from Hacker News

The iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus Review: Iterating on a Flagship

by chetangole on 10/10/16, 12:20 PM with 150 comments

• by davidf18 on 10/10/16, 2:47 PM

  Hardware feature table mentions WiFi, but not the LTE modem and radio which is far more important as LTE has to deal with skyscrapers and buildings with stone and steel which conveniently block LTE signals, population density, and spectrum consumption has been dramatically increasing year to year. The unit has the Qualcomm X12 modem but that modem doesn't cover AWS-3 (Band 66) which is a very large swath of spectrum, making the phone already obsolete for dense markets (e.g., large cities).

  So, it would be very helpful to see 1) signal improvement, 2) download speed improvement, 3) improvement in voice quality when listening, 4) improvement on voice quality when speaking including background cancellation.

  For example, something I rarely saw in iPhone 6s(+) reviews was the addition of a 4th microphone for noise cancellation. I also rarely saw any talk of the H.265 compression (2 x H.264) for FaceTime Video over cell networks in the 6s.

  Last Sat, I was in a Starbucks speaking with a friend who was in a different Starbucks. I was on the 7+ he on the 5S. I could hear annoying background noise, he could hear no background noise. These things are critically important, but it seems as if the reviewers are not using these units in real world situations.

  I think this is because the people doing the reviews don't really have technical backgrounds. Otherwise, they'd be testing this issues.

  EDIT: The modem specs (for Verizon/Sprint). AT&T, T-mobile use a lesser Intel Modem. https://www.qualcomm.com/products/snapdragon/modems/x12

• by rayiner on 10/10/16, 1:27 PM

  On several of the tests, Apple has basically lapped the competition with the 6s and 7 both beating the Snapdragon/Exynos-powered devices. In Jetstream and Kraken, which additionally take the JS engine into account, three generations of Apple devices are beating the latest flagship android devices.

  Really a phenomenal showing by Apple's CPU and compiler teams, especially considering that everyone uses the same fabs.

• by Yhippa on 10/10/16, 2:16 PM

  > At the start of this review I said it was important to consider perspective because at the end of the day, I use Android devices. Doing the iPhone 7 and 7 Plus review is important, but also deeply disillusioning. With the iPhone 6s review I showed a number of clear and present issues in Android devices relative to the iPhone, and these issues continue to appear time and time again. More than ever it’s obvious to me that most companies in the Android ecosystem don’t really care about the details as an organization.

  I would love to hear more about the disillusioning part. As an Android user I want to stay with them but after playing around with the 7 and reading this review I'm actually much more impressed with this phone than when it initially came out. Especially after the release of the Google Pixel which was very underwhelming to me. I can't believe I'd say this but the iPhone 7 seems to provide a better value than the Pixel.

• by Steko on 10/10/16, 1:31 PM

  I've always wondered what it is that Anand Lal Shimpi, Brian Klug (also formerly Anandtech) and (now) Chris Ziegler (formerly The Verge) do at Apple (or did if they've moved on). At first I thought they might be involved in PR and media outreach but that doesn't seem to be the case. Now I'd guess maybe they just painstakingly review devices just like they did before except now they do internal only reviews of Apple's prototypes and maybe the competition.

• by saturdaysaint on 10/10/16, 2:59 PM

  I really don't understand the calls for higher pixel density - there are clear performance costs, and the only use case where it makes a meaningful difference is VR, where I'm more and more skeptical that mobile will be relevant for a while. I've noticed with TV's, tech reviewers have almost unanimously yawned at 4K for normal viewing, and are much more excited about HDR - this just sounds like specs for the sake of specs.

• by nextos on 10/10/16, 1:12 PM

  A bit offtopic but I am very disappointed only Apple seems to have a clear plan, and makes continuous progress in careful iterations.

  I quit Apple precisely when the iPhone 1 was released due to ideological reasons, as I realised the whole ecosystem would become a walled garden. But I concede they have good products.

  I was looking forward to the new Pixel and Pixel XL. Google devices are the only ones that have a sane code/update policy within Android, and thus allow me to run Copperhead OS (which is the only free mobile OS I find realistic to run). However, they are insanely expensive, which IMHO risks making Copperhead a really niche option.

  Samsung makes decent hardware, Note fiasco aside, but their Android mods are a joke. Same for most Androids. Jolla is stuck. And fringe options like Pyra are cool but inconvenient on a daily basis...

• by WhitneyLand on 10/10/16, 1:35 PM

  Is anyone making different decisions based on the headphone jack?

  After a steady upgrade cadence since iPhone 1, this is the first time I've postponed my decision, still deciding how to proceed.

  Google is making the right moves but I'm not sure how much it can help them. Pixel is an excellent product, but you need a crowbar to pry people out of a well worn and comfortable habits.

• by tluyben2 on 10/10/16, 2:21 PM

  > Apps like WeChat are fairly notorious for holding wakelocks on Android and never really stopping background resource usage

  I thought everyone went mad when they said this as I never encountered this issue, but I see it everywhere... The app that drains my Android is always Skype. That is also the app the drains my laptop and the reason I started using the web version but when that is on, Chrome drains my laptop. Wechat seriously does not come close and I use it a lot more...

• by throwaway_45 on 10/10/16, 1:32 PM

  I am surprised cell phones are still selling for 650 bucks. You can get a Chinese cell phone for 200 dollars which will do 90% of what latest apple or Samsung will do. Maybe it will be a little bit slower, but not 450 dollars slower.

• by wodenokoto on 10/10/16, 1:03 PM

  > The default maps application didn’t offer that kind of functionality and Google Maps was completely absent, as was YouTube

  I don't remember ever not using Google maps on an iPhone. When was this impossible? I got the 3GS in 2009 and moved to the 4S in early 2012

• by mark-r on 10/10/16, 10:30 PM

  There's a lot of moaning about the resolution of 326ppi, but does anybody find that to be an actual limitation in practice? Just because other devices get a higher figure doesn't mean you get any practical value from those higher figures.

• by nikon on 10/10/16, 2:26 PM

  I returned my 7+ as it's barely any different to the 6S+, and at £719 here in the UK for the 32GB model it was hard to stomach. £819 for 128GB model is now almost Macbook territory in my mind. I had barely any free space on the 32GB model, and using an adaptor for my headphones was annoying. The camera was good though.

  A 64GB 6S+ is a much better proposition to me and will be my daily driver until I find something better. I've not noticed any difference since swapping.

• by PTRFRLL on 10/10/16, 10:11 PM

  >It’s hard to actually think about the user experience of the headphone jack and to design wireless earbuds that don't have all of the friction points that we've come to expect.

  What are the 'friction points' of traditional 3.5mm headphones? The fact that they're wired?

• by haikuginger on 10/11/16, 12:40 AM

  >[The home button] doesn't actually depress so it isn't quite as accurate as something like the Macbook trackpad in replicating the feel of a real button

  You guys know that the MacBook trackpads don't actually depress either, right?

• by kpga on 10/10/16, 2:48 PM

  I am buying iphone 7 plus for my wife, yet I believe this review is quite biased towards iphone 7 and at times reads more like a PR piece.

  Quite a disappointement from anandtech.

• by dovdov on 10/10/16, 1:01 PM

  Let's be honest, it's a 6SS (Plus).

  And thank god, since I only got my 6S Plus a few months ago. :)

  I hope they are planning some fireworks (you'll recover Samsung ;) for the iPhone's 10th year anniversary next year.