iPhone XS Max Review: Everything Apple Got Wrong and a Few Things it Got Right! By Gary Explains

iPhone 10s is completely uncompromised: okay, Thank You, Johnny, although I do enjoy the dulcet tones of my fellow countrymen, so Jonathan I've, I, think I'll. Take you from here hello there and welcome to this video. My name is Gary Sims, and this is Gary, explained Tuesday I almost do my review of the iPhone 10s max okay, before we get cracking I just want to say one quick thing, and that is that the last time I really use an iPhone for my kind of daily usage was way back with the iPhone 3GS. Since then, I've really been exclusively an Android kind of person, but in this video I do try to be as objective as I, possibly can about the iPhone 10s can the first thing we have to knowledge about the iPhone 10s and the 10s max is the screen. It really is a superb screen. We're not needed to talk about their edge to edge experience.

We're talking about the brightness, we're talking about the color reproduction, we're talking about the clarity. It is a superb screen now the thing we have to also recognize the fact that doesn't have a chin when you look at that kind of the not at the top. Well, that brings it up as far as they go to the top of the body, but then they bring it right down to the bottom of the body, giving you that full kind of body experience that full screen experience. That really is very, very nice. Another great thing about the new iPhone is the camera.

Now I don't have much to compare it with in previous generations, but in the testing that I've done, the pictures it has produced have been very, very good. Now there are a couple of things: I don't like about the camera, and I'll talk more about in the negative section in a moment, but as a general feature of the phone, the camera is top class and what we talked about top class course. We have to mention the a12 Bionic processor I mean this really is in a league of its own. The overall experience in terms of CPU and GPU is absolutely fantastic, and Apple should be congratulated on designing such an excellent processor, as they have done previously, with the a11 in the a-10 and so on. So the performance of the iPhone 10s and the 10x Mac's is absolutely top of the class couple of other more things to mention that Apple get really right on the iPhone 10s, and that is the wireless charging great to see that feature included and the gestures that, although they've taken away now the physical home button that we found in previous older iPhones.

Actually the navigation just using the gestures, actually works out really well, particularly like the ability to be able to swap between apps by scrolling, left and right on the gesture bar. It did take me a couple of minutes to get used to kind of returning to home by swiping up from the gesture bar there, but actually, once I got used to it different to how things is on an Android, but once I got used to it. It was actually great, and I find myself actually wanting to do that. Naturally, now, when using the device, so gestures, wireless charging a great plus now one thing that is: ok, not brilliant, but ok is the battery. We know this over a 3000 William hour battery, although Apple don't really officially talk about that and using it day to day, as I have been doing so, I've been getting around 6 hours of on-screen time.

There's some people reporting more like four or five hours of on-screen time. I've actually found six hours of on-screen time, but of course it depends on your usage depends on whether you how much you have the brightness up depends on whether you are playing 3d game depending on whether you are kind of you know, watching video, whatever your mix is that you're doing now in my mix, I was getting certainly full day, and I'm sure you will get full day battery usage, it isn't an issue, it's not spectacular and I. Think devices like the note 9 are better but active. This is an OK feature. It does the job and that's what we're looking for.

Well now that we've covered all the positive aspects of the iPhone 10s great display. Great camera great performance: there are some things that are really, really wrong about this device. First, you're paying eleven hundred dollars or more for the max version, and you don't even get a fast charging charger in the box. I mean we're paying. You know over a thousand dollars and something that probably only cost Apple I, don't know what $$1020 to manufacture they're, not including it in the box, and you're stuck on the slow charger.

That's just last penny-pinching that really is stupid and then the same again it doesn't have a headphone jack, and this is the device I've ever used without a headphone jack, it's just criminal doesn't have a headphone jack I mean the headphone jack is a universal connection on all manner of equipment that you want to get audio out. You use a 3.5, millimeter, headphone jack doesn't have one I know it's not the first time it doesn't have one in the iPhone series, but at least before they included the dongle okay, that little little of cable. You could plug it in it. Would they don't even include that now you have to go and buy that as an extra thing? This absolutely blows my mind, we're talking about a device that is $1,100 upwards, and they can't even include a tiny little drama. It reminds me of buying you know when the first Motorola G device came out.

That was really budget low-end. They didn't include a battery charger in the box because they wanted to save money and now Apple at the other end post $1,000, and they can't even include a $9 dongle in the Box, that's just criminal and while we're talking about charging holes, we talked about the Lightning port. Everything else, I use, USB type-c I've got a Chromebook the charges on USB type-c, my latest Android phones all charged on USB type-c. There are headphones that charge on USB type-c and the list just goes on and on and on, but Apple have to stick with their lightning port, which is just ridiculous, because the only device in the world that uses it. Why can't they just be standard like everybody's, like if I went to someone's, you know house, and they can? I plug in, but you know the into the wall socket.

You know our wall socket is different. Here you have to have a unique adapter. Why can't you just use it like everybody else? What's the problem Apple and although earlier on I mentioned that the camera is excellent in is the fact that there's a camera bump is just ridiculous. I can't remember the last time I used with a phone with a camera bump I actually check all other phones that are in our house that my wife uses, and my children used, and none of them are camera bumps and I can't believe that this 11th $100 device has a camera bump and what I've been kind of writing about this, and I've kind of been testing the device I've also had it on my desk in front of me and if something's happen in the kind of I want to check the phone as I'm tapping a little keep all the phone thing, but it's just wobbling there on the table because of this stupid camera bump Apple pride themselves in design, at least if the camera was in the middle and I suppose, then it might not rock for it's over a one side. So, as your literally it's just tipping like that, I don't understand.

Please someone help me understand now. Another thing, I, don't understand, is face. I'd I understand the technology. In fact, I'm going to make a video about how face ID works as a technology, because I think it's fascinating. So, from a technical point of view, yeah great, but from a practical point of view, it's absolutely criminal.

Let me give you two big problems that I've encountered when using face ID over these last days, Nothing about speed of recognition. We're not talking about you know accuracy. What we're talking about is the fact that whenever I look down at my phone, because there are notifications, come suddenly, the notification expands, and it can be read the first few lines of emails and the first few lines of the note page can be read by anybody around me. Non-Android. If I want to do that, I have to act, there know's notification and I go in, and I can see it as a conscious act and if I don't want to look at that moment, that's fine, but the phone kind of buzzes or make beat forever I look down and suddenly all the notifications are shown for whole world to see.

Now you might not find that a problem because you say well I'm not hiding anything, but if I was a businessman, I've got contracts flying back and forth, and I've got money numbers, but going back and forth, and actually my notifications just basically just started getting shown without me, really making any kind of conscious decision other than just looking out the phone, because it made a noise. No I'm. Sorry, that's just wrong. The other thing about face. Ids are that actually several times one of my children wanted to play with the iPhone cause, it's locked with face ID.

So all they did was just surreptitiously took the phone they'd say: hey Dad I turned they had the phone up to my face, and they unlocked it and off. They went now. Obviously we're talking about children here, but if I was with a group of people, let's say in a public place and my phone was down on the table, it wouldn't take very much for someone just to serve just lift it up tilt it towards my face it unlocked, and now they have full access to my phone while I was maybe occupied with something else, wasn't quite seeing what was going on I, don't need to interact number four with a fingerprint or a pin code. If you want to get into the phones, you have to force me to kind of tap in the pinko it'll force me to put my finger and of course that can happen. You know that does happen, but there's in violence there, a level of physical interaction with face unlock you just kind of circus, usually put it in front of someone's face.

That's it the phone down lock. That is not a good system of security. I'm! Sorry, just isn't now what we talk about things that I don't find very intuitive on iOS tiny little thing is just a little nag, but I'm I have multiple Wi-Fi networks. Here in my house, and often when I'm out and about there are multiple Wi-Fi networks around, and sometimes I want to be connected to one something. I want to be connected to a different one, and I can't find a quick way of seeing which Wi-Fi network I'm connected to on iOS when I pull down that control center thing, it doesn't show me which Wi-Fi network I'm connected to now.

On my note, my Galaxy Note I can tell which network I'm connected to very quickly by looking at the shade that you pull down the notification shortcut thing there and it, and it just works now on iOS I had to go into settings, and then I had. This is one of the basic things. What network am I connected to, and these know quickly and talking about settings. The other thing is: is settings is an app which you have to actually find on your home screen now I can imagine on my note, I've got like four or five screens worth of apps that I've installed over time, and you know you're kind of scrolling around where's the setting button. Well, of course, on Android you just go up, and it's always available via the pull down menu up there on iOS.

It has to be the app as far as I can see, and that means you'll go look for it and that's really not very intuitive settings in other places. I go to all the time now. I know Apple have got the control center because they think those are the things that you need to set very quickly, but actually now I want to be able to go into the settings quickly, and it's a real pain. Now I noticed few other things that Android people complain about. These really aren't issues for me, but they are worth mentioning if you are used to what you can do with Android.

There's no split-screen multitasking on iOS there's no way of clearing all the recent apps. If you want to get rid of everything, that's running from memory, there's no way of doing other than swiping them all out individually and, of course, there's a terrible lack of customization with Android. You really can customize so much, and you just can't do that with iOS you're kind of fixed, with what Apple give you take it or leave it pay your thousand dollars or not. That's what you've got, and I think for that kind. Money I'd like to be able to tweak just a few more things they do like the portrait mode.

That's inside the camera, I would actually say it's a positive feature. However, it's not perfect, and so, if you do bump up that background, blurriness too much you know, bits of ears will start getting cut off. Bits of glasses will get cut off if you're taking a picture which has got glass in it. For example, if you just take a picture of a glass, maybe with some water in it, then we bump up that blurring. It's just going to get all mangled up, so I think it's a good feature and I think Apple is on the right path.

I'd like to see this more and more, but actually it's not there yet, and sometimes if you can make some bad mistakes, and I'm actually gonna. Do a separate video about testing the portrait mode against a full-frame camera and see which one comes out best in the different situations, and we can see the strengths and the weaknesses of this portrait mode. I'll do that video, maybe in the next week or so I want more thing. I don't like about the camera. Is there are no manual settings and there are no options to save RAW files.

Now I know there are probably third-party apps that do this. I didn't actually look for them, but when I come from a device, let's say like the Galaxy Note range from Samsung, this kind of features come in the default, app I don't have to go and look for another app to do these things they're there in the app I can ignore them. If I want to I, don't have to enable them. I don't have to use them, but they are available to me so again when you're buying a high-end device that cost $1000 upwards I would like some of this functionality to be there in the default app not to be something. I have to go, look for and install a different app and try it out and test different ones who aren't there in the default like I, do have on the note line now, there are two things: I haven't touched on, and I've left them here to the end, one is the charge gate thing and the other is antenna gate.

So this deal with these separately so charge gate. Is this problem that, as I've shown on Twitter, and I've posted it also on YouTube that you can plug in the cable while the phone is sleeping, it won't start charging. Now it looks like it's a software issue. It looks like it will be fixed in the next iteration of iOS and that's fine software bugs exist. I understand that I was a software engineer for ten years.

I fully understand it, however. However, a simple thing like plugging in the charging cable should be part of any kind of quality assurance testing that happens at any company. Okay, if there was some obscure bug that when I use a different mode in the camera and the camera was upside down, and I was in the Southern Hemisphere, and it was in daylight saving, and it was night, you know, and then something strange happen. I understand that, but plugging in a cable is the most basic thing that you can do on a smartphone besides turning it on and off, and there really is no excuse for a product, this level of pricing to have bugs as simple as that and the other thing is this antenna gate. There is some discussion going on about how well the antennas work inside the photo of the iPhone 10s and the 10s Macs, and how well it can pick up.

LTE signals 4G signal how well it can pick up Wi-Fi signal. Well, I did two sets of testing. First, on LTE on 4G I was actually getting better speeds on the iPhone 10s than I was on my Galaxy Note. I took the same SIM card standing in the same place plugged into the other device, and it was faster on the new Apple. So I don't see any problems with the LTE.

However, the Wi-Fi is a completely different story. First, I started to test out the speed of the Wi-Fi I. Did it by kicking to my local Wi-Fi and then running a speed test to see the kind of upload and download speed I can get and, of course they have their own problems, so you have to run them multiple times, maybe run them on multiple different days, but consistently I was getting low speeds on the new iPhone. So I decide to do my own internal testing. Now I have here in my house my own file server, it's connected by a Gigabit Ethernet to the backbone of my network, and then I connected the iPhone to that Network and copied files to and from my server it's a controlled environment.

Okay and I did exactly the same thing using my Galaxy Note and what I found actually is that the iPhone was half the speed of the Galaxy Note 4 Wi-Fi signals okay. So when I copied over the file on the note, it took just 55 seconds for a file just to be over half a gigabyte in size using exactly the same setup using exactly the same control conditions. I repeated this multiple times using multiple apps on the iPhone. Actually, it took 55 seconds on the note it took 2 minutes and 20 seconds on the iPhone, ok and that's a difference between a kind of megabytes per second transfer speed of around 9 o 10 megabytes. A second write down: 2 3 4 megabytes a second.

So it's it there's a rapid decrease in speed here now it could be for a bunch of different reasons, but I got onto this because I was looking at the antenna. Gate thing and I think that the Wi-Fi strength, the Wi-Fi throughput on the new iPhone is, is terrible, not very good at all. Ok, so here are my conclusions for you. If you are an existing Apple, iPhone, 10 user, don't upgrade to the 10 s, it's not necessary. If you have an older iPhone- and you want to upgrade then going to the 10s and the 10s max- is a good upgrade path.

If you want to stick with Apple, however, I would suggest that you also look at the 10 R, because that does have a much lower price point, but still include many of the good features, including, for example, the a12 Bionic, if you're an Android user using high-end Android devices, like the note like the s9 plus, then don't even think about switching because really from my experience, it's painful, and there are so many things that are intuitive on Android- that I just don't find them the same thing there on iOS, ok, so my name is Gary Sims, and this is Gary explains. I really do hope you enjoyed this video I've tried to be as objective as I can pointing out the strengths and the weaknesses of this new iPhone. If you did enjoy the video, please do give it a thumbs up, also, please consider subscribing and how about hitting that notification, Bell icon, so that you get notified every time. I drop a new video. Okay! That's about it, I'll see you the next one.

Source : Gary Explains