1: iPhone Plus
07 Feb 2013Speculation on what a bigger iPhone’s screen might be and why.
Episode Description:
Speculation on what a bigger iPhone's screen might be and why.
Transcript start
⏹️ ▶️ John You know, something you put about like an A5X in the Apple TV thing.
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco However many hits you get on that.
⏹️ ▶️ Marco By the way, I’m an idiot for that. It’s going into the Retina iPad Mini, of course.
⏹️ ▶️ John Oh, the A5X, yeah. I was thinking about
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco that. It’s a die shrink
⏹️ ▶️ Marco that’s going into the Retina iPad Mini, of course.
⏹️ ▶️ John No, but wasn’t Anand saying he thought the A5X was going into the shrunken Apple TV?
⏹️ ▶️ Marco Yeah, well, he said that, and he said he believes it’ll be a die shrink, which makes sense, because the full-size one would be too much
⏹️ ▶️ Marco heat for that, probably. And of course, if you’re going to have a die-shrunk A5X,
⏹️ ▶️ Marco that’s going to be a really inexpensive way to retina-ify the Mini
⏹️ ▶️ Marco while still maintaining good separation for people to buy the high-priced one with the faster chip
⏹️ ▶️ Marco and keep those margins a little bit healthier on the Mini.
⏹️ ▶️ John The reason I totally believe it for the Apple TV is because you said it yourself, they’re going to put the ones there with two of the GPU
⏹️ ▶️ John cores burned out. Because you’ve got four GPU cores in there and it’s like,
⏹️ ▶️ John alright, we’re going to have a lot of parts for one of those four GPU cores is no good, write to the Apple TV, because it does
⏹️ ▶️ John not need more. Maybe they’ll intentionally burn out two. Even if one fails, they will intentionally short out
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco two of them. Because the CPU in the
⏹️ ▶️ Marco current one is an A5 with one core burned out.
⏹️ ▶️ John Right, and crappy GPU. So if you put an A5X in there, it’s like, no, we’ve got four cores. If
⏹️ ▶️ John any one of them is bad, we’re going to intentionally burn out two of them just to save power. And you know what I mean?
⏹️ ▶️ John Because it’s 1080p, it’s the max resolution. You do not need four cores for that.
⏹️ ▶️ Marco don’t buy that. I’m upset that it’s an A5X in all likelihood. I’m upset because
⏹️ ▶️ Marco the A5X is a shitty CPU for iPad programming because it’s
⏹️ ▶️ Marco four times the graphics power, but the same CPU power. So
⏹️ ▶️ Marco CPU-bound graphics operations become four times slower than an iPad 2, and
⏹️ ▶️ Marco that’s really, really terrible.
⏹️ ▶️ John I don’t know. For the Apple TV, I totally believe that it’s going to be A5Xs with stuff shorted
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco out. Oh yeah, because the Apple TV doesn’t matter. But if they then put that-
⏹️ ▶️ John But for the Retina Mini, I still think that’s gonna be an A6.
⏹️ ▶️ Marco Yeah, I hope so. But if that’s the case, then why, besides I guess having a bunch of extra
⏹️ ▶️ Marco binned out A5Xs, but then why would they put the A5X in the Apple TV?
⏹️ ▶️ John I think that’s what it is. I think it’s like, they made the iPad 3 for a long time, right? No,
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco I know, but that’s a lot of, they
⏹️ ▶️ John sold a lot of them. It’s not like, how many Apple TVs do they sell those seven months versus how many iPad 3s they sell on it.
⏹️ ▶️ John You know, the mini wasn’t even around. Like the iPad 3, I guess they had the iPad 2
⏹️ ▶️ Marco, John I guess. Maybe
⏹️ ▶️ Marco because it’s such a large die, they had a
⏹️ ▶️ Marco, John whole bunch of failures. I
⏹️ ▶️ John think it’s because that chip is such a big monster that they had to have a lot of rejects and they’re
⏹️ ▶️ John looking for something to do with those rejects because, you know, otherwise what are you going to do? You throw them away, right?
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco Yeah, I guess that’s true.
⏹️ ▶️ John It’s basically like Fremont and what do you do? You put it in your crappy, low-selling
⏹️ ▶️ John little TV thing. You’ve got them laying around. They’re probably telling them, don’t
⏹️ ▶️ John out. Just keep them on the side. something for those and you know, here you go, Apple TV. That’s if
⏹️ ▶️ John you believe Vance rumors, but it seemed like I looked at his investigative work and I buy it. So
⏹️ ▶️ Marco yeah, I mean, and I don’t think he would post something that confidently without having having good stuff to back
⏹️ ▶️ Marco it up. So I believe it too. And that’s why I figure like, the only two option, the only two explanations
⏹️ ▶️ Marco are using up old old bin chips, or upcoming retina. I’ve had many using
⏹️ ▶️ Marco that particular die shrink of that particular chip, but I really don’t want that to be true.
⏹️ ▶️ Marco I hate that chip so much.
⏹️ ▶️ John Yeah, it depends on how desperate they are for Retina Mini. I always assumed a Retina Mini
⏹️ ▶️ John would not arrive for like a
⏹️ ▶️ Marco year. Yeah, I was thinking like next Thanksgiving season, you know, next fall. But this
⏹️ ▶️ Marco, John could be for them. Apple’s
⏹️ ▶️ John doing some crazy things these days. What the hell with the 128 gigabyte
⏹️ ▶️ Marco was a weird, like why now?
⏹️ ▶️ John I’ve, you know, there’s lots of theories. Like I like, my favorite One was,
⏹️ ▶️ John they just got off their earnings thing where people yelled at them about their margins. You’re like, fine, you want our stupid margins
⏹️ ▶️ John to go up here? Well, just throw in an even higher margin. I think it’s the margins. That thing has just got to be monstrous. But
⏹️ ▶️ John no one’s going to buy it. I know, but it’s like, well, they’ll say, look, we can do this. We can make
⏹️ ▶️ John this thing. If we make this thing, we’re going to sell a non-zero number of them, and the margins are going to be awesome.
⏹️ ▶️ John And they probably have some demand from some people who want it. So like, you know what? Fine. Slap in 28 gigs.
⏹️ ▶️ John Sell it for a ridiculous price like what chance will that because pretty soon they’re gonna have to do the line shift where they do Like okay
⏹️ ▶️ John 16s are gone, right? It’s 32 64 128 all for the same price points, you know, like that’s
⏹️ ▶️ John gonna happen eventually This is their one chance to sell 128 gigs with a ridiculous markup
⏹️ ▶️ John and It’s you know, it doesn’t bring their margins down right the mini is dragging their iPad margins downs
⏹️ ▶️ John Like how can we pull the iPad margins back up? Well, you put a higher-end model in there
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco It’s off cycle, it’s weird.
⏹️ ▶️ Marco this actually, the same way the iPad 4 came out only like seven months after the
⏹️ ▶️ Marco 3, what if they really are moving to a more like twice a year update
⏹️ ▶️ Marco Because the iPhone and iPad are their most important products. And they
⏹️ ▶️ Marco often get dinged in comparisons and the press and reviews and everything. Yeah, because they’re old. Because
⏹️ ▶️ Marco they’re shipping an 11 month old model against somebody’s brand new thing with a brand new core
⏹️ ▶️ Marco and a brand new radio and stuff like that. You
⏹️ ▶️ Marco, John know, what if they do have to
⏹️ ▶️ John balance that? There’s like they’re always getting dings in comparison to whatever the hell the latest Android
⏹️ ▶️ John phone is. But any individual Android phone, the makers want to be on the market for some
⏹️ ▶️ John period of time because you just don’t get the economies of scale unless you sell it for a couple of months at least. Right.
⏹️ ▶️ John So like, you know, it’s got to strike a balance between not. They just want they’re just one maker. They’re never going to be
⏹️ ▶️ John except for like when they first introduce a phone, then they can be a little bit ahead of everybody else. but everyone else will catch up immediately. They just have to
⏹️ ▶️ John be okay with three months, six months of just being a little bit behind, because during that time, they’re like
⏹️ ▶️ John cranking on, you know, so I totally buy trying to go to an eight month
⏹️ ▶️ John or a six month cycle or a twice a year cycle, especially if they stick with the like four, four S, five, five S cadence
⏹️ ▶️ John where you just, you know, upgrade the guts. And also, especially since like, we went,
⏹️ ▶️ John you know, edge, 3G, LTE, in a
⏹️ ▶️ John pretty quick sequence, relatively speaking, There’s nothing surpassing LTE except for maybe 802.11ac
⏹️ ▶️ John that’s going to have to go in there and screw with the radio. So they’ll be able to iterate on the other parts with like, you know,
⏹️ ▶️ John let’s relax for a little bit. We have like a world phone that does LTE and all these other things. One or two more
⏹️ ▶️ John revs of that and it’s not a total upheaval where we go from 3G to LTE and have
⏹️ ▶️ John to support all. You know
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco what I mean? Right, and if
⏹️ ▶️ Marco the retina screen is done, they’re probably not going to go with a more
⏹️ ▶️ Marco, John dense screen. Quad retina.
⏹️ ▶️ Marco doesn’t make sense. They could go bigger maybe. You know, and that’s honestly
⏹️ ▶️ Marco I think they have to go bigger just to keep competitive in the market Like I think I don’t think they
⏹️ ▶️ Marco have to make their only model bigger But I think they have to have a bigger model because even though we all make fun of these
⏹️ ▶️ Marco phablet things They’re really popular. Like yeah people love
⏹️ ▶️ John it to be a phablet. It just needs to be like Right now it’s
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco right now. It’s
⏹️ ▶️ Marco like a skinny four inches. I think they need to have like a more reasonably like
⏹️ ▶️ Marco, John you know, three
⏹️ ▶️ Marco, John Four and a half
⏹️ ▶️ John like it’s like the iBook g4 that was 800 by 600 old people love it I loved it everything was
⏹️ ▶️ John so big you could actually see things you could use your big fat old person finger Like they just got to make a 4.5 inch
⏹️ ▶️ John or you know iPhone same res everything
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco you know just blow it up
⏹️ ▶️ John The screen will be I bet the screen would probably be cheaper because like the density will be lower so even though the screen is Bigger
⏹️ ▶️ John probably cost Apple less money to make you could put an even bigger battery in there so that thing like lasts forever I mean
⏹️ ▶️ John you’ll get all these awesome advantages Well you know
⏹️ ▶️ Marco actually, so on how the LCD cutting theory kind of predicted the Mini,
⏹️ ▶️ Marco what if you do the math backwards, what if you cut the Retina full-sized iPad screen
⏹️ ▶️ Marco to Retina iPhone resolution, how big is that?
⏹️ ▶️ Casey, Marco Say that again?
⏹️ ▶️ Marco we predicted the Mini was by saying, alright, if you just take the 3GS screen and make it the same.
⏹️ ▶️ Marco Do it backwards from the from the full-sized retina iPad from that physical size or
⏹️ ▶️ Marco from that DPI rather how big would an iPhone 5 resolution screen be at that
⏹️ ▶️ John I don’t think you need to I don’t think you need to do that I think they just need to decide how much bigger than 4 inch do you want it and just
⏹️ ▶️ John make the screen that big like I don’t you know the screen cutting theory the thing about the screen cutting theory is even if you 100%
⏹️ ▶️ John buy that that’s how the technology of manufacturing LCDs work I think Apple changes their screen supplier
⏹️ ▶️ John every single device because they’re always chasing the next guy with the next best deal who’s going to offer them
⏹️ ▶️ John the better screen for less money. Like LG, Sharp,
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco Samsung. But
⏹️ ▶️ Marco they also always have volume problems. They always are short on screens. They
⏹️ ▶️ Marco always need more screens.
⏹️ ▶️ John they go with dual. They have multiple suppliers. But once you have multiple suppliers… Basically, what I think is every time… But
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco if you standardize
⏹️ ▶️ Marco on a couple of sizes, and if that cutting theory is correct, then And
⏹️ ▶️ Marco you could dramatically increase your yields
⏹️ ▶️ Marco simplify everything by only having two DPIs that you buy screens at.
⏹️ ▶️ John But only if you’re sticking with someone like, only if the guy who is making you your Retina iPad screens
⏹️ ▶️ John is also the same guy you’re going to get to make you your iPhone Plus size screens.
⏹️ ▶️ John And I think when the iPhone Plus goes out, they just rebid the entire thing. And they give no particular
⏹️ ▶️ John weight or advantage to the guy who is making the screens at the same DPI for some device, especially as
⏹️ ▶️ John far distance as the iPad 3. Like, I think they just rebid every time two best manufacturers,
⏹️ ▶️ John you know, especially with the IGZO stuff. I forget what the
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco hell that stands for. Yeah, Incel and blah, blah,
⏹️ ▶️ John blah. Yeah, like, you know, whoever’s offering that, like if that guy who was doing the iPad 3 screens, whether it’s Sharp or whatever,
⏹️ ▶️ John or, you know, Samsung, if they can’t offer the IGZO thing, but that guy can, I think they just rebid all the time and just
⏹️ ▶️ John set the suppliers against each other like dogs and just wait to see who comes out, you know, surviving. Like, that’s
⏹️ ▶️ John the TSMC thing or TM, whatever. But I
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco get it. Yeah, TSMC. Taiwan
⏹️ ▶️ John Semiconductor, yeah.
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco There was a magazine article
⏹️ ▶️ John Yeah, I know. I read. They’re obviously so incredibly hungry. But just, I
⏹️ ▶️ John mean, you follow video card manufacturing and the ATI and Video Wars back in those days, they
⏹️ ▶️ John both manufactured at TSMC. And it was sometimes good and
⏹️ ▶️ John sometimes disastrous. So I don’t doubt that they’re hungry. I do worry that
⏹️ ▶️ John they’re going to make a deal that Apple will accept because it’s an awesome deal and then just not be able
⏹️ ▶️ John to deliver and we’re all going to be sad.
⏹️ ▶️ Casey So I have two questions. Firstly, if you take a iPhone Plus
⏹️ ▶️ Casey that is not Retina by standard iPhone standards, because if, and
⏹️ ▶️ Casey it’s late and I’m tired, but the DPI of the Retina iPad is considerably less than the DPI of the iPhone
⏹️ ▶️ John, Casey Considerably,
⏹️ ▶️ John, Casey it? Like, what is it, Mark?
⏹️ ▶️ John Well, okay. Like one is 264 and the other one is like…
⏹️ ▶️ Marco It’s like 312 versus 264, something like that.
⏹️ ▶️ Casey Well, that’s somewhat considerable. So anyway, so if they make an iPhone plus with the 264
⏹️ ▶️ Casey DPI, don’t you think they’ll get raked over the coals? No, no, it’ll
⏹️ ▶️ Casey, John still be fine.
⏹️ ▶️ John It’s supposed to be the old people phone. Old people can’t see those pixels. My parents could not see the difference between an
⏹️ ▶️ John iPad 2 and 3. When I showed them right in the store in front of them, I said, these are the two things. I made them get a 3
⏹️ ▶️ John anyway, but they literally could not tell the difference. I intentionally
⏹️ ▶️ John brought up some text and I held it an inch from their face and said, see how you can see the pixel? Oh yeah, I can kind of see it. It’s like, just get the
⏹️ ▶️ John three. But anyway, like old people phone, I’m telling you.
⏹️ ▶️ John, Casey Things are bigger on the
⏹️ ▶️ John screen. They need it to be bigger. They need to be bigger so they don’t drop it. So it’s like just bigger and heavier and
⏹️ ▶️ John bigger pictures and bigger place for their fat fingers to touch. They love it.
⏹️ ▶️ John, Casey Bigger pictures for the grandkids.
⏹️ ▶️ Casey The other question was going to be, well, does Apple really give a shit either way? If they do get raked over the coals, do they really
⏹️ ▶️ John No, as long as they sell them, they won’t. People will not complain. It will not be, it’s like, well, it’s not
⏹️ ▶️ John real red. It’s fine. Look at all the other phones that eight bazillion different resolutions. It’s basically like, can you see the
⏹️ ▶️ John pixels or can you not see them? And 264 is definitely still in the
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco not-see realm.
⏹️ ▶️ Marco Oh yeah, and especially like, if the phone itself is bigger, you’re not going to hold it as close to your
⏹️ ▶️ John Yeah, I mean, that’s what the old people don’t like. They don’t like to have the thing, you know? They want to hold it away. Like, you see the old people holding the
⏹️ ▶️ John books away so they can read it, because otherwise, if they don’t have their reading glasses, they need to get it farther away. But you get an iPhone 5
⏹️ ▶️ John at arm’s length, and suddenly you can’t read the tiny text.
⏹️ ▶️ Marco Yeah, honestly, I might consider getting one of the bigger ones if that was the option. Like if it was otherwise just as good, just
⏹️ ▶️ Marco a little bit bigger?
⏹️ ▶️ John I managed to go this whole Skype session without making a short joke, even when you talked about how they were trying to give you a mini.
⏹️ ▶️ John And now you’re telling me you want to get the five inch iPhone. No, Marco, you have to get the small one. It’s the correct size
⏹️ ▶️ Casey It’s properly proportioned.
⏹️ ▶️ Casey, John It’s arm and size.
⏹️ ▶️ John It’s sized for your family. Are you, is your family all small or is it just you?
⏹️ ▶️ Marco Yeah, they’re all small.
⏹️ ▶️ John So that’s what I’m saying. You’re a hobbit derived people. You got to stick with it. You cannot get, you’re forbidden from getting the giant
⏹️ ▶️ John iPhone. It’s too big for you.
⏹️ ▶️ Casey, Marco I just found
⏹️ ▶️ Marco something extremely nerdy. I have, I just made in Photoshop a quick image mockup, putting
⏹️ ▶️ Marco the right size rectangle, emailed to myself, putting onto my iPad. It is
⏹️ ▶️ Marco about 4.8 inches diagonally.
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco Yeah. I mean, that
⏹️ ▶️ John may be a little big. I would say 4.65 is as big as I can see them going
⏹️ ▶️ John for the iPad Plus, because I don’t know, you’re holding it in front
⏹️ ▶️ John, Casey of you. It’s not
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco you printed it out,
⏹️ ▶️ John can you? Have you held
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco like a… I didn’t print
⏹️ ▶️ Marco that I emailed that I know the image to my iPad so I could look
⏹️ ▶️ Marco, John at it on your 1x
⏹️ ▶️ Marco Honestly, it isn’t that much big like it’s not
⏹️ ▶️ John have you held the Lumia 920 like the big monster Windows phones
⏹️ ▶️ Marco No, I’ll only though only that very first one that was not as it was not a monster the seven
⏹️ ▶️ John I have held the big monster phones, and there’s something to be said for like It’s got like heft it
⏹️ ▶️ John feels like you could you could fend off a mugger with this with this thing. Like, it’s big. It’s like, it’s a little
⏹️ ▶️ John bit heavier. But it just fills your hand more than the other thing does. And I think
⏹️ ▶️ John some people just like that. I wouldn’t like it, because I can’t imagine trying to stick that in a pocket. I
⏹️ ▶️ John like the small, thin form factor. But I think some people like the bigger ones. And it definitely gives
⏹️ ▶️ John a different feel. So if you can, so you have it there on your screen.
⏹️ ▶️ John a piece of paper. Like, make your own little paper craft iPhone Plus. And then make a blog post
⏹️ ▶️ John with you holding it. And there you go.
⏹️ ▶️ Casey But again, he can’t be the one holding it, because he’s hobbit-sized.
⏹️ ▶️ John Yeah, well, you know, your wife’s not normal-sized, either. She’s also small, right?
⏹️ ▶️ Marco actually taller than me. She’s like an inch and a half taller than me.
⏹️ ▶️ Marco, John Is she? And Adam is. But give it to Adam,
⏹️ ▶️ John because it’ll be adorable. I love the fan movie of him watching
⏹️ ▶️ John the fan in the store.
⏹️ ▶️ John, Marco Oh, yeah. So
⏹️ ▶️ Marco, John apparently. I
⏹️ ▶️ John do not use Vine, but I click on the links when your wife posts a picture of a baby looking at a fan. I’ll look at that.