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iPhone X Tests Reveal Apple's Design Problems

This article is more than 6 years old.

Love or hate Apple ’s iPhone X, there’s one thing you can’t dispute. The world’s most expensive mass market smartphone has the fastest hardware and delivers the smoothest, most optimised software experience on the planet. Right? Wrong…

Tests by high profile YouTubers like XeeTechCare, SuperSaf TV and EverythingApplePro (7M subscribers combined) have reached a consensus: the iPhone X can’t live with the real world performance of the new Samsung Galaxy S9 Plus.

Apple

The shocking aspect to this? Apple seemingly has everything in its favour:

  • iPhone X A11 chipset benchmarks up to 45% faster than the Galaxy S9 Plus Snapdragon 845 chipset used in the tests
  • Snapdragon 845 is much slower than the Galaxy S9 Plus Exynos 9810 variant shipping outside America
  • iOS is famed for its optimisation, efficiency and instant software updates
  • Samsung’s Android customisation is infamous for bloatware, lag and glacial updates

As such what the tests expose are two significant chinks in Apple’s armour which the company can no longer afford to keep making:

1. RAM-Raiders

Where the Galaxy S9 Plus dominates the iPhone X is in how much better it holds apps in memory. This despite Apple boasting the A11 is 70% faster at multitasking compared to the A10 in the iPhone 7.

Ultimately what Apple can’t escape is it can no longer afford to skimp on RAM. While the Galaxy S9 Plus has 6GB of RAM, the iPhone X has just 3GB and RAM (Random-Access-Memory) is not only the fastest memory in any device, but also where background apps are stored when not in use. If RAM fills up it makes space by discarding the save state of previous apps, forcing them to reload when you return to them.

There are arguments against adding more RAM: it adds cost and can impact battery life, but Apple needs to suck this up. Profit margins on the iPhone X are substantial enough to swallow the cost of 4-6GB (OnePlus puts 8GB in a $500 smartphone), and Apple is long overdue fitting its phones with bigger batteries: iPhone X (2716 mAh), Galaxy S9 Plus (3500 mAh).

2. Bloatware Goes Both Ways

While Samsung’s reputation for bloatware and slow updates is well earned, Apple has largely escaped criticism for also pre-installing ever more apps and for arguably over updating its phones: rushing out update-after-update which often cause as many problems as they fix.

Furthermore, while Samsung phones are known to slow over time, iPhones are now known to slow even more after Apple admitted to deliberate performance throttling in iOS to combat battery degradation. Samsung has gone on record saying it has no need to do the same so, if Samsung has the beating of the iPhone X now, this lead is likely to extend over time.

Long Overdue Changes

What the Galaxy S9 Plus brings to a head is something the Pixel 2 XL (using a generation older Snapdragon chipset) almost exposed in speed tests against the iPhone X last year: for some time slower hardware running Android has been catching far more powerful hardware running iOS when it comes to real-world performance.

As such Apple needs to do the following:

Add More RAM - 4GB must be the minimum for the next iPhone (6GB ideally). Modules are cheap and Apple has the profit margin to afford it.

Increase Battery Capacity - Samsung has had 3,500 mAh capacity batteries in its flagship smartphones since 2015. There’s no reason Apple couldn’t match this.

Reduce iOS Updates - If the iPhone keyword has a bug, iOS needs an update. If the calendar glitches, iOS needs an update. Problem with Email? iOS needs an update. Safari? Maps? Clock? Calculator? You get the picture. iOS needs to become more modular so bugs in apps can be fixed from the App Store without having to flash iPhones and iPads with a whole new version of iOS. It’s faster, simpler and will lead to fewer problems.

Right now pressure on Apple is building as reports claim the company has finally pushed iPhone prices too high. With three new iPhone X models on their way and prices expected to increase again (up to almost $1,400), Apple can no longer afford to keep making the same mistakes which have seen Android phone’s real-world performance reel iPhones in.

As one prominent analyst put it: if Apple fails to get the balance right this year “there’s going to be hell to pay”...

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