DPReview TV: Why Jordan is buying the iPhone 13

@Phillip USB-C on the iPad Pro finally convinced me. It just works, including also with things like third party USB-C hubs, ethernet, external monitors, video streaming, ... It should also simplify the connectivity to cameras with USB-C. No comparison to connectivities 10 years ago, like Lightning (I know that one from an old iPad Air).

As for Europe: you are right. I was sloppy, similar to people saying America if they mean U.S.A. :(
Btw. I have heard people from UK speaking of Europe if they mean the other European countries ...

Can’t speak for “most folks” but I am amongst those who upgrade annually because I enjoy my phone and its cameras just as I enjoy my dedicated cameras. I could apply the money elsewhere but I choose this. (And with trade in its really not a “lot” of money — basically I need to keep it low key this weekend — no dinners out, bars, concerts, etc. — and I’m back to par.)

It’s a choice, not a necessity.

Or maybe because he wants it. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Such is the Apple way, along with an OS that looks like it was designed for toddlers. There are even good $350 phones with 90Hz displays, like the One Plus Nord. You don't even get extremely basic features like that in a non-Pro iPhone 13 at 2-3x the price. Never mind things like small bezels, no notches, under-display cameras and under-display fingerprint readers - maybe on the iPhone 20. Apple does a much better job with it's tablets IMHO, most of which have USB-C.

You know you can have that for around 150€, right? I have and it is more than enough.
And you know that they know every phone does that, so they try to fool people with camera features, mostly in software, 99.9% will never use...

" Please do appreciate the effort these companies are putting into converging so many devices into a pocketable device"

Well I would rather appreciate the Trillions of dollars consumers have now likely spent over the years which has allowed stated companies to even exist. Period.

My most used app is the Weather Channel

So now you can get 100 different functions packaged in an essentially disposable phone that costs $1,200. If that is what you crave, then go for it. After all, it is your money.

Personally, I'm pretty happy getting 95 different functions packaged in my essentially disposable $400 phone. To each his own.

I do understand everybody has their own preferences and their own budget. I just wanted to highlight that progress phones have made since iPhone was launched is astonishing. I still remember using my Nokia 1100 and playing snake game on it, but now I can play call of duty. Capture beautiful moments of my little one. I am not talking only about Apple but phone companies in general. The reason i prefer iPhone is that I have an iPhone X and its still going strong and earlier when i had HTC, Xiaomi and Samsung I had to change every ~2 years.

@Marty4650 Where did you get $1400? Are you in Canada? Last I checked there are multiple 13 models starting at $700.

I said $1200..... which falls somewhere in the range of their two top models, They will cost you between $999 and $1599 based on memory configuration here in the USA. (prices from the apple website)

13 Pro 128GB.............from $999
13 ProMax 128GB...from $1,099
13 Pro 256GB..........from $1,099
13 ProMax 256GB...from $1,199
12 Pro 512GB..........from $1,299
13 ProMax 512GB...from $1,399
13 Pro 1TB...............from $1,499
13 ProMax 1TB ...... from $1,599

You could save a little money by buying the 13 or the 13 Mini, but you won't get all the same high end cinema features. But even the cheapest model with the least memory will still set you back $700.

Ok...well I am getting the Mini($800 256 GB) not to save money but because it's the smallest device. I know a lot of high profile users with no expense are getting the iPhone 13 Mini as well(Peter McKinnon for example).

The conversation is about the 13 line which is many models and it doesn't have to be those models you listed. Peter McKinnon apparently doesn't care as he is getting the 13 Mini and many other content creators value form factor as a major decision maker as well.

"@ So you assume every iPhone user is buying a new iPhone each year "

maybe not every year but, maybe 2-3 year average.

So how else they can they stay the richest company in the world just selling phones and tablets?

That totally was not the context. He was comparing it to last year's 12 pro max telephoto lens when he made the smaller sensor size comment. Start at 2:04 for the full context

Isn't 4 is the unlucky number with Chinese culture?

Or is unlucky 4 Japanese culture?

@A7matt

'4' is pronounced as 'shi', which means also death in Japanese. So it's considered as unlucky or related to death. There are buildings which have no 4th floor in Japan and jump from 3 to 5.

As a side note my brother in law uses Japanese plates as a kind of joke with 'double 4'

4 meant the same in Chinese culture, not sure in mandarin or cantonese or hokkien but pretty sure 13 is a western thing.

Was the iPhone 4 released in Asia or renamed?

Superstition on 13 is Western, coming from the story of Jesus. Many cultures have superstitions on numbers, and like all cultural traits they diffuse more or less into other cultures they’re in contact with (so 13 may be seen today beyond the West).

I kept my last phone for 3 years and it was still working fine but I got a fair amount of money for trade in from apple and upgraded last year to iPhone 12. Will likely keep for another 2 years at least.

This is not a simple question to answer. From the technological perspective, smart phones are now relatively mature, so each new release is mainly an incremental improvement over the previous version. They simply don't improve by leaps and bounds like they did in the early days. If your phone works and you are happy with the features there is no reason to replace it.

Along with that if you pay full price for a phone it may make financial sense to wait as long as possible before purchasing a new phone. However, recent iPhones have a good trade-in value, and Apple and various carriers (T-Mobile, AT&T, etc.) currently have enticing incentives to trade up for a new phone. Those deals can decrease the price by a huge amount (but you'll be in a contract with a carrier for 2-3 years), which may make getting a new phone more reasonable.

I use them until the become unreliable. I just preordered a 13 Pro, and it’s replacing a 7.

Kept my iPhone 7 plus until 3 months ago when the (replaced) battery gave up and wasn't worth to replace. Had it for ~4 1/2 years. The dual camera worked great, and I especially liked the tele option. Apple supported the phone until at least this year. My new iPhone 12 pro is great but not much greater.

I agree it's best to change them only if needed. When compare my 3 yrs old model with the new ones, they are different, but not that much. It will easily run another year, I think. That negates a bit the higher prices of the new ones (in general, not iPhone 13 in specific). If you buy once in 4 years, it's fine.

I normally upgrade every 2-3 years or if I am planning to go on a trip, I consider upgrading earlier. And only upgrade because of the camera upgrades as I mostly use my phone for photography. Of course I use it for making phone calls and reading emails etc but for that you do not need latest model. My parent in-laws are still using iPhone 5s still with original battery. Only one time in past I upgraded from 3Gs to iphone 4, only because of aesthetic reason!

munn1, I actually still have Nokia 6303c. I think it was made 2008 or there about. And when I dropped my previous phone and the screen broke, with an adapter for normal size SIM cards, I used it for 5 days, 'till waiting for my new one to be delivered. In 5 days I did not recharge the battery once :)

Some may consider the inability to use Google services as a blessing. Google has had its share of privacy and copyright issues.
Use Microsoft services.

Anyone suppose to know who you are or give a damn that you didn't?

Not sure about how good - each to their own and I won't pass judgment. However in terms of reliability I think Apple has a good reputation.

From what I understand, it's a holdover from film being shown at 24p. Supposedly our brains associate "cinema" with 24p due to repeated theater exposure. There's nothing inherently special about 24p beyond it being cheaper than 30p or 48p; it was just the lowest "film spend" number that movie companies thought they could get away with.

It's a tough argument to make when modern people are inundated with 30+FPS video from infancy and streaming is killing off old theaters. I expect 24p to die out to 30p in the next ten years.

You can do all that and more with practically any phone right now. I'm not sure what you're getting at. Do you want Apple specifically to stop putting so many resources into phone develoent?

remember the camera module build price is quite inexpensive vs. the price of the phone. The 12 pro has a build price for Sony's CMOS image sensors and they are priced at around $5.40 to $7.40 per unit. Now I don't know if this is for the lens too but the camera modules are not very expensive.

@mal - If you could not care less why comment on it? I mean, you could not care less is fine, but other people may care. So? Both outcomes are valid and right.

My XR RAW files using the Lightroom app are pretty decent, investing 1500 USD upgrading to the iPhone 13 is a little hard to swallow.

@Igor FWIW, I've been using Otterbox Defender cases for over 10 years. The case goes on the iPhone when I unbox it. It has a removable exterior polycarbonate cover with a belt clip, which I use all the time to carry the phone on my waist. It covers the front of the iPhone including the camera lenses.

Otherwise there is nothing covering the lenses that might degrade the image quality. The case also has a built-in clear plastic cover for the iPhone's glass front, which does not interfere with using the screen.

The combo of an interior polycarbonate case with an exterior rubber covering provides a lot of protection without adding a lot of bulk compared with similar cases. I periodically clean the case and phone using OmniCleanz to remove any dust that gets inside. Otterbox also replaces used parts at a big discount or free- great support!

Over the years I have sold my old iPhones with the case on CraigsList for top dollar because the phones look like new after years of use.

@Brent Of course you can. Maybe I was just caught off guard by this "Why is he buying" and "excited" as a sales pitch for the company soon to be the first 3-trillion dollar company. On this occasion a bit much for my taste. Over the top you might say, this endorsement thing. And also in this day and age an endorsement for maximum profit in high price consumer goods. Like the auto tester from New Zealand saying: why I am excited about my new McLaren and why I'm buying one. There are days where I can't stand this indulgence and I thought it's not all gold that glitters 😉

@Brent You are quite polarising with your comments, I noticed that on the SONY forum as well. On the international (US) website the iPhone 13 costs 800.00 and here in New Zealand the cheapest iPhone 13 is NZ$ 1.429,00. Your price that caused you to call me crazy (US$ 500.00) I could not find anywhere. US$ 500,00 is NZ$ 700,00 by the way, about half of what you mentioned.
Polarising I called you because of your really quite remarkable comment for the iPhone 13 being 500,00.
I wasn't offended that the company existed but about not taking anything technical with a little grain of salt.
Nuff said, will ignore you in the future and would suggest you do the same.

My sister in law lives in Napa and would be interested to know where you get an iPhone 13 for 500.00.

Your suggestion that what you "really" meant was subsidies and trade ins and you used THAT to call out somebody from another country crazy?

Talk about superiority when you - from the US?? - tells the world how it's done.

bravo!

My friend still uses my iPhone 5S from 2013, I still have working iPhone 6S from 2015 and currently using iPhone 11 Pro Max as daily driver.

Android fanatics live in parallel universe.

We are in the better parallel universe, of course!

No Apple to brick your battery here!

I'm upgrading 2 year old 11ProMax for the 13ProMax and there is nothing really wrong with the 11, the battery is still holding charge very well and it is at 89% of its life health. I just wanted the new camera features and the new sensor that's all. Verizon $1000 discount deal was just too good to pass.

The battery termination thing is what Apple lost the suit against them for, and supposedly stopped doing. But when you're a $240,000,000,000 hedge fund that has a tech division.. a few million in fines ain't nothing but a chicken wing.

You can have the battery replaced at iphone repair shops for $50(US). My son replaced mine in my iphone 7. The battery costs about $18 online.