post #791

Can't be just me who feels underwhelmed by the announcements yesterday? I can't imagine why they prioritise making thinner iPhones at the expense of longer battery life.

Because longer battery life comes at the expense of heavier phones and lots of people think the current phones are too heavy already.
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