Apple really outdid themselves

[strollin]

Wireless in-room charging sounds cool but it certainly wouldn't make me switch to an iphone from S7, or switch to iOS from Android.

I'm sure if Apple is working on it, so are other mfrs.

 

[Trotter]

And if Apple has a patent on that tech (which they do) that makes it much harder for other companies to do the same thing.

Ugh. Please don't get me started on the completely b******* way mobile phone companies do their "patents" crap. They patent a very broad, very generic premise and then sue the hell out of anyone who actually comes up with anything remotely resembling whatever a lawyer can torture out of the generic description.

 

[jarlmaster]

Ugh. Please don't get me started on the completely b******* way mobile phone companies do their "patents" crap. They patent a very broad, very generic premise and then sue the hell out of anyone who actually comes up with anything remotely resembling whatever a lawyer can torture out of the generic description.

I'm not denying that. It's awful and I don't applaud Apple for engaging in that practice. I'm just saying that Apple is beating others to the punch and that's just good business. The unethical, crappy patent lawsuit trap comes after. My mom works in a patent office. It's unbelievable the politicking that goes on in the patent business.

 

[cb600fshornet]

Apple have been very clever in the mobile market in my opinion.

Android is far too open a code base. Combine this with apps that are primarily Java based and policed in a less effective way than those through the Apple App Store, and it's no surprise that phone manufacturers are heaping in a lot of RAM and 8 core CPUs.
I'm a software developer, and from my perspective, I can see it's easy to "fix" poor software by throwing hardware resources at it. From what I can see, Apple has the far superior software with iOS (in terms of efficiency and performance), compared to Android. In this sense, it's unfair to compare the hardware since practically, iPhones perform as quickly as their Android counterparts.

 

[jarlmaster]

Apple have been very clever in the mobile market in my opinion.

Android is far too open a code base. Combine this with apps that are primarily Java based and policed in a less effective way than those through the Apple App Store, and it's no surprise that phone manufacturers are heaping in a lot of RAM and 8 core CPUs.
I'm a software developer, and from my perspective, I can see it's easy to "fix" poor software by throwing hardware resources at it. From what I can see, Apple has the far superior software with iOS (in terms of efficiency and performance), compared to Android. In this sense, it's unfair to compare the hardware since practically, iPhones perform as quickly as their Android counterparts.

Exactly. Couldn't have said it better myself.

 

[Technician1]

Never been a fan of the OS they use personally, the hardware is ok I suppose but the software is not what I want in a personal device, you are locked in to too many things that big brother thinks you need or want.
I always buy unlocked factory android phones for more freedom and personal choice, plus who want a phone that doesn't even work with flash? lol

 

[cb600fshornet]

If I need to use flash content then I use the "Puffin" browser. It hasn't been opened in the past 12 months. Shows you how often you actually need it...

 

[jarlmaster]

Never been a fan of the OS they use personally, the hardware is ok I suppose but the software is not what I want in a personal device, you are locked in to too many things that big brother thinks you need or want.
I always buy unlocked factory android phones for more freedom and personal choice, plus who want a phone that doesn't even work with flash? lol

Fair enough. That is definitely an issue with iOS for some people. It's weird because that's how I feel about Mac OS. I LOVE tinkering and you just can't do that with Macs so I'm a Windows person all the way. I appreciate Mac OS for its simplicity, ease of use, and "idiotproof" nature but I would still never want to use a computer with said OS. I like iOS because when it comes to my phone, I really want something simple and intuitive. It's so smooth and eminently functional. For the most part, it does what I want the way I want it done, oftentimes before I even realize that I wanted it.

With regards to flash, like Joedaman said, it's not that big of a deal. The vast majority of sites now run HTML5 (81 percent in fact) and I rarely ever run into flash issues with my iPhone. It does sometimes irritate me that I can't customize some facet of my phone but it's whatever.

 

[root]

Android is far too open a code base.

I'm not sure I understand, how is a free open code base a bad thing?

Combine this with apps that are primarily Java based and policed in a less effective way than those through the Apple App Store,

Yes, java is shitty, but you can run apps compiled from C on Android.
You can't blame an OS because of the code that people run on it.
(I mean sure you can say windows is a pile of crap because of security bugs, and the amount of script kiddy programs there are, but you can't say that windows is crap because a lot of software companies chose to use visual basic to write software, or Java, or whatever...)

phone manufacturers are heaping in a lot of RAM and 8 core CPUs.

that's because people are subjectively stupid and cannot compare like things with like things. So they just look for bigger numbers.
Again a people problem not a manufacturer issue, or an OS issue, I see what you're getting at though

[wireless charging] And since the tech is proprietary and no other manufacturer has even hinted that they are working on it.

it's still just a pipe dream at the minute though,
Other people are working on, if you google wireless power, plenty of hits, a few days ago the IET ran some lectures on it.
you may believe that apple are going to be the only ones that can play with this, but I doubt that's going to be true at all. if it is possible, then pretty soon that's going to be near off the shelf bolt on technology for devices... everyone will have it.

of course there are plenty of "ifs" in that sentence, the biggest "if" being "if" regulators allow it, most systems at the minute for near base station charging have plenty of idle power draw, scale that up room sized and these systems may end up incredibly wasteful! (e.g the "base station" device may not meet environmental requirements.)

Then there are other concerns, a "near field" inductive charging devices doesn't radiate much power unless you're really close.

scale that up to room size and things get a little more complicated...

maximum amount of power that a device can transmit is limited by local regulations, such as FCC Part 15 in the US. Equivalent isotropically radiated power (EIRP) in the European Union is limited to 20 dBm (100 mW).

you still want the frequency to be reasonably high so not too much power is lost,
so you've still got to use an unlicensed radio band.

and then you're stuck with power limits.
most people think charging sucks on a 10W adapter, using a 0.1w wireless charge, (and possibly sharing that) is going to suck balls.

meanwhile Samsung have (cabled) fast charge using 9 instead of 5v, meaning you can achieve a near full batter charge in 30 minutes of so.

Apple are dreaming of a wireless world, the tech is undoubtedly cool. but I'm not convinced it fits with modern requirements.

(yes I've tried both OS'es and have come to that decision empirically) and I don't DISLIKE Android. For me, the iPhone is just an easier and more pleasurable device to use on a daily basis.

I have both the same and opposite experience,
I had an android tablet, hated it at first, everything was unfamiliar.
then grew to love it, (but then it broke).
I still have and use and iphone. I also have an android phone as my work phone. both are as good as each other. (and short coming in one OS applies pretty much to the other too!)


and who cares about flash, the sooner flash shuffles of and dies in a corner the better place the internet will be.

 

[jarlmaster]

I don't doubt that many companies are working on wireless power and in fact there are. I guess I should have clarified that Apple is the only PHONE manufacturer working on this tech for phones (that I'm aware of). From my understanding, Apple is pretty close to getting this tech working. Of course once they do, this will expand to every electronic device before too long. It's revolutionary and will change innumerable parts of our society. But it's looking like Apple will be first to the party with true wireless power transmission for their phones.