“Apple’s next iPhones should be announced next month, but this is an ‘S’ year. That means — if Apple sticks to the pattern it’s adhered to since 2008 — that the 2015 iPhones will maintain the same basic design as last year’s model, and focus instead on ‘under the hood’ improvements,” Scott Stein writes for CNET. “This year, the big feature upgrade looks like it’ll be Force Touch: a pressure-sensitive display, with vibrating haptics underneath.”
“Force Touch combines a pressure-sensitive display (or a trackpad) with haptic feedback underneath,” Stein reports. “What makes Apple’s Force Touch interesting, mainly, is the introduction of a pressure-sensitive touch display: most everyday touch screens currently available aren’t pressure sensitive at all.”
“the Apple Watch’s Force Touch display will ‘click’ when you press down on it, but it feels more like a gentle push inward, and clearly seems like it’s triggering a vibration in the watch body,” Stein reports. “What will happen to Force Touch on a larger screen? I’m wondering if it will feel more like the trackpad on the MacBook, serving up a click that starts to feel truly real… I’m most excited about how it could create the feeling of real buttons and switches on a normal screen. Could it feel like I’m operating a virtual thermostat with real buttons, or a TV remote? Or more importantly, could it create a feeling of typing on actual keyboard?”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Force Touch will be more important than most people think. And, “S” years often usher in hugely significant features, such as oleophobic displays, significant GPU improvements, world phone capability, Siri personal assistant, video stabilization, panorama photos, 64-bit processors, TD-LTE support, and Touch ID, among other improvements and additions.
And Android, littered across a veritable junkyard full of disparate devices, will not be able to follow. – MacDailyNews, February 28, 2015
SEE ALSO:
Revealed: How Force Touch works and feels in Apple’s next-gen iPhone 6s – August 10, 2015
Apple’s Force Touch: The future of mobile interfaces – August 4, 2015
Why Force Touch on the iPhone will be awesome – July 29, 2015
Apple’s Force Touch iPhone 6s to be major differentiator, put rivals at further disadvantage – July 6, 2015
Apple assemblers begin making next-gen iPhones with Force Touch – June 27, 2015
Analyst: Apple’s ‘iPhone 6s’ to feature stronger 7000 series aluminum, slightly thicker for Force Touch – June 17, 2015
Apple’s new Force Touch patent application reveals stylus, virtual paint brush, 3D buttons interactions – May 28, 2015
Apple’s forthcoming iOS 9 supports ‘iPhone 6s’ Force Touch – May 26, 2015
Apple patent application reveals work on Force Touch for iOS devices and more – March 5, 2015
Force Touch rumored to arrive exclusively on ‘iPhone 6s Plus’ – April 2, 2015
Apple’s next-gen iPhone 6s, iPhone 6s Plus to feature Force Touch – February 28, 2015
Anyone who says “S” years do not bring important new features just hasn’t been paying attention.
Correct; “S” models bring more internal/functionality changes rather than numbers-only models, which are more about appearance change.
However, this aspect that article discusses will not be the way they describe it:
“This year, the big feature upgrade looks like it’ll be Force Touch: a pressure-sensitive display, with vibrating haptics underneath”
Haptic Feedback has nothing to do with Force Touch, it is separate thing. And if author would care to carefully look at WSJ article on this, he would notice that they only talk about Force Touch.
Haptic Feedback is big linear engine that would increase iPhone 6S/6S Plus thickness much more than by ~0.3 mm, which is enough only for thin Force Touch sensors.
Speed (or Steve), Siri, Security (touchID) have been 3GS, 4S, and 5S. So what would the 6S’s word be?
Snappy
Force Touch.
(Looking for an S-word)
Coooooooooool!