10 ways iPhones are just better
Linus Tech Tips
·Linus Tech Tips
·2019-05-06
·
2,379 words · ~11 min read
0:00
recently we released a video detailing my thoughts on the new iphone 10s and
0:04
10s max and apple's position as an innovator in general and maybe it's a
0:08
video i shouldn't have done because i allowed myself to get emotional rather
0:12
than giving equal airtime to positive aspects of the iphone experience that
0:17
might not mean as much to me but clearly mean a lot to our community
0:22
so with the goal in mind of creating a
0:25
second video now to balance out our first we turned to you and asked
0:31
what were the main reasons that you bought your iphone why do you love it
0:36
and we compiled this list of 10 legitimate ways that iphones still beat
0:41
the competition even if i still personally feel that their latest
0:46
refresh is incremental expensive and
0:49
boring thanks to lastpass for sponsoring this video their password manager now
0:53
supports face id on the latest iphones learn more at the end of the video
1:05
reason number one is security and privacy and this has become one of
1:09
apple's biggest talking points recently and for good reason their long history
1:14
as a company might not be perfect but they've taken some very bold steps
1:20
in the interest of protecting their customers even refusing to comply with
1:24
fbi requests to unlock their customers phones while Android is closing the gap
1:30
here in general iphones are more secure than Android devices where iphones
1:35
deliver consistent hardware-based security like the secure enclave and the
1:40
now infamous usb restricted mode on
1:43
Android hardware based security varies
1:46
wildly between manufacturers with some handsets even having been accused of
1:51
phoning home and providing user information to third parties
1:56
as for the software well base Android is
1:59
open source which theoretically would give a security advantage over apple
2:04
because anyone could go in and examine the code for vulnerabilities
2:08
in practice though the Android that ships on almost any device
2:14
that you can actually buy has been modified by the manufacturer and those
2:18
changes are typically not open source
2:22
furthermore the google play store tends to have more malicious apps on it due to
2:26
looser submission criteria and even if it didn't Android allows users to
2:32
install apps outside of the play store an attack vector that simply doesn't
2:37
exist for iphone users and one that is actually currently in the process of
2:41
becoming normalized by companies like epic games so they won't have to pay
2:45
google a cut of their in-game purchase revenue reason number two is
2:49
optimization the smartphone market has matured to the point where chinese
2:53
brands that you've never heard of are making phones that legitimately aren't
2:58
complete garbage yet apple's deep integration between the hardware and the
3:03
os continues to give them a lead in
3:06
speed stability and just
3:09
feeling smooth now Android fans will complain
3:13
apple cheaped out on the specs of their phone but the cold hard truth is that
3:19
just because apple's investment wasn't in
3:22
more dram chips to solder to their main boards doesn't mean that they
3:26
necessarily cheaped out software development costs real money
3:32
and it's not an accident that they get more out of 4 gigs of RAM than others
3:36
are getting with 10 and one more thing their cpus are at times as much as a
3:41
full generation ahead of the competition apple presses this advantage by offering
3:46
reason number three industry leading device support apple's
3:51
phones and tablets get updates both for features and security more quickly more
3:56
consistently and for longer than just
4:00
about any other mobile device on the market and contrary to the general
4:05
perception that exists that apple acts with planned obsolescence in mind
4:10
forcing users to upgrade by slowing down their old devices
4:14
the last few updates have actually had a lot of users reporting that their old
4:18
phone feels snappier after the update
4:22
the fact that iphones are so well optimized and supported by apple for
4:26
years after release contributes then to number four longevity you can use your
4:31
iphone for four five maybe even six years if you stretch it
4:35
it was actually only recently that my ipad 2 finally stopped working with
4:40
enough apps that i actually care about that i had to retire it
4:44
and the thing about this is that even if you won't use your device for five years
4:49
i mean i suspect a lot of the people out there watching this channel swap their
4:54
phones a little more frequently than that you could which is part of what helps
4:59
customers justify the four digit price tags on these things
5:04
that and iphones hold their value better people are still selling iphone 6s for
5:10
200. how much would you get today for your
5:13
galaxy s5 here's a hint probably less than this broken iphone 6
5:19
and they both came out in 2014. now
5:23
yes apple did slow down phones with old batteries without telling anyone
5:28
but considering that the longevity of the hardware is one of their main
5:33
selling points i get why they didn't want to go around
5:36
shouting hey your old iphone's battery sucks and
5:40
so that's why we had to slow it down a bit from the mountaintops number five
5:45
new apps often launch first on iphone
5:49
and there are a lot of interesting reasons for this including device penetration in the us the propensity for
5:54
iphone users to spend money and just plain old developer preference
5:59
but at the end of the day none of those reasons
6:02
really matter because when i buy a phone it's ultimately about the experience i'm
6:07
going to have and Android users often
6:10
have to wait longer whether it's for the companion
6:14
app for that kickstarter you backed a hot new social network like tbh which
6:19
managed to get big enough to be acquired and then eventually shut down by
6:23
facebook before it ever hit Android or even a global phenomenon like fortnite
6:28
which only arrived on Android in august despite being available on iOS a full
6:33
four months earlier bringing us to at least one important app that is never
6:38
coming to Android imessage imessage is
6:42
objectively way better than sms there's group chats read receipts stickers and
6:48
it works over wi-fi so you can use it across your devices even without your
6:51
sim installed all great stuff and yes you could use whatsapp or facebook
6:56
messenger or wechat or just about any chat app that you want for that
7:00
animoji's notwithstanding but the fact is that imessage like facetime is a
7:05
default that everyone with an iphone has
7:08
and that gives it tremendous power i've actually heard Android users complain
7:13
about missing out on events with their friends because the invite only happens
7:17
to go out to the imessage group chat and as a techie
7:21
how difficult it is to convince iOS users to install third-party chat apps
7:26
might make my brain hurt a little bit but here again the reason imessage is
7:32
important doesn't matter it's all about the user experience and people prefer it
7:38
because why would you want to switch when it works so well with your other
7:43
apple devices you can reply to messages from your macbook and secure code
7:47
autofill super cool it'll just grab that two-factor sms from your phone and plop
7:53
it down directly in your browser because that's right number seven is the
7:57
ecosystem your photos messages and browsing history are synced between your
8:01
iphone and macbook you've got universal copy paste you can send files with
8:05
airdrop instead of trying to figure out if your friend's phone has nfc at all
8:09
and if it does where exactly the stupid antennas align and even i was blown away
8:14
by how legitimately pretty damn magical the pairing process
8:20
is for the airpods which are an accessory and accessories are reason
8:25
number eight that segue wasn't that bad right the thing about having a large
8:29
number of people out there using the same device is that there's money to be
8:34
made making everything from cases to
8:37
gimbals to even personal massager okay
8:40
not not all of the iphone accessories make a ton of sense but the point is
8:44
when it comes to accessories iphones do give you more choice number nine
8:50
is the hardware mute button believe it or not this is one of the few features
8:53
that has stuck around since the very first iphone and curiously hasn't been
9:00
copied on mass by other phone manufacturers oneplus who does include a
9:05
similar three position switch on their phones is actually kind of the odd one
9:09
out there with and the weird thing is that it's not even because they can't
9:12
find a place to put another button they just want it to like summon bixby or
9:15
whatever the especially funny thing here is that while most people assume that
9:21
apple has the mute switch uh patented or something we actually couldn't find any
9:25
evidence for that so hit us up in the comments if you know something that we
9:29
don't know here bringing us finally to number 10
9:32
setup now both iOS and Android through your apple id and your google account
9:37
respectively allow you to transfer your apps and photos from your old device to
9:41
your new one but when it comes to the smoothness of the experience only some
9:47
Android migrations manage to retain system settings and app icon placements
9:52
like when you go from a samsung to a samsung apple
9:56
does all this stuff by default and for enterprise zero touch deployments with
10:01
apple take the cake again apple's business manager helps companies
10:05
automate device deployment delegate administrative privileges and purchase
10:09
apps in bulk so that it's easy to manage user licenses now that last one might
10:14
not be a big deal for you the individual employee but
10:18
this is about reasons to own an iphone and so it could be a big reason that you
10:23
are stuck with an iphone for work even if you'd prefer something else so the
10:28
final component of this video then is just me wanting to set the record
10:32
straight once and for all i don't hate apple's devices
10:36
and i don't specifically hate the iphone
10:39
i have been frustrated with some of the decisions that they've made recently
10:42
notably the inclusion of a display notch and the removal of the headphone jack
10:47
particularly because the rest of the industry is such a bunch of mindless
10:50
copycats so whenever apple goes and does
10:53
something that i disagree with i can pretty much count on everyone else doing
10:57
the same thing within a product cycle or two i also wasn't excited for the iphone
11:03
10s and the 10s max in general and i guess that's where i really ran into
11:06
trouble i i think i let myself get too involved emotionally and while i do
11:11
stand behind the vast majority of what i said and i even left out some big
11:15
frustrations that i realized as i was sitting here about to shoot this video
11:19
including like of course face id doesn't work though
11:22
missed opportunity how is this not a fingerprint sensor touch id is awesome i
11:27
love to touch it people are like alanis you're such an apple hater i buy heaped
11:31
praise on touch id how does this not have an always on display this is the
11:36
good video right sorry this is the video but what's good missing the aesim
11:40
capabilities of the iphone 10s was one
11:43
glaring omission that i really feel bad about and so i just want people to
11:48
understand that my criticisms came from a place of love maybe not love for apple
11:53
in general or the iphone in particular but of tech i'm rooting for apple i want
11:58
to see them continue to do great things and i really hope that the iphone
12:03
xs 2 knocks my socks off and makes phones
12:07
exciting again because i think that's one thing that the fandroids out there
12:12
and the sheeple can agree on phones have gotten a bit boring lately
12:16
and we really need something to come in and shake up the market so thanks again
12:20
to lastpass for sponsoring this video i've been using lastpass for years now
12:25
lastpass is a password manager that relieves the troubles of remembering
12:29
your passwords and reduces anxiety about getting locked out of your accounts and
12:33
the hassle of waiting around for password reset emails you'll never need
12:37
to write down remember or reset a password again lastpass allows you to
12:42
keep track of them so that you can stay sane and secure and the best part is
12:47
that it's cross-platform it works on desktop it works on mobile sites it
12:52
works for apps and it works on iOS and Android whenever you open up an app or a
12:57
website lastpass will fill in your username and password making logging in
13:01
simple and this was such an amazingly
13:04
pleasant surprise i actually can't believe i didn't include it in my original review lastpass now supports
13:09
face id with the iphone 10 10r and 10s
13:12
as well as of course the 10s max so all you have to do to unlock your lastpass
13:17
vault is use your face instead of having to type your master password it's
13:21
freaking awesome and you can click the link below to learn more about lastpass
13:26
so thanks for watching guys if this video sucked well you know what to do
13:30
but if it was awesome get subscribed hit the like button or check out the link to
13:33
where to buy the stuff we featured in the video description also down there is
13:36
our merch store which has cool shirts oh this one's not in there but
13:41
they're like this one like designed by lloyd some of them um so those are down
13:45
there and our community forum which you should totally join