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Leaks Reveal New Features In Apple's Next iPhone 224

Posted by EditorDavid from the no-headphone-jacks dept.
Though Apple officially unveils their newest iPhone on Tuesday, information is already leaking on the internet.
  • Mashable: "Physically, it's expected to be about the same size as an iPhone 7, but with an edge-to-edge OLED display that's bigger than what is currently on the iPhone 7 Plus. It won't have a home button or Touch ID, and will likely use some kind of facial recognition tech to unlock."
  • MacRumors cites a report from KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo suggesting facial recognition may just be one feature of a complex front camera with 3D sensing hardware, including a proximity sensor, ambient light sensor, and a structured light transmitter (using a surface-emitting laser) and receiver.
  • Fortune: "Apple's iPhone line is expected to catch up with Android phones in the area of wireless charging this year... just lay the phone down on a compatible charger mat or base or dock, and watch the battery fill up."
  • 9to5Mac: "We've found a brand new feature called 'Animoji', which uses the 3D face sensors to create custom 3D animated emoji based on the expressions you make into the camera. Users will be able to make Animoji of unicorns, robots, pigs, pile of poo and many more."
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Leaks Reveal New Features In Apple's Next iPhone More

Leaks Reveal New Features In Apple's Next iPhone

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  • Oh joy.... (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Rick Zeman ( 15628 ) on Saturday September 09, 2017 @08:29PM (#55167121)

    "Users will be able to make Animoji of unicorns, robots, pigs, pile of poo and many more.""

    We've hit rock bottom....

    • Well, they will need something to do while they are waiting to 'watch the battery fill up' when on wireless charging, since wireless generally charges at a fraction of the wires charge rates ;) They shouldn't have to watch and wait more than a few hours....

      But hey, its a new iPhone! The media just cannot contain their gushing over any tiny change, because it just HAS to be revolutionary.

      Still, a whole lot of people will no doubt suddently realise that their year or two old phone, that was working perfectly

      • Well, they will need something to do while they are waiting to 'watch the battery fill up' when on wireless charging, since wireless generally charges at a fraction of the wires charge rates ;) They shouldn't have to watch and wait more than a few hours....

        That's the thing, isn't it? People with access to the Smartphone Club need something to do while they're waiting on, well, literally everything; a turd to crown, the light to turn green, the boss to come back around.

        We have to ask ourselves what's been lost... think of the poor magazine salesmen who are out of work now that waiting rooms don't have to be stocked with their wares.

      • Well, they will need something to do while they are waiting to 'watch the battery fill up' when on wireless charging, since wireless generally charges at a fraction of the wires charge rates ;) They shouldn't have to watch and wait more than a few hours....

        Marketing beats technology, I guess. Horrible efficiency, and no other advantage other than fixing the first world problem of it being too much trouble to plug the phone in. The real answer to that problem is the venerable old charging dock. And it causes more problems, by putting components that should be in a charger - inside the phone.

        Which then creates conflicts with another marketing demand, longer battery life, as space is used by the second half of the charger now inside the phone.

        But hey, its a

        • FWIW, I tend to skip a generation. Started on an iPhone 5, now have a 7.

          Ditto. Started with 3gs, kept it for 3 years and got a 5. Kept that for 3 years and got a 6s. The 6s battery kind of sucks, but I'll keep it until I really feel like I have to upgrade. You don't _have_ to upgrade every year or two.

          • Yes, you do, citizen.

          • FWIW, I tend to skip a generation. Started on an iPhone 5, now have a 7.

            Ditto. Started with 3gs, kept it for 3 years and got a 5. Kept that for 3 years and got a 6s. The 6s battery kind of sucks, but I'll keep it until I really feel like I have to upgrade. You don't _have_ to upgrade every year or two.

            I try to explain this to people. You can have a lot more money in hand if you skip a generation of electronics, or keep your car longer, but I guess many people are like crows, and attracted to shiny objects.

            I've found the 7 to be a nice phone, even if it doesn't have the ancient headphone jack (guess I'm doing some trolling for AC's here) The 5 I traded in was nice too, but it was at one of those good deal times. My son is on our family plan, and he wanted a Samsung. And he paid more than I did even wi

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by tsqr ( 808554 )

        Well, they will need something to do while they are waiting to 'watch the battery fill up' when on wireless charging, since wireless generally charges at a fraction of the wires charge rates ;) They shouldn't have to watch and wait more than a few hours....

        Sounds as if you've never used wireless charging. The charging rate isn't significantly slower than wired charging, in my experience. Wireless is much more convenient at work, where you just set your phone down on the charging pad when you're not using it, and grab it and go when you need to leave your desk. The phone's always charged, and you're not messing about with cables. And of course, you aren't forced to use wireless charging if you don't care for it. The cost differential between having wireless ch

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Dunbal ( 464142 ) *
      If there was ever a compelling reason to pay $500+ for an upgrade, here it is.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by jez9999 ( 618189 )

      I always wanted to know what it would be like when poo frowned at me.

    • Came here to post that, prefaced by ".. having solved all of the other of the worlds' problems..."

      • Perfect is the enemy of good enough. Solving "all of the other of the world's problems" would result in no progress ever again.

        That said this specific thing is quite stupid.

    • What everyone wants is for their phone to be as thin as a credit card and for their batteries to last for seconds, rather than minutes.

    • "Users will be able to make Animoji of unicorns, robots, pigs, pile of poo and many more.""

      That's not the part that concerns me.

      "We've found a brand new feature called 'Animoji', which uses the 3D face sensors to create custom 3D animated emoji based on the expressions you make into the camera.

      Jesus wept. Now we get treated to people on the bus making funny faces into their iPhones, while we guess which emoji they're trying to pantomime. How funny would it be if the phones could be hacked so that no matt

  • I'm curious about the facial recognition (Score:4, Interesting)

    by 93 Escort Wagon ( 326346 ) on Sunday September 10, 2017 @06:39AM (#55168371)

    Initial rumors were they couldn't get TouchID working without an actual home button, and facial recognition was a fallback. I have a hard time seeing how that won't be a big step backward... so I'll be curious to see the announcement on Tuesday AND how well (or how poorly) it works in the real world.

    TouchID works quite well, so the bar is pretty high.

    • Initial rumors were they couldn't get TouchID working without an actual home button

      They might have a look at the dozens of Android phones that manage to do just that.

      • The technology that is being discussed is fingerprint recognition without a visible sensor with the screen doing the work. The Home button on the iPhone doubled as the fingerprint sensor. On Android, there still is a fingerprint sensor but requires a visible sensor whether on the back or the Home button.

        • No, the "technology being discussed" was "having a fingerprint sensor without an actual home button". Android solved that problem simply and efficiently by putting the sensor on the back, a solution that Apple could have adopted as well.

          • Android solved that problem simply and efficiently by putting the sensor on the back, a solution that Apple could have adopted as well.

            Apple, for once, wanted to be a bit original and have the fingerprint sensor work on the front, through the screen.
            (think all the sci-fi movie where the hero is required to place a hand on the shape drawn on the screen).
            Turns out, they didn't manage to find a way to pull this thing while fitting the ever thinner form factor

            • My point is: the front of the phone just isn't a good place for the fingerprint sensor to begin with.

          • I don't consider moving the sensor to the back as either "simple or efficient". And what do you say about the models of Androids that have a front fingerprint sensor that doubles as a home button.?

            • And what do you say about the models of Androids that have a front fingerprint sensor that doubles as a home button.?

              I think they copied a bad design decision from the iPhone.

    • I have a hard time seeing how that won't be a big step backward... so I'll be curious to see the announcement on Tuesday AND how well (or how poorly) it works in the real world.

      I'm sure if you're holding the phone in front of your face it probably works quite well but if you do things like unlocking your phone while it's sitting on the table then it's unlikely to work well at all. Have they got it to work reliably and securely when you're wearing a hat and/or glasses? I'm sure they've got some method to work around that but as you say, these are the sorts of scenarios where touchid works very well.

  • Great. I am now on android for the rest of my life.

    • Until they all copy that feature, which by that time all the Android fanboys will say Apple copied the feature from Android.

  • The problem with the fingerprint sensors on the iPhone is that it's on the home button, or alternatively, that the home/unlock button is in the front. The location on the back, as on Android phones, may seem less natural but is more convenient. Rather than admit their mistake and simply move the sensor to the back, Apple is pouting.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by martinX ( 672498 )

      How does a back sensor work in conjunction with a phone case?

      • By making a case that has a hole in the relevant spot. Duh.

      • Same way as the headphone jack, microphone, speaker, usb socket, buttons, camera, temperature sensor, barometer, pulse oximeter and fingerprint sensors on the back work.

      • By putting a cutout on the back of the case. You know, like the non-functional cutout on many iPhone cases to let you see the Apple logo.

    • Why would anyone want a phone unlock on the back of the phone? The most common place for me to unlock my phone is when it sitting flat on my desk.

      • Android phones tend to be unlocked by proximity in that situation.

        • So your solution to an obvious problem is to turn bypass the security mechanism altogether?

          • I'm just telling you how many people use Android and what they find convenient. You can also use face unlock if you like; many modern Android phones have it.

            • No, what you're saying is to overcome a problem with the fingerprint on the back (which means I have to pick up the phone to unlock it), I should bypass security completely.

              • I have no opinion on what "you should do". For all I know, a rotary phone is ideal for you.

                I'm telling you what people tend to do, and it's different from what you do,.

                • Why is it hard for you to admit that this is a problem with having a fingerprint on the back of the phone? Are you in that much denial of the problem?

                  • I'm telling you from first hand experience: the fingerprint sensor on the front of the iPhone sucks. In fact, so does the home button itself.

  • It's easy to predict the next iPhone's features (Score:5, Insightful)

    by elrous0 ( 869638 ) on Sunday September 10, 2017 @07:58AM (#55168499)

    Just look at the list of features on a good Android phone from a year ago and then double the price. Bingo!

    • Re:It's easy to predict the next iPhone's features (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Opportunist ( 166417 ) on Sunday September 10, 2017 @08:11AM (#55168535)

      You forgot to remove a feature people actually used and replace it with some stupid gimmick nobody asked for to give tech journalists something to write about.

      • Re: (Score:3)

        by elrous0 ( 869638 )

        Yeah, "The new iPhone comes with an automatic feature that locates nearby restaurants when it hears your stomach growl" should get you at least 10 fawning articles in Wired and several segments on The Tonight Show where a half-drunk Jimmy Fallon calls it the greatest thing ever.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by MrKaos ( 858439 )

        Fuck you man, We worked hard on that predictive acne app in the facial recognition software for the iPhony. How can you say that's a gimmick?

    • There is also removing the POS android OS. On my Nexus shit crashes all the time and when I click on the google app mic icon the Google app opens and then instantly closes. I have to wait for this to happen and then click it a second time to get the app to work--great UI, Google!

      Now, vote me down, I'm going against the slashdot norms.

  • If Apple were a democracy ... (Score:5, Funny)

    by mikael ( 484 ) on Sunday September 10, 2017 @08:33AM (#55168599)

    and compromises had to be made, the iPhone would look like this:

    https://i.redditmedia.com/i2AK... [redditmedia.com]

  • Will the masses burn out from this churn? (Score:5, Interesting)

    by swb ( 14022 ) on Sunday September 10, 2017 @08:33AM (#55168601)

    It seems more and more obvious that the utility value for smartphones generally peaked some time ago - messaging/email, web, photos and apps to some degree anywhere you are seems like the primary utility function of the smartphone.

    Yet companies like Apple are on this business treadmill where they think they have to re-invent it every year in order to keep selling phones. They mostly coasted on the fact that the next model improved some aspects -- CPU, storage, photo quality -- some noticeable increment, but they didn't really increase the basic utility value.

    It really seems like they've hit the point where not even technical incremental improvement adds very much, and now they're needlessly altering the experience just to sell new phones.

    Maybe this works with some segment of the population, but will people generally start rebelling against this? Most of these changes don't seem like a better experience, at best the *same* experience that requires re-learning, at worst a lesser experience.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mikael ( 484 )

      That's been the trend for 20+ years for the general consumer market. First there were 8-bit home computers (1980's), desktop PC (1990's). Once 3D graphics took off (1999 onwards), the mass market trend was for sub $600 desktop PC's (2000's) as vendors faced ever tighter profit margins. These were replaced by laptops and netbooks and smartphones (2005+) with wireless broadband. Back then, people in SF were complaining that they didn't see everyone else carrying laptops with them to the cafes, just their smar

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ljw1004 ( 764174 )

      They mostly coasted on the fact that the next model improved some aspects -- CPU, storage, photo quality -- some noticeable increment, but they didn't really increase the basic utility value. It really seems like they've hit the point where not even technical incremental improvement adds very much, and now they're needlessly altering the experience just to sell new phones.

      What?? I'm personally a Windows Phone fan (well I was until that died and I reluctantly switched to Apple) but I think basic utility is definitely helped by the few changes we saw:

      * Wireless charging. Sometimes lint gets stuck and I can't charge. Often I just forget to charge my phone. When I had a micro-usb adapter I'd wear out about one cable a year, and once the port on my phone just got too damaged and I had to get a new phone. The lightning port doesn't seem quite as fragile, but even so I'm excited ab

      • * Wireless charging. Sometimes lint gets stuck and I can't charge. Often I just forget to charge my phone. When I had a micro-usb adapter I'd wear out about one cable a year, and once the port on my phone just got too damaged and I had to get a new phone. The lightning port doesn't seem quite as fragile, but even so I'm excited about this.

        Lightning port is pretty hardy, and a paperclip does wonder to get the lint out ;-) I generally do that about once a year.

      • or using the phone with a finger or toe that I haven't registered . . .

        How is this Apple's fault that you didn't register all the fingers you wanted to use with Touch ID. You are allowed to register many prints.

        . It also interferes with the when you want to grab your phone and take a photo instantly, another toddler-related need

        Um, you do know you don't have to unlock your phone to take a picture, right? That's been a feature of iPhones and Androids for a while.

        . It took me about 5 months to of iphoning to learn the muscle memory rule "DON'T press the home button (because it's too prone to failing to log you in and by that time you'll have lost the shot);

        Er what? You are pressing the Home button. It's not the button to take the picture.

        instead pick the phone up, wait for the motion sensor to realize it's moved, then swipe left to get to the camera".

        So which of the steps are you complaining about? You have to pick up the phone otherwise you're taking a photo of the surface it's on (in the dark). I do

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by ljw1004 ( 764174 )

          How is this Apple's fault that you didn't register all the fingers you wanted to use with Touch ID. You are allowed to register many prints.

          Umm... thanks for telling me that I'm holding my phone wrong, I guess??

          You're allowed to register five fingerprints. With my two thumbs, two index fingers and my wife's thumb, we're already maxed out.

          So which of the steps are you complaining about? You have to pick up the phone otherwise you're taking a photo of the surface it's on (in the dark). I don't know about your phone but I never have "wait" for the motion sensor. It takes less than a second to get to the camera with all of those actions.

          Try it. On my iPhone 6S, it's about two seconds from picking it up to being able to take a photo...

          Wait for motion-sensor to wake up enough that the screen allows a swipe-left: ~0.7 seconds, failure rate ~2%
          Swipe-left: ~0.4 seconds, failure rate ~5%
          Wait for phone app to be responsive: ~0.3 seconds, failure rate

          • Umm... thanks for telling me that I'm holding my phone wrong, I guess??

            Your complaint about not registering your prints to use is as silly as saying that your web accounts aren't unlocked by passwords you haven't set yet.

            Try it. On my iPhone 6S, it's about two seconds from picking it up to being able to take a photo...

            So have I. Under a second. I've tried it with other models. Under a second. I'm not sure what's wrong with your phone.

    • It does. Look at desktop and laptops. People still want the latest one, but they haven't changed anything but the display connector and video board for about 10 years.

      • Well going from HDDs to solid state memory is a major improvement, I think. CPUs with integrated GPUs has come a long way. Before you had to have a discrete GPU even in laptops. Wifi chipsets taking less power and space, etc. So some progress is being made.

        • enough to justify the cost of a new machine? I can put an SSD in my 10 year old laptop. Beyond that, battery times have improved and I'm not sure I see much else. I don't do much graphics intensive and there I'm fine so long as the graphics card isn't eating my memory.

          • enough to justify the cost of a new machine?

            You said: " they haven't changed anything but the display connector and video board for about 10 years". That is factually not true. Secondly the argument you're bringing up NOW is that these changes are not worth buying a new machine. You didn't mention that in your statement and is strictly a matter of your own personal choice and opinion.

            I don't do much graphics intensive and there I'm fine so long as the graphics card isn't eating my memory.

            Well good for you. Other people have different needs than you. Maybe that's why they've bought a new laptop in the last 10 years.

    • And if they just kept making the same model for a few years, do you think anyone will buy it? Sure the improvements now are not as far reaching as in the early years but there are still minor improvements to be made. CPUs for example are starting to peak in terms of power. While they can introduce more powerful ones, the ones that are currently being used are powerful enough for most things. Where it seems to be going is that one day maybe your smart phone will be your computer/laptop. The UI is the last hu

    • Yet companies like Apple are on this business treadmill where they think they have to re-invent it every year in order to keep selling phones. They mostly coasted on the fact that the next model improved some aspects -- CPU, storage, photo quality -- some noticeable increment, but they didn't really increase the basic utility value.

      So you think they would be better if they _didn't_ release upgrades every year?

      I would also say that Apple "re-invents" the iPhone every 2-3 years, in terms of there being larger changes to form factor, internal design, etc. The second year is usually just a refresh with better camera, CPU, etc. If you're going to complain about an incremental refresh, then I really don't understand your argument.

      iPhone 3g / 3gs (2 years)
      iPhone 4 / 4s (2 years)
      iPhone 5 / 5s (2 years)
      iPhone 6 / 6s / 7 (3 years)

  • And nothing of value was won...

  • There is absolutely no spyware on this phone at all. No seriously, fuck off, stop laffing, it's really really true. This phone respects your privacy, it really honestly does.

  • "Apple's iPhone line is expected to catch up with Android phones in the area of wireless charging this year... just lay the phone down on a compatible charger mat or base or dock, and watch the battery fill up."

    So, exactly what I do already?

  • Facial recognition without button. How? (Score:3)

    by BlackPignouf ( 1017012 ) on Sunday September 10, 2017 @09:57AM (#55168795)

    How is facial recognition supposed to work without any button?
    Is the camera always recording and scanning even when the phone is supposedly off?

  • The user is the product, the newest feature is more accurate data about their behavior.

  • a brand new feature called 'Animoji'

    Is there a noSJW app to make it go away?

  • Also, now that the phone can charge wirelessly, it also will not have any ports whatsover.

    So you will HAVE to use Apple's bluetooth headphones to talk to anyone or listen to music.

    Because courage.

  • Privacy Concern? (Score:3)

    by dcw3 ( 649211 ) on Monday September 11, 2017 @04:34AM (#55172875) Journal

    So what happens when a cop grabs your phone, and wants in? Does he get to just hold it up to your face to unlock it? If so, this seems like a serious flaw.

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