Is the iPhone X a disappointment? Investors think so

CNN ^ | December 26, 2017 | Jordan Valinsky

[C19fan]

Shares of Apple and its suppliers tumbled this week after multiple industry analysts predicted weak demand for the new flagship iPhone. Apple's (AAPL) stock slid by as much as 4% in premarket trading Tuesday.

The radically redesigned iPhone X was supposed to give Apple a boost following several years of sinking sales. Early sales reports were positive, and Morgan Stanley reported last week that the iPhone X is especially hot in China.

[aquila48]

“Which would you rather have: a phone that runs at full speed but depletes the battery quickly and dies, or a phone that functions as long as possible but at less than full speed?”

How about letting the customer choose?

They could have made it an option.

[Allen In Texas Hill Country]

#Neverapple.......... I finally saw a use/feature of a smartphone that my flip phone
doesnt have. While getting ready to order at a restaurant where it was dark the next table turned the smartphones light on. I mean a feature that I desire. Sorry for the typos, I dont normally use my table for fr. But were at Wakiki beach for Xmas.

[MrEdd]

They make those, and they are the only phones I buy.

Until my LG V10 gets fixed I am back to my old (2012 is old for a phone) Samsung Galaxy Note 2. Works great, and I have five batteries for it.

It’s not like nobody in the population of phone customers has an understanding of technology.

[packrat35]

Which is why I have never owned or ever plan to own any Apple product!

[whistleduck]

I am open minded. Might be a real necessity in another 100.

[adorno]

I am open minded. Might be a real necessity in another 100.

Glad to hear it.

Have you gotten used to the horseless carriage yet?

Better be quick, because soon, we'll all be riding on the 'driverless horseless carriages'.

[sergeantdave]

Why would I pay $1,000 for a phone when I can buy a perfectly good phone from AT&T for $29.99?

[Mr. Jeeves]

I have it. I like it. I wouldn't call it revolutionary.

If you can't afford the upgrade, you really aren't missing anything mandatory. OLED screen is nice, Face ID works very well, and the chip is ultra-fast. But I don't think we are going to see radical new software to take advantage of the iPhone X's capabilities for some time, so the user experience doesn't change that much if you are coming from any of the 6 or 7 series iPhones.

[no-s]

was a legitimate attempt to prolong the life & usability of degraded batteries.

yes, but they found it convenient to conceal the root cause; in fact they tried to hide the battery status from the average consumer, hoping we would buy the explanation that new features in new versions of IOS used more battery power...

of course there was probably intense pressure to conceal this internally as well. Apple is known to practice a very pervasive culture of secrecy.

You might be a little put out if you spent valuable time trying to track down the problem and received a runaround from applecare. I think we have some with the issue that are out of applecare now.

[Swordmaker]

According to "unidentified supply chain officials," the Apple iPhone X sales are less than anticipated, with one Asian anal-cyst dropping his estimate of Last quarter sales of iPhone X by an absurd 25 MILLION UNITS!. . . except REAL analysts, looking at REAL orders find their claims are not true. . . but that hasn't stopped market rats to flee onto the hawsers.

From SeekingAlpha:

• (Analysts firm) Rosenblatt defends Apple (NASDAQ:AAPL) following this morning’s reports of cut iPhone X expectations.
  
• (Rosenblatt) Analyst Jun Zhang says the firm’s research doesn’t indicate any further cuts after the holiday season. Rosenblatt thinks the X has had stable sales in North America, a recent acceleration in China, and has outsold the combined 8 and 8 Plus.
  
• Zhang believes the Taiwanese media reports are “referring to previously mentioned iPhone 8/8 Plus production cuts with an iPhone X production ramp in December.”
  
• The firm also doesn’t see 3D sensing or OLED panel order cuts.

"Zhang writes that he specifically sees no cuts to parts for " 3-D Sensing," a reference to the " Face ID" feature in the front-facing camera of the iPhone X. And he's also seen no cut in orders for OLED-based phone panels. Those two data points are "specific components for the iPhone X," he notes."

The results the anal-cysts were reporting had actually been reported earlier in December with the shift over from production in the iPhone 8/8+ to iPhone X production and the ramping up to meet that production demand. In addition, the October through December quarter just finishing is the largest sales quarter of the year, followed by lowest sales quarter of the year in the January through March period. It is natural for Apple to reduce part orders and ramp down production leading into the next two slow sales quarters. There is nothing to see here except hype and FUD from Asian Android phone sellers.

Bret Kennell, writing in an editorial in "The Street" asks are “We really going to trim off nearly 3% of Apple’s roughly $900 billion market cap — a swing of approximately $25 billion! — over a report from an outlet most investors have never heard of citing ‘unidentified supply chain officials?” Well, that's what those panicked hawser running rats have just done. Amazing. — PING!

Apple iPhone X Sales Slip Rumors
Are Likely Asian Competitors FUD
Ping!

The latest Apple/Mac/iOS Pings can be found by searching Keyword "ApplePingList" on FreeRepublic's Search.

If you want on or off the Mac Ping List, Freepmail me

[Swordmaker]

I will not use facial recognition for turning on a newer phone. Thus, I will be going to a non-apple phone eventually.

Facial recognition on the iPhone X stays on the device. It is not sent anywhere or shared anywhere. It is not a photographic system at all. Why should you worry about it? It works perfectly? It is more secure than TouchID. . . and works instantly.

In addition, you do not have to use it if you do not want to use it. You can still use a passcode.

[Swordmaker]

Litium batteries primarily degrade after a large number of recharges.
Apple pulled this crap even on people who travel and turn their phone off at night, only charging the phones when necessary. Their phones are just fine.

Next time you want to spout some bullshit prevarication don’t try it on an old bench tech who has worked with electronics since the seventies. You thought you could pist to someone uneducated enough not to unmask Apple’s lie. You’re busted.

BS, MrEdd. It doesn't matter whether you turn the phone off at night or not. It's the number of charge/recharge cycles that cause the degredation of the batteries plus age. ANY Lithium Ion battery's lifetime is 500 cycles before will only 80% of its original charge after that it degrade even more with every cycle. The Department of Defense, Android, and Apple all state the same thing. It's a matter of physics and chemistry.

You might be lucky and skilled at keeping your battery in top condition by paying attention to when you charge it and shutting your phone down, but 750 to 1000 cycles is about the maximum reasonable cycles anyone can expect before a Lithium Ion battery will start to drop voltage rapidly under load.

Every LI battery has circuitry built-in to prevent the rapid rise in temperature that can occur as the battery is over-drafted too fast. That circuitry will shut down the output if the temperature rises too fast or if the battery is placed under stress. That stress occurs far more often in a chemically depleted battery.

Anyone who recharges a battery on a daily basis will exceed the 500 cycles in one year, four ½ months from the day it's put in service. One thousands cycles in twenty one months. That battery will NOT hold a charge under heavy, processor-intensive use.

The iPhone 6, with an A8 dual core processor and one GPU, is now expected to run an OS and new and upgraded Apps that are designed for the iPhone 8 and iPhone X SIX core A11 processor with 3 GPUs. . . which run far faster than what was possible in the iPhone 6. That older processor will try to do those tasks but will be stressed in doing so even with a fully charged, new battery. . . but when pulling power from a weak, depleted, old battery, it cannot do it. That old battery's built-in circuit will shut it down to prevent over-heating, cutting off all power to the device.

Apple added a battery power management algorithm to spread the processing of processor or GPU-intensive apps over a longer period to ameliorate the draw on the battery if the battery had too many charge cycles, or was reporting stress conditions. Unfortunately, more and more updated apps are processor or GPU intensive. One of those apps was John Poole's Geek Bench Testing software.

You want that old phone to work as best it can, replace the battery with a new one.

There is a binary choice here:

1. Allow a chemically expended, old battery to randomly shutdown the device under abnormal loads, even when it shows there is an adequate charge for normal phone activities, or

2. Control the power draw to the chemically expended, old battery to prevent that shutdown by spreading out the processing of those processor/GPU-intensive apps over a longer period of time to keep the stress down on the battery which has the result of slowing down that processing on those apps, but keeps the device running.

Apple explained this choice in January 2017 when it was included in the 10.2.1 update of iOS for the iPhone 5s, 6, and 6s. It only became a kerfuffle when John Poole started running his Geek Bench tests on older iPhones 6 models with depleted batteries and found that they ran his tests slower than new iPhone 6 with new batteries. The test also run fine on old phones with new batteries.

These are facts. You're the one who is busted in claiming there is a lie here. There is not.

[Swordmaker]

I have several Apple products including iPhones and will continue to do so but Apple was wrong here, particularly since they didn't own up to it until they were caught and didn't give consumers a choice in the matter. Getting a battery replaced isn't a particularly expensive option. You could have a brand-new battery and the phone is still throttled.

No, it isn't throttled with a new battery. Multiple people have replaced batteries in the iPhone 6 and repeated the tests and found they were back to full speed. The Apple Algorithm works if the battery is stressed by over drafting the battery.

There is a caveat here. Part of the issue is that the iPhone 6 with its A8 dual core single GPU is attempting to run new and updated apps that were designed to run on more modern iPhones with 4 and 6 core processors with 2 and 3 GPUs. It's going to try and run those apps as fast as it can, but it really cannot run those newer apps as fast as it could run the older, simpler apps that were designed to run on one or two cores. It just is not as fast in doing so. It is also possible it will stress even a new battery into pulling more than the algorithm might think the battery can deliver. It might be that Apple needs to tweak that algorithm for these processor/GPU intensive apps so it's not quite so sensitive. . . but most people who have replaced the battery are finding it's back to regular speed.

[Swordmaker]

A long time ago I railed against the design decision of putting the battery in the phone in a way you couldn’t take it out. The case is sealed, so you can’t change the battery.

In nearly every other phone, you can remove the battery.

Now we sort of know why. I was puzzled we never got a waterproof iPhone even with the sealed cases. They answer was obsolescence, not water contamination, was the driver of that decision.

iPhone 6 batteries can be replaced in under 2 minutes. It's not hard. There's a YouTube that demonstrates it. Two screws, a suction cup, and a special screw driver, and a "spludger." A replacement kit with battery and tools are available on Amazon for $12.95 is all you need.

[Swordmaker]

I don’t know - I see that notch at the top and I think this is not a product Steve Jobs would have let ship. Fix the notch and put a fingerprint reader in the display and I’ll buy one.

The TouchID is secure at 1 in 50,000 that someone else other than you could unlock it with their finger. The FaceiD of the iPhone X is secure at 1 in 1,000,000 that someone other than you could unlock it with their face.

I can truthfully say I do not notice the "notch" on my iPhone X unless I specifically look for it. The screen segments on either side of it are merely notification areas as far as I am concerned. They contain information, not useable screen area that detracts from the image.

[Swordmaker]

1. Older people lose the fingerprint identity with age as they just wear down.

2. Middle age guys in particular, who have had for decades, jobs/hobbies/sports that cause a lot of wear on hands and finger prints. Often like us older folks have basically no fingerprints.

The Apple TouchID really doesn't use the fingerprint. . . so that isn't a problem.

TouchID works on the ridges and valleys of the fat pads underneath the skin. It maps the highs and lows of that, not the actual fingerprint. That's why a photo or a copy of a fingerprint will not work to unlock an Apple TouchID protected device.

[Swordmaker]

How about letting the customer choose?

The problem was the depleted batteries were just randomly shutting down the devices with no warning even though they had sufficient charge to continue working as a phone. The use of a processor/GPU-intensive App would do it. . . leaving the user with out the use of a phone.

Merely spreading the processing of those particular Apps over a longer period of time solved that problem. . . either way, Apple was going to get the blame.

The solution was to replace the depleted battery. . . which users were not doing. Also the number of more sophisticated and processor/GPU intensive apps was increasing with those that designed for later iPhones but that would also run on the iPhone 6.

[aquila48]

“The problem was the depleted batteries were just randomly shutting down the devices with no warning even though they had sufficient charge to continue working as a phone. “

Sounds like a defect - apple should have replaced the batteries for free.

Better yet, how about making phones with easy, user replaceable batteries?

[Swordmaker]

Sounds like a defect - apple should have replaced the batteries for free.

Why? You used it up over three years. It’s out of warranty, pay for a new battery your self. Do you expect you car manufacturer to refill your gas Tank? Replace your tires? It’s a consumable item. Says so in the warranty.

Why should Apple give you another three years of free battery use?

[ProtectOurFreedom]

The $1,000 device isn’t a “phone,” it is a super-supercomputer in your pocket that just happens to have a phone app added to it.

If I analyzed my device usage by time, I expect I would find the “phone”app is well below 1%.

The “phone” has four radios built in — cellular voice, cellular data, WiFi, BlueTooth and GPS. It wasn’t that long ago that a single receive-only “radio”was the size of a loaf of bread.

Calling an iPhone “just a phone” is like calling DJT “just a President.”