"MacBook Pro" and "iPad Pro" are the ones you buy if you need it for work, because the increased price will pay for itself with increased productivity. But buy the "Air" or basic versions if you are primarily using it for more basic tasks and media consumption.
Not sure the "Pro" distinction will hold up for iPhone, though. I guess it depends if Pro Photographers actually will give up their "Pro" cameras for an iPhone 11 Pro. And I can't think of any other profession where the iPhone Pro will "pay for itself" in productivity increases relative to other iPhones.
For most people relying on a smartphone for work, be it 700 or 1000 the device will pay for itself in a few months at most, so I think the price difference won’t matter much. Better battery performance could be significant though.
I'm not sure how meaningful the "Pro" suffix really is, but the iPhone has undoubtedly become a piece of professional equipment in the media industry.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/academy/en/collections/smartphone-jour...
Dictaphone, camera, editing and publishing, phone, notepad, email... arbitrary other software around all of these, all in your pocket. Makes total sense.
I find it odd how people will happily pull their wallets out for a PC they will spend a ton of time on, but then balk at the idea of spending half that on a device that lives in your pocket and can help you do practically anything that comes to mind, even if all that comes to mind is entertain you for a few moments. Is it just down to the physical size of the device?
But none of what you described explains why you would need a Pro instead of the standard. Its nice to have, but the base model isnt nerfed to a point that makes it unusable.
1) They age better, and oftentimes are more not just useable, but actually a joy yo use, for a longer time
2) The price difference just isn't that much to justify taking a lower power device. Sure, the iPhone 11 would probably be just fine compared to an iPhone 11 Pro. But when you're talking about phones in that price caliber, honestly what's an extra $200? And I've never had a phone in my hand wishing it was less capable, so why chance wanting to replace it earlier?
Like I said, I bought the X at launch and that was to replace, in turn, a 6 Plus which was still very usable so I'm far from an every year upgrader, and I think that has to do with the fact that I always get the biggest and best, and then just age out a few cycles instead of continuously upgrading.
My 0.02.
I’ve been handing down my iPhones since day one. All of them have got 6 years minimum use.
I dunno, for all the uses and advantages my phone gives me, I'm happy to pay. My last one was an X and it's served me extremely well since I bought it at launch. I passed on the XS, but the 11 is tempting.
You may “need” one when you’re at school or university, but i would think many people can easily do without a PC, after that.
Here is one: I'm a botanist. I take a lot of pictures of herbarium specimens (pressed plant specimens in natural history museums) to make morphological measurements. I have a Sony A7RM3 that is a MUCH higher resolution, better quality camera, but it's a lot bigger, requires more setup time, etc. With an iPhone, the pictures I take are automatically uploaded into Apple's cloud storage and available on my laptop. It's a very nice, simple, relatively seamless system.
If I'm shooting something for a billboard, yeah, I'll go get out a real camera. Almost anything smaller than that can absolutely be done on almost any modern flagship phone.
People can be productive and do fantastic work on any working material. But why have it worse when you’ll be using the device day in day out and stare at it for years ?
I don’t think we are arguing the Pro is nicer, right ?
I didn't watch the entire presentation, but didn't seem very different from current high end phones, except for the camera.
I don’t mean candy bowls or flashy sofas, but well lit, well ventilated, with decent toilets, noise isolation and living space between desks, and ergonomic chairs (at least adjustable in height and depth/inclination)
Cheaping out on work environment is the first sign of misplaced priorities IMO. Especially when it’s so easy to get penalties from work inspection.
* I’ll settle for a million dollar a year, I confess
I’m estate agent and I want to be able to photograph exteriors and interiors.
I’m a garden designer, I like to photograph my clients gardens for a portfolio.
I run a small bar, that has live music sometimes- I like to photograph and video the bands for my website.
There may be other folks out there who want the fastest phone for the purposes of demoing technology. For me, I mostly just don't want to look like I'm a luddite (although I've seen a surprising number of founders/CEOs who rock the SE).
1. No Camera bump (c'mon, this is simple)
2. Good photos (I'm not trying to replicate Mona Lisa, I just need an ok camera that captures day-to-day things)
3. Small, portable
This is an iPhone 7+ we’re talking about... Maybe not the best springboard for your complaint.
Obviously for heavy lifting, I still would prefer an SLR with an assortment of lens options and such though.
Twice during this summer, I was not able to share my screen with coworkers using Zoom because my MacBook pro would overheat and throttle the processors. It might be that there's some dust inside the fan (I have a cat) but I am not able to open and clean it up. How is that "Pro"?
Our servers are all linux based and virtualization in mac is spotty (especially if you want to share a Docker-based setup via Zoom on a mildly hot day).
I strongly doubt I will go back to Mac when the time comes for renewing. I really do need to get stuff done, and this machine has gotten in my way too many times.
The finger reader thingie is nice, though.
Where I work, for example, the social media team are looking to buy an iPhone for IG Story content, as well as internal videos.
Whilst it obviously won't replace a pro photographer's equipment for static, paid shoots, it will be used often in a "pro" setting.
I vlog with a DSLR and even with an iPhone X most people can’t tell when I use footage from that (running with a dslr is hard, for example). iPhone Pro likely makes better video than my T6i Rebel in many situations. Depth of field is usually where DSLRs shine
I find that modern phones are better than traditional cameras a) by nailing exposure more consistently in tricky lighting conditions, b) having a far better display for proofing your shots, and c) can use computational photography tricks to create great HDR photos.
Where the standalone cameras are useful are where you need a capability that you just can't get in a phone. (And that's a set of capabilities that's been greatly diminished over the years, although it will never fully go away.)
People don't _look at_ Instagram posts in the same way they might a fine art photograph. It's a double tap while scrolling through hundreds of posts.
I say this as an avid amateur wildlife photographer who posts on Instagram and gets a handful of likes while friends get hundreds or thousands for an out-of-focus image of a milkshake and bagel.
The iPhone is a lifestyle product. It does a lot of things, but it does some of them quite poorly.
The new camera is better than it used to be, but it's still a long way of short of the quality you'd expect from a high-end professional photo studio camera.
As a lifestyle product, the important factor is the narrative that buying it will put you within reach of that professional creative lifestyle.
In a sense it will, if your definition is limited to lifestyle social sites like IG and FB.
But in a more honest and realistic sense it won't, because it lacks the quality and the flexibility of real professional equipment. A good DSLR + glass will still kill it, and medium format - which is what the most successful full-time studio pros are likely to use - will absolutely destroy it.
There are still situations where that high end is needed. Fashion, ads, and high-end portraiture and photojournalism all rely on it. I don't think studio photographers working in those fields are going to be moving to an iPhone any time soon.
My point was mostly that the definition of “pro photographer” is much wider these days than many people realize. For many values of “pro” an iPhone Pro is going to be absolutely fantastic and a better fit than higher-end pro.
That's precisely what I meant. It's what most people do most of the time.
Taking a shot of my breakfast smoothie with my 150mp Phase One, editing on a calibrated workstation and exporting to have it resized to 2mp for display on mobile phones is beyond pointless.
But the part it’s really going to revolutionize is the baseline level of expected image quality. Just like Casey Neistat forced everyone to start using DSLRs for vlogging with his famed 2 or 3 year experiment.
Not if I'm travelling internationally, as then I'm concerned about the implications of having border officials demand access to my phone. Or if I'm participating in various watersports/snowsports/backcountry activities where a phone is problematically fragile and difficult to keep charged.
In either of those scenarios (which account for the majority of pictures I take) I'm more likely to have a camera accessible than a phone.
Case in point, I have an iPhone X and a DSLR with all of the above lenses and the camera kit + lenses were more expensive than the new iPhone and I probably would use them less.
More like "Prosumer" digital cameras, without removable lenses.
Don't know if the new mac pro will shake that up.
It does, you need to be able to charge its cost as a business expense to be able to afford it. The "Pro" signals to the tax auditors that Apple approves of this :-)
Self-styled "influencers". They'll be all in.
A great example of this is the "PS4 Pro"
I love it when people complain about the prices Apple charge, especially given the experiences I've had with customer service at Apple, so... story time!
I had an iPhone 5 when it first came out. At the time I was a heavy motorbike rider to and from work. One day when I was riding home it rained heavily (this was in England, so yeah...) and my pocket had been left open. When I got home my iPhone was completely submerged in water for at least 20 minutes.
I took it to Apple the next day and they replaced it for free. Try that with your Pixel... oh that's right, you don't have any stores to take it into world wide. Shame.
Fast forward to only two years ago...
I was in Vienna for Christmas a few years back. We'd gone through Italy to get there. During my time in Italy I noticed my iPhone 6S' battery was dropping quickly. I couldn't work out why. By the time we got to Vienna it would drop by 20% every 15-20 minutes. I found a premium reseller who took it in and replaced the battery in 45 minutes for free. I bought the phone in Australia.
Try that with your Pixel... oh that's right, you have to post your phone to the manufacturer and wait for them to fix it or replace it, a process I know to take weeks. Shame. But you saved $300 though!
I personally don't think it's worth counting the pennies in that manner given the services you're getting outside of the hardware. It's not much of a price hike at all, in the grand scheme of things.
As it turns out, I've never destroyed any of my own phones, so I saved $300 every two years since I started buying smart phones 12 years ago. So $1800. If my phone gets submerged and Google won't replace it, I guess I'll have to buy another phone with my $1800 budget!
Also, when I got my Pixel 3, the back had some waves in the paint. It literally did not matter at all, because I put a case on it, and it couldn't affect functionality at all, but I told them I wasn't happy, and they shipped a new one that did not have the cosmetic imperfections. Try that with your iPhone! Oh yeah, it would probably work.
shrug This isn't a competition. Just be smart with your money (or do with your money as you choose, whether someone else thinks it smart or not!)
Expensive compared to what, exactly? Car insurance, which doesn't have a world wide chain of stores you can walk into when your car is smashed up? House insurance, which also does not afford you the luxury of world wide stores with commission free staff to assist you when your house burns down?
Most "insurance", if you want to call it that, doesn't offer you the same level of experience, so in what way is it expensive?
My house insurance doesn't teach me how a boiler works so I can use it correctly, or my dish washer, TV, or anything else about the property I own. Apple DO run classes for learning to do just about anything on your iPhone, iPad, Mac, etc. I'd have to only attend one, perhaps two, of those classes for the staff member's time to be worth more than what I paid for my "insurance".
So what are you comparing it to that makes it expensive?
> As it turns out, I've never destroyed any of my own phones
Which of course means no else does, neither.
> shrug This isn't a competition.
Then why did you argue price as a competitive factor in your purchasing decision? That's literally a competition.
It's expensive to pay nearly double for a phone because you feel you need classes to learn how to use it.
I'm saying it is perfectly fine if you want to spend more money for the Apple experience. And obviously you are fine with that, too. I prefer to use my money on other things. It's not a competition between rabid fans. It's a market for selling chunks of hardware. So yes, they are competing for our dollars. I prefer to maintain my decision-making over where those dollars go. Having special in-store luxury experiences is not why I buy a phone that takes pictures and does other things nicely, too. But it's fine if you spend that money.
Insurance is betting you're going to have something bad happen. Expensive insurance is when the ones calculating the insurance make a bunch of money off you because you pay a lot more than you get out of it. Paying a ton for a low deductible but never making a claim. If you personally don't destroy phones, paying a lot for insurance on them doesn't make sense. I never said no one else should do so, or that no one else destroys phones. Obviously you do. But still not enough to make up for the price premium.
Overall it's not a solid argument for the phone, but you have your reasons for buying it. It just does nothing to discount my reasons for saving my money and buying a different phone.
Now you're just being dishonest. You know right well that a flag ship Android is near the same price.
Actually on a (Samsung) Galaxy 5 you could've just popped open the back of the phone and replaced the battery yourself in a few seconds.
Most people do not get free replacements or repairs for their iPhones.
(Admittedly, the bloke next to me with the iPhone 4 arguing that the back glass had shattered "all on its own; I didn't drop it, honestly!" probably wasn't going to get a new phone for free...)
Thus the "expensive" iPhones are $250 or less per year. And they are, in my opinion, usually better than the Android equivalent.
You might say; "but what if I have the same upgrade cycle with iPhones". Well, then you can have a look at what a used version of the last gen iPhone costs. Where I live; it is something like $100-200 less than what it was new. That means; some people are having the newest version of the iPhone for only $100-200 / year. That is, at least, roughly the same price as your are getting (or better, depending on resale value of the specific Android phone), but with the newest version of a more premium product.
In other words. You might be getting ripped off at $260. It all comes down to money over time, not amount at a defined moment, unless the amount is prohibitive.
When it was time to upgrade, it apparently also became time for apple to jack up the price of their flagship to a thousand bucks and I just vehemently avoided that out of principle.
Looking at alternatives,the Galaxy seemed like a reasonably similar premium (not polished software fosho) phone, but sticker price was similar to iPhones. However thos things go on sale a lot. Nabbed a S9 few months after release for 500 and looks like it'll last me three years at least. Super happy with the hardware (and software actually) as well.
The only "flaw" in your logic above is that in principle an iPhone probably can last 4 years but that's not constant - models from them are sometimes just not as reliable (we talking 4 year reliability vs 3) and it's not just a thousand dollars, it's thousand and tax and bells and whistles (which for apple is always more). Plus you now have a premium phone that you better don't break or scratch (if you want to sell) or you're out a very large number of Benjamins.
Don't get me wrong, I am writing this on a Sony Android phone, which I expect to get 0 dollars for if I try to sell it. But from an economic perspective I don't think there is a clear advantage to Android devices.
In your opinion, the iPhone is better, so it's OK that you're spending more, but it's weird to say someone's getting ripped off by buying an excellent one year old phone for much, much less.
The money over time argument rarely works out as better for a more expensive item. Anecdotally, the people I know that buy a brand new flagship do not wait four years between phones. The ones that are OK with a one year old flagship are also OK with a three year old one. And even if they upgrade more often, it's just so much less expensive (over time.)
This new extra-wide camera is interesting as it's fairly rare for a consumer-targeted camera to exceed a 24mm (FFE) focal length. Even in expensive professional lenses, getting to 13mm (FFE) is fairly unusual. Most ultra-wide glass stops at 16mm.
The idea that apple needs an extra $300 dollars to fit that into my phone, maybe i'll just get two pixel 3s. Or a nice point and shoot.
The 'bare minimum' that the consumer will accept vs 'the average feature set expected' vs 'lets sprinkle in some unicorn dust and charge people up the wazoo' model is getting a little old. Its why I have iPhone 6s, 7s, still in the fleet of devices I support. The consumer and businesses are simply tired of this bs.
The new iPhone Pros appear to mark a shift; it's the same shift the Mac Pro announcement did in June, and was also a source of contention on Hacker News.
It's hard to name the more expensive version to convey it's better without in turn suggesting the cheaper one is shittier.
"Pro" lets you do that by suggesting that it's for a different audience, allowing consumers of the budget model to save face so to speak (I don't need it because I'm not a professional).
I'd imagine people getting into vlogging and such, or even people who just want to be "that cool and popular" (especially younger people) that would buy in to the "Pro" moniker.
I made the point elsewhere, but I think that ignores "professionals in the workplace doing this alongside other things". These can easily be "pro" for content creation teams, like editorial staff for capturing Stories from events and the like.
Just because they're not replacements for high-end commercial photography equipment doesn't mean they're not being used as intended by professionals.
Completely agree that their terminology might be skewing, but I wouldn't be so dismissive of their use in a professional context, even if the users aren't "photography professionals" themselves.
Without knowing anything about the X phones, I at first assumed that XR was the top of the line X phone. XR just... sounds like a better phone.
I think they resolved this with the 11 line.
Naturally it's just a marketing term.
If people feel strongly enough that the name is not accurate, they will have to buy a competing product that fulfills their needs at the price they are willing to pay.
I suppose what would be interesting, but highly proprietary, would be Apple's marketing research information on how the "Pro" marketing term is received by their target consumers.
All that being said, I personally have never bought from Apple, and think the $150 upgrade cost is ridiculous (not to mention the $300 jump from the XR, which is still $300 more than I paid for my Pixel)! So I could say the "Pro" marketing isn't working on me! But overall, they aren't hurting for customers.