“The price, the delays, and the popularity all tell you one thing, loud and clear: There’s an unbelievable amount of advanced technology in this thing,” David Pogue writes for Yahoo Finance. “Everybody talks about the iPhone X price ($999 for 64 gigs of storage, $1,149 for 256 gigs). Or they talk about its face-recognition feature. But the best thing about the iPhone X is its size. It’s a standard-size phone, only a hair bigger than an iPhone 7 or 8, and therefore easy to wrap your fingers around without growing extra knuckles. Yet the X has the screen size of the iPhone Plus models!”
MacDailyNews Take: Actually, it’s even better than that: At 5.8-inches, iPhone X’s display is larger than iPhone 8 Plus’ 5.5-inch screen.
“Bizarrely, Apple gave most reviewers only 24 hours with the iPhone X before posting their reviews (not a week or two, as in the past 10 years), so nobody can really say what battery life is like in real-world scenarios. I’ll update this review once I’ve had a chance to live with it,” Pogue writes. “I tried to fool the True Depth camera by putting on wigs, a fake mustache, a fake unibrow, and glasses. I even invited a Yahoo Studios makeup artist to turn me into a zombie, with full face makeup. None of it fooled Face ID… I finally got it to fail by applying a full beard that covered half my face. At that point, it didn’t recognize me and didn’t unlock. Of course, very few people sprout that much hair overnight. Ordinarily, Face ID continues to fine-tune its mathematical model of your face every time you use it, so things like slow hair growth (and wrinkle growth) won’t fool it. If you do do something radical, like shaving off your beard, you just re-train.”
“It doesn’t take long to get used to the Notch. But it is a kind of weird design decision. It winds up dividing the menu bar into two ‘ears’ and leaving no room for your cell carrier’s name or battery percentage,” Pogue writes. “The iPhone X represents a far more exciting leap than the incremental upgrades we’ve seen in recent iPhone models. The X’s cameras are fantastic, the screen is the best you’ve ever seen, the Face ID really works, and the depth camera will unlock a whole new realm of apps. Above all, you’re carrying around a Plus-size screen in a normal-size body. There may be some unbelievably sophisticated technology in this phone — but maybe the most winning feature of all is how little space it takes up in your hand.”
Good review because it pointed out some annoyances that may be important to some, like no carrier display (useful when traveling abroad) or battery percentage (just a graphic). Rather than a flashlight on the home screen, I would have preferred a wi-fi on/off for those times when the available network is too slow or not connected to the internet, making the telecom network more useful. This happens to me often when I use the free wi-fi connection in an airport. The face ID is remarkable tech to be sure, but i am waiting for reviews from people who have had a chance to use it over a month or so. The inability to share a face to unlock the device is a hindrance as my wife and I have registered a fingerprint on each other’s phone for various reasons. For now I am sticking with my intention to get an iPhone 8 rather than the X.
it would be neat to have the two lower corners of the iPhone X screen be like Apple Watch “complications” with customizable, assignable duties. I will leave the camera and flashlight, as those are the two most common things I currently swipe upwards to activate. But others may want to assign the calculator and Do Not Disturb for instance.
dan
One of the reviews I watched commented on the utilized screen space as being slightly smaller than on the Plus (more compact keyboard, empty space below it, slightly narrower screen). It’s basically in between the 8 and 8+, hopefully the better screen and form factor make up for this.
Good review because it pointed out some annoyances that may be important to some, like no carrier display (useful when traveling abroad) or battery percentage (just a graphic). Rather than a flashlight on the home screen, I would have preferred a wi-fi on/off for those times when the available network is too slow or not connected to the internet, making the telecom network more useful. This happens to me often when I use the free wi-fi connection in an airport. The face ID is remarkable tech to be sure, but i am waiting for reviews from people who have had a chance to use it over a month or so. The inability to share a face to unlock the device is a hindrance as my wife and I have registered a fingerprint on each other’s phone for various reasons. For now I am sticking with my intention to get an iPhone 8 rather than the X.
it would be neat to have the two lower corners of the iPhone X screen be like Apple Watch “complications” with customizable, assignable duties. I will leave the camera and flashlight, as those are the two most common things I currently swipe upwards to activate. But others may want to assign the calculator and Do Not Disturb for instance.
dan
Actually the 5.5″ screen of the 8 Plus is slightly bigger in terms of net screen surface than the 5.8″ X. In pixels, the X is the clear winner.
One of the reviews I watched commented on the utilized screen space as being slightly smaller than on the Plus (more compact keyboard, empty space below it, slightly narrower screen). It’s basically in between the 8 and 8+, hopefully the better screen and form factor make up for this.
Well, buy several then. Won’t that multiply your satisfaction?
The world acknowledges your infautation, David.