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From: -hh <recscuba_google@huntzinger.com>
Newsgroups: misc.phone.mobile.iphone,comp.sys.mac.advocacy,comp.sys.mac.system
Subject: Re: Apple tacitly admits their CPUs and new Modem are merely a
 marketing gimmick
Date: Sat, 22 Feb 2025 18:05:27 -0500
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On 2/22/25 15:57, Your Name wrote:
> On 2025-02-22 11:38:58 +0000, -hh said:
> 
>> On 2/21/25 18:24, Alan wrote:
>>> On 2025-02-21 13:08, Your Name wrote:
>>>> On 2025-02-21 15:15:28 +0000, Rick said:
>>>>> ...
>>>>>
>>>>> There is an easy solution here.  If you don't like the product, 
>>>>> don't buy it.
>>
>> Bingo.
>>
>>>> The fact is that nobody in the real world gives a damn nor will ever 
>>>> notice any supposed slowness. It's only the tech geeks and the odd 
>>>> extreme high end user that might be bothered at all. Computers and 
>>>> devices reached peak speed and efficiency for 90%+ of users years 
>>>> ago and it's now become little more than annual updates for the sake 
>>>> of the companies making more money.
>>>
>>> Especially when one of the features Apple's modem doesn't have isn't 
>>> anywhere NEAR universal yet.
>>
>>
>> Pretty much my thoughts as well.  I looked at that design trade-off as 
>> being a reasonably good one:  the modem in question lacks the one 
>> niche cellular band that's shortest range & has limited deployment, so 
>> it might connectivity when at a stadium concert 1x/year, but it being 
>> ~1% more power efficient helps me every day when I leave my home's WiFi.
>>
>> In any event, there's more things than just geekery to criticize the 
>> new iPhone 16E about.  Since the Apple modem is to not pay Qualcomm's 
>> high chip licensing costs, then why did the price jump up by so much? 
>> For the $170 increase from $429 to $599 is a whopping +40%.  Tariffs?
>>
>>
>> -hh
> 
> Trump the Chump's idiotic tarriffs may well be one reason, as is the on- 
> going general price rises of almost everything, including shipping and 
> raw materials, but there are also a few updated specs compared to the 
> out-going iPhone SE:
>   - newer / faster CPU

Silicone wafers are cheap, so once the new mask is done for the flagship 
phone, the question of the manufacturing cost of the (A14 vs A15 vs) is 
pragmatically close to zero...or even negative, once you've done the 
manufacturing technology to improve yields (I was on one just one such 
project a few years ago ... we dropped cost from just under $50/unit to 
$8.xx).

>   - more RAM (needed for the useless Apple Intelligence gimmick)

The material's cheap and the long term trend is down.  A quick Google 
suggests a manufacturer cost of $4 per GB, so the increase from 4GB to 
8GB is all of a ~$16 manufacturing increase.

>   - higher resolution rear camera

Still is just a single aperture camera.

>   - larger / OLED display

 From the existing parts bin, right?

> (There are of course also a few small things now missing, such as the 
> home button.)

Sure.


> It may also be partly due to where the new model is being made - India 
> for example may be a little more expensive than China (which of course 
> is becoming more and more of a "no-no" for the conspiracy nutters in 
> some governments).

Sure, but of what magnitude of cost per unit?  Some years ago, I had a 
conversation on manufacturing offshoring with a Dell executive while at 
a funeral; TL;DR they admitted that when Dell sent PC assembly from the 
USA to China, their cost savings was around just $20/unit.  A decade 
ago, epi.org reported the assembly cost was ~$15 (2%), so assuming that 
this cost doubled due to India, +2% on a $500 iPhone is +$10. That's not 
nothing, but its also not a big smoking gun for a $140 price increase.



-hh