Episode 979: iPhone 17e review

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Macworld Podcast Intro

0:30Welcome to the Macworld Podcast. My name is Michael Simon and I am joined today by my UK colleague, David Price. Hello. And my US producer, Roman Loyola. Hi there. This is episode number 979. We're getting close, Roman, to a thousand. What are we at? 21 a week, so yeah.

1:03Quick math, 4, 8, 12, 16, 20, 5 months. Oh, shoot. 5 months. 5 and change.

iPhone 17e Discussion

1:08So. Today we're going to talk about the iPhone 17e. David got a chance to try one out. Wrote a review. So I'm going to talk to him all about that, what he liked, what he didn't like, who should get one, where Apple goes from here, maybe some MacBook Neo stuff, you know, we'll hit all those points. Then we're going to have a what we're watching segment. So David can tell us what we're missing out on living in the States. This Week in Apple History, and we will close with our comment corner.

1:39Speaking of comments, you can contact us through Blue Sky Facebook threads, search for Macworld, look for the Blue Mouse logo, send us an email at podcast.macworld.com, send us a personal email, comment under a video, comment under a post, get us your thoughts, and we will talk about them on a future show.

Apple 50th Anniversary

1:55Okay, Roman. I know we were supposed to be done with the Apple 50th stuff last week, because I'm tired of it, you're tired of it, and I'm sure our listeners are tired of it, but I can't have David on the show without talking about his list of the top 50 Apple people of all time. So before we get to the 17e, give me like, maybe like five minutes, we'll see what David has to say. Five minutes? I can't speak to it in five minutes.

2:26Ha-ha.

2:28Six seconds, Papaz. I will, so if you didn't see on our website, and Roman will put a link to it in the show notes, David wrote a very exhaustive, historical, excellent list of the top 50 people at Apple to celebrate their 50th anniversary. We ran it, was it two weeks ago, three weeks ago? I don't know, whatever, the week of Apple first. And, you know, I like to think that I know Apple's history pretty well. I learned a lot from it.

2:59If you haven't read it, you should check it out.

Steve Jobs and Apple History

3:02And we'll run through the top 10 quick. But first, I just have one question for you, David. Are there any regrets? Did you print this thing or, you know, publish this thing and say, you know what? I shouldn't have put so-and-so in, or I wish I would have put so-and-so in?

3:21No. No, I thought about this for a long, long time. I was talking to a friend about this list in the pub last night, and he thought that it was very boring, that I'd put Steve Jobs at, well, shall I give away where I put Steve? Sure, sure. Yeah, we can have spoilers. It's fine. Yeah, I put Steve Jobs at number one. And he said, oh, that's really predictable. And I just thought, you know what? I don't care that it's predictable. It would be ridiculous to have anybody else there.

3:51So I think there's a few names in the list. There's a few rankings in the list that I think people will disagree with.

Jeff Raskin and Macintosh

3:58Sure.

Jeff Raskin and Macintosh

3:58But I don't really mind that. Like, we've got Al Gore in there, and I just wanted to put Al Gore in there. And maybe there are people on the original Macintosh team that should have been there instead of Al Gore. But I think it's all right. I think it's a good list. And we spent a lot of time, so I talked to the rest of the team about. And moving people up and down, and people made a lot of suggestions. So I think it's a solid list, a solid 50 in the end. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. I was actually worried. So as an editor, I get the final say, so to speak.

4:33But I didn't want to mess with any of your rankings. You know, this is a personal list. I edited, you know, content, little word stuff. But I didn't change any of the numbers, and I wasn't going to. But I was concerned that you would put someone else at number one just because people expect Steve Jobs to be number one. And as you wrote in your, you know, explanation, it can't be. Like, he has to be there. No.

5:03I wrote an article, I think last year it was, about, it was sort of, it was a little bit devil's advocate. I was arguing the point that you could say that Tim Cook has been a more effective CEO than Steve Jobs was. Sure. Steve Jobs was, but this is a slightly different, this is a slightly different criteria, really. This is saying who is the most significant figure in Apple's history, who has contributed the most to Apple being the company they are today.

5:33And, you know, Steve Jobs was, he's the founder. You know, he was hugely influential. In the early years, he went away and they almost collapsed. He came back and reinvented the company.

5:46You know, he's head and shoulders above anybody else. And that's despite, because, I mean, you've read my article and you had to wrestle with it. I waxed quite poetic about most of the people in the top ten because there have been some amazing people working at Apple. But, yeah, it had to be Steve Jobs. And I think, and if I hadn't, if I hadn't chosen Steve Jobs and I'd come back from holiday and you'd switch them around, I don't think I could really have complained because it would just be, you remember there was that Game of Thrones controversy where somebody just, where they, where they, where they decided to have somebody else kill the Night King from the person you expected.

6:25And they just did it, they seemed to just do it to be, to be different. And it made no sense. I don't think you can do that for no reason. So, yeah. Steve Jobs all the way. I mean, there are rankings of other computer companies, most of them probably where he would be listed without working there. Because he's, I mean, the things he did are so influential that you, like, it's just, it's impossible. Tim Cook, arguably, as you said, was more successful, certainly with growing the company, like, financially and, you know, to be the biggest, most profitable company in the world, which, and also had an effect on Google and Microsoft and everything else.

7:09But without Steve Jobs and what he did, Tim Cook wouldn't have, we wouldn't know who Tim Cook was. He'd be some low-level executive at Hewlett-Packard and maybe even CEO of Hewlett-Packard, but we wouldn't know who he was, not like we do now. Yeah. So, yeah. All right.

iPhone 17e Review

7:27Let's just run through the top 10, if you don't mind, David. And if you want to comment on any of them, I don't think we have time, Roman. He's going to yell at me because we're already several minutes into this. But, all right, we'll give, like, a 30 second, or you can give, if you're able to do that, like, a quick little 30 second while you pick them. We'll go quick. So, number 10 is Susan Care. Yeah, designed all the typefaces, the icons. Was an actual artist in the Makintosh team.

7:59So, the whole of the rest of the team were technical people. She came in with, I think, zero technical background. She was a fine artist and, I think, a crocheter. And she had that sort of mixed art, mixed medium background. And she used, literally used those skills to create pixel art and was a sort of pioneering pixel artist, something that hadn't been done before. And her icons are still being used today. Her typefaces are still being used today. It's hugely important. Yeah, really responsible for Apple's identity, fonts, typefaces, and, you know, those little icons on the Happy Mac.

8:35Like, we still kind of have that today. Like, it's remarkable how she was able to capture Apple's spirit in these little teeny little icons. Number nine, Jeff Raskin. I might butcher some of the pronunciations of these people because I'm just running through it. So, correct me if I'm wrong. Yeah, Jeff Raskin, he came up with the idea of the Macintosh, essentially. So, he theorized it. Like, he, because he was, he was really into the idea of computing for the masses, computing for the people. And he wrote papers on it and the idea of what it would mean to have a computer, have a personal computer for everybody.

9:12And then he said, let's, you know, let's do this. And he, and he, he, he evangelized for this idea within Apple. He said, let's do this. They started the project. He named the Macintosh. That was his favorite Apple that he liked to eat. And he, and he sort of, he pushed it. He got it to a certain point. And then he was removed. You know, then Steve Jobs came along and said, I think I'll take over the Mac project because that sounds fun. And, and, you know, this is one of many examples when I was researching this of sort of examples of Steve Jobs's cruelty and pettiness of character that he, he wanted to strip Raskin's identity completely off the project.

9:51And he wanted to take away the name Macintosh. He wanted to rename it The Bicycle, which would have been an awful, awful name. But he, he redesigned a lot of, a lot of ideas. He wanted to use the, the GUI ideas that they'd got from Xerox Park and they'd used on the Lisa project. So it ended up being quite different from what Jeff Raskin had, um, originally, but he's the one that started the Macintosh and it changed, but without his input, um, the Mac wouldn't have started. So he's really important.

10:21Right. Um, you know, that's just another reason why Steve Jobs is number one. Not that he stole someone else's work, but that he had, he was able to take someone else's work and like find like the core importance of it, remold it, and then bring it to, you know, a viable consumer product. Like he did that numerous times over the years. We're going to skip to number five, Roman. So you don't get too upset. I don't have time to go. They're all dead. Uh, Tony Fadell, number five. Yeah. The father of the, uh, father of the iPods.

10:53Um, yeah, I mean, I'm going to, I'm going to shorten these. Um, but yeah, he, he was, so again, we, what we had with the Jeff Raskin, Steve Jobs thing, it was, uh, Ruben Stein was originally working on the iPod. And then he brought in, uh, Tony Fadell, who had experience with working on mobile music players, portable music players, but he, he came in and he got it over the line. And the general feeling is that he did more to create the iPod than Ruben Stein did. And the iPod, I mean, you guys will probably disagree, but for me, the iPod is, is the single most important product in Apple's history.

11:29It's the one that tipped them over into being this, this, this monster, um, that did everything.

11:38I don't disagree with that at all. The iPod was the first non-Mac hit that Apple had. It, it made it culturally relevant in a completely different way than it had ever been before. So yeah, I don't, I don't disagree with that at all. iPod was super important. Yeah. Johnny, I, if we don't, we can, oh, uh, carry on. Yeah. No, I mean, yeah. Johnny, I've doesn't need, doesn't need an introduction for me. Yeah. We can skip Johnny. Oh, poor Johnny though. I'm getting skip.

12:09Uh, Steve Wozniak, uh, people know he was the co-founder of Apple with Steve Jobs. Yes. And an altogether nicer man, which, uh, in, which is a positive element negative. Cause, um, yeah, if he wasn't quite so nice, he might've made more money. But, right. I mean, I'm sure he's doing just fine, but yeah.

12:33There's that whole, um, what if scenario of what would have happened if he hadn't had his plane crash. Um, and he was, and he was out of action for, I think several months. And while that was going on, I think he, he would have been on the Macintosh project with Raskin and then later with Jobs, but because he wasn't available, it became entirely Steve Jobs baby. And then sort of the path of history slightly changed. The, the, the, what if thing, there are so many of those in this list. Like if this thing didn't happen, if that thing didn't happen, like it's wild how, you

13:10know, these, Apple's a $4 trillion company and it comes down to a phone call or as you say, a plane crash, which, uh, Wozniak was the pilot of that. Was it, wasn't he the pilot Roman of that plane? Like he wasn't like, it wasn't a, you know, plane crash, but he was also, um, somewhat responsible for it. But, um, yeah, like there's so many little instances. He wasn't like for his crash. No, no, I'm not blaming it. I'm just saying like, like it just deserves some context. Yeah. You know? Yeah.

13:40Um, but yeah, a little tiny decisions, like even like number 10, bringing on, uh, Susan care, like the different person had done the icons. Like maybe people don't respond as much if they didn't change the logo because it was this ornate, you know, thing, uh, just incredible. All right. Number two is Tim Cook. Number one is Steve Jobs. Um, we don't have to talk about that. Uh, we're already 13 minutes in Roman is, uh, he's going to yell at me after this is over. But, uh, it's an excellent list.

14:12Um, we will have the link to it, um, underneath this, if you're watching it on YouTube or wherever, um, it's go, go check it out because it's, it's long, but it's, it's worth the read because they all kind of relate to each other. Like it's not chronological obviously, but it is very much in the sphere of influence, how one person relates to another, relates to another. And, um, just, it's, it's a fascinating history. I don't know of many other companies that have this like rich tapestry of people that helped form what it is today.

14:42So good job on that, David study and play come together on a windows 11 PC and for a limited time, college students get the best of both worlds. Get the unreal college deal. Everything you need to study and play with select windows 11 PCs eligible students get a year of Microsoft 365 premium and a year of Xbox game pass ultimate with a custom color Xbox wireless controller. Learn more at windows.com slash student offer while supplies last ends June 30th. Terms at AKA dot M S slash college PC.

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15:29And good job on your iPhone 17 e-review, which posted, he wrote it a while ago. I, I held it. Uh, I was waiting for you to email me over fake. You were on vacation last week. I was waiting for you to text me and say like, Hey, how can my review hasn't gone up? Because I didn't want it to get lost in all the 50th stuff. So I kept it for this week. Um, but you tested it for a little while. Are you still using the iPhone 17 or did you go to the back to the 17? No, I'm still on the, I'm still on the 17 e.

16:00It's on my list of jobs for this week, actually, to go back to the 17. But I think that's, I think that's a measure of, um, how, how little of a downgrade it's felt to me that I haven't yet bothered to go back to the iPhone 17. It's, it's, it's weird. Um, the things you miss and the things you don't miss, um, to explain the context. Um, I've, I've been doing two iPhones sort of a year, um, for the last couple of years. So last year I went from the iPhone 16, I think it might've been the plus.

16:33So it was a bigger screen, but I went from the 16 down to the 16 e and then I've gone to the 17 down to the 17 e. So each time it's theoretically been a downgrade. Um, and the seven and the 16 e last year, it, it felt like a downgrade and, um, I gave it quite a negative review. I, I, I didn't think it made a lot of sense as a product. This one, this one much less so. Um, I find the, the notch, um, is sort of annoying from a sort of muscle memory point of

17:04view, like, um, cause lots and lots of apps, lots of websites, you have that thing where you tap at the top of the screen to jump up and I really like that, that gesture, but it's, you've got less space to work with somehow when the notch is there, you have, you've only got this little sliver when it's the dynamic island, you can just, you know, it's much easier. And this is such a repeated gesture that you're constantly annoyed of, oh, why is the notch there? It's not so much the, um, the functionality of the dynamic island that I like. I mean, occasionally that's useful.

17:35It's mostly that it just takes up a bit less space and is less sort of obtrusive. Um, so I don't love the notch and I, and I don't love the fact that it doesn't have an always on display. Those are the only two things really that have annoyed me. The, the weaker camera, the slower processor, the weaker battery, the slower MagSafe. None of those things really bother me on a day to day basis. I barely even notice them to be honest. Um, yeah, I, I think it's fine. I think it's, I think it's a decent phone now. Yeah.

18:05I, I, so I went from the 17, no, the 16 plus to a 17, no, it's not a 17. So to the air, similar type of thing. I gave up the extra camera, smaller screen. Um, but I don't miss those things either. Like, it's funny, the things that you think you're going to need on a phone versus the things that you actually use in practice. So the 16 E you tested and your biggest complaint was the lack of MagSafe. And I, I don't disagree.

18:37Like, I think Apple probably held it. So the 17 E looked like a better phone in comparison by getting it, but it's, it's an important thing. And like I, every night I pop it onto my nightstand. It's a little, uh, you know, like a little arm that like works as like an alarm clock. And, you know, it's been there since the iPhone 12. I've, I've, I've had it. And it, yeah, it's a, it's a, it's a fantastic feature. And as you say, the charging speed is less relevant than the actual fact that you can pop it onto a charger without a wire.

19:08Yeah. Yeah. Cause wireless charging generally is fiddly. Um, right. You have to hit the sweet spot. You have to, you have to, you know, you're sort of tiptoeing around where it is in case you nudge it and it goes off the sweet spot. And, and MagSafe is, is just, it takes everything about wireless charging and makes it nice. It's just sucks it into the sweet spot and keeps it there. And, and yeah, and I, I really, really like it.

19:38And I really missed, I really missed it when I had the 16E. Um, and I, and I tested it, you know, the, so it's, it's only 15 watt, uh, the MagSafe or the 17E. I mean, there's, there's, there's all sorts of different speeds. The 17 is 25 watts. It's quite a bit quicker. I think the air is like, is it 22 or something? It's not quite. It's slightly slower. Yeah. Um, but they're all basically, they're all faster than the 17E, but I don't think it really matters. So, so the, the 17E, it took me three hours to charge from zero on MagSafe compared to

20:12two hours on the 17, which is a notable difference. Right. Um, but you're, you're usually going to be doing it overnight and if you are charging it and there's, and if, if time is in any way a factor, if you, if I need to charge 20 to get next 20% before I go out and I've got to leave the house and you use a cable, like in any situation where speed is a factor, I, I, I don't really see why you would then go, I'll use MagSafe. It's MagSafe is there for the convenience of the overnight charge.

20:44The cable is there for speed. So it's fine really to have a slow MagSafe. And I was annoyed when I heard about this because it was, this has been a sort of feature of the two E iPhone launches each year. They've, they've lured us in, they go, it's cheaper and it's mostly got quite a good spec line, but, and then there's a series of buts and this was one of them. And they said, oh yeah, MagSafe this year, but it's only 15. And it was annoying and I, and I still like it to be 25 watts, but in reality, it's fine.

21:20Yeah, I agree. Um, if you're looking for, if you need to fill up your phone really quick, you have a half hour, 20 minutes or something, you're going out. Yeah. You just pop in the USB-C cable and you're on your way. Um, and you know, MagSafe, you talk about how important it's so important that it's now an industry standard, uh, uh, the Qi 2.2 standard, which is going to be on air. Some Android phones have it and others will keep getting it. Like it's, it's a thing that everyone has recognized. Like, wow, wireless was cool. If I'm in, if I'm in the, in bed and I reach over to put my phone on the little stand, I

21:52just kind of push it until it clicks and it's done. Otherwise I, there were so many times when I would put it on a wireless mat and, and miss and I'd wake up and it'd be like 16% on my phone. I'm like, gosh, like this is, it's like, it's, it's, it's a no brainer upgrade from, uh, anything that you've had. Um, so like, when did I, so MagSafe came out with the iPhone 12. So most, I'm going to say most iPhone users probably had a phone or have a phone, even

22:23if they're going from a 12 or a 13, they probably have MagSafe. But if you're coming from Android, there's a good chance he didn't. And it's somewhat revelatory to be able to just not listen. You got to buy a, a puck or a stand or something that supports it. So it's a little bit of an extra expense, but it's absolutely worth it. Um, while we're in this section, let's talk about, um, battery life real quick. What was your ultimate takeaway on the 17 E's battery life?

Battery Life Discussion

22:52Fine.

Battery Life Discussion

22:52Um, yeah, it was, it was fine. It wasn't as good as the 17, um, but it was, it was high enough that it, that it never made a difference really. Um, even on the days when I, I'd been doing intense benchmarking and I'd been pushing it to the limit, it would still make it through a day. And that's sort of the threshold for me. So you have a little chart in your review. Um, this is based on minutes and Roman, if you want to give me quick, quick hourly math.

23:24But what struck me the most is that it's about the same as the iPhone air, which is the phone I use. And, um, I could generally get through the bulk of a day with the air. I use my phone a lot. Um, I might have to throw it on a charger at like nine o'clock at night for an hour or two before I go to bed or, or like right now I'm doing the podcast and I, I have it on like a little desktop stand. Like I might have to do that stuff. Otherwise it gets through a day, but on this list, it's fat.

23:55It's, it lasts longer than the 16 E. It lasts as long as the 16 and, and quite a bit longer than the 15. So people coming from an older phone, which those are the ones probably even earlier than that for 13, 14, 12, even they're going to see a boost in, in battery life. Like no one is going to go from a 17 to a 17 E. Like it's just not, there's no reason to ever do that, but the 17 does have significantly longer. Your thing is 200 minutes. Roman, what's that in hours, two, three, 60, a little over three hours.

24:30So that, that, that's a lot, you know, that's significant. If battery life is a thing, that's, you know, three hours of extra battery life is a lot, but it's also $200 more. Like we'll get into that a little bit further into the segment, but, um, anything else on battery life, David, that you, the one thing to remember is that the battery life, when we, the reviewers get hold of the, of the unit is the best it's ever going to be. So I always try and remember that, but it was comfortably, comfortably getting through

25:03a day. And once I stopped really hammering the battery, it would get through to the day with 30 or 40% left on the, on the clock. So that's, that is giving you the wiggle room for a year down the line, 18 months down the line when the battery health starts to dip and it doesn't last quite as long. Uh, I, I, yeah, I, I didn't really have any, any worries about the battery. And it's interesting what you said about the comparisons with the iPhone 15, the iPhone 16, the iPhone 14, how consistently Apple has now started to, to raise the bar each year.

25:38I don't remember that being a consistent thing in the past is that it used to just be, you know, you go, you go about far enough and it would be, it would be generally said, iPhones have poor battery life. And it was felt that if you want a good battery life, you have to go to Android. And then they, they have been consistently improving year by year. I'm assuming, I don't use Android, but I'm assuming that the best Android phones still are ahead on battery life. They are. Yeah. And you know, Apple does all these apps, uh, iOS optimizations, things like standby battery

26:08is, is excellent. You can turn the thing off and then you can turn it on in three days and it'll still have basically the same battery as it did. Like things like that. Um, it absolutely is better than Android and you know, like this galaxy, I was looking up, um, comparison phone. So the, the one that kept coming up was the galaxy S 25 FE, which I believe stands for fan edition, which is kind of like the SE and that was the, but, um, that has a 4,900 milliamp

26:39power battery in it, which is, you know, way more than the 17E, like twice as big. So we're comparing apples to oranges when it comes to that. If Apple put a 5,000 milliamp hour battery in the 17E, it would last for like a week and a half. So, you know, we're, we're, they, Android phones generally have higher capacity batteries in them. Now, if you look at something like the 17 pro that has, I think 45 or 4,600 milliamp hour.

27:10So, and that lasts, you know, probably twice as long as the 17E. So, you know, you, uh, Apple, Apple targets these things very specifically. It, it, it knows the kind of people that are going to buy these phones and, you know, like, so I use my parents a lot, my, my, it was the weirdest thing. The day the 17E came up, my dad called me up that night and said, I just ordered, or I'm going to order two iPhone 17Es. And I'm like, what? Like, you know, like my dad has a 14, my mom has a 12, like they don't upgrade their

27:44phones ever, but they got an email from Verizon saying that it was, you know, you could trade in this and my dad's a veteran. So he got a discount and it ended up costing them 300 something dollars each and they, they got it. And that's the perfect market for the 17E. They don't, they, they take pictures, but they don't need the advanced photography stuff. They just want to phone the guest through the day and, you know, can, uh, isn't gonna, you know, die at five o'clock if it's in my mom's pocketbook or my dad's pocket for a

28:15while, it's perfect. So, you know, the, the, the, the, the areas that Apple hit, I think are, are, are spot on. Um, let's talk about the camera since I just mentioned it. Um, same as the 16E one camera and I have the iPhone air that I spent a thousand dollars for it. I have the same camera. So there's that. Yeah, it's, it's sort of disappointing.

Camera Comparison

28:41It's obviously more disappointing for you with your iPhone air that you only get that, but it's still basically fine. Um, yeah, the thing that you have to explain to anybody that asks about this for general advice, like your parents, like my parents is that when we're testing, when we're, when we're reviewing the special process, we are going and seeking out those, um, those borderline situations, those particularly challenging situations, there's, there's a photo I took in the review where I deliberately went down a road and looked up at the sun and took a

29:16photo of some houses with the sun, just pointing directly into the lens. It's just appalling compositional strategy, um, just to test it. That's the thing. And then we walk and then we go away and we say, oh, well, you know, if I'd done this same shot with the iPhone 17 pro, then maybe the smart HDR would have had more pros, pros, it would have been able to maintain the color fidelity slightly better. Um, but 99% of the time, you're not going to be taking those sorts of photos. The, the real difference in the, the spec, the real thing you're losing is the, um, is,

29:51is the, you won't have the two lenses. So you, you can't really take portrait mode photos, uh, portrait mode photos in a, in a sort of, in a real way. It has to do with software, um, trickery. So it's having to, instead of it being able to take two, two, um, exposures from slightly different angles and thereby seeing the three dimensional shape, it's, it's having to try and decide which part is a human face and that fail. So I did some, um, I did some portrait modes and it was, it was my face, um, and around my

30:27hair, the 17 E, it got confused by that sort of feathering you get on short. And it blended in with the background a bit and created a shape around the side of my head. And it, when you zoom in, as I say, you know, to test, to see which one is the best, then clearly the iPhone 17 is the best because it has the extra lens because it has greater facility at doing portrait photography. But if you just take the photos, you don't really notice the difference.

30:59It will only be these edge cases, these occasional situations where you say, I've lost out here, you know, by spending $200, $300 less, I've got a weaker camera, but most of the time you don't notice the difference. Most of the time the camera is, is fine. Um, which I think is what's happened with the iPhone air with you that you've. I love the iPhone air. Okay. I would buy it again in a second. Really? I didn't expect you to play that. It's the, the, the design.

31:30So my son has a 17. My wife has a 16 pro and I use their phones here and there. And I, every time I pick up their phone, I'm like, this thing is so clunky and ugly. Like, I just like the feel of that thin phone. So the way the, the plateau is, is high enough where I never even noticed the, the, that, that thickness, the bulbous top. Um, it's fantastic. I, I, I would, like I said, a thousand bucks. I'm perfectly happy to spend. I, some, my, my fun, my, my fun, my, my son asked me at the time, like, like, cause he

32:05said, like, well, what's like, what's your phone or whatever it was, whenever I went, when he got the 17 and I said, well, it's, it's, it's not as good as yours. Like it's, it's, you have a better camera, you have a better screen, not better, but you have the same screen. You have the similar processor. He's like, well, why'd you get it? I'm like, I just liked the design. He's like, well, why does that matter? I'm like, it just does. To me, it does. Yeah. And I like feeling that thin phone. That's the only reason to get it. There's no other reason. And I understand that people say that it's not selling well.

32:38It makes sense to me because if you put them side by side with any other phone, it's like, well, why would I get this? Cause most people don't care. Once I, I've used it, it's going to be really hard for me to go to another phone next year. I generally switch just to get an experience for all of them. So maybe I'll get the fold next year. Maybe I'll get the pro. We'll see, but I'm going to miss this phone a lot. That's a real, that's, that's the interesting element is that when it becomes the standard in people's minds, nothing else compares, nothing else will live up to that.

33:09So you have surprised me. I haven't even, I haven't even got an iPhone air in my hand. So for me, I'm exactly what you said. I look at the specs, I look at the price and I just think they've, they've changed something. I was happy with the thickness of the iPhone 17, let's say I'm, I'm completely happy with the thickness, the weight, and then they've weakened other things to make that thinner. And I worry actually in my head that it would be too thin. It'd be too light and it would feel weird and I'd drop it more.

33:40Um, but from what you, well, from what you're saying, I really, I might have to try and get my hands on one now because once it, yeah, once it becomes a standard, maybe the sales will pick up. I don't know. I mean, it's expensive. It's, you're, you're giving up a lot for nothing. Basically you're, you know, like you're not, there's nothing the air brings that's better than another phone except for the design. Design is nothing though. I mean, I do hear it. Right. It is important. Yeah. And depending on how you approach it, like I thought I was fine with the iPhone thickness

34:14before as well. Like the 16, I had the 16 plus. I was like, it's, this is great. It's, it's thin. Like I said, I, I never use a case. I haven't used a case in, geez, I don't know, however long I buy Apple care. And if I drop it, which I do, I'll just go and fix it for 30 bucks. But without a case on this phone, it just feels like I'm using a completely different product than I was last year. Real quick on your, uh, the camera stuff, just before we bounce to something else, you have a comparison photo of a portrait of your, you said that like, so it's like the top of

34:49your head because you wanted to show the, the, the little wisps of hair and stuff. And when I first did the slider thing without looking at the caption, I wasn't totally sure which was which like the 17 E does a pretty good job of getting like enough wisps of hair where unless you like analyze it, it, it, it's, it's hard to tell. They did a good job. They've been doing that kind of like digital or faux. They used to call it, um, foca instead of, instead of a bokeh or bokeh, whatever it's called. Um, because they've done this since like the iPhone six S I think with a single lens portrait.

35:24So like, it's not like this is a new thing. They just haven't had to really do it until the, um, the iPhone SE, the iPhone 16, like those phones. But, um, it's, it's, it's good. If fortune mode is a thing that you use and I know it's kind of fallen out of style, it used to be really popular, maybe not so much anymore, but, um, they did a great job with it as far as like the digital portrait stuff. The one thing I do miss on the air is, um, macro mode because that, when you have the

35:55two lenses and that was, it's on the 17, it's on a 17 pro 16. I think it was on the 15 too, man, that thing is so cool when you can get in really close and get all those details. Um, I do miss that because there's no fake version of that. Maybe there never will be. I don't know if they can figure that out because it does kind of need to lock in folically. And I don't know if they can do that, but that's something that I'm going to be happy to get back. If I get a phone with two cameras, cause that's, that's an excellent feature.

36:25Well, the iPhone fold looks like it will have two cameras. Yeah. So there is that to look forward to. Yeah. If I want to spend two grand on a phone.

36:37It is a lot. Um, oh, and one more about the photo. Okay. Like that one that you talk about the street, when you look into the, into the sun, I mean, it's really not bad considering your, it's kind of a moody shot. You do get some, some low lights in there still. I'm sorry. You do get some highlights in there still, even with, with, with all the shadows. It's, it's pretty good. You know, it's pretty good. Most people, they just want, like my parents will take out a shot and my mom will be at

37:10church with their friends or she'll take a picture of my son or something like that's all they want. And they want to make sure they could take their phone, press the button and it looks good. And you're, you're, you're, you're going to get that. Uh, we can talk briefly about the processor, but I don't think there's much to say. It's good. It's really good. It's great. The fact that it's binned, I didn't even notice. Um, Jason Cross just wrote, um, a thing about binned processors and like, like how it works. This could be a whole nother show. Like Apple's use of bin processors has like completely changed the game because like it,

37:47they could take a, a bunch of chips that otherwise would have really gotten thrown away because they don't sell chips like Intel, Intel, AMD. Like they all, everyone has this real quick about bin. So bin processes are you, you, you, you have a processor that, that you're fabricating and you got this big wafer of things and there's like, I don't know, a hundred chips on it. And of those hundred chips, 40 of them, or maybe more won't be right. They'll be, they'll be missing a, uh, a GPU core won't, won't work or whatever.

38:20And normally a company will take those chips and they'll repackage them as a slower chip and they'll sell it to someone or they'll, they'll, they'll use them. Apple has found a way to like take that wafer and completely and totally, uh, uh, be efficient about how they use the chip. So this goes here and this goes there and this goes there. And, you know, we just ran an article about the MacBook Neo. They're using a iPhone 16 pro chip that they're selling so well that they're going to run out

38:51of. And, you know, like, this is like a fantastic problem for them to have. Like they're, they're not spending more on the chip. They're not making more chips. And now they're the products that they're using them in are selling so well that they can't even keep up. So yeah, it's a great chip. Um, you, you're missing out on a GPU core. You can check out David's benchmarks. All right. So that's about, that's like a good overview. Who in your opinion, David should buy or consider buying?

39:21Buying an iPhone 17 E.

39:25Um, lots of people really. It's, it's, it's a good choice, particularly if, so like, I think you said your parents are on the iPhone 12 and the iPhone 14. Yeah. Those are two very good examples of people that will see a noticeable upgrade when they switch to the 17 E without spending over the odds, particularly if they can get, you know, discounts. If you're coming from, uh, Android, it would be quite a nice one to come from that come to from Android. If it's your first ever smartphone, I don't know if there's many people like that out

39:57there anymore. Um, it would, I know maybe for, you know, a kid. Um, that would, I mean, that would be a very generous, um, gift. Yeah. I just, I mean, if you, obviously you're not going to come to the 17 E as, as I did through circumstances from the iPhone 17, you know, you, you, you shouldn't be coming to it from something that's better and you wouldn't be. Um, and anything within the last two years, you shouldn't come to the iPhone 17 E, but anything older than that, it's a good choice.

40:28It's, it's, it's value for money, which is not what I felt about the iPhone 16 E, particularly because, and we haven't mentioned this, actually, they've doubled the starting storage. Ah, yes. Which makes it so much more appealing. So you, you now, you just get the 599 version. That one is fine. That, that does the job. Whereas previously, I can't remember if it's 699 or I think it is 699, the, uh, the 256 gig model of the 16 E, but now you just get the starting storage because it's more, it's more,

41:02it's generous, it's enough and you'll be fine. So they've, they've made all these little improvements year on year that have shifted it. It's only gained, only gained half a star in my review. So the 16 E got three stars out of five. This one's got three and a half out of five, but it, it does make quite a big difference, um, in terms of the recommendation. And I would, I would recommend this to a lot of people. I was going to start a conversation with you over the star because reading it, it feels

41:33like a four star review. Yeah. However, I did go back to the 16 E and I saw the score you gave that and I said, okay, I get it. Like it's not a full point more because you're really only getting back safe, slightly better processor. And yeah, the extra storage, um, is nice because 120, the 16 E came with 128 for 599. And to get two 56, you had a, it was a hundred dollars more, like you said. So this is essentially a hundred dollar price cut, which Apple does from time to time.

42:04Um, the biggest thing for me and my, my dad actually pointed that out too. He's like, I can't believe I have so much storage on this thing. I never have to think about it. And that's the best thing because the people who, who are the target market for this phone don't want to dive into settings and look at their story. My mom used to complain about it all the time. She has an iPhone 12. It was, I think 64. And she would say, how come I don't have any space on my phone? I'm like, well, because you have too many apps on there. She's like, well, I didn't download. I'm like, well, you did. I'm like, go to storage.

42:35And I would, I would talk her through, go to apps, click on this. You can delete that. Most people don't have, well, certainly not macro editors, but even people in their lives that are willing to show them how to do this. So they just say, well, my phone can't update anymore, or I can't download this app anymore. And they just suffer through it. And for as long as they keep it, like I can, I can, I can honestly say, or comfortably say no one who buys this phone is ever going to have to worry about storage because that is a ton of space to fill up unless you're taking like a lot of 4K videos, which if you

43:09are, you're not getting this phone. Yeah, you're right. It's an, it's an effective price cut, which we weren't expecting. I felt like $599 was a slightly frustrating price point because we were used to the iPhone SE before, which was $429, but it was, it was quite a bit weaker. Yeah. It was a very old design, particularly towards the end, it was looking, looking its age. So I've, I've, I've, I've got more on board with the $599, particularly because you don't

43:44need to upgrade. We haven't mentioned the, uh, color options. Ah, you're right. You're, you, so. Upgrade. Yeah, the 16E came in black and white. Yeah. The 17E now comes black, white, and one of your favorite colors, maybe, maybe, maybe your favorite, because you've written about it several times. I have. Pink. Yeah. I like pink tech. Um, I, no. Now I can't remember what they, what they call it. It's pale pink. Soft pink. Soft pink. Soft pink. Yes. So I haven't, I haven't seen it.

44:15I had to stress. Uh, they sent me the white one and I really liked the white one. You know, it is nice. I just, I think having the options, it felt like it was another of the butts. Wasn't it? Last year. Yeah. It's only in black and white. And we're so used to having a few interesting color options. So this year they, they said, one of the improvements is you get soft pink. He said, it doesn't look very pink. It looks really pale, really pale pink. Uh, and our colleague Jason, he, he did get the pink one and he sent me a photo and he

44:50sent me a paragraph to put in the article. So I didn't actually credit it. So if you see an article in there saying, uh, and wrote that paragraph, um, yeah, he said it was really sort of washed out. It looks basically white. Um, so that's a disappointment. You know, it's, it's nice that you get, again, it's, it's an improvement, but it's only a small improvement that you don't really get the option. Um, but I know that most people, I don't know about most people, I know a lot of people don't share my interest in pink technology.

45:24Maybe I'm in the minority there. A lot of them. I don't know. The MacBook new comes in pink. So people must be buying it. Apple wouldn't have made it. Yeah. They do. They do quite often do a pink one. And there, there was a phase, um, I don't know if it was the same with PRs in the U S but I, I had, I had a few, when I was working for, um, PC advisor, um, my colleagues who were women would always get sent the pink version of any Chromebook or whatever it would be. And, and, and we would not, the men would not.

45:55And it seemed to be, and I wasn't sure if it was going to go down the angle of becoming kind of a sexist thing. Um, but I, I, it doesn't seem to be the case anymore that they associate it with pink ones are for women and the other ones are for men, which is good. Cause I'm a man and I like pink phones. Yeah. I remember when, uh, Rose Gold came out, this was the iPhone. She's five for us. Roman, do you remember when Rose Gold made its first appearance? But it was like, like the first articles I read were like, Oh, this is a girly color.

46:28And there's definitely, there's a lot of that in the U S where blue is for boys and pink is for girls. Like it's inescapable. But yeah, I think there's some crossover, but I also think that Apple probably looked at its, the demographics of people buying these phones and maybe it's a younger generation. Maybe it is skew a little bit more female because it's pretty clear that the Mac book Neo, you got that citrus color, which is neutral. Then he got Indigo, which is, you know, more of the masculine type.

47:00And then there's the pink one, which is more of the feminine type. So like they do, I'm sure there's studies and, and portfolios and things that they do before they come out with these colors to see. I mean, my mom bought the big one and my dad bought the black one. So, you know, it does, it does exist. My mom likes the pink. She's a, she likes that kind of soft pink color. Like her kitchen is all soft pink appliances and things. So, um, she, she likes it a lot, but then she put a case on it. I said, well, if you, if you like the color so much, why are you going to put a case on?

47:32She's like, well, I don't want it to scratch. I'm like, who cares? Just enjoy the color, but, um, and so that's another thing. It has ceramic shield on it, which is less scratch resistant or more scratch resistant rather than the, um, 16E. I've been using the air for what's that? Uh, September, October, New Roman. How many months is that? Six, seven since it came out. I tell you what, I can't find a scratch on this thing anywhere. I don't baby it.

48:02I don't make sure that it's nicely put in my pocket. Sometimes I have keys in the same pocket. Nothing like the ceramic shield is, is legit. Yeah. I think the 16E had ceramic shield as well, but this one is ceramic shield. The new one. Yeah. Yeah. That's right. 30% more scratch resistant. Uh, I think that's the number they get, which is such a weird thing to put a number on how they, I really don't. Yeah. I don't like, I like what they say.

48:34Like it's two times more noise resistant. Like, wow. Yeah. Like, how am I supposed to measure that?

48:40Yeah. That's good. We go, we're going too long, but I have one more question for David and then we'll wrap up the 17E section. Um, what happens with the 18E next year, in your opinion? They've left room to improve. They've certainly not rushed ahead too much. Um, so they could, they have, they still have room to, they could finally add the second camera lens back in because it's, it is ridiculous in this day and age to have a single camera lens. Um, I think they'll go back to the faster MagSafe, although as I've said, I don't think

49:13that would make a huge difference, but it would be, it would be nice, but I don't think it'll be particularly different. Um, if, if Seaman, they do it next year, I think it will just have the next generation of processor. And then they'll think of one other change to make, um, maybe the second camera lens. That, that's probably the one I would ask for the most, or maybe, maybe the dynamic island. There was talk of that this year. I was going to ask. Yeah. So do you think it will? So the dynamic island would mean that it, it enters the, the, the most modern era of

49:47iPhone, which it's never done. Apple's never done with its, with its budget phone. It's always a generation behind. Um, do you think so next year in the spring? We're supposed to get the iPhone 18 instead of releasing in September of this year, like it's done for the last decade or whatever it is, um, is going to get pushed to the spring, which is going to be, it's like budget event. I guess I assume MacBook Neo two iPhone, they say iPhone air, which doesn't really fit, but

50:19maybe, um, iPhone 18 E and the iPhone 18. So like all of those kind of, kind of lumped together, maybe an event, maybe in a week, who knows, but do you think the iPhone 18 E will, will get a dynamic island or stick with the notch for at least another year? I can see a scenario where they give it the dynamic island on the sort of basis of the folding phone now being the latest design innovation or the latest design.

50:50I don't know what the word is for that, but you're, you're right. I mean, it's, it's an interesting thought that they won't do anything that they won't bring it up to the level of the most expensive phone, but then at this point, the most expensive phone is going to be twice as expensive as even the iPhone 18. So yeah, that does change the dynamic quite a bit. Yeah. Um, maybe they would do it on that basis. I, but my, my suspicion is that they won't, they'll hold on to it. So then, then I suppose then there'll be three, three tiers design wise, fold the dynamic

51:24island and the notch to, cause they, they always want to bump you up one more level. The, uh, 18 pro is supposed to get a slightly smaller dynamic island. And so there's that visual difference as well. Okay. That does make a little bit shorter. No, that does make a difference. So in that case, it could be still, if you want to have the small dynamic island and especially a new name, that'll be even better, but dynamic island two or something. Uh, then you, then you have that, then that opens up the opportunity to bring the, uh, the

51:56E up to the old dynamic island, which seems as appealing. Yeah. Now you've said that about the smaller dynamic island. Now I am convinced that they may well.

52:07So 18e dynamic island, 599. That is a, that's, that's an appealing phone. If it gets a second camera, like that's lights out. I don't think they would do both. I think they'll, I think they'll give it the new processor and then they'll make one change. Okay. Um, and I hope it's not fast and mag safe. I hope it's either the camera lens or the, uh, or the, or the dynamic island or an always on display. Um, I, I'd be surprised if it got that, but because the 17 only just got that, it took how many generations for it to come to that?

52:40I think it's an important feature, probably the most important feature, but that has to also come with the dynamic island because they never did it on the notch one. I don't know if they would, it's got to have the refresh all the way down to 1% or whatever it is for battery life. So, um, all right, give me a prediction. Second camera or dynamic island, 18 E. Dynamic island. Okay.

53:04You can read David's iPhone 17 E review, um, on our website. Uh, I'm sure he'll have, he'll have a lot more to say about the phone over the coming weeks and months until we get the 18 E next March, according to rumors. Okay. We, I haven't left any time, David. I'm sorry. We're going to have to skip your, what we're watching segment. I, we, we, we, we, we, we just don't have time to get into a long discussion about British television.

53:34It's not British. It's, I'm going to barge in. It's the news reader and it's Australian and it's really good. Anyway, that's, that's Australian television. Now, well, now I'm more intrigued. We'll have you on again so we can talk about this stuff. Okay. All right, Robin, let's do, um, this week on Apple history.

This Week in Apple History

53:50Because this is, this is going to be a couple of minutes. So this week in Apple history, um, on April 19th, 2010. So about 16 years ago, Gizmodo, the website published an exclusive scoop of the iPhone four. Uh, now in retrospect, now that we look at it with today's eyes, it doesn't seem like that big a deal because we, we see this kind of stuff all the time, but back then it was sort of a big deal. And the circumstances of the story, uh, it's kind of wild.

54:25Um, yes. So basically what happened was Gizmodo bought this phone from a guy who got it from a bar. Essentially what happened was this guy was at a bar. Someone left this phone behind and somebody thought this phone belonged to this guy. So the guy took it, tried to figure out who, whose phone it was. Nobody claimed it. And then he basically took it and figured out that it was a prototype iPhone four.

54:58Uh, yeah, it was in, if I remember correctly, it was in a dummy iPhone three GS case. Right. And the guy was able to take it off and realize like, oh my goodness, you're right. In the sense that this isn't as big of a deal today, but I think it still would be a pretty big deal today. If someone found like an iPhone fold in a German bar and sold it. Right. Right. Like an actual phone. Like we read rumors all the time and we did back then too. Like we knew it was getting a redesign. We heard rumblings of the retina display, but this leak was like, oh my goodness.

55:33Yeah. Cause it was the iPhone four. So, you know, the iPhone was just, even though it was what, four years into the iPhone, it was, you know, it was still this big phenomenon. Um, so yeah. Yeah. So scoop like this was a big, really big deal. Um, and it was such a big deal that Apple took some steps that were a little, if you think about it now, you'd be like, what the heck? They got the police involved and they, so what happened is essentially was the guy who

56:06found the phone, he says, uh, he got taken to court and he says he tried to find someone from Apple, uh, to take, take this phone to whoever lost it. He thought somebody at Apple owned it. He says he tried to contact Apple to find the owner of the phone and it, and it, and couldn't find, find an owner. He ended up selling it to Gizmodo. So Gizmodo could write about it. And the edit, the guy who wrote the article, Jason Chen for Gizmodo, I'm not sure what he

56:38does now, but he got his house. His apartment was raided by the police. Uh, so they, uh, because apparently Apple was claiming that Jason Chen had stolen property, uh, which, you know, I mean, he kind of did. Yeah. It depends on how you define it. So, yeah, I mean, I'm not, I'm not defending the rating of journalists houses, but you know, I can understand all sides of this. Apple was pissed. Apple was pissed. Steve jobs was pissed.

57:08Yeah. Um, so there was this whole behind the scenes drama between Gizmodo and Apple that happened. Gizmodo printed an article initially about it that I think the next day they printed like a tear down of the, of the phone. They did a bunch of other follow-up articles. Uh, and there was a lot of drama involved with Steve jobs. Eventually what happened was about a year and a half later, the editor in chief of Gizmodo ended up quitting.

57:39So the editor in chief of Gizmodo quit. He ended up eventually founding, uh, wire cutter, the review website that the New York times bought. He wrote an article kind of detailing the whole, his whole version of the saga that happened between Gizmodo and Apple. And he had a lot of regrets about how he handled it. And he even wrote an apology letter to Steve jobs. Steve jobs never replied back, but he wishes he could have got, he wished he had, he could

58:10have gone back and done things differently. According to sources who were in contact with Steve jobs, uh, told Brian lamb that Steve jobs basically was like, it's water under the bridge.