Apple iPhone 13 is Exciting for This One Reason
Apple effectively answers the question: Why do I need a new iPhone?
Apple didn’t reinvent the wheel or the iPhone. From a distance, you’d be hard-pressed to tell the difference between an iPhone 12 lineup and the iPhone 13 devices Apple unveiled on Tuesday.
They share the same sharp-edged design as the 12. The camera arrays are still surrounded by that box and could resemble a stovetop. The only visible difference is the iPhone 13 cameras are now offset diagonally to each other. Apple didn’t even trade-in the lightning port for USB-C (which it’s already using on its iPad Pros, iPad Airs, and the spiffy, new iPad mini).
And yet, I still think there’s at least one good reason to be excited about the new iPhone 13.
Of course, to understand why you’ll care about and probably want to upgrade to one of the new 5G-capable iPhone 13 models (you have a choice of the 6.1-inch iPhone 13 [$799], 5.4-inch 13 mini [$699]— it lives! — and the 6.1-inch iPhone 13 Pro [$999]or 6.7-inch Pro Max [$1099] — up to 1 TB!) you need to understand the brains of this operation, the new A15 Bionic.
With 15 billion transistors (up from 11.8 billion), the 5-nanometer A15 Bionic appears to push the boundaries of what’s possible on a mobile CPU. Apple’s claiming that it’s twice as fast as “the competition,” by which I assume it means Qualcomm Snapdragon 888+ (though I won’t know for sure until I Geekbench it). Instead of 11 trillion operations per second, the A15 boasts nearly 16 trillion. However, what might be most exciting is the new, faster Neural Engine.
This AI and Machine Learning bit of silicon is where the magic comes in and it’s what powers the iPhone 13 line’s most exciting update: Cinematic Mode, which is video with a depth of field — though it’s more than that.
