Why do you [not] buy Apple?

: Anybody who tries to play the 'innovation' card; what about 64-bit mobile processors and sapphire displays etc etc. that are going into their phones?

Does it look like LG or Samsung are innovating to you?

You're like daft investment bankers - you expect growth year, upon year, upon year. The car industry has been putting diesel engines into cars for 80 years - why haven't we 'innovated' more and found something more efficient? Oh, we have? Minor, incremental updates including the revision of the constituent elements of the fuels and engines used? Not hydrogen powered cars though - not innovating enough. Shun them. They're rubbish.

^ Doesn't sound very plausible, does it? About as plausible as you sound when you say that tech companies have to produce new products every 4 months.

tl;dr? I buy Apple, not as a fanboy, but because I have no other viable options for my needs. My needs? Simplicity, speed and good after-purchase support.

In what way are you meaning "messy". Messy as in a hassle to set up, or messy as in "too lazy to spend a bit of extra time (and maybe money) to make things look neat and tidy"

I have a Macbook Air because of its portability, its super light so good for traveling. And my Macbook Pro is great because of the large storage space. Generally I would recommend Apple because they just go so much faster and smoother than PCs, same goes for the iPhone, its really quick and aesthetically pleasing I guess. But I also think the prices are way too high, but the products last quite a long time so I would continue buying them.

Desktops

Laptops

Tablets

Phones

Music players

[hypothetically] wearable tech

Apple TV

The innovation element you speak of is the same as most Apple "innovations" in recent times, they are first to announce, not necessarily the first to actually do it.



Much like I am taking a biased view against Apple because I really dislike them as a company, you're being rather biased against the competition. Yes, I would say Apples competition is being "innovative" I would not say because they are forced to make an announcement just to say "we aren't behind on this tech" means they aren't the innovator, not necessarily at least.

As for the car analogy, it's not a particularly good one. Technology moves forwards pretty quickly: flash storage capacity has increased over 1000 fold in the last decade; a lot of components still observe Moore's law, architectures are getting smaller and smaller every few years such that it's not at all long until quantum effects might have to be considered.

People aren't asking for new products every 4 months, we have come to expect new products annually, along with some groundbreaking progress every two. Look at how a lot of things are going- one year something new happens, the next it is revised, the following year something new. The iPhone naming system gives it away, it's visible in GPU and CPU road maps: Something new and groundbreaking every other year and a revision in the middle.

Ok, fine. By your argument, Apple, Samsung and Intel are 'innovating' at a similar base wrt their CPUs. The point I'm making is that both big competitors (Samsung and Apple) are innovating at a pace which:

a) equals each other
b) don't match the current limitations of hardware (ie. they both don't use the best of every single component in any iteration of their device)

*I* don't expect much 'groundbreaking' progress any more from either Samsung or Apple; certainly not in a manner which is obvious to a typical consumer. The reviews of the S5 said it all; it did absolutely nothing to improve on the S4 aside from adding a faulty fingerprint sensor and making it benchmark faster - a trait which actually lends very, very little benefit to the user when using apps.

Technology increases at an exponential rate, yes, but like you said, we're having to look towards methods such as quantum engineering for CPU production which, currently, is quite difficult to achieve. We're very close to that brick wall with very little indication of success with the current budget being used to develop such technology. What will happen then? Will people finally stop hungering for the exponential gains we've been expecting?

You're right about the first announcers being classed as the innovators. I don't class Apple as the innovators for 64-bit ARM mobile chips solely because they were the initial announcers. I will class them as the innovators because only they will optimise their software and encourage developers to use it.

Samsung has no clout wrt how Android apps are developed. Just look at how Google forced them to stop modifying their UI so much - they don't have entire control over what they put out on their own phone! So if I build an S5/S6 with a 64-bit chip in it and absolutely 0 apps make use of it, then what's the point in having it? It will come with time as devs realise the benefit, but I can tell you now that my dad, who develops Android apps for business and daily consumer use, won't take advantage of the new architectures for at least a few more years. It means a lot of work for relatively little gains for a vast majority of the apps on the market, and for a minute userbase for Android as a whole.

Because Apple has such a large userbase on its flagship phones at any given point in time, the devs are more inclined to develop for those phones specifically, knowing that they aren't catering for a market which vastly outperforms the previous iteration of the device.

I'm not entirely sure what you expect from the iPhone 6 or the Samsung S6. Putting in stronger GPUs/bigger screens means bigger batteries which are currently limiting factors for both companies. They're racing to make their phones light and thin, so there's little room to pack in other features shown in concept videos (projectors in the phones, I'm talking about you!). Yes, the next iPhone will come in at 4.7", but I definitely don't want it any bigger. I had always hoped that the iP5 wasn't 4" but 4.5. I can meet apple in the middle with 4.7", but I wouldn't buy the 5.5" that is currently rumoured to also exist. It's too big for practical use - as is 5"! Even 4.7" is a stretch.

The only thing I want my iPhone 5 to do right now which it doesn't is optical image stabilisation and to be just that tad faster with simple apps (Safari, Mail, Messages etc). After toying with a friend's 5S, the speed differences for this stuff is quite big - I can't see how the 6, 6S and 7 could really improve to the point where I care.

Of course they won't, spending on working it out will go up and maybe it will take longer to work it out. And it won't be too long until, if Intel, AMD, ARM etc haven't put enough money into it, Nvidia joins in funding it too since their GPUs for the end of this decade/beginning of the next will be running into the same problems.


What proportion of apps are cross platform these days? And, correct me if I'm wrong, but will the developers not only start making use of 64-bit in a big way when it is actually necessary to do so?

Have you been living under a rock for the last few years? Android has a WAY bigger userbase, phones running an Android OS ship about 4 times as many units as those running iOS, last I checked that doesn't constitute a "minute userbase". Again, 0 apps is highly improbable, if there are 0 android apps I highly doubt there would be many 64-bit apps in the app store given how many of the apps are cross platform anyway, especially the bigger ones that one would expect to be more likely to make use of 64-bit; and, again correct me if I'm wrong, but is it not true that more apps are made for Android devices anyway, given how much easier it is, financially at least?

I'm not expecting much more from this year's flagship phones, as you said, battery life is the main issue. I really don't get why people are so addicted to wanting lighter and thinner phones and laptops, it's just a bad idea. Making it thinner means less room for batteries and cooling (more so in the case of laptops, where it results in less power) which is really self defeating; they need more power generation on generation, but make the batteries smaller and smaller so any improvement in the tech is more or less cancelled out. I would like to see more phones take the hit in thickness and add the ability to be charged wirelessly, it may not be efficient, but effectively increase battery life. I know of people who have 3 recharge pads: one at home, and two at work (in two different places). Wireless charging may not be the most efficient but it keep their battery near full. Watching a review of the HTC One M8 one of the only criticisms was that they didn't add a mm or two to add that capability for those who want it.
And on the battery front it may become a relative non-issue in the near future. Can't actually find the article, but a few weeks back there was an article on the BBC about <30 second charging, when it hits the market we could, theoretically, be seeing mobile devices where the primary concern is the thermals.

Ridiculously overpriced.

too many silly marketing ploys (Retina...);