> From specs to hardware build the iPhone 6 just seems really behind the curve

Obviously people see what they want to see, but: http://www.anandtech.com/show/8559/iphone-6-and-iphone-6-plu...

Specwise it looks like a top-end phone from last year. RAM, screen, etc.

I'm glad to see it's doing well in the javascript benchmarks at least. Speaks highly of Apple's nitro engine.

No, iPhone's A8 is optimized for single-core performance, which is way more meaningful in real applications than combined multi-core performance. 99% of apps run on single core. Although, A8's combined multi-core performance is also on par with other high-end smartphones.

See comparison to SGS5 in Geekbench 3: http://www.phonesreview.co.uk/wp-content/phoneimages/iPhone-...

> "99% of apps run on single core."

This really isn't true. A rudimentary "Hello World" app, maybe, but all of the common apps that are being run are heavily multithreaded.

Even an app that just uses stock/fairly common libs (like AFNetworking) is going to be multithreaded by virtue of those things alone.

Multi-core performance is critical in the iOS ecosystem, single-core is hardly a concern anymore.

Just because an app is multithreaded doesn't mean it's going to scale to use more than one core on average. It doesn't matter if you can do networking in a background thread if your UI is just going to block until the results come in.

I think the GP's implication is that the A8 can deal we'll with apps that primarily work on the main/UI thread - which most apps do.

Speaking of screens: http://www.displaymate.com/iPhone6_ShootOut.htm

For fun compare to a similar sized phone that's come out at the same time as the iPhone 6.

http://www.displaymate.com/Galaxy_Note4_ShootOut_1.htm

Based on our extensive Lab tests and measurements, the Galaxy Note 4 is the Best performing Smartphone display that we have ever tested. It matches or breaks new records in Smartphone display performance for: Highest Absolute Color Accuracy, Highest Screen Resolution, Infinite Contrast Ratio, Highest Peak Brightness, Highest Contrast Rating in Ambient Light, and the smallest Brightness Variation with Viewing Angle. Its Color Management capability provides multiple Color Gamuts – a major advantage that is not currently provided by any of the other leading Smartphones. The Galaxy Note 4 delivers uniformly consistent all around Top Tier display performance: it is the first Smartphone display to ever get all Green (Very Good to Excellent) Ratings in all test and measurement categories (except one Yellow for a Brightness Variation with Average Picture Level) since we started the Display Technology Shoot-Out article Series in 2006, an impressive achievement for a display. The Galaxy Note 4 has again raised the bar for top display performance up by another notch.

It's not like the iPhone 6 is a bad phone. If it were an Android device it would be considered an above average to a good in the field. But it's not, it's an iPhone and expectations are that it should come out as class leading. Which it isn't along most measures to date.

You haven't shown that it isn't class leading. You've only shown that one phone beats it in one category and not by a lot, two categories if we count pounds to deform.

The Anandtech link above shows the new iPhones basically among the leaders in every category. The displaymate reviews extend that. How you spin that into merly above average and last years quality is beyond me.

What is infinite contrast ratio? Is the phone able to emit zero light from a pixel instructed to show RGB(0,0,0) when another area asks for RGB(255,255,255)?

Multiple color gamuts—does the phone's screen actually extend well past sRGB, or did they just discover perceptual color mapping?

The compact camera market went through a spec-obsessive phase, and it resulted in 14+ megapixel compact cameras that struggled with anything less than direct sunlight. My 12 megapixel dSLR sounds weaker spec-wise, but works better in every lighting situation—even this aging piece of kit gives me pleasing images at ISO 5,000, well past its design limits.

There's a lot more to design than stuffing in faster CPUs, more RAM, and more screen and camera pixels.

Choosing a different android device to trump each separate specification of the iPhone just proves that there is no single android device that is as good overall.

Did you read the iPhone 6 link? It was done after the Note 4, as mentioned in the write-up. Also mentioned in the write-up was

"Based on our extensive Lab tests and measurements, the iPhone 6 Plus is the Best performing Smartphone LCD display that we have ever tested."

Read the two articles again. In several categories the Note 4 comes out ahead, sometimes significantly.

I have a hard time trusting prose with inappropriate capitalization

Not really, it speaks highly of their SOC.

Obviously those tests were rigged.