11 ms·

iPhone SE and the Commodification of the Pocket Computer

84 points by mpweiher 7y ago

swiftcoder 7y ago
It's an interesting (if quite long overdue) strategic move on Apple's part, as moving into the mid-range drastically increases their addressable market. Their biggest rivals can afford to compete on specs in the high-end, but likely don't have the vertical integration to do so at a $400 price point (especially when Google captures most of the software ecosystem revenue via the Play Store).
- BurritoAlPastor 7y ago
  Overdue? The 2016 SE was also $400.
  - lstamour 7y ago
    Yeah, the same thing was said about the original SE. If Apple were serious about the mid-market they would have given the previous SE a spec bump in 2018, at least.
    - coder543 7y ago
      Apple gave it one bump: https://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker/2017/3/21/14998660/apple-iphone-se-128gb-announced-pricing-release-date https://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker/2017/3/21/14998660/a... Apple also lowered the price to $349 at some point in order to continue enticing new purchases, partially compensating for the lack of spec bumps. But, I don't think a lack of spec bumps indicates they aren't serious about a given market. The iPhone SE appears to be a way to reuse the manufacturing and tooling that was developed for a given multigenerational style for a few more years, further amortizing the cost and providing a value-oriented phone for customers that want this. If you watch some videos[0], you'll see that the original 2016 iPhone SE is still surprisingly usable in 2020, and it is rumored to get iOS 14 as its last major update. If they were "not serious" about that market, the original iPhone SE would've been unusuable a year ago, with no clear upgrade path for its users, leading to user pain and confusion. This is not the case at all. Users got along just fine, and the new iPhone SE has launched with plenty of time to spare before things become either painful or unsupported. [0] example of one video that shows how the new iPhone SE is measurably faster, but the old one is still perfectly usable: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgwtGmyTDiY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgwtGmyTDiY
      - untog 7y ago
        For me personally the camera was the reason I finally upgraded from my old SE. The camera in there was noticeably old technology. If they’d done a 2018 refresh with current camera tech I would have bought it in a heartbeat.
      - fouc 7y ago
        Interesting in that video the new iPhone SE was 50Mb/s faster due to wifi chip/antenna differences. Could've explained a lot of the faster page loads with pinterest/twitter/amazon/ebay. It's incredibly how performant the old iPhone SE still seems to be.
      - dwighttk 7y ago
        I agree. Not only is this segment of users saving money on initial purchase, but (probably) also by not updating every year or two. The real “clear upgrade path” is to a more expensive phone. Or as you said, not upgrading for 4ish years.
      - ken 7y ago
        I don't know if this is normal for iPhones, but the SE got a big price break through carriers towards the end. I bought the 32GB model new for $50. Even if I didn't want that carrier, I could have bought the phone and the minimum 6 months service for under $250 total. As a "not a phone person", I think even $400 for a phone is nuts. The (first) iPhone SE is still perfectly usable (why would that be surprising?), and doesn't lag on anything I do. I don't see why I'd need to upgrade. That video seems to confirm that newer phones are really only faster at things I never do (games, video encoding, benchmarks).
- sharkjacobs 7y ago
  > Google captures most of the software ecosystem revenue via the Play Store My impression is that the opposite is actually the case. Google has about 4x the users but the App Store takes in almost twice as much revenue. I don't have any good sources to cite, that's just my impression. The first few google results for "ios vs android software revenue" seem to support it. edit: maybe you meant Google captures the majority of Android software revenue. I forgot there were alternative Android app stores.
  - syspec 7y ago
    I believe the parent is referring to, google captures most of the revenue in Play Store... for android devices
  - nxc18 7y ago
    It’s worth highlighting that in the iOS ecosystem, Apple makes money on the hardware, apps, and in-app-purchases, with few exceptions. On Android, Google makes money on the apps, and some in-app-purchases, but the OEM makes money on the device. I think that, in addition to underlying architectural flaws, helps explain why OEMs are so disinterested in supporting phones for more than 1-2 years. LG only makes money when you upgrade, whereas Google and Apple make money every time you buy an app. It’s in LG’s interest to sell you a $300 phone every two years, whereas it may be in Apple’s interest to sell a $400 phone every 5 years and make up the difference on software and services, and hope enough people are enticed by the new shiny to upgrade more often.
    - millstone 7y ago
      Hardly any OEMs makes money on Android devices. https://www.counterpointresearch.com/apple-continues-lead-global-handset-industry-profit-share/ https://www.counterpointresearch.com/apple-continues-lead-gl...
      - nl 7y ago
        That's not what that report say. Apple takes most of the profit in the sector, but the other companies are profitable, at lower levels. Eg, even the low end Chinese manufactures: Chinese smartphone brands operate at low-profit margins, but better than in previous years, even though they are expanding outside China and also penetrating high-tier price bands.
- alkonaut 7y ago
  It’s a shift though and can’t simply be an expansion. This means giving up a chunk of the high end market to be taken by themselves but with lower margin products. If 10 would be android buyers get the SE that makes them money. But if also just one or two would-be iPhone11 buyers get the SE that’s probably a net loss. I interpret it as a shift more towards software and services and away from hardware. They are realizing that phones get better and better and once they are this good people will keep them for longer (while still buying software and services like iCloud). It’s musical chairs and Apple knows the music is about to stop and want to expand before it does.
dillonmckay 7y ago
So, the Model 3 of smartphones?
corporateslave5 7y ago
I think the iPhone se is a response to the economic downturn. Apple needs to sell phones, this phone is too good of a deal. They normally wouldn’t release a product like this. Edit: Dumbfounded that people don’t think the most valuable company in the world doesn’t have a plan for economic downturns. This model reuses parts already made. Somehow it’s coincidental it shows up right as the downturn does?
- mcphage 7y ago
  They also spend a while working on their products, so I don’t think they had time to change much in response to the downturn.
- cmarschner 7y ago
  A few years ago a phone with this price tag would have been a flagship phone. Apple defined a new category with their $1000+ phones
  - scarface74 7y ago
    A few years ago? Apple released the original iPhone at $499/$599 in 2007.
- Waterluvian 7y ago
  It absolutely sold me. Buying an Apple phone wasn't even on my radar. I bought it and later discovered it has wireless charging. I thought, wow, this is quite the play. This phone is way underpriced.
- simonh 7y ago
  Except they did exactly the same thing with the first SE. It was, like this one, the latest top of the line internals in the previous generation form factor at an affordable price point. Thats the SE formula. It was even the exact same price point as the new SE.
- gurkendoktor 7y ago
  Then why did they release the original iPhone SE four years ago, when Apple was still on a steady upward trajectory? It also had great parts for the money. My pet theory is that business customers loved the original SE even more than consumers did. I hope I'm right, because then we might see an SE 3 as soon as the SE 2 nears its end-of-life.
simonh 7y ago
The SE is Apple’s way of cutting off the oxygen supply to competing me-too mid and high end Android smartphones, for the many people that really don’t care about the brand. It’s a no-compromises smartphone with the fastest internals you can get, plenty of longevity and competitive screen and camera at a midrange price. If we hadn’t already got XRs for my teenage kids, this SE would have been the obvious choice.
- megablast 7y ago
  > with the fastest internals you can get, plenty of longevity and competitive screen and camera at a midrange price So improved CPU which most people do not car about, old design and not great camera.
  - gherkinnn 7y ago
    People don’t care about the CPU, they care about the fact that the phone will remain fast and snappy for many years to come. And many of the same people who don’t give a shit about the CPU don’t care about the design and not-great camera either.
    - fulafel 7y ago
      The reason phones become badly janky as the years pass is very rately the CPU. You can tell by how the lag ebbs, there are small hangs and the the device gets going again. It's some combination of flash perf degeneration, ram squeeze, and the many ways the OS install degenerates between wipes. And OS upgrades that have left old hw performance regressions unfixed.
  - sq_ 7y ago
    Most compelling thing versus similarly priced Android offerings from my point of view is the guarantee of software support far into the future. Hardware is roughly the same as the 11, so, based on Apple's past behavior, one can expect that this will be supported for roughly as long as the 11 will. I'm definitely not aware of many Android phones at this price point that one can expect to get security updates, much less feature updates, 4-5 years into the future.
klmadfejno 7y ago
I've gone from the old SE to the new SE. I like it. Feels fine for one hand use. I think the debate about FaceID vs. TouchID is people exaggerating their beliefs. I've got FaceID on a work phone, and have Touch ID now. On my old one, the button broke so I just used the assistive touch virtual button and input my 8+ digit code every time to unlock it. Didn't phase me at all after an hour. As someone who hasn't cared at all about any of the iphone tech advances of the recent past, a relatively cheap phone with 64GB of space and a hand held size is great.
- untog 7y ago
  It feels ironic that at a time where I want to use contactless payment as much as possible my Face ID has stopped working because I’m wearing a mask. I’d take Touch ID back in a heartbeat!
  - techsupporter 7y ago
    > my Face ID has stopped working because I’m wearing a mask I have started thinking pretty strongly about buying an SE (2020) and trading back my 11 Pro Max based solely on Touch ID. I've missed having Touch ID for a while but I like the much better screen and cameras on my 11...but considering masks in public are very likely to be a thing in North America for a while, it's worth my considering. My hope is that Apple figures out how to do multiple faces on Face ID, like fingerprints on Touch ID, so I can tell it "this is me" and "this is me with a mask."
    - pmalynin 7y ago
      Settings -> Face ID —> Set Up an Alternative Appearance
      - sq_ 7y ago
        Will this work reliably for teaching it to recognize you with a mask on? Seems like using different masks or having some wrinkle in your mask would throw it off. Additionally, would it lower the amount of information the sensor can gather to the point where someone else's face with a mask would trick it into unlocking?
2OEH8eoCRo0 7y ago
Computers used to exist in some far away place and take up a room. There were very few in the world. Computers eventually shrunk and moved into the home- occupying a desk in the house. Computers shrunk further into laptops, then to tablets and mobile phones. The computers are now constantly pressed against our skin. Soon we will wear them on our face. The implantation of computers under our skin or inside our skulls has been a story happening in slow motion over the course of 60 or so years. This is the inevitable conclusion.
- spitfire 7y ago
  So I'm going to have to go to the apple store for major surgery every 12-24 months? No thanks. Seriously though, we long ago reached the limits of audio and stopped innovating there. We're close to that for 2d screen visuals (8K, full visible colour spectrum, etc). It is neat to think about what being able to reproduce media at the limits of perception might be.
  - nchase 7y ago
    I agree with your comment broadly, but I think I disagree with respect to audio - have you had time to check out audio ray tracing?
  - conradev 7y ago
    I don’t think we’ve reached the limits of audio yet, we have yet to figure out a (scalable) way to measure personalized HRTFs for truly immersive spatial audio
  - est31 7y ago
    We haven't reached the limits of audio yet. People still complain about noisy neighbors, or roads or airports they live close to. They still have to wear earphones. One thing which I think might happen in the next 30 years is advanced cochlear implants or maybe something that directly stimulates the auditory nerve, while disabling the borne with hearing machinery. This sounds a bit cruel, but think of it: running everything through a digital layer of noise filtering would make so many things easier. Society wouldn't have to care how loud something is. The people not opting for the technology will have a hard time enduring all the noise... The stapediuus regulation capacities are quite limited, and we already constantly wear headphones.
randyrand 7y ago
Do internals actually matter when it comes to performance? iphone 6s vs xs speed comparison is only about 5% slower in actual usage and often is actually faster. Not very compelling. https://youtu.be/uN4JoIeRojg https://youtu.be/uN4JoIeRojg https://youtu.be/a1dWINdNGl8 https://youtu.be/a1dWINdNGl8 https://youtu.be/uN4JoIeRojg https://youtu.be/uN4JoIeRojg
- NaOH 7y ago
  I have a 6s and XS non-Max and use both daily. A claim of 5% difference does not in any way match my experiences, and I say that as someone who prefers the 6S for its size and pre-FaceID UI. My XS consistently and handily outperforms my 6S (which does have a new battery, so it is not affected by battery-related performance downgrades). The only difference between the devices is that the 6S does not have cellular service. Other than that distinction, all apps and settings on the devices are identical. The only exception I see whereby the 6S is faster is with the Box.com app when it syncs the files I've marked for offline use. I have no idea if that's because of differences between the phones or something with the app.
- gruez 7y ago
  >is only about 5% slower in actual usage and often is actually faster Think about that for a second. The 6s has a slower cpu, gpu, disk, wifi than the xs, yet it often performs faster? Maybe this means there's something wrong with the benchmark. Does 6s some sort of secret sauce that they forgot to add in the xs? Maybe there's something that they're not accounting for? Maybe the 6s running with a hot cache and not the xs? Maybe the xs was recently used and was hot? Also, I don't get the popularity of this style of benchmarks. They're not representative of actual usage. Cold app launches account for maybe 1% of my smartphone time.
  - randyrand 7y ago
    Some of those videos also do wifi website loading comparisons and the 6s is about the same speed. What do you spend time waiting for on your phone? I dont spend much time waiting fo my phone on my SE daily driver, do you? App loading time is still the most common thing I can think of. What else would you suggest they test?
clairity 7y ago
it’s puzzling that the central reason for SE iphones to exist wasn’t spelled out with respect to commoditization: apple shifted to a focus on services, first with ipod and apple music, and now with everything else, apps, files/backups, video, news, games, iot, AR/VR, etc. the hardware is commoditized and sold at lower price points specifically so that the addressable market for services is expanded and revenue can be harvested from those offerings. note that services and secondary devices are the parts of apple’s business that’s driving its growth, not hardware.
- snuxoll 7y ago
  Save $350 buying an iPhone SE instead of an iPhone 11, maybe get an Apple Watch or iPad to go along with it with the money saved. Oh, now I have multiple devices and Apple services are so convenient. It’s a model only Apple can really pull off right now with their wide product range, vertical integration of services, etc.
  - sq_ 7y ago
    > Save $350 buying an iPhone SE instead of an iPhone 11, maybe get an Apple Watch or iPad to go along with it with the money saved. I'm not sure this is what Apple's going for. What I've heard from family and friends about the SE is that they'd buy it in order to save some money while still getting modern hardware with long-term software support. I kind of doubt that the market of people looking for a $400 phone are too interested in spending another few hundred on an Apple Watch or an iPad.
  - enos_feedler 7y ago
    I agree with the result here, that the iPhone SE is going bring down the average price of buying into the Apple universe. I'm not sure the average Apple customer is doing this kind of math to justify their purchases. I think you are projecting far too much rationality onto the Apple consumer. Apple doesn't like to create confusion around which product is right for users. The clear iPhone SE buyer is the lagging customer who, when buying the iPhone SE is seeing a technology upgrade given how far back they are. They don't want to pay the extra $$$ to skip too far forward into the future.
ksec 7y ago
Not sure I agree. Despite $400 being the entry level price for new iPhone and that is quite affordable and offers amazing performance. It is by no means commoditising. In 2017 the ASP of Xiaomi Smartphone was barely over $100. In the world of Smartphone that is inclusive of China and India, $400 is considered as premium segment. Even if you took out China and India and only look at Android, $400 is still considered as mainstream / premium. And judging from Apple's past experience and strategy, they are unlikely to lower the price any further. The iPhone SE was $399 in 2016, $399 in 2020, and likely still be $399 in 2024. The true commodity Smartphone segment still has a long way to go before reaching iPhone SE quality. And unlike Cars which has comparatively minimal advance, you can still use your car from 2000s, your 3G phone will likely not be getting much bandwidth due to Spectrum reframing.
- yftsui 7y ago
  I wouldn’t use Xiaomi’s early pricing strategy as a proof, just checked the price of Mi 10 and it is definitely higher than iPhone SE.
  - AbuAssar 7y ago
    Mi is their high end line Redmi is their budget midrange line
- gruez 7y ago
  >Even if you took out China and India and only look at Android, $400 is still considered as mainstream / premium. But there are plenty of other developing countries other than china/india, which means the number is still being dragged down. You'd need to get ASP for android phones in US or western europe only.
  - ksec 7y ago
    For US specifically, $400 will likely still be considered Mainstream. Vast Majority of the Phone sold in are through carriers, and prices are mostly masked behind a monthly contract up to 30 months. So most of the phones are actually $500+. But there are a substantial and growing market of non-contract and prepaid that are under $300. I dont have Data from Western Europe, but in terms of iPhone usage it is considered to be low compared to US, and they have official access to Chinese Brands from Huawei, Xiaomi, BBK. Would not be surprised if the actual distribution ( excluding tax ) would be even lower.
gnicholas 7y ago
> putting its latest and greatest processor, camera, operating system (and almost its display) into a form factor that can sell for under $400 The camera is not as good as the 11 or 11 Pro. Very good, yes — and even better using third-party camera apps that let you bokeh non-faces. But still not the latest and greatest.
darren0 7y ago
Hmm... commoditization vs commodification?
lazylizard 7y ago
I have been using a series of lg g5s for a while now. Its dual sim n the battery is replaceable. And the screen can be easily replaced yourself (less than 30usd on aliexpress). And years ago I'd stopped trying to run pc game emulators on my phone so the spec is plenty enough..
- e_proxus 7y ago
  Once I started using one normal and one eSIM on my iPhone I found the lack of dual SIM slots a lot less annoying.
freepor 7y ago
Got my SE on Friday and haven’t yet bothered to open it (upgrading from 6s). In a way that’s evidence of how much of a “commodity” phones have become.
627467 7y ago
I get it: Apple placed their fastest SoC on a phone 1/3 of the price of their other phone. And currently that seems to be faster than any android device... But, what is the big deal? Chips always get faster/cheaper. "Pocket computers" have been commoditized for many years now. iPhone is a fine device, but does not seem any more revolutionary than anything else. Plus, is it really a computer if you don't get to install and manipulate the file system however you want?
technofiend 7y ago
Apple has such a great lead with their processor line I can't help but wonder if at some point Qualcomm will swallow their pride and hire the same engineer who buffed AMD's and Apple's chips: Jim Keller.
mark_l_watson 7y ago
I really like not having a Physical Home button on my iPhone 11 Pro. Going back to a physical button and less possible screen size seems like a backward move to me.
- ezequiel-garzon 7y ago
  It’s market segmentation, they have to make it uglier. If Apple gave their “affordable” model the same internals and looks of their flagship, which costs about three times as much, they would effectively kill their premium line.
eatbitseveryday 7y ago
Some folks here gripe about FaceID not working with a mask, TouchID not working with gloves. I wonder if Apple has given thought to something like VoiceID. You see this in Star Trek when an officer gives an access code, and in many other sci-fi shows. Or, RetinaID which goes based on a scan of your eyeball. Or even some combination of these in case one is obstructed.
thewileyone 7y ago
Using the same CPU as more expensive phones eases the supply chain and end-user support, plain and simple. Now they don't have to support different CPUs for different phones and make iOS backwards compatible.

84 points by mpweiher 7y ago

It's an interesting (if quite long overdue) strategic move on Apple's part, as moving into the mid-range drastically increases their addressable market. Their biggest rivals can afford to compete on specs in the high-end, but likely don't have the vertical integration to do so at a $400 price point (especially when Google captures most of the software ecosystem revenue via the Play Store).

BurritoAlPastor 7y ago
Overdue? The 2016 SE was also $400.
- lstamour 7y ago
  Yeah, the same thing was said about the original SE. If Apple were serious about the mid-market they would have given the previous SE a spec bump in 2018, at least.
  - coder543 7y ago
    Apple gave it one bump: https://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker/2017/3/21/14998660/apple-iphone-se-128gb-announced-pricing-release-date https://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker/2017/3/21/14998660/a... Apple also lowered the price to $349 at some point in order to continue enticing new purchases, partially compensating for the lack of spec bumps. But, I don't think a lack of spec bumps indicates they aren't serious about a given market. The iPhone SE appears to be a way to reuse the manufacturing and tooling that was developed for a given multigenerational style for a few more years, further amortizing the cost and providing a value-oriented phone for customers that want this. If you watch some videos[0], you'll see that the original 2016 iPhone SE is still surprisingly usable in 2020, and it is rumored to get iOS 14 as its last major update. If they were "not serious" about that market, the original iPhone SE would've been unusuable a year ago, with no clear upgrade path for its users, leading to user pain and confusion. This is not the case at all. Users got along just fine, and the new iPhone SE has launched with plenty of time to spare before things become either painful or unsupported. [0] example of one video that shows how the new iPhone SE is measurably faster, but the old one is still perfectly usable: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgwtGmyTDiY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KgwtGmyTDiY
    - untog 7y ago
      For me personally the camera was the reason I finally upgraded from my old SE. The camera in there was noticeably old technology. If they’d done a 2018 refresh with current camera tech I would have bought it in a heartbeat.
    - fouc 7y ago
      Interesting in that video the new iPhone SE was 50Mb/s faster due to wifi chip/antenna differences. Could've explained a lot of the faster page loads with pinterest/twitter/amazon/ebay. It's incredibly how performant the old iPhone SE still seems to be.
    - dwighttk 7y ago
      I agree. Not only is this segment of users saving money on initial purchase, but (probably) also by not updating every year or two. The real “clear upgrade path” is to a more expensive phone. Or as you said, not upgrading for 4ish years.
    - ken 7y ago
      I don't know if this is normal for iPhones, but the SE got a big price break through carriers towards the end. I bought the 32GB model new for $50. Even if I didn't want that carrier, I could have bought the phone and the minimum 6 months service for under $250 total. As a "not a phone person", I think even $400 for a phone is nuts. The (first) iPhone SE is still perfectly usable (why would that be surprising?), and doesn't lag on anything I do. I don't see why I'd need to upgrade. That video seems to confirm that newer phones are really only faster at things I never do (games, video encoding, benchmarks).
sharkjacobs 7y ago
> Google captures most of the software ecosystem revenue via the Play Store My impression is that the opposite is actually the case. Google has about 4x the users but the App Store takes in almost twice as much revenue. I don't have any good sources to cite, that's just my impression. The first few google results for "ios vs android software revenue" seem to support it. edit: maybe you meant Google captures the majority of Android software revenue. I forgot there were alternative Android app stores.
- syspec 7y ago
  I believe the parent is referring to, google captures most of the revenue in Play Store... for android devices
- nxc18 7y ago
  It’s worth highlighting that in the iOS ecosystem, Apple makes money on the hardware, apps, and in-app-purchases, with few exceptions. On Android, Google makes money on the apps, and some in-app-purchases, but the OEM makes money on the device. I think that, in addition to underlying architectural flaws, helps explain why OEMs are so disinterested in supporting phones for more than 1-2 years. LG only makes money when you upgrade, whereas Google and Apple make money every time you buy an app. It’s in LG’s interest to sell you a $300 phone every two years, whereas it may be in Apple’s interest to sell a $400 phone every 5 years and make up the difference on software and services, and hope enough people are enticed by the new shiny to upgrade more often.
  - millstone 7y ago
    Hardly any OEMs makes money on Android devices. https://www.counterpointresearch.com/apple-continues-lead-global-handset-industry-profit-share/ https://www.counterpointresearch.com/apple-continues-lead-gl...
    - nl 7y ago
      That's not what that report say. Apple takes most of the profit in the sector, but the other companies are profitable, at lower levels. Eg, even the low end Chinese manufactures: Chinese smartphone brands operate at low-profit margins, but better than in previous years, even though they are expanding outside China and also penetrating high-tier price bands.
alkonaut 7y ago
It’s a shift though and can’t simply be an expansion. This means giving up a chunk of the high end market to be taken by themselves but with lower margin products. If 10 would be android buyers get the SE that makes them money. But if also just one or two would-be iPhone11 buyers get the SE that’s probably a net loss. I interpret it as a shift more towards software and services and away from hardware. They are realizing that phones get better and better and once they are this good people will keep them for longer (while still buying software and services like iCloud). It’s musical chairs and Apple knows the music is about to stop and want to expand before it does.

dillonmckay 7y ago

So, the Model 3 of smartphones?

corporateslave5 7y ago

I think the iPhone se is a response to the economic downturn. Apple needs to sell phones, this phone is too good of a deal. They normally wouldn’t release a product like this. Edit: Dumbfounded that people don’t think the most valuable company in the world doesn’t have a plan for economic downturns. This model reuses parts already made. Somehow it’s coincidental it shows up right as the downturn does?

mcphage 7y ago
They also spend a while working on their products, so I don’t think they had time to change much in response to the downturn.
cmarschner 7y ago
A few years ago a phone with this price tag would have been a flagship phone. Apple defined a new category with their $1000+ phones
- scarface74 7y ago
  A few years ago? Apple released the original iPhone at $499/$599 in 2007.
Waterluvian 7y ago
It absolutely sold me. Buying an Apple phone wasn't even on my radar. I bought it and later discovered it has wireless charging. I thought, wow, this is quite the play. This phone is way underpriced.
simonh 7y ago
Except they did exactly the same thing with the first SE. It was, like this one, the latest top of the line internals in the previous generation form factor at an affordable price point. Thats the SE formula. It was even the exact same price point as the new SE.
gurkendoktor 7y ago
Then why did they release the original iPhone SE four years ago, when Apple was still on a steady upward trajectory? It also had great parts for the money. My pet theory is that business customers loved the original SE even more than consumers did. I hope I'm right, because then we might see an SE 3 as soon as the SE 2 nears its end-of-life.

simonh 7y ago

The SE is Apple’s way of cutting off the oxygen supply to competing me-too mid and high end Android smartphones, for the many people that really don’t care about the brand. It’s a no-compromises smartphone with the fastest internals you can get, plenty of longevity and competitive screen and camera at a midrange price. If we hadn’t already got XRs for my teenage kids, this SE would have been the obvious choice.

megablast 7y ago
> with the fastest internals you can get, plenty of longevity and competitive screen and camera at a midrange price So improved CPU which most people do not car about, old design and not great camera.
- gherkinnn 7y ago
  People don’t care about the CPU, they care about the fact that the phone will remain fast and snappy for many years to come. And many of the same people who don’t give a shit about the CPU don’t care about the design and not-great camera either.
  - fulafel 7y ago
    The reason phones become badly janky as the years pass is very rately the CPU. You can tell by how the lag ebbs, there are small hangs and the the device gets going again. It's some combination of flash perf degeneration, ram squeeze, and the many ways the OS install degenerates between wipes. And OS upgrades that have left old hw performance regressions unfixed.
- sq_ 7y ago
  Most compelling thing versus similarly priced Android offerings from my point of view is the guarantee of software support far into the future. Hardware is roughly the same as the 11, so, based on Apple's past behavior, one can expect that this will be supported for roughly as long as the 11 will. I'm definitely not aware of many Android phones at this price point that one can expect to get security updates, much less feature updates, 4-5 years into the future.

klmadfejno 7y ago

I've gone from the old SE to the new SE. I like it. Feels fine for one hand use. I think the debate about FaceID vs. TouchID is people exaggerating their beliefs. I've got FaceID on a work phone, and have Touch ID now. On my old one, the button broke so I just used the assistive touch virtual button and input my 8+ digit code every time to unlock it. Didn't phase me at all after an hour. As someone who hasn't cared at all about any of the iphone tech advances of the recent past, a relatively cheap phone with 64GB of space and a hand held size is great.

untog 7y ago
It feels ironic that at a time where I want to use contactless payment as much as possible my Face ID has stopped working because I’m wearing a mask. I’d take Touch ID back in a heartbeat!
- techsupporter 7y ago
  > my Face ID has stopped working because I’m wearing a mask I have started thinking pretty strongly about buying an SE (2020) and trading back my 11 Pro Max based solely on Touch ID. I've missed having Touch ID for a while but I like the much better screen and cameras on my 11...but considering masks in public are very likely to be a thing in North America for a while, it's worth my considering. My hope is that Apple figures out how to do multiple faces on Face ID, like fingerprints on Touch ID, so I can tell it "this is me" and "this is me with a mask."
  - pmalynin 7y ago
    Settings -> Face ID —> Set Up an Alternative Appearance
    - sq_ 7y ago
      Will this work reliably for teaching it to recognize you with a mask on? Seems like using different masks or having some wrinkle in your mask would throw it off. Additionally, would it lower the amount of information the sensor can gather to the point where someone else's face with a mask would trick it into unlocking?

2OEH8eoCRo0 7y ago

Computers used to exist in some far away place and take up a room. There were very few in the world. Computers eventually shrunk and moved into the home- occupying a desk in the house. Computers shrunk further into laptops, then to tablets and mobile phones. The computers are now constantly pressed against our skin. Soon we will wear them on our face. The implantation of computers under our skin or inside our skulls has been a story happening in slow motion over the course of 60 or so years. This is the inevitable conclusion.

spitfire 7y ago
So I'm going to have to go to the apple store for major surgery every 12-24 months? No thanks. Seriously though, we long ago reached the limits of audio and stopped innovating there. We're close to that for 2d screen visuals (8K, full visible colour spectrum, etc). It is neat to think about what being able to reproduce media at the limits of perception might be.
- nchase 7y ago
  I agree with your comment broadly, but I think I disagree with respect to audio - have you had time to check out audio ray tracing?
- conradev 7y ago
  I don’t think we’ve reached the limits of audio yet, we have yet to figure out a (scalable) way to measure personalized HRTFs for truly immersive spatial audio
- est31 7y ago
  We haven't reached the limits of audio yet. People still complain about noisy neighbors, or roads or airports they live close to. They still have to wear earphones. One thing which I think might happen in the next 30 years is advanced cochlear implants or maybe something that directly stimulates the auditory nerve, while disabling the borne with hearing machinery. This sounds a bit cruel, but think of it: running everything through a digital layer of noise filtering would make so many things easier. Society wouldn't have to care how loud something is. The people not opting for the technology will have a hard time enduring all the noise... The stapediuus regulation capacities are quite limited, and we already constantly wear headphones.

randyrand 7y ago

Do internals actually matter when it comes to performance? iphone 6s vs xs speed comparison is only about 5% slower in actual usage and often is actually faster. Not very compelling. https://youtu.be/uN4JoIeRojg https://youtu.be/uN4JoIeRojg https://youtu.be/a1dWINdNGl8 https://youtu.be/a1dWINdNGl8 https://youtu.be/uN4JoIeRojg https://youtu.be/uN4JoIeRojg

NaOH 7y ago
I have a 6s and XS non-Max and use both daily. A claim of 5% difference does not in any way match my experiences, and I say that as someone who prefers the 6S for its size and pre-FaceID UI. My XS consistently and handily outperforms my 6S (which does have a new battery, so it is not affected by battery-related performance downgrades). The only difference between the devices is that the 6S does not have cellular service. Other than that distinction, all apps and settings on the devices are identical. The only exception I see whereby the 6S is faster is with the Box.com app when it syncs the files I've marked for offline use. I have no idea if that's because of differences between the phones or something with the app.
gruez 7y ago
>is only about 5% slower in actual usage and often is actually faster Think about that for a second. The 6s has a slower cpu, gpu, disk, wifi than the xs, yet it often performs faster? Maybe this means there's something wrong with the benchmark. Does 6s some sort of secret sauce that they forgot to add in the xs? Maybe there's something that they're not accounting for? Maybe the 6s running with a hot cache and not the xs? Maybe the xs was recently used and was hot? Also, I don't get the popularity of this style of benchmarks. They're not representative of actual usage. Cold app launches account for maybe 1% of my smartphone time.
- randyrand 7y ago
  Some of those videos also do wifi website loading comparisons and the 6s is about the same speed. What do you spend time waiting for on your phone? I dont spend much time waiting fo my phone on my SE daily driver, do you? App loading time is still the most common thing I can think of. What else would you suggest they test?

clairity 7y ago

it’s puzzling that the central reason for SE iphones to exist wasn’t spelled out with respect to commoditization: apple shifted to a focus on services, first with ipod and apple music, and now with everything else, apps, files/backups, video, news, games, iot, AR/VR, etc. the hardware is commoditized and sold at lower price points specifically so that the addressable market for services is expanded and revenue can be harvested from those offerings. note that services and secondary devices are the parts of apple’s business that’s driving its growth, not hardware.

snuxoll 7y ago
Save $350 buying an iPhone SE instead of an iPhone 11, maybe get an Apple Watch or iPad to go along with it with the money saved. Oh, now I have multiple devices and Apple services are so convenient. It’s a model only Apple can really pull off right now with their wide product range, vertical integration of services, etc.
- sq_ 7y ago
  > Save $350 buying an iPhone SE instead of an iPhone 11, maybe get an Apple Watch or iPad to go along with it with the money saved. I'm not sure this is what Apple's going for. What I've heard from family and friends about the SE is that they'd buy it in order to save some money while still getting modern hardware with long-term software support. I kind of doubt that the market of people looking for a $400 phone are too interested in spending another few hundred on an Apple Watch or an iPad.
- enos_feedler 7y ago
  I agree with the result here, that the iPhone SE is going bring down the average price of buying into the Apple universe. I'm not sure the average Apple customer is doing this kind of math to justify their purchases. I think you are projecting far too much rationality onto the Apple consumer. Apple doesn't like to create confusion around which product is right for users. The clear iPhone SE buyer is the lagging customer who, when buying the iPhone SE is seeing a technology upgrade given how far back they are. They don't want to pay the extra $$$ to skip too far forward into the future.

ksec 7y ago

Not sure I agree. Despite $400 being the entry level price for new iPhone and that is quite affordable and offers amazing performance. It is by no means commoditising. In 2017 the ASP of Xiaomi Smartphone was barely over $100. In the world of Smartphone that is inclusive of China and India, $400 is considered as premium segment. Even if you took out China and India and only look at Android, $400 is still considered as mainstream / premium. And judging from Apple's past experience and strategy, they are unlikely to lower the price any further. The iPhone SE was $399 in 2016, $399 in 2020, and likely still be $399 in 2024. The true commodity Smartphone segment still has a long way to go before reaching iPhone SE quality. And unlike Cars which has comparatively minimal advance, you can still use your car from 2000s, your 3G phone will likely not be getting much bandwidth due to Spectrum reframing.

yftsui 7y ago
I wouldn’t use Xiaomi’s early pricing strategy as a proof, just checked the price of Mi 10 and it is definitely higher than iPhone SE.
- AbuAssar 7y ago
  Mi is their high end line Redmi is their budget midrange line
gruez 7y ago
>Even if you took out China and India and only look at Android, $400 is still considered as mainstream / premium. But there are plenty of other developing countries other than china/india, which means the number is still being dragged down. You'd need to get ASP for android phones in US or western europe only.
- ksec 7y ago
  For US specifically, $400 will likely still be considered Mainstream. Vast Majority of the Phone sold in are through carriers, and prices are mostly masked behind a monthly contract up to 30 months. So most of the phones are actually $500+. But there are a substantial and growing market of non-contract and prepaid that are under $300. I dont have Data from Western Europe, but in terms of iPhone usage it is considered to be low compared to US, and they have official access to Chinese Brands from Huawei, Xiaomi, BBK. Would not be surprised if the actual distribution ( excluding tax ) would be even lower.

gnicholas 7y ago

> putting its latest and greatest processor, camera, operating system (and almost its display) into a form factor that can sell for under $400 The camera is not as good as the 11 or 11 Pro. Very good, yes — and even better using third-party camera apps that let you bokeh non-faces. But still not the latest and greatest.

darren0 7y ago

Hmm... commoditization vs commodification?

lazylizard 7y ago

I have been using a series of lg g5s for a while now. Its dual sim n the battery is replaceable. And the screen can be easily replaced yourself (less than 30usd on aliexpress). And years ago I'd stopped trying to run pc game emulators on my phone so the spec is plenty enough..

e_proxus 7y ago
Once I started using one normal and one eSIM on my iPhone I found the lack of dual SIM slots a lot less annoying.

freepor 7y ago

Got my SE on Friday and haven’t yet bothered to open it (upgrading from 6s). In a way that’s evidence of how much of a “commodity” phones have become.

627467 7y ago

I get it: Apple placed their fastest SoC on a phone 1/3 of the price of their other phone. And currently that seems to be faster than any android device... But, what is the big deal? Chips always get faster/cheaper. "Pocket computers" have been commoditized for many years now. iPhone is a fine device, but does not seem any more revolutionary than anything else. Plus, is it really a computer if you don't get to install and manipulate the file system however you want?

technofiend 7y ago

Apple has such a great lead with their processor line I can't help but wonder if at some point Qualcomm will swallow their pride and hire the same engineer who buffed AMD's and Apple's chips: Jim Keller.

mark_l_watson 7y ago

I really like not having a Physical Home button on my iPhone 11 Pro. Going back to a physical button and less possible screen size seems like a backward move to me.

ezequiel-garzon 7y ago
It’s market segmentation, they have to make it uglier. If Apple gave their “affordable” model the same internals and looks of their flagship, which costs about three times as much, they would effectively kill their premium line.

eatbitseveryday 7y ago

Some folks here gripe about FaceID not working with a mask, TouchID not working with gloves. I wonder if Apple has given thought to something like VoiceID. You see this in Star Trek when an officer gives an access code, and in many other sci-fi shows. Or, RetinaID which goes based on a scan of your eyeball. Or even some combination of these in case one is obstructed.

thewileyone 7y ago

Using the same CPU as more expensive phones eases the supply chain and end-user support, plain and simple. Now they don't have to support different CPUs for different phones and make iOS backwards compatible.