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  • boozed - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    "The Apple iphone maximum excess"

    Sounds about right.
  • SaolDan - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    Mobile phone prices are out of control
  • StormyParis - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    Nope. Apple, maybe flagship in general, prices are out of crontrol. It's never been cheaper to get a delightful phone, ie a perfectly price-controled $150 Xiaomi redmi Note 5. People can choose to spend more, but reasons to do so, especially objective reasons, are very few.

    There's very little a $800+ flagship can do than a $150 Redmi Note 5 can't: AR/VR, Music creation (requires iOS), low-light pics.. I'd say that's it for the objective stuff. Flagships are now luxury phones, not premium phones.
  • serendip - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    $300 for a Poco F1 with a flagship chip and mostly flagship internals. There's no way I'm spending $999 on a phone.
  • V900 - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    Flagship chip = iPhone 7 performance roughly.

    Also no way in heck I’m getting a phone named “Poco”.
  • Dragonstongue - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    got me a remi 5 plus "global" around 2.5 months ago and besides a few "quirks" is perfect in pretty much every way.

    I wish could easily swap the battery because they eventually die, but phone, charger, screen protector and case all told $356 (tax and ship) is pretty decent price, considering is that much better then the previous phone I had Moto G4 Play which ended up costing me roughly the same price overall.

    I seriously do not get Apple (or Ngreedia) want to charge big bucks for things that are at most "slightly" better then previous versions, but end up being worse in many ways, mostly in the cost department...in Apple case, they build them in such a way to make sure you cannot easily repair or replace anything on them, and these days, require service places to "destroy" instead of "repair"

    pricing is totally out of control, these things are being priced above most laptops etc that arguably have much more specs to back them up, and a battery that you can replace as you see fit ^.^
  • EnzoFX - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    Exactly. This is the age of the lavish smartphone, the uber premium. These are not really intended for everyone. The market isn't there anymore, not the one that feels the need for the upgrade.

    Came in here just for the 120hz.. Not the display itself? Oh well.
    Are the panels still samsung? Don't want to beta test an LG =P.
  • MonkeyPaw - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    Go to Apple's refurb store. You can get what will look like a brand new iPhone 7 32GB, with 1 year warranty and AppleCare eligible for $379. I've purchased 2 refurb devices from Apple (iMac, iPad), and you'd never know that either device wasn't new. Cutting edge? No, but a very nice iPhone for under $400.
  • V900 - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    I’d be careful with Apple Refurbs.

    You know the iPhones that had problems with “Touch sickness” and the no service issue on iPhone 7?

    That’s where some of the refurbs come from. But instead of replacing the motherboard they give it a fix that could end up being temporary.
  • Cellar Door - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    You have absolutely no idea what you are talking about - not just in this comment but any of them.
  • bull2760 - Thursday, September 20, 2018 - link

    You obviously know nothing about Apple refurb service and are just spouting off at the mouth, in this case the keyboard. Post proof about their refurb service to show everyone. I have purchased 2 refurbs direct from Apple and never had a lick problems with either. If you don't like Apple products don't buy them simple. Good thing Apple doesn't listen to the peeps on this blog or their stock would be in the shitter. Everyone complained about the iPhone X price last year and Apple sold record numbers of them.
  • beginner99 - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    The parallels to Nvidia pricing seem obvious. Huge increases over short time span. I feel the amount of people being able to afford and justify this is rather limited even in the west. Also they basically have scared away many previous iPhone users that liked the smaller size. The could capture a huge market by offering a 4th smaller model or probably easier just make the Xr smaller, max 5".
  • V900 - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    Agree on a smaller iPhone, no bigger than the iPhone 8 being needed.

    I don’t get the hubbub about Nvidia though. They’ve released a solid upgrade of a GPU that isn’t just faster but also offers new features.

    Of course there is a small price increase. The people who want one, will be willing to pay for it, and for everyone else, prices will come down in 6 months to a year.
  • MrSpadge - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    No, no, one size fits all in iWorld!
    (and XS is obviously the smallest, as in "extra small cloth")
  • Ktracho - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    Looking at the prices, who is going to want just 64 GB on their iPhone Xs? So then, the price immediately jumps to $1149 and $1249, respectively, for the iPhone Xs and Xs Max. Compare that to the iPhone Xr, where you might argue that the true starting price (to make a fair comparison) is $799, which means the premium of the Xs is $350-$450, though who am I to argue whether that kind of premium is worth it, or whether the iPhone Xr is a definitely a bargain?
  • Qasar - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    any yet... there are people that will STILL spend this kind of money on a phone... even line up for HOURS on release day to do it.. and its a wonder why apple keeps making record profits ?? bah.. not me.. they can keep these over priced phones.... and just for a bit more storage, yet.. the micro SD cards..are what 1/4 the price that apple charges for the increase in storage....
  • varase - Sunday, September 16, 2018 - link

    I was up at 1:45 AM CDT, confirmed my preapproved selection at 2:01 AM for delivery on the 21st

    No lines for me.

    As for storage, it's half a terabyte of NVMe storage - not really in the same class as what you get with your storage card.
  • Dr. Swag - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    I mean for most people 64gb is more than enough.
  • beginner99 - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    True. I'm still on 32 gb (not iphone) and it's mostly ok. now and then I need to free some space by moving pics and movies taken to my PC but in essence that isn't all that bad as it actually forces me to create a backup which else I might not.
  • bogda - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    64GB storage with no microSD option on a premium device at the end of 2018 is way too small. When you start recording 4K video, storage becomes limit very quickly.
  • V900 - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    That’s what cloud storage is for!
  • Ktracho - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    For which Apple will be happy to charge you - what a deal - for Apple, that is.
  • Dr. Swag - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    How often do you really record video though? Personally, I rarely do.
  • varase - Sunday, September 16, 2018 - link

    No, but I carry a lot of video (1080p) in the form of movies and TV shows - not to mention my whole photo library.

    That's one reason why the Max is so attractive - it has a screen even larger than the Plus models - I mean physically larger even for the portion of the display participating in 16x9 video (which the X and XS don't have).
  • dudedud - Friday, September 14, 2018 - link

    You need to record around 4 hours of video on a empty 64GB iphone to full it.
    Nobody is going to do that.

    Not even half of that.
  • pixelstuff - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    I've had 32GB for the past 2 years without bumping into it's limit. I would guess most people don't really need 64 GB.

    However, one thing I don't do is use it as a long term archive device. Phones are too fragile to not have its data backed up. So if I happen to shoot a lot of video (or photos) on vacation I eventually copy it to my PC and eventually up to the internet. So it's no big deal to delete excessive video off the phone (or worry about the phone dyeing and taking everything with it).
  • Spunjji - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    As someone who worked as an Apple service technician, I can tell you from personal experience that the vast majority of iPhone owners don't offload the contents of their phone.
  • V900 - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    64 GB is more than enough for the vast majority of people.

    Especially if you mostly stream your movies and music.

    How much p0rn can you possibly pack a phone with?
  • Dr. Swag - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    No mention of 120 hz? I think that should be included in the article.
  • Dr. Swag - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    Turns out I got bamboozled and all the 120 hz referred to was touch sensing not the display ;_;
  • zodiacfml - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    Same here. Quite unfortunate as that would have been impressive and try myself an iPhone just for once.
  • Dr. Swag - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    That would've justified the lack of a price drop from last gen but now... Too expensive.
  • varase - Sunday, September 16, 2018 - link

    Not sure you can push OLED to 120 hz.
  • waltmeger - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    Makes my $100 microsoft 1520 look better and better
  • Avalon - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    Would be nice if they'd make a sequel to the SE. Guess I'll be upgrading to an 8 when it goes on sale. I don't like these 5"+ phones.
  • ezridah - Friday, September 14, 2018 - link

    The iPhone XS is 0.2" taller and 0.14" wider than the iPhone 8 while giving you a screen that is 1.1" bigger diagonally. Would you really even notice the difference in size and would it not be worth sacrificing that minuscule increase for the drastically larger screen? Or is it really just about the cost? I would agree that $400 is not a small difference. The size difference, however, is quite small.
  • varase - Sunday, September 16, 2018 - link

    The had to serve the rather huge crowd who wanted a bigger display - like me - before they can consider edge cases.

    The outcry in the US was for a larger X - and in places where your phone might be your primary computing device, they also want larger phones.
  • eastcoast_pete - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    A few points: 1. Great phones, but the prices.. OUCH. The XS Max is now easily more than a decently spec'ed out laptop, especially with the large storage option (256 GB), which you'd sort-of want for that phone, especially if you wnat to use the (probably great) camera for videos.
    Apple has never allowed micro-SD cards in their phones, and that has kept me from buying them since the first iPhone came out.
    2. The higher resolutions and the OLED screens seem to be little power hogs, judged by the battery life stated by Apple. The XS Max has three hours (or 20% less) than the XR, which is physically a bit smaller and thus probably has the same or a smaller battery than the XS Max. They all have the same A12 SoC, so that can't be it. I guess pushing the extra pixels through the GPU and the high-res OLED does eat significant power.
    3. Along that line: They missed one major item for the XS Max: a large (really large) capacity battery. This could have been the one iPhone that won't have its users hunting for an outlet wherever they go. Yes, it would have added 2 mm or so in thickness and 20 g or so in weight, but a 4500 mA or larger battery would have made the Max really "The Max".
    4. Only Apple could have a $749 & up model as the "economy line" of their newest phones.
  • Qasar - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    east coast pete:
    same reason why i wont even look at an i phone... they dont allow sd cards so they can charge 4x or more for the storage capacity, vs just buying a sd card... there is NO way going from 256 to 512 costs 200 bucks for the chip...
  • varase - Sunday, September 16, 2018 - link

    Apple doesn't do "low end" - this is the phone at a price point which will make Android flagship makers look back at with trepidation when they set price points for their phones.

    The new ISP (7nm) pipelined to the new octacore neural engine (5 trillion ops/sec), the new deeper pixel wide angle camera, the edge-to-edge LCD, post-shot variable bokeh, and the traditional 4-5 years or so of OS/security updates will push on the low end of the Pixel 3 line let alone all the other less well connected contenders.

    Plus, it will offer the iPhone 8 and lower iPhone users a more reasonable and less jarring upgrade path.
  • eastcoast_pete - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    Oh, and excuse me: point 1. should have read ..(512 GB), which you'd sort-of want... .. Silly me, $ 1,449 for the 512 GB Xs Max is, of course, an utter bargain.
  • 0iron - Wednesday, September 12, 2018 - link

    A10 Fusion
    A11 Bionic
    A12 Bionic
    Running out of name or just 'tick' upgrade?

    iPhone schedule is a bit of mess lately. It was every 'x'S model featuring 'tock' SoC and non-S model will have 'tick' SoC & new exterior design. Apple killed iPhone 7S!
  • iwod - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    The CPU likely gets some tweaks and 7nm improvement, and it is fundamentally the same as A11, mostly likely more cache, or slightly higher clock speed. So the name remains the same.
  • varase - Sunday, September 16, 2018 - link

    I think the large cores are about 15% faster, the efficiency cores 50% less power hungry, and the octacore neural engine 9x faster and a tenth as power hungry.
  • silverblue - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    "ubuiquidous" - fifth paragraph under A12 Bionic SoC.
  • Arnulf - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    And "reminicant" (reminiscent) ...
  • Ryan Smith - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    Thanks!
  • iwod - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    I am still looking for a reason why Apple dropped LAA support on the Xr, despite having the same baseband.
  • Xex360 - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    They look like all those Chinese notched phones, hopefully they will fail miserably so we can finally get some new designs from Apple (and it's copies).
  • V900 - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    Not too impressed by these tbh.

    Too big, too expensive, FaceID & notch, no homebutton/Touch ID and no 3D Touch.

    All pretty big drawbacks in return for a marginally better, faster, etc. phone.
  • V900 - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    But hey, looking at the bright side, if you’re running a screen repair shop good times are definitely ahead!

    See that thin bezel? That means a poorer grip on the phone. Combined with a display that goes closer to the edge than before, that means the display cracking and breaking will be even more common on that phones.
  • Spunjji - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    The downside is that if you're a 3rd party and you try to replace the display the phone won't work properly and you'll fully invalidate the customer's warranty. Even if it goes wrong for a reason completely unrelated to the repaired display, that's now a thousand-dollar paperweight.

    There's nothing good for anyone in this. Just more e-waste and more expensive, broken toys.
  • Manch - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link


    I do find it funny they try to obscure that it has a notch. Is it a notch though? As wide as it is, its more like the screen has ears. The notch doesn't bother me but don't count the ears when doing a screen measurement. We're already slowly crawling back to the viewable vs adv size again.

    Overall they're nice phones but the price!!!! Good Lord. They're just ridiculous. The sheeple though will plunk down their hard earned cash or submit to indentured servitude with a carrier to get one. smdh
  • varase - Friday, September 28, 2018 - link

    Oh, I don't know.

    High end Android phones hover about in the same territory.
  • Manch - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    I'd like to see a price perf graph on these vs the other vendors and their flagship phones.
  • V900 - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    With a graph like that, you’d find that the iPhone is in the top in regards to performance, but a cheap Android handset would get you more performance pr dollar spent.

    But performance is just one parameter of a good phone. There are many other factors that go into that.

    iPhone users don’t buy an iPhone because it’s the fastest and most powerful phone on the market.
  • Manch - Friday, September 14, 2018 - link

    In regards to cheap Android handsets, I said Flagship for a reason. ;)

    Most iphone users don't. The ones that come here to Anandtech do, which is why it would be relevant. If you must change perf to perf/feature set.
  • id4andrei - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    Something the article did not pick up. For the first time ever Apple is capable of stereo audio recording in video mode. They even make use of 4 microphones, a la Pureview Nokias.

    They also advertised proper color management for the first time I think. This one is weird since all the reviews, at Anandtech at least, have stated that ios had proper color management ever since the first P3 iphone came out.
  • varase - Sunday, September 16, 2018 - link

    I think they even had color management before DCI-P3 - they just used it because everything before was RGB.

    Remember, the iPhone is actually a tiny Mac, and Macs have had ColorSync for all their pre-press history and later for Aperture and Final Cut and their ilk.
  • francescop1 - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    Sorry Tim...I ll just have a oneplus 6 for exactly half the price. Apple is milking their premium brand status too much. It's going to come back and bite them in the long run. They have a competitive advantage on their custom chips, but that's about it. Android is way ahead in terms of actual consumer value implementation of deep learning in android Pie anyway.

    IMO Xr 64gb should have been priced at $650, with Xs 128gb at $850, Xs Max $950. They are having a laugh with selling a 64gb phone for 1000 bucks.
  • varase - Sunday, September 16, 2018 - link

    I think the 64GB option exists because a lot of employers buy minimum RAM iPhones for their employees and they don't want them taking photos or videos or storing company data on their phones.
  • ads295 - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    So the iPhone X sales were millions less than the 8 series yet made almost as much revenue. Now the new series gets higher prices... Extrapolating, I'd say we may soon see $2000 iPhones that will sell in less than 10 million quantity overall and yet Apple will have a good quarter...
  • varase - Sunday, September 16, 2018 - link

    The XS is essentially a spec bump for the X, and the XS Max is the same phone with a bigger battery and OLED screen - God knows what Samsung charges them for that display.

    So ... the XS is the same price as X, and the Max moves up a bit to cover a higher cost of components (plus a profit, naturally).
  • PeachNCream - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    Too big, too expensive. Apple is putting literally zero effort forth to actually send a worthy design to 3rd party manufacturers. They have no focus whatsoever on balancing cost with size and endurance. Call me back when you can put a decent phone behind a 4 - 4.5 inch LCD that has a user replaceable battery inside and sell it for under $50. That would be a design worth bragging about. They're just taking the easy way out by slopping the latest X together.
  • varase - Sunday, September 16, 2018 - link

    Compared to everyone else, Apple is the least guilty of "slopping" a phone together.

    To my knowledge, they're the only phone manufacturer who calibrates the display of each phone shipped.

    As for endurance, their phones have some of the longest endurance in the business. A *lot* of Samsung phones end up dying premature deaths, and while there are outliers in every phone Apple does have physical stores you can walk in to and get stuff fixed.

    Heck, I just walked in to an Apple store this week and saw a genius within five minutes - even though I'd accidentally make my appointment for Friday and went in on Wednesday - and got their cheap battery replacement for my old iPhone 6, not so I could use it but so if we needed it we'd have a backup. (This phone was used by me, and then by my daughter. Still worked, but after her deep discharge cycles the battery was degraded.)

    As such, I told them there was no hurry and I left the store right afterwards but it was done by end of day on Thursday.
  • boeush - Thursday, September 13, 2018 - link

    "...with all three phones announced today being iPhone X ***decedents*** in some form."

    *snicker-snort*

    Sorry, too funny. Couldn't resist. Normally I'm not a grammar Nazi. But occasionally, I'm a grammar comedian ;-)
  • Dr. Swag - Friday, September 14, 2018 - link

    I think you should make it more clear Dolby vision and hdr10 are separate standards. Saying Dolby vision hdr10 makes it sound like one standard.
  • Evilbred - Friday, September 14, 2018 - link

    "Though as is usually the case here when discussing performance and power efficiency in the same breath, these results should be taken with a grain of salt, as you usually can’t simultaneously decrease total power consumption and increase total performance."

    Except you easily can when you reduce the process size. That's the entire point of shrinking processes, so you can reduce the amount of power needed. In a desktop this typically allows you to pack more transistors/cores on the die so you can increase the performance while maintaining the TDP for cooling. In mobile devices like smartphones, heat is one consideration but battery consumption is the bigger consideration. By shrinking from 10 to 7 these new gains are entirely realistic (assuming some minor efficiency gains with the new architecture as well)
  • Total Meltdowner - Saturday, September 15, 2018 - link

    My God, since when did AnandTech readers become such whiny babies? All the comments are filled with childish responses. Millennials I'm assuming.
  • Sahrin - Tuesday, September 18, 2018 - link

    >40% power reduction on the performance cores

    That's right about the theoretical savings from the process shrink.
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    Oh yeah. What a great idea that would be.
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