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The Tech Thread

I figured this would expand into other areas...but Apple announced iPhone 8 and their new flagship iPhone X today:

https://techcrunch.com/2017/09/12/iphone-x/

Apple’s iPhone X, like the new iPhone 8 and iPhone 8 Plus, comes with a brand new design, ditching bezels and opting for a glass front and back. Apple says there is a deeper strengthening layer in the glass that makes it the “most durable in a smartphone.”

Thanks to this new design, the iPhone X is sealed for water and dust resistance.

It’s made from surgical-grade, stainless steel and comes in two finishes: space grey and silver.

Following the current trend in smartphones, Apple has done away with the bezels on the iPhone X, offering an edge-to-edge 5.8-inch display. In fact, Apple is upgrading quite a bit in that department, offering an OLED display for the very first time, calling it the Super Retina Display. This brings with it all the standard benefits of OLED, including more accurate colors, better image uniformity across the screen, etc.

The iPhone X Super Retina display supports 2046×1125 resolution, with 455 PPI, and HDR in both Dolby Vision and HDR.

The company is reportedly paying around $125 per panel, which is part of the reason for the reports of a more expensive iPhone.

This is also the first iPhone that will not have a home button, with the new screen reaching across the entire front of the device. Users can wake up their device by picking it up or swiping across any part of the screen. To close an app, simply swipe up on the screen and throw it away. Users can also reach Siri by simply saying “Hey Siri” or by pressing the side button.

Given that the home button has historically been central to the iPhone’s security, the replacement comes in the form of a depth-sensing front camera which will unlock the phone by detecting the user’s face. Apple is calling it FaceID.

This means that the iPhone will know what your face looks like from all angles and can unlock the phone while it’s, say, lying on a table. It also means that the feature shouldn’t be susceptible to trickery, such as unlocking for a two-dimensional photo of you instead of the real thing. Apple says the chances that someone can trick FaceID and break into your phone are 1 in a million.

“You’re wearing glasses, or wear a hat, or do it up any way you want to do it…” FaceID still works, day or night, according to Phil Schiller.

FaceID is enabled by a True Depth camera system, equipped with an infrared camera, flood illuminator, dot projector and more all packed into the top of your iPhone.

The feature is used for Apple Pay now, as well as a new feature called Animojis for messaging. Animoji’s use FaceID to lay your facial expressions into emojis, giving them your own unique take. You can pick from a dozen different animated emojis.

As far as cameras are concerned, the iPhone X is about as locked and loaded as one can get. The rear camera features a 12-megapixel sensor, with dual-lenses at f1.8 and f2.8 apertures (which is brighter than the 7 Plus telephoto). It comes with dual-image OIS quad-LED TrueTone flash.

Because of the combination of the new A11 Bionic and the enhanced camera, Apple is introducing a new Portrait Lighting, letting users select their lighting effects. These aren’t filters, but rather a real-time analysis of the light hitting the subject’s face, and these lighting effects can be added before and after the photo is taken.

Video is vastly improved as well. Combined with that A11 processor, video can be captured at 60FPS in low-light mode, with faster frame rate support and 4K capture. Slo-mo videos shot in 1080p will have 240 FPS.

The front-facing camera is powered by that True Depth camera system that supports FaceID. But the big news here is that Portrait mode and Portrait lighting is now available on the front-camera.

The iPhone X, as well as the other new iPhones announced today, comes with wireless charging capabilities, thanks to that new glass back. Wireless charging is supported by Qi, which is considered as the standard in the wireless charging industry.

Plus, battery life is two hours longer than the iPhone 7, with most of the improvement coming by way of software enhancements. But because Apple likes to take things to the next level, the wireless charging on the new iPhones is coming with a new accessory called AirPower. It’s a larger mat that lets users charge their iPhones, Apple Watch and AirPods all at the same time.

The iPhone X is packed with the new A11 Bionic processor: 64-bit design, six cores, two high performance processors that are 25 percent faster than the A10 and 4-high efficiency cores (two more than the A10) that are 70 percent faster. The GPU is 30 percent faster.

Part of the bigger news here is improved photographs. As Panzarino noted in the live blog, “The Apple ISP is one of its secret weapons in photography. If you’ve loved an iPhone picture you’ve ever taken then thank the image processor inside the phone for that result.”

The iPhone X starts at $999 for the 64GB model, with a larger 256GB option.

Pre-orders begin on October 27 and regular sales begin November 3, just in time for the Holidays.

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On 2018-09-12 at 5:07 PM, FrostyWinnipeg said:

The new iPhones

10R 6.1" $1029

10S 5.8" $1379

10SMax 6.5" 1519

https://www.apple.com/ca/iphone/compare/

Those prices are killer but when its time for a new one, I'd look long and hard at the 10S.

1 hour ago, The Unknown Poster said:

Those prices are killer but when its time for a new one, I'd look long and hard at the 10S.

Those prices mean that when it's time for a new phone I'll be looking long and hard at an Android.

1 hour ago, StevetheClub said:

Those prices mean that when it's time for a new phone I'll be looking long and hard at an Android.

I've been an Android fan and supporter for 8 years. I'm pretty invested in the ecosystem, both Android and Google. Google Minis at home, Chromecasts, YouTube Premium, etc. 

That being said, in my last position at work, I had an iPhone. I had it just short of two years and I miss it dearly. Not because of the tech but because of a few simple things like iMessages. My friends and family have iPhones and I relied heavily on the simplicity of iMessages, including the group chat.

I'm up for renewal now and I was prepared to get an iPhone over an Note 9. Now, with these prices, I can't justify it. It will cost me hundreds more. I like the larger screen, so I would need a Xs Max. I need more than 64gb, so I would need to get the 256gb model. 

It will cost me $640 more to get the iPhone Xs Max over the Note 9. That's a lot of money. 

I can make the Google ecosystem work without an Android phone but I can't get over the price difference. 

1 hour ago, JCon said:

I've been an Android fan and supporter for 8 years. I'm pretty invested in the ecosystem, both Android and Google. Google Minis at home, Chromecasts, YouTube Premium, etc. 

That being said, in my last position at work, I had an iPhone. I had it just short of two years and I miss it dearly. Not because of the tech but because of a few simple things like iMessages. My friends and family have iPhones and I relied heavily on the simplicity of iMessages, including the group chat.

I'm up for renewal now and I was prepared to get an iPhone over an Note 9. Now, with these prices, I can't justify it. It will cost me hundreds more. I like the larger screen, so I would need a Xs Max. I need more than 64gb, so I would need to get the 256gb model. 

It will cost me $640 more to get the iPhone Xs Max over the Note 9. That's a lot of money. 

I can make the Google ecosystem work without an Android phone but I can't get over the price difference. 

It seems iMessages keeps a remarkable number of people in the Apple ecosystem; I know that was one of the biggest factors for us. That and Apple getting into the mid-range market (my wife and I got SEs). Now that they're back to being high-end only I don't think even iMessages will be enough to keep us when it's time for a new phone (I was very close to getting a Nokia 6.1 a few months ago but had trouble even justifying that expense with my SE still ticking).  I'm impatiently waiting for the day when there is a capable iMessage equivalent on Android. 

1 minute ago, StevetheClub said:

It seems iMessages keeps a remarkable number of people in the Apple ecosystem; I know that was one of the biggest factors for us. That and Apple getting into the mid-range market (my wife and I got SEs). Now that they're back to being high-end only I don't think even iMessages will be enough to keep us when it's time for a new phone (I was very close to getting a Nokia 6.1 a few months ago but had trouble even justifying that expense with my SE still ticking).  I'm impatiently waiting for the day when there is a capable iMessage equivalent on Android. 

Where does the Xr slot in? Too high? I didn't really look at it or consider it. 

I'll be watching with curiosity when Apple needs to announce their sales. That should be telling if they miss targets. 

 

13 minutes ago, JCon said:

Where does the Xr slot in? Too high? I didn't really look at it or consider it. 

I'll be watching with curiosity when Apple needs to announce their sales. That should be telling if they miss targets. 

 

Xr is just over $1000 to start.  It not a matter of can I afford it but do I want to. At this stage in my life (i.e., with a young family) I would much rather buy something like the Nokia 6.1 and spend the other $700 elsewhere. 

6 minutes ago, StevetheClub said:

Xr is just over $1000 to start.  It not a matter of can I afford it but do I want to. At this stage in my life (i.e., with a young family) I would much rather buy something like the Nokia 6.1 and spend the other $700 elsewhere. 

No doubt. I'm in exactly the same boat. I just don't want to spend that much money on a phone. I believe that they pushed a bit too far.

We'll see if they meet their forecasts. 

  • 2 weeks later...

Windows 10 - 1809 might be available as an update.  Probably is.

Coming Soon but pre-ordering now...

Fire TV Stick 4K with All-New Alexa Voice Remote, streaming media player

http://a.co/d/d1bxHmK

No YouTube but it is Kodi-able but you already knew that.

Edited by FrostyWinnipeg

On ‎2018‎/‎10‎/‎16 at 1:54 PM, JCon said:

Give me Goldeneye, Starfox and a good wrestling game (like WCW Nitro) and I'll buy it. 

They'll probably include Doom 64 and a good Mario. 

I doubt that they will have Golden Eye or a Wrestling game (licensing issues).   I'd imagine it's mostly Nintendo first party games. 

  • Author
9 minutes ago, FrostyWinnipeg said:

Done!

And by the way, I am an avid Apple user but man am I angry.  We have an older macbook pro and in August the HD died.  I dont use the cloud but I do keep most things on an external hard drive so it wasnt the end of the world (lost a handful of things I just recently saved to the HD).  

Go to Apple...where you really have to plan a whole day.  Was willing to buy a new macbook or large desktop (I like video editing) but they talked me into replacing the HD because it would be such a huge upgrade over what we had.  So we do that.

Last month, it crashes again and needs a complete re-install.

Last week, same thing.  Seems to be related to one of the updates for the OS.  I was so angry, I almost bought a PC.  GF talked me down.  What the heck??

I will say with Windows 10 to re-install the operating system it is ridiculously fast and also easy.   The OS also runs very light and over the last few years I found it to be much smoother then Windows 7.   I'd make the leap.

rFOUzX1.jpg

Whats interesting here is that Panasonic was not supposed to send tv's to North America anymore but Visions has this.

Expensive but may be best TV you can buy.

 

  • Author
23 hours ago, FrostyWinnipeg said:

rFOUzX1.jpg

Whats interesting here is that Panasonic was not supposed to send tv's to North America anymore but Visions has this.

Expensive but may be best TV you can buy.

 

I got my LG from visions.   Just bought my mom a hisense from Costco for $700 all in (taxes, warranty etc). 55” and it’s damn well the same quality as mine. Great price 

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