**A Conversation About Android and iOS**

I recently had the opportunity to use an Android phone to do something for someone, and I have to say, it was very confusing at first. I put it down to it being a different system from my usual Apple device, but after some research, I realized that this is not just a matter of unfamiliarity with a new platform. The opinions people have about their operating system are indeed very different, and Android in particular can be quite overwhelming.

In fact, I think there's something to the idea that Android is poorly conceptualized compared to iOS. While Apple has designed its platform as a cohesive and intuitive experience for users, Android represents more of chaos. It's like comparing apples and oranges - both have their strengths and weaknesses, but in different ways. With Android, you can literally do anything to make it run differently, which can be both a blessing and a curse. On the one hand, this flexibility is what makes Android so appealing to some users. On the other hand, it can also lead to fragmentation and inconsistencies that can be frustrating to deal with.

**My Experience with Android**

As someone who's used to iOS, I have to admit that using an Android device was a bit of an eye-opener. The more I looked into it, the more I realized how different it is from what I'm used to. But at the same time, I have to give credit where credit is due - Android has its own unique charm and appeal. It's like trying a new restaurant or a new hobby - you might not love it right away, but with some experimentation and exploration, you can discover new things about it.

**iPhone 16 Pro Max: My Excitement Builds**

And speaking of excitement, I'm also looking forward to reviewing the new iPhone 16 Pro Max. As someone who's been following the tech world for a while now, I'm always eager to get my hands on the latest and greatest devices from Apple. This year's model is expected to bring some exciting changes, including improved cameras and new features that will surely take our mobile photography game to the next level.

**My Photography Adventures**

While waiting for the iPhone 16 Pro Max to arrive, I've been thinking about my own photography adventures. Two years ago, I went to Dollywood in Tennessee with my camera, and it was an amazing experience. Last year, I took a walking trail and out in town, capturing some beautiful moments along the way. This year, I'm not sure what I'll be doing yet - maybe something entirely new? If you have any suggestions or ideas, please don't hesitate to share them with me.

**A Special Message from William**

Before we wrap up this episode, I want to remind everyone that September is National Childhood Cancer Awareness Month. This is a cause close to my heart, and I encourage all of you to support organizations like St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, which provide life-saving treatment and care to children with cancer. You can donate whatever you can afford, even just $5, to make a difference in the lives of these young patients.

**And Finally...**

That's it for this week's episode - I hope you enjoyed our conversation about Android and iOS, and that we inspired you to try something new. Don't forget to check out my YouTube show, "How Many Keys," where I chat with guests about all things tech. And if you want to hear me talk about Apple products in more detail, be sure to tune in next week when I'll be on Mac Power Users and The Omni Show. Thanks for listening, and we'll catch you all next time!

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enhello and welcome to the Apple Insider podcast I am your host Wesley Hillyard and I'm joined once again by William Gallagher and see I know how to do an intro I did it just fine this time let's move on I'd like to thank our sponsor Zach do and uh you know as you're listening we're just anxiously waiting for uh FedEx truck or whatever William has to pull up to the front door and deliver our goodies and yes that does mean William might have actually ordered some goodies as well we'll be discussing it in apple Insider plus this week what did we order and um maybe how do we recommend the products this time around if someone says hey what am I buying out of Apple's fancy new lineup what are we going to do but uh William what about you are you going to reveal your secrets what did you order oh let's hang on to some drama but actually just what you said right there this year more than ever I'm f it really hard when people ask me uh what to get and whether not to get things for some reason this year it feels like a really fine balance maybe when Apple intelligence is fully out it'll be much more obvious but right now I have more questions than I do answers yes but I did order something and unfortunately it's coming via DHL sorry DHL but I've had a bad time with I mean I have watched the truck drive by and then seen somehow they teleported one of those notes saying we missed you while you were there I watched it drive up and drive away and they still didn't do it yeah I'm not going to say I ran after it but you know I did so I have actually gotten in a car and drove through my neighborhood to catch a FedEx truck before so right did they it was worth it it was worth it because I'd got my package so there you go yeah but then did you have proof of ID and things or they just think strange man pursuing us give him what he likes take the back of the truck it's to be fair I did call dispatch and say tell your truck guy I am coming and they were like that is totally fine yeah oh but did the driver step on it to try to get away was it a car chase right chase him down and this Four mile per hour giant truck going okay like a Zamboni Chase or something okay I have I'm I'm embarrassed to admit this but it's true so why not I have just read 64 Night Rider scripts and and I promise you as I drive along the road I am suspicious of every car that comes near me and you don't even know what Night Rider is so I can Pretender it was a searing political drama just cuz it came up before I was born doesn't mean I don't know what Night Rider is right well uh the rest of this podcast is W on his own as I go sobbing anyway I yeah I'm might be seeing car chases where there aren't any let's be fair yes so so everyone knows uh I ordered the iPhone and Apple watch of course I didn't find any reason to get any airpods uh finding less and less reasons because um Apple doesn't offer an official USBC to headphone jack adapt adapter and uh there's still no word of whether the new pair with USBC works with standard third party uh connectors or if we're going to need a special apple one so um I report I record my podcast with airpods Max on my head um over that little uh $35 connector uh sure I I'm I'm good I don't need airpods Max but I did want to say pre-orders seemed to go pretty well um I clicked two buttons I was wrong it wasn't three buttons it was actually two buttons and I had an iPhone in hand um for delivery day I had already ordered my Apple watch the week before and um iOS and everything launched the other day I wanted to tell you uh I was updating all of our devices going through the house telling my neighbors hey go update your phone and um I go to my fiance's Apple watch and realize it was an Apple Watch SE from 2020 it could not update to watch 11 so what do I do I immediately go and order an Apple Watch series 10 excellent on like oh you're a keeper you are okay on like Tuesday right and it's still arriving um tomorrow or it's still arriving Friday day of release so uh but it was the smaller model and uh the standard silver or uh color aluminum so I I I'm not sure if that helps anything or what but I did find it funny that we just could get a delivery day um brand new Apple watch I actually offered to buy uh my wife Angela the the smaller of the new ones cuz she prefers the smaller ones but she says she's very happy with a series 7even she doesn't want a bigger screen so uh so save some cash that I let I let people say that until the the device can't update to the newest operating system that that has to be the cut off because come on I mean I understand that the features aren't that important especially on Apple watch but still I don't want you running last year's OS and then at this point you would start running into compatibility issues with certain apps or different notifications wouldn't come through like you're going to run into problems so might as well just go ahead and upgrade no you just you just don't want to be seen out with somebody with an old Apple watch that's what it is yeah imagine walking up the aisle and she's on watch OS 10 oh oh it's so okay yeah the checkout cler is going to judge me so hard when they see that it's the wrong operating system well I do notice actually just anecdotally it's stunning how many people around here in uh the Midlands of the UK have apple watches but the giant majority of them must be uh series 4 or earlier because you hardly ever see an always on face so I do notice these details yeah the jumping from a an SE to a series 10 is like jumping six Generations I'm I'm excited for um I did want to point out something I I I saw going around the Internet it's kind of odd um we're net negative watch faces this time around Apple took away three watch faces and added only two this generation oh I oh I didn't know that do you know which ones we've lost please don't say the Siri watch face the utility uh original not the like big one um gosh I might even be seeing the wrong um and there was a third one uh that we went missing whose name is escaping me um well clearly you're distraught at the L then if you can't remember the names but I I I just come on Apple third party something it just it's it's odd to me that someone made the comment I wish I'd save this but it was um you know clearly two Apple watch faces a year is pushing Apple thin their running out of money uh to develop these whatever shall we do cuz I agree where why why is it so rare I to get a new watch face I mean at least on iPhone you can just change your wallpaper um or now do so many other customization options but what's going on with these watch faces yeah remember some years there's absolutely no difference with the watch at all they just up the number so they got to have something to say and that's an easy I actually think designing watch faces incredibly hard and I can well imagine that if they just open the doors and let anybody do it there would be some really ugly faces on there absolutely it would be nice and there's some really ugly iPhone home screens now with the uh new configuration options that you can do but I mean to each their own everyone can have as ugly an iPhone as they want let us have ugly Apple watches Apple Don't Be Afraid um I we did see uh the pro Max sell out fairly quickly in almost every range that might also just be because it's harder to make or scarcity but um yeah the the the various models sold out Apple watch did see some uh models sell out I couldn't order uh the my preferred band I wanted to get like one of the new fancy bands and it pushed it out to Mid October so I switched back to a sport band because I wanted my watch on release day I actually hadn't realized until this year that you can't buy an Apple Watch without some band I mean I have I don't particularly collect them but I've got three or four that I like I'm happy to order it with a sport band because then I have a band to give away with my old watch so that at least that's that's an option and I realized mid checkout that because I wanted the new um link band that Apple's selling that's $400 uh it's not black anymore it's now slate and I I am very disappointed so I will not be buying that um Nomad makes an excellent titanium link bracelet that is perfectly black that I think I will be ordering at the next convenient moment but speaking of colors I actually I hadn't noticed that the watch was selling out I was watching the phones and I noticed how quickly I mean as ever the pr Max is the first one to go but the last of the pro Maxes to go was uh the natural titanium color so last year's big one it's like H whatever so p no um and I didn't notice all the other three colors seemed to go more or less at the same time but natural took the longest and I was so Keen to get natural last year it seem sad how tastes move on I'm I'm excited to see how different this new Apple watch is going to be larger display thinner case but also for me 20% lighter for anyone who bought aluminum 10% lighter 20% is a significant difference uh because I'm moving from stainless steel to Titanium this thing's going to basically not exist on my wrist I'm I'm really excited for this new Apple watch when Steven Steven robers was running uh this very podcast we would often talk about the materials on an Apple Watch because I just I could not cope with the fact that he had to buy stainless steel or and he couldn't ever buy the aluminium one exuse me aluminum one because he hammered that watch against doors and desks and all sorts of things and I haven't got a s single Pixel of a scratch on mine um so I go for the aluminum aluminium one um mostly on the count of why would I want anything else it's the cheapest it perfectly hard wearing enough yeah I don't know why but something about the higher end always catches my eye I just I want that uh different material I think it might be the glass uh the sapphire coating or cover because that gives you more impact protection and I I'm not like Stephen I'm not just casually jamming my wrist into doorways but I definitely um not can note the years that I've had aluminum watches I end up with Nicks and cuts in the display and the paint on the aluminum but this year my with no real difference in how I live my life my stainless steel Apple watch is basically in perfect condition there is not a single Nick anywhere on the surface or on the display so there's got to be something to it I had a an original series well as we call them series series zero watches as we say now and at one point I was away on holiday and I turned my wrist to read the time fine turned the wrist back and the whole display just fell off that is the only damage I've ever had I went from there they Apple replaced it with the series one eventually and I went from there to a four from a four to a seven so I've seen big GS but I've not had any other damage at all there's there's not much else to say about the Apple watches is there I mean I guess we might as well cover it here the uh sleep apne detection is going to be interesting I have a feeling I'm going to get some kind of um detection there I've never been diagnosed but come on my sinuses I know I know how I know life I know how I live this there's probably something there that's going to pop up and be like you should probably get checked out it's like yeah thanks guys I I knew that um I am wondering about when that will come to 150 plus countries cuz I know Apple now has the FD approval that they must have so wanted before the events that they could say it and then didn't quite manage it but I don't know I don't even know who approves these things in there's laws in other countries preventing Apple from just releasing medical grade Hardware to the public and just telling but I genuinely don't know which end of the UK government uh should be doing it or at the moment has the time to do it so perhaps the EU needs to write a bill to make sure Apple allows Android to detect sleep apnea as well on I I'm joking so the the Apple Watch series 10 bigger brighter display wider viewing angles um the ticking secondhand because of the uh renewed refresh rate for the always on display just a bunch of fun little things I I don't know what it is I've seen a lot of people saying this was kind of a boring release across iPhone Apple watch and everything I I don't I don't feel that I I think every year it's just a new range of commentators in the Apple space just gets more jaded and says everything is now boring but you compare this to any other year and honestly this is great if you want to look back at the smallest change ever in an Apple Watch look at the series 7 um was basically a non-existent upgrade year uh from the six to the seven I think they twe that's the one I bought okay I was suckered they tweaked the display size ever so slightly but I'm pretty sure almost nothing else changed unless um you're someone who minres and they you got that new uh detection correct but literally nothing else changed in the series 7 and I still bought it because I buy an Apple watch every year but um looking at this it's just like the display is bigger and brighter the case is thinner like this is close to a redesign as we're going to get in the next 5 years or so I mean at some point Apple's going to have to change the case and the bands in order to do something different but I'm really happy this year I think this is honestly a better upgrade than the series 9 I think Apple will stick with these bands for a long time because it's an incredibly clever band system I remember being so impressed right back at the start with one of those things if Apple does it and you think yeah that's how it should always have been done I'd like to bring up a point just because people are used to change like having to get a new iPhone case every year or um magnets shifting in the iPad Pro uh looking at the watch industry I mean we kind of figured those out a long time ago do we need to necessarily reinvent how bands work every few years especially that we've got such a clever design now uh I mean the clasp on a metal link band was invented I don't even know I'm not even going to pretend to know a long time ago and it's still works the same way uh does Apple need to reinvent how the bands are connected to its watch or did it just get it in one and it's just going to stick with that for perpetuity well the presumption was always that Apple would have to change it when the watch got bigger but the watch has got bigger and they didn't have to change it so no I'm I'm a fan I'm saying stick with it I I re the keynote and they said uh the Apple Watch series 10 display is bigger than the ultra and they overlaid the two if it is bigger it's by a pixel it's a hair bigger but it is still impressive that it's bigger it is but I got so confused by that because I quite faned the ultra because of the size so I thought oh this sounds good and I looked at the measurements and you look at the physical measurements that Apple publishes and the series 10 is smaller than the ultra so how is the screen bigger and I look at that I couldn't see a difference well either I'm just happy it's big so if I remember right the ultra is 49 mm case size versus the Apple being 46 now um the case size on the ultra is huge it has all that overlapping junk on the edges that's where that comes from and then the display is a different measurement um the display is within the case yeah the the bezels on the ultra yeah chunky yeah it's the display that's bigger and that's that's the most important part I honestly if it was all display that would make the most sense we're getting there it's ever so slightly shrinking over the edges every year so uh at some point it's going to eat into the digital Crown space and we're going to have to change that too but um okay I sorry I'd like the Digital Ground I read a patent uh actually several patents over the years where the rotating Crown was changed to um a capacitive thing or something and it just you know it didn't sound the same you know digital Crown is like the way watches used to be in the olden days so I'm a noal feedback with the watch can lie to you but yes yes I don't know why I think this and I'm sure if I were to buy a watch and it was like this I would be fine with it but you know um I like that it works so well straight away I think it's clever and it's nice so I'm I'm unconvincing myself as I speak please Rescue Me Okay so let's look at the uh we got reviews coming in from pre-release uh Apple products uh that went to uh different public Publishers or YouTube commenters I've watched um MKBHD and iustin and uh iPhone iPhone do do iPhone do like no it's tawon do see it's I do this every time it's iPhone do I think but uh anyway I know that one okay yeah there's he's he's excellent go give his videography is awesome um but yes so these are all pretty fun uh Austin man came out with his camera update so let's let's just go down the line a little bit airpods 4 everyone's impressed everyone who ever thought about getting airpods Pro for the noise cancellation but couldn't stand the rubber tips are now buying these in droves I'm sure we're going to see these stubby little guys everywhere um going forward uh not much to say there excellent it works it's not as good as airpods Pro obviously but the air noise cancellation and transpar transparency modes do work without ear tips I really really miss my airpods Pro uh because I have this fault on one of them that can't be fixed but I actually and and this is meant I have considered buying the new airpods so I've gone down the route of uh airpods 4 with noise cancellation versus airpods Pro 2 and I think Apple's very clever in how they space these apart by £50 or $50 so that it's not unreachable to get to the next one but it's still quite a chunk of change uh and then I had I highly recommend airpods Pro two right but I had an epiphany which saves me money can I show you that I found my original airpods from way back in the day and they're actually on my desk now and they're tiny and cute and they don't have any air noise canceling or anything like that but they're here and I know they worked when I stopped using them I'm guessing the batter's a bit rubbish but I'm going to charge this up and I might have some airpods back without spending any money that's funny I believe I have my original air ODS in my original Apple watch in a drawer in here but yes I have original watch somewhere yes I I I wouldn't rely on those no um airpods 4 are great definitely uh interesting I'm on the pro train so I'm waiting for airpods Pro 3 uh to to launch in inevitably sometime in 2025 with some new kind of features and a probably H3 chipset that still won't be in the airpods max but we discussed the Apple Watch series 10 the reviews are good people are liking it um I think as I said the uh various upgrades to the display and case shape and everything gave it enough of a refresh that people can see the difference and that's important uh when you're talking upgrades especially on a device that got no new features it's still running watch OS 11 it's still doing the same apps and same things it's just a slightly bigger display and a a lighter design a thinner design so maybe the look and feel of it has changed enough I'm excited to get my hands on that and check it out um I won't be doing that review but I will be doing the iPhone 15 uh 16 Pro Max this year really excited for that one there's there's reviews on the iPhone 16 Pro these are a little more mixed uh what do you before I say what I've seen what do you think about the reviews here on the 16 pro and pro Max what mixes the word for I don't think anybody says it's a bad phone uh I just think the worst you can say about it is it's the same as last year's phone until Apple intelligence comes out that is the the big missing spot um which I think is not unfair at all but you know there are things to like I don't Tetra come to it I agree that Apple intelligence was a big promise but Apple intelligence still doesn't really do enough to put so much weight on it like oh the phone's going to be so much better when you can ask Siri you know how much butter to put in a cake like I it's fine Apple intelligence is going to be fine and it's going to take a while to really wow people I think it'll be interesting but it's not all that's cracked up to be the actual devices themselves I think are quite impressive and their own way yes the external design didn't change that's what helped the Apple watch but for some reason if the I phone looks the same as last year's it will always get worse reviews just because it doesn't look any different um so take it that that said what did change well we didn't really get into it much last week we focused mostly on the capture or camera control I I'm still doing it we're we focused mostly on the camera control um and we discussed a little bit about what was different but primarily the camera system got a huge upgrade the sensor for the main camera is improved with the new Fusion sensor that is doing a different pipeline than before so it's going to have it's going to produce different photos than the iPhone 15 Pro Max the 48 megapixel ultrawide is going to allow for better macro and better overall uh video anytime you're doing spatial or anything like that even though it's still recording at 1080 the improved sensors and Pipeline on those should result in better images in video and on top of that uh you got a better image signal processor which should allow the uh 5x tetr prism lens to do better as well even though that one actually didn't physically change at all this year so camera system new almost all the way around except for the uh tetr prism but that one came to the pro and the pro Max this year so that's a big difference on top of that we got got the new charging speeds we did mention last week for mag safe and the USB port which is a quality of life difference battery life is the longest ever um 33 hours is nothing to sneeze at that is insane for a phone and finally if I a stronger front glass and the obviously the a18 pro processor did I miss anything the colors uh once again I focus on the on the the real technical differences between these I mean ultramarine versus tail we could talk for an hour couldn't we know I really like the colors I mean uh it's interesting to me that the regular iPhones get a much wider range of colors than the Pro Models ever do and okay I like the pro colors as well but yeah what's wrong with a bit of color in the of course also the the devices are bigger I forgot to mention that 4K 120 frames video recording and then the camera control so this is not just an you know there have been just like the Apple watch there have been iPhone years where it's here's the same iPhone as last year with a new processor and the image signal processor makes the photos better we might have tweaked a camera but that's it and that is not what we got this year so the people classifying this phone releases boring it it's just odd to me I I get that it's iterative iterative is totally totally valid that is a valid name I would give this year but it is definitely not what I would call boring I I don't I don't like that descriptor for this one this is the kind of thing though that makes me think um I'm glad I skipped the 14 and went from 13 to 15 uh should I skip 16 and go to 17 and so be more conscious of the bigger steps that I'm taking with it I think that's a reasonable particular if you have an iPhone 15 Pro and so you will be able to use apple intelligence then I I think there's a strong argument to hang on till next year for it but then isn't there always an argument to hang on next year yeah at some point you know you need to jump in I would definitely say that this is so there's different hats okay so if I am being a rational human being and talking to a person I'm going to say probably if you have a 14 pro or a 15 Pro you don't have to get the 16 Pro but um there are reasons to get it over those devices uh like if you have the money go for it if you're on the upgrade program go for it but um this isn't a oh my God you have to buy this device but I don't think that's ever really been the case um every iPhone has been iterative since the 10 and we're never going to get a 10 again uh not not as far as I understand it just we're reaching the point where these can only get so every even Austin man mentioned in his review we can talk about that a little bit of I he used to be more um he loved the sensationalist way that iPhones every two years would just get this leaps and bound upgrade and that just doesn't happen anymore and I would agree with that there was a few years where we had to get over a few different hurdles different camera limitations different device and display limitations the notch to the dynamic Island but we've kind of hit this equilibrium point where um updates need to are going to be for quality of life versus dramatic changes to the Paradigm and that's fine everything has to get to this point Apple isn't Reinventing what a desktop computer is every two years they just released a new iMac it's thinner but it's still an iMac it's still as imy as it was in 200000 whatever it's fine it's a display with a computer behind it how that looks and feels changed because of the technology but the concept has remained the same an iPhone is a slab of glass with a bunch of cameras attached to the back that's where we are this episode is brought to you by Zach do have you ever had to search for a new doctor oh you moved to a new town a new state or your doctor's moved and now well you're asking absolutely everyone for a recommendation friends neighbors Facebook strangers passing by and maybe you get some names hopefully you even get good 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appointments so stop putting off those doctor's appointments and go to Zach do.com slapple inssider to find and instantly book a toprated doctor today that's excuse me not Z zo do.com slapple Insider ZD do.com slapple inssider and thank you to zdoc for supporting the Apple Insider podcast so I hear you you're saying for drama leave the iPhone go to Android yeah oh yes of course the Android phones where there's definitely a revolution in um unique design choices like camera bars and 15 cameras on the back yeah that's definitely no I I I think we want to talk about Android what's interesting here is um it's you have to look at the source you have to look at who's talking but like the Android commentators will be the first to say how amazing a device is because they got the new z uh what is it Snapdragon processor um and nothing else would change about it or year-over-year the device is dramatically different they've just completely it's like they hired new designers and completely changed the the entire device so if you like the old product too bad the new one's completely different or if the new product is bad uh the old you know there's just no consistency whereas iPhone somehow has remained remarkably consistent but still worth buying because the upgrades make it worth buying so it's it's a difference in Philosophy for sure I just find it interesting how people cover these products they're graded on different curves where Apple can change five things about the the device improve the processor uh in a way that Intel could only dream of and make the cameras even better even though they're already being used for professional video and photo shoots those kinds of gains are unheard of anywhere in the rest of the industry and yet for Apple they're boring to be fair though Snapdragon is a much better name than a isn't it so there's that I'm a sucker for a good title but you know okay I just feel I don't use the iPhone cameras remotely enough I I just I don't even take the time to understand how the different things work I mean last week we talk you about this you were very reassuring that I use it the right way but I know I could be getting a lot more out of it than I do I just don't put the time into try and did you look at Austin man's uh review I saved it into insta paper to read this weekend so I'm aware of it I saw the headline uh think about the fastest way to take a photo that was nice but I haven't read the details yeah he skipped 15 for whatever reason I think there was actually like some clash with the schedule uh there wasn't really any other particular reason but uh he usually does every year he just didn't do this one apple just gives him a phone and he goes to some part of remote part of the planet to uh test the photo and video this this time he went to Kenya it was awesome he he has a YouTube video component to this uh pretty much tells you most of what's in the written review but you get more photos in the written review um of like actual examples uh like he set up a tripod and used his Apple watch to uh take photos of some lion cubs that were checking out the phone which was pretty cool but nice overall really really glowing um I I'm going to agree with a lot of what he says here because I it it it's like you're not going to rush out here to buy the new iPhone because of the camera control it's not a game changer it just it's useful it gets you to the camera faster it gives you options he did say that it's fiddly enough that when he's you know shaking around in a helicopter that his finger will accidentally slide along the thing and change the zoom level that kind of stuff but how many of us run into that in our day today life okay but well I did actually have helicopter flying lessons so I could you know I just couldn't afford to keep him up uh seriously but there you go uh so overall um really positive yeah um well I just wanted to say the takeaway go go look at his review go watch the video excellent review as always but the takeaways were 48 megapixel Ultra wide is going to be amazing for anyone especially those who take uh big landscape shots or macro um he prefers Ultra wide uh to main to the main camera because of the intimacy it provides in a lot of settings and some photographers do as well that it just makes all the difference the photo pipeline is huge he was really really positive on photo photographic Styles and how those have changed they're not just filters I know everyone likes that Meme of Apple reinvented filters no really they're not filters um but anyway the key takeaway from this was between the upgrades to the camera system uh the new camera photo Pipeline and photographic Styles upgrades this makes taking photos easier for people who are not professionals you can just pull out your phone point and shoot pick a photographic style and you have a professionall looking edited looking thing that normally would have taken uh understanding like professional grade work and Lightroom to achieve but you're getting it straight out of an iPhone sensor and that is impressive on its own and no one else is doing that right now do you know if it's non-destructive if I change my mind this is what's so cool so yeah we didn't get to talk about the iPhone cameras last week so we can dive in a little bit more um so the pipeline has changed enough that Apple has actually made photographic Styles uh reversible excellent right now if you do a photographic Style on your iPhone 15 it is a permanent application you cannot reverse it it becomes the photo but now with the iPhone 16 it's non-destructive it's part of the package AG so you can go in edit and remove the photographic style you can change to a different photographic style or you can change the um different settings that photographic Styles have so you can no you you I actually never relied on those because I was too um afraid of regret of shooting with one style and wanting it to be another way but now um like Austin man's example was just go in and duplicate the photo and choose the black and white photographic Style just to see the differences and like you can really kind of go crazy with this now um and so I'll explain do you know why this isn't just a filter well I think so I'm going to say I've just totally ignored filters for the same thing uh I figure whatever effect I want if I ever want effect I can do in Photoshop or Affinity or something like that I'd rather take the photo of the thing as it was and deal with it later so I kind of half tuned out of the photographic Styles thing until they showed that example of some sort of Field of Corn or barley or something and then they changed the style of it and it instead of just putting a a color over the whole thing it separately adjusted every shade that was in the shot so it was proper film style grading and suddenly I was wishing I was paying more attention uh so I take it as that it's like it's not just a blanket um piece of glass over some it feels I that's a good word for it it feels more like you're grading it professionally rather than just slapping an Instagram filter on it um so what's happening and it's always worked this way it's just now you can um kind of go back and undo it uh but right now it was permanent but what they what Apple's been doing with these photographic Styles is in the pipeline it's adding it in to the the camera pipeline so you you when you take a photo it does that some absurd number 10 billion calculations in the instant you click the shutter to combine multiple exposures and um choose the best one and uh rewrite all the pixels to the right location and ensure the sharpness levels and all that right all of that is happening when you click the shutter every time and um what this does is add photo your photographic style to that process so the end result is um under so basically while it's creating that jpeg while all that raw data is still available it is going through layer by layer and applying skin tone Sky background texture on top of the photographic style that you've provided it to ensure the most accurate representation as if you took the photo in that condition to create that those effects um it's very intelligent when it comes to skin tone so so everyone's skin tones will be preserved which is something filters really just can't do um it is very intelligent when it comes to object and people and just everything kind of recognition and it's not unilaterally dousing it in a color or light scheme or changing the Shadows it's just taking the photo with this information added in and what's fascinating about iPhone 16 Pro and I'm assuming this is part of jpeg XL which is that package of information that that photo contains is able to kind of deconstruct back to the point that the photographic style was applied remove it and then reconstruct the image given the leftover information without harming or degrading the photo in any way it is as if you took it again just now but without the photographic style that's what's really impressive about this this isn't quite the same thing but you put it back in my mind he was saying that um shelin low on and Gadget uh was writing a review of the uh 16 Pro I can't remember if it's a pro or the max but one of them and she was trying to do one of those things where you know you throw a cushion or something in the air and you take a shot of it in mid-flight and it was proving impossible she just couldn't get it to work she finally found out that the camera is so fast at taking the shot that as it's where you used to just kind of time pushing the button the moment the instant you press that button the shot is taken so she was having to physically relearn when to do something because the cameras are that quick and they're doing all of that calculation at the same time that's that's a lot faster than my old roll of 16 films cameras shots that I remember from a long before you were born again anyway yes so a good point very impressive and very quickly impressive will I use photographic Styles well I'm definitely going to play with it now if I ever get uh such an iPhone well I think it was uh nyia Patel from The Verge that said um he's been very unhappy with some of Apple's um highlight enhancements and sharpening so he went in and created a photographic style that's basically uh make the highlights minus 50 automatically just taking it to the most extreme setting and just making that his default shooting option and he is uh able to get a much more true to life um Shadow representation at least that was his words I I'm going to have to try it myself I don't think I'm going to go that dramatic I actually quite enjoy um Apple's default camera output but I will definitely be checking out photographic Styles if only as a way to shoot but maybe as a way to edit as well um this could be really cool it's never going to be as powerful as something like taking a raw photo into dark room and applying their intelligent filters cuz dark room also isn't just a filter system they're taking into account all of the raw data in your photo um photographic Styles is an in between if you use Pro raw you cannot use photographic Styles because of how Pro raw Works um and pro raw gets you more data and you can get a better image graded if you know what you're doing than with photographic Styles photographic Styles is a lossy format it is a JPEG format you're going to use it when you're just quick firing from the hip kind of stuff but if you really want control you're still going a default to Pro raw you can't do both at the same time either that's interesting though it's like apple isn't taking anything away it's giving you options once you know those options are there and what that's why that's why I agree with Austin man on this this iPhone in particular this camera system as powerful as is as amazing as it is for pros it's the best it's ever been for casual Shooters as well that's an amazingly difficult Bix to pull off isn't it and yet iPhone does it I'm I'm trying to remember I I read a quote that was ascribed to somebody from Apple so can't remember where the quote was can't remember who was claimed to say it don't know that they really did but the quote and also got remember the word so you know look at the quality of information you're getting here but the gist of the quote was that Apple's uh opinion about photography is that photographs are trying to capture what's going on now it's not trying to I think it was faithful reproduction of what's in front of you is the key aim of all of it which doesn't quite fit with then adding photographic Styles but having that option of getting it what it is not you know uh artificially replacing the moon or something is Apple's aim and I I kind of liked it there was a purity to the honoring of why cameras have been what they have been forever so I like that Apple has for all that it does I mean it's technology firm but the cameras this sounds like they really care about the history of photography and we know with watches that they really do cuz the whole reason we have complex ations is that's what they used to be called on watches in horology so there's yeah there's art in apple I think so good on them in general you're making me think I should get an iPhone 16 I may have also just revealed what happened there but no I I wish I had it in front of me but I I believe maybe it was The Verge but um there was a statement about Apple photography photog graphic Styles um artificial intelligence all of that stuff and it kind of it highlighted what I've been saying this whole time Apple's push for consistency and realism capturing what is in front of you what is a photograph is so important I believe this was in The Verge as well um but uh the idea is like go go read the iPhone review and go read the pixel 9 Pro review on the verge and um you can see where they've landed there were it was two different reviewers to be fair but um pixel9 Pro with its photog generative nonsense um made The Verge question what is a photo and then Apple comes out with their iPhone and they were able to answer it uh funny enough so nice that it's it's it's an interesting binary so you you look at their answer for what a photo is an iPhone because in in pixel9 Pro they were questioning what what is a photo like you because beginning to end this new P like what Google is doing Chang is the definition of a photo and then Apple comes out with their Pipeline and they're like no actually this this is what a photo is not that AI garbage and they kind of just landed on this idea that photography as it has existed as a medium for you know a very long time now gosh again I'm not going to try to remember history at the moment back like going up back to Deo types or something but um yeah photos have been around for a while we really like them they capture what's in front of us for memory for a moment for for historical purposes news whatever but that is what it is it captures what is in front of us and Apple has done an exceptional job producing a camera even with all of its algorithms even with all of its machine learning even AI it still preserves what is in front of us uh down to the detail the color and the texture of someone's sweater whereas Android's priorities have shifted away from reality to masking what is real to creating an ideal world that no longer exists so that when you go back and look at it it's no longer there sorry you know I've been rereading um 1984 so my brain just keeps going to um you know Ministry of Truth and changing changing the past to reflect what big brother said so that way it it's accurate with what actually happened and my goodness it is it doesn't it feel kind of like that like you know those balloons were in the sky when we were in the field do you not remember that look at this photo that I took that I altered with AI because that's actually what happened look how interesting I am now because I have balloons in my photo that weren't actually there please don't let us go down this line but yes you put in her mind of all the politicians at the moment that are saying I didn't say that and then I did say that no I didn't and uh also let us know on a happier note you're reading 1984 I'm reading Night Rider I think there's a there's a spread here of we should swap at some point I'm very concerned was such an excellent writer wasn't he yes yes it's a long time since I read that but I should go back to it it's it's always good to just revisit it because um I had I hadn't read it in many years um I I might read Animal Farm next just for fun that one's a little bit more silly but I enjoy it too um I don't think I've read that one but oh yeah that that one's fun you you might actually enjoy Animal Farm um it like I said it's it's it's takes on much less of a uh the grayscale background of dreariness but it's um once you realize what's happening it's like oh oh no this is um very dark just in a different way you do know the George orw World worked at the BBC and a lot of the things in 84 listen to me the hip kit 84 uh 1984 were shall we say um not uninspired by the hallowed Halles broadcasting house I'm sure I'm sure I I I yes no I believe it I hope maybe it isn't um as Drey as the it may have changed a little bit just a little um no um yeah the anyway yes the way he talked about speaking into some of those machines I can see the relation to the BBC now but in any case moving on from 1984 uh there was an Apple ad you know that there there we go we're back to Apple well done see how you did that yes 1984 won't be like 1984 yes remember it well so speaking of Mac you reviewed Mac OS Sequoia right yes I did and I found it really hard um because there are new bits in it and I like it and within about an hour I I mean I used the beater and I know you shouldn't use beaters too early but I was writing about it so I put the beater on one machine and I kept uh my MacBook Pro on last year's one and that meant I was constantly comparing the two and that constant comparing became actually slight constant annoyance because there's just enough difference in the new one that I mean every year the old one suddenly seems so old and ancient so I would go back and I I came within one pixel of uh upgrading uh both me machines to it and risking everything and now they're all out um officially I'm very tempted but I'm I'm hanging on for another week to see if there are any big problems but yeah I just I like SEO without really been able to pin down why I mean yes uh iPhone mirroring ridiculously useful I truly can't explain why but most days I will fire that up rather than get my iPhone are are you writing your journal on your Mac Now using iPhone mirroring do you know I never even thought of that once that's a very good point uh yes will be the answer okay truly I hadn't thought of that I I really wish that app would just launch literally anywhere else put it in my vision Pro I don't care just put it somewhere else I like it on my phone but um anyway iPad OS 18 I reviewed um this was interesting so you don't really have anything no no Revelations for Mac OS COA it's another Mac OS the iPhone is really cool I'm having permissions problems and I realized today that it might be because I'm on two different Mac os's so it's probably not Apple's fault but um the separate the related thing of uh do you want to Grant permission for a month um I'm finding that already annoying that's managed to come up a couple of times so the month goes by very quickly and like yes that's why I installed it kind of thing this isn't Vista is it but uh generally speaking um I just I like squer and I can't justify it but since it's free do you have to justify it no it's good it's there yes yeah this I always find it interesting when I finish a review and I don't have to put like price section it's like and uh go download it there you go yes for I actually I gave it a reasonably low rating because um more so than I think maybe with the phone because of writing tools and things Mac OS a is going to be different when Apple intelligence is here and without it it did feel a little bit Hollow there's almost nothing there uh the phone mirroring and Screen tiling I believe were the only exclusive features that's true yes uh there's also the uh the Mac wallpaper and screen saver I I know I talk about colors a lot uh but I do actually like uh the screen saver for it just quite absorbing uh seeing uh Susan car's yeah Susan K's icons blown up to giant size and the odd little text appearing where you don't expect it it's really well done and most of the time you know you kind of use your Mac for work but every now and again sitting there have a cup of tea and this comes in it's nice so not a reason to buy a Mac and upgrade but since you know it's there I feel I'm sounding more and more defensive here but I just like it so did you see my iPad review actually you know my insta paper pile it's growing I like Sunday afternoons I try to create like a magazine of of longer interesting articles just read with my feet up kind of thing and and you made it into the snack for this weekend I don't know what it is I don't do this on purpose but when I write these kinds of reviews they just kind of become 3,000 words without even thinking about it it's just I guess it's I'm passionate about it so I have a lot to say even though to note at the top there's two count two exclusive features to iPad OS 18 this year uh the smart script handwriting recognition oh yeah yes and they toolbar is well okay so I guess there's tool yeah the toolbar the it's the new top bar I believe they call it lowercase top bar sorry yes give it or t tab tab bar that's it um okay tab bar it's not even an uppercase name um but yes again a tab bar it gained a calculator with math notes which I counted as a unique um iPad feature because you can write the math notes unlike you can on other platforms so I gave that to them so that's technically three features calculator with math notes handwriting with smart script and the tab bar fine um good features all around good evolution of the operating system but um the title says it all uh Apple made iPad better for everyone but Pros now Pros are included in everyone so it's improved for me as well I enjoy the new t uh tab bar handwriting with smart script is really cool I can't wait for the day Apple Journal comes to iPad and I can do handwritten uh entries hint hint Apple Come On Let's Do It um I would love to do handwritten entries that'd be awesome and then have like a text transcript next to it ah come on let's go but then you then everything else is just iOS customizable control center dark icons on the home screen the if there's anything revelatory about this it's that all of the iOS 18 things came to the iPad at the same time so we didn't have to wait a year for customizable controls Center whereas these last few years we would have it took a year for us to get the home screen it took us a year to get the new lock screen but this year no we got everything alongside iPhone and I'll give them that that was a good that was a good update so it was less harsh four stars yeah true by the way the mac review is 3,000 words it just it takes that long to cover all of these things even when there's not a lot to say I really like iPad OS 18 in the same way I like iOS 18 I find the whole kind of look and feel of the iPad is nice I haven't done much of the app customization the way I have actually done on the iPhone uh for it so I'm not really aware of that but control center it's great um the you got to remind me cuz I keep the name wrong the top bar the tab bar The One You tab bar tab bar right uh in certain apps that's really good in others it's completely pointless but I like the concept of it I have a concept of a plan of how to use the top bar oh goodness yeah reference but I think the thing I wanted to note here the most is the pro stuff because um this was kind of a spiritual successor to my iPad 13-inch iPad Pro review they're they're well read in tandem actually if you haven't read that yet but um the iPad Pro review was written just before WWDC I did that on purpose to ensure it would not be spoiled by Apple's announcements because we were kind of hopeful that M4 would make impact it did not there was no new workflows for pros no new Pro apps no new Pro app updates um and if anything this entire beta cycle between 18 and 18.1 there's new bugs specifically for pros um there you go you see some right they're thinking of us they're thinking of us so I if you're connected to an external monitor stage man stage manager has fallen apart frankly I still use it every day um I fight through through it it's not cons it's not constant but it is definitely annoying when it happens but uh I can no longer swipe between stages reliably without stealing a window from my my monitor really so so if I have my drafts and my Safari open on my monitor on my um Studio display and I go to the iPad and swipe from slack to mass it on to Trello at some point if I keep swiping it's going to grab the Safari and drafts from my monitor and and treat it as an active window on the iPad and move that stage over that is very broken it should not behave that way the stages should be separate from the iPad and the monitor but they are no longer separate for some reason in the latest updates uh well there is an answer to that don't bother with Stage manager you can't on an iPad wait uh on an iPad when it's plugged into an external display I learned that from you yes uh this isn't why I don't plug my iPad into an external display but it it but it helps yeah the um if I have Safari open full screen or any size and I bring drafts in it dramatically changes my Safari layout and I have to readjust it every time then there's also that like and it seems to be specific to Safari I've tried this with other apps and it's less dramatic but for some reason bringing Windows into where Safari is Safari explodes um then there's also the cursor issue which has been a issue for a while I I can't pinpoint when it started but let's say I'm typing in drafts on my monitor and then I go to answer someone on slack I click in the cursor field start typing I'm still typing in drafts I click in slack I've done that by accident not realized which app I'm still in no it forces it you can see the animation it jumps it like and for some reason because it's selecting a different active window all of stage manager does this kind of like jiggle and like so you keep you can you can either do one of two things uh for me if I'm frustrated I will just keep clicking until it stays because I'm like you will listen to me okay or you can do the rational thing and uh what actually fixes it every time is you just click the icon of the app you want to type in on either the home screen or in the uh in the um bar so right that does sound the dock the dock yes that sounds less stressful but I will fight it sometimes and just be like no you will stay here I'm going to keep clicking until you stay where I want you to anyway uh just just out of frustration but that has been there for so long now it's just part of the operating system I I it's I I I I put it in the review of just kind of taking a jab of like these bugs between the windows switching and this cursor either I'm the only only one with this issue or it is intentional at this point because I do not understand how stage manager can be this broken through the entire beta cycle and it not be addressed at all hopefully it'll be fixed very soon but again this not it's not a deal breaker for me I'm still working from iPad every day but still it's just like come on I I have I shouldn't say this but I have the developer beas of course cuz I'm writing about it I think once in this cycle I filed a report over something I can't remember what it was uh did you pester them with Radars as I think they called them or just trust they would get it right radar is the is the old name now they're called feedbacks and I've submitted feedbacks um right it's that's really boring feedback instead of radar A8 instead of Snapdragon what's the matter with these uh USBC instead of lightning all the good names are gone usually when I file these things it's kind of pointless because they just get they're just missed because it's redundant there's already an existing whatever for this problem fine it's I cuz I know I'm not the only person on the planet with these issues so fine but it's just one of those things of okay but why is it like this in a shipping product and everyone's going to say well you use it during a beta it was like this pre beta through the beta and now in release I promise you it's just there I don't know why it's there but it is there are you in beta uh should you be updated yes that because that would explain a few things yes okay and one last thing before we close up um I updated my whole home to all the new operating systems immediately uh because I had everything on beta but the one thing you cannot run betas without an apple seed program which I've never been invited to um is the homepod especially the older hom pods so my office has the original homepods I can never run a beta on those without being in the apple seed program um I updated them to iOS 18 or uh well tvos 18 I guess audio OS whatever they yes I get really confused by that but it is TV o they just don't even call it that they call it homepod operating system which is really silly but anyway update it to version 18 and now my while I'm listening to music the left speaker makes a pop and then suddenly it's just my right speaker playing for about five minutes and then it just joins back and it's been doing I've had I haven't had the popping but I've had the suddenly only one works uh months ago now unfortunately I cleared out my office to fix a problem and I haven't put everything back in including the home pods but I was meaning to just try repairing doing all of them to see what would fix this really irritating this is happened before it's uh likely to do with the fact that it's still running an ancient chipset it's they're they're going to age out eventually I'm counting down the days it's going to break I'm going to have to go buy new homepods it's fine the fact that they haveed lasted this long they've I've got my money's worth I've literally used them every single day for years now at medium to high volume I have worn them out so I'm not going to be upset when I have to replace them I'm just going to keep using them until they stop working I've had this bug before it's going to get fixed so I'm not going to rip them out of the wall just yet but um it's just like another just another silly thing to have to deal with it just works apparently that's the thing it does I mean none of this is to really disparage Apple I let let let the Fanboy out for a second honestly speaking it's still nothing compared to what I've dealt with with Sonos before so let's just not even get started on that there's a reason why as weird and finicky as homepods can be I abandoned Sonos a few years ago now and looking at Sonos today I'm just like man I dodged a bullet there thank goodness wow cuz they're having a rough time over there yeah you've said and I I've just I've never even tried them so I don't know if I'm missing out in any way but it doesn't sound like I am so thank you very much that's good yeah is it's it goes back to our earlier discussion about like Android updates and you know iPhone boring Android amazing whatever reviewers do because of this uh I I like turning the reality Distortion field inside out it's no longer about making apple better it's about um grading apple on a curve so that's how I use reality Distortion field today is everyone's treating apple as if they need to be perfect anything less than perfect gets them a bad score whereas if Google shows up wearing clothes and their shoes are tied they get an A+ you know so it's it's just one of those kinds of situations um so the reality Distortion field I think is inverted because correct me if I'm wrong the original uh use of that was basically to say um Apple was always viewed as perfect because of they were apple and if if it was an apple branded object it would automatically be seen as perfect because anyway it was more specific than that it was Steve Jobs could convince you of anything and then you left the room and suddenly no hang on kind of thing so now I can poke holes into it but with him here I couldn't even see the holes yeah yes yes um but no that that's what's interesting here as awkward as things can get with some of these updates like stage manager being silly or uh like losing a cursor or what Windows switching being kind of broken or homepods dropping out randomly because of a software update it is still a walk in a park compared to what I have dealt with with other software with other companies and other devices that are supposed to just work so let me be clear as we're As We complain because we're passionate We complain because we want these things to work well but I have tried the other things and it would be a you get so used to disappointment that it stops being an issue good point yes I I think I said this sorry very briefly I know we're running out of time but I use an Android phone recently to do something for somebody and I just found it so confusing and I I put it down to it's just it's a different system but actually the more I've looked into it since it's just a crazy the opinions they have about their operating system is very different from Apple so of course it would be difficult for anyone who hasn't gotten used to Android to just use it but I agree with you from the other end of the spectrum of I think Android is just poorly thought out it's not well it's just it's good that you can configure it to me better because uh you can literally do anything to Android to make it run differently but um better or worse but I I do think there is something to that that Android is just poorly conceptualized compared to I iOS i iPhone is definitely the designers platform made by designers for designers um in that way uh Android represents a little bit more chaos so on that note I think uh that's a show we can close up here my goodness we've still only barely penetrated the uh event and what's happened in it but next time we talk we're going to have new goodies to talk about um might even will we because we don't know yet whether I vought anything well I will of course um I'm excited to I'm excited to write the review for the iPhone um 16 Pro max if anyone has any questions please send them my way you can email me um if it's something I haven't thought of great I'll include it in the review uh I'm really excited to try out the new camera systems I still haven't figured out what I want to do yet because this is the weekend I'm going to be able to do it um I need to conceptualize this weekend write it next week and have something uh of a completed platform by the week after so this is the weekend to do the stuff so I'm still trying to figure out what I'm going to do uh two years ago I went to Dollywood and did photos around the park uh that's a amusement park in Tennessee um last year I went on a walking trail and out in town uh just kind of stuff like that kind of a little bit more generalized I took pictures of a little iMac G3 robot toy which was cute uh still haven't figured out this year I'm thinking about it but if anyone has any uh great suggestions for what to discuss if you have any questions throw them my way but I feel like this is going to be a fun one this year camera controls are going be great I have one thing to say by the way uh sorry you're about to ask me where can people find me should they wish to and it's usually William ata.com but by absolute weird chance this coming Monday as we record this goes out I am a guest on both the Omni show and Mac power users I can only assume they were both let down at the last minute but I'm on both of those and I am not and as yet have never been on homekit Insider Monday's Apple Insider podcast I'm not taking it personally but you know wow I am jealous of Mac power users see I would never be invited there because like my Mac's on a bookshelf so they the only reason why they would invite me is to ridicule me uh I would I would gladly go on the show to be ridiculed though that would I was on it for an hour and a half and I talked about nothing except you and your Mac and what you do to it oh goodness of I I'm excited for that that'll be a good listen I that is already in my queue because I listen to macow users regularly so yeah but uh yes as William said you can find us via email that's at the top of any article we've written click our name you can shoot us an email question comment whatever um I am on Macedon William has his YouTube show what how many keys8 keys 58 keys can you not remember a number that's steeped in Apple history let's just leave it as a mystery like that yes no 58 Keys it was a joke the um calm down William but that being slow I'm sorry yes right no anyway that that's the show this week everyone uh want to thank our sponsors Zach talk again please reach out with any comments or uh let William know how much um you want him to buy some new airpods and uh we'll talk next week oh and I do this every time guys St Jude it is still September child C Cancer Awareness Month see I put it in the right order that time donate it's just it's just a good cause they over the guys over at re FM they do it every year just go uh give him a little bit of money even if if it's five bucks it helps but with that I'll say talk next weekhello and welcome to the Apple Insider podcast I am your host Wesley Hillyard and I'm joined once again by William Gallagher and see I know how to do an intro I did it just fine this time let's move on I'd like to thank our sponsor Zach do and uh you know as you're listening we're just anxiously waiting for uh FedEx truck or whatever William has to pull up to the front door and deliver our goodies and yes that does mean William might have actually ordered some goodies as well we'll be discussing it in apple Insider plus this week what did we order and um maybe how do we recommend the products this time around if someone says hey what am I buying out of Apple's fancy new lineup what are we going to do but uh William what about you are you going to reveal your secrets what did you order oh let's hang on to some drama but actually just what you said right there this year more than ever I'm f it really hard when people ask me uh what to get and whether not to get things for some reason this year it feels like a really fine balance maybe when Apple intelligence is fully out it'll be much more obvious but right now I have more questions than I do answers yes but I did order something and unfortunately it's coming via DHL sorry DHL but I've had a bad time with I mean I have watched the truck drive by and then seen somehow they teleported one of those notes saying we missed you while you were there I watched it drive up and drive away and they still didn't do it yeah I'm not going to say I ran after it but you know I did so I have actually gotten in a car and drove through my neighborhood to catch a FedEx truck before so right did they it was worth it it was worth it because I'd got my package so there you go yeah but then did you have proof of ID and things or they just think strange man pursuing us give him what he likes take the back of the truck it's to be fair I did call dispatch and say tell your truck guy I am coming and they were like that is totally fine yeah oh but did the driver step on it to try to get away was it a car chase right chase him down and this Four mile per hour giant truck going okay like a Zamboni Chase or something okay I have I'm I'm embarrassed to admit this but it's true so why not I have just read 64 Night Rider scripts and and I promise you as I drive along the road I am suspicious of every car that comes near me and you don't even know what Night Rider is so I can Pretender it was a searing political drama just cuz it came up before I was born doesn't mean I don't know what Night Rider is right well uh the rest of this podcast is W on his own as I go sobbing anyway I yeah I'm might be seeing car chases where there aren't any let's be fair yes so so everyone knows uh I ordered the iPhone and Apple watch of course I didn't find any reason to get any airpods uh finding less and less reasons because um Apple doesn't offer an official USBC to headphone jack adapt adapter and uh there's still no word of whether the new pair with USBC works with standard third party uh connectors or if we're going to need a special apple one so um I report I record my podcast with airpods Max on my head um over that little uh $35 connector uh sure I I'm I'm good I don't need airpods Max but I did want to say pre-orders seemed to go pretty well um I clicked two buttons I was wrong it wasn't three buttons it was actually two buttons and I had an iPhone in hand um for delivery day I had already ordered my Apple watch the week before and um iOS and everything launched the other day I wanted to tell you uh I was updating all of our devices going through the house telling my neighbors hey go update your phone and um I go to my fiance's Apple watch and realize it was an Apple Watch SE from 2020 it could not update to watch 11 so what do I do I immediately go and order an Apple Watch series 10 excellent on like oh you're a keeper you are okay on like Tuesday right and it's still arriving um tomorrow or it's still arriving Friday day of release so uh but it was the smaller model and uh the standard silver or uh color aluminum so I I I'm not sure if that helps anything or what but I did find it funny that we just could get a delivery day um brand new Apple watch I actually offered to buy uh my wife Angela the the smaller of the new ones cuz she prefers the smaller ones but she says she's very happy with a series 7even she doesn't want a bigger screen so uh so save some cash that I let I let people say that until the the device can't update to the newest operating system that that has to be the cut off because come on I mean I understand that the features aren't that important especially on Apple watch but still I don't want you running last year's OS and then at this point you would start running into compatibility issues with certain apps or different notifications wouldn't come through like you're going to run into problems so might as well just go ahead and upgrade no you just you just don't want to be seen out with somebody with an old Apple watch that's what it is yeah imagine walking up the aisle and she's on watch OS 10 oh oh it's so okay yeah the checkout cler is going to judge me so hard when they see that it's the wrong operating system well I do notice actually just anecdotally it's stunning how many people around here in uh the Midlands of the UK have apple watches but the giant majority of them must be uh series 4 or earlier because you hardly ever see an always on face so I do notice these details yeah the jumping from a an SE to a series 10 is like jumping six Generations I'm I'm excited for um I did want to point out something I I I saw going around the Internet it's kind of odd um we're net negative watch faces this time around Apple took away three watch faces and added only two this generation oh I oh I didn't know that do you know which ones we've lost please don't say the Siri watch face the utility uh original not the like big one um gosh I might even be seeing the wrong um and there was a third one uh that we went missing whose name is escaping me um well clearly you're distraught at the L then if you can't remember the names but I I I just come on Apple third party something it just it's it's odd to me that someone made the comment I wish I'd save this but it was um you know clearly two Apple watch faces a year is pushing Apple thin their running out of money uh to develop these whatever shall we do cuz I agree where why why is it so rare I to get a new watch face I mean at least on iPhone you can just change your wallpaper um or now do so many other customization options but what's going on with these watch faces yeah remember some years there's absolutely no difference with the watch at all they just up the number so they got to have something to say and that's an easy I actually think designing watch faces incredibly hard and I can well imagine that if they just open the doors and let anybody do it there would be some really ugly faces on there absolutely it would be nice and there's some really ugly iPhone home screens now with the uh new configuration options that you can do but I mean to each their own everyone can have as ugly an iPhone as they want let us have ugly Apple watches Apple Don't Be Afraid um I we did see uh the pro Max sell out fairly quickly in almost every range that might also just be because it's harder to make or scarcity but um yeah the the the various models sold out Apple watch did see some uh models sell out I couldn't order uh the my preferred band I wanted to get like one of the new fancy bands and it pushed it out to Mid October so I switched back to a sport band because I wanted my watch on release day I actually hadn't realized until this year that you can't buy an Apple Watch without some band I mean I have I don't particularly collect them but I've got three or four that I like I'm happy to order it with a sport band because then I have a band to give away with my old watch so that at least that's that's an option and I realized mid checkout that because I wanted the new um link band that Apple's selling that's $400 uh it's not black anymore it's now slate and I I am very disappointed so I will not be buying that um Nomad makes an excellent titanium link bracelet that is perfectly black that I think I will be ordering at the next convenient moment but speaking of colors I actually I hadn't noticed that the watch was selling out I was watching the phones and I noticed how quickly I mean as ever the pr Max is the first one to go but the last of the pro Maxes to go was uh the natural titanium color so last year's big one it's like H whatever so p no um and I didn't notice all the other three colors seemed to go more or less at the same time but natural took the longest and I was so Keen to get natural last year it seem sad how tastes move on I'm I'm excited to see how different this new Apple watch is going to be larger display thinner case but also for me 20% lighter for anyone who bought aluminum 10% lighter 20% is a significant difference uh because I'm moving from stainless steel to Titanium this thing's going to basically not exist on my wrist I'm I'm really excited for this new Apple watch when Steven Steven robers was running uh this very podcast we would often talk about the materials on an Apple Watch because I just I could not cope with the fact that he had to buy stainless steel or and he couldn't ever buy the aluminium one exuse me aluminum one because he hammered that watch against doors and desks and all sorts of things and I haven't got a s single Pixel of a scratch on mine um so I go for the aluminum aluminium one um mostly on the count of why would I want anything else it's the cheapest it perfectly hard wearing enough yeah I don't know why but something about the higher end always catches my eye I just I want that uh different material I think it might be the glass uh the sapphire coating or cover because that gives you more impact protection and I I'm not like Stephen I'm not just casually jamming my wrist into doorways but I definitely um not can note the years that I've had aluminum watches I end up with Nicks and cuts in the display and the paint on the aluminum but this year my with no real difference in how I live my life my stainless steel Apple watch is basically in perfect condition there is not a single Nick anywhere on the surface or on the display so there's got to be something to it I had a an original series well as we call them series series zero watches as we say now and at one point I was away on holiday and I turned my wrist to read the time fine turned the wrist back and the whole display just fell off that is the only damage I've ever had I went from there they Apple replaced it with the series one eventually and I went from there to a four from a four to a seven so I've seen big GS but I've not had any other damage at all there's there's not much else to say about the Apple watches is there I mean I guess we might as well cover it here the uh sleep apne detection is going to be interesting I have a feeling I'm going to get some kind of um detection there I've never been diagnosed but come on my sinuses I know I know how I know life I know how I live this there's probably something there that's going to pop up and be like you should probably get checked out it's like yeah thanks guys I I knew that um I am wondering about when that will come to 150 plus countries cuz I know Apple now has the FD approval that they must have so wanted before the events that they could say it and then didn't quite manage it but I don't know I don't even know who approves these things in there's laws in other countries preventing Apple from just releasing medical grade Hardware to the public and just telling but I genuinely don't know which end of the UK government uh should be doing it or at the moment has the time to do it so perhaps the EU needs to write a bill to make sure Apple allows Android to detect sleep apnea as well on I I'm joking so the the Apple Watch series 10 bigger brighter display wider viewing angles um the ticking secondhand because of the uh renewed refresh rate for the always on display just a bunch of fun little things I I don't know what it is I've seen a lot of people saying this was kind of a boring release across iPhone Apple watch and everything I I don't I don't feel that I I think every year it's just a new range of commentators in the Apple space just gets more jaded and says everything is now boring but you compare this to any other year and honestly this is great if you want to look back at the smallest change ever in an Apple Watch look at the series 7 um was basically a non-existent upgrade year uh from the six to the seven I think they twe that's the one I bought okay I was suckered they tweaked the display size ever so slightly but I'm pretty sure almost nothing else changed unless um you're someone who minres and they you got that new uh detection correct but literally nothing else changed in the series 7 and I still bought it because I buy an Apple watch every year but um looking at this it's just like the display is bigger and brighter the case is thinner like this is close to a redesign as we're going to get in the next 5 years or so I mean at some point Apple's going to have to change the case and the bands in order to do something different but I'm really happy this year I think this is honestly a better upgrade than the series 9 I think Apple will stick with these bands for a long time because it's an incredibly clever band system I remember being so impressed right back at the start with one of those things if Apple does it and you think yeah that's how it should always have been done I'd like to bring up a point just because people are used to change like having to get a new iPhone case every year or um magnets shifting in the iPad Pro uh looking at the watch industry I mean we kind of figured those out a long time ago do we need to necessarily reinvent how bands work every few years especially that we've got such a clever design now uh I mean the clasp on a metal link band was invented I don't even know I'm not even going to pretend to know a long time ago and it's still works the same way uh does Apple need to reinvent how the bands are connected to its watch or did it just get it in one and it's just going to stick with that for perpetuity well the presumption was always that Apple would have to change it when the watch got bigger but the watch has got bigger and they didn't have to change it so no I'm I'm a fan I'm saying stick with it I I re the keynote and they said uh the Apple Watch series 10 display is bigger than the ultra and they overlaid the two if it is bigger it's by a pixel it's a hair bigger but it is still impressive that it's bigger it is but I got so confused by that because I quite faned the ultra because of the size so I thought oh this sounds good and I looked at the measurements and you look at the physical measurements that Apple publishes and the series 10 is smaller than the ultra so how is the screen bigger and I look at that I couldn't see a difference well either I'm just happy it's big so if I remember right the ultra is 49 mm case size versus the Apple being 46 now um the case size on the ultra is huge it has all that overlapping junk on the edges that's where that comes from and then the display is a different measurement um the display is within the case yeah the the bezels on the ultra yeah chunky yeah it's the display that's bigger and that's that's the most important part I honestly if it was all display that would make the most sense we're getting there it's ever so slightly shrinking over the edges every year so uh at some point it's going to eat into the digital Crown space and we're going to have to change that too but um okay I sorry I'd like the Digital Ground I read a patent uh actually several patents over the years where the rotating Crown was changed to um a capacitive thing or something and it just you know it didn't sound the same you know digital Crown is like the way watches used to be in the olden days so I'm a noal feedback with the watch can lie to you but yes yes I don't know why I think this and I'm sure if I were to buy a watch and it was like this I would be fine with it but you know um I like that it works so well straight away I think it's clever and it's nice so I'm I'm unconvincing myself as I speak please Rescue Me Okay so let's look at the uh we got reviews coming in from pre-release uh Apple products uh that went to uh different public Publishers or YouTube commenters I've watched um MKBHD and iustin and uh iPhone iPhone do do iPhone do like no it's tawon do see it's I do this every time it's iPhone do I think but uh anyway I know that one okay yeah there's he's he's excellent go give his videography is awesome um but yes so these are all pretty fun uh Austin man came out with his camera update so let's let's just go down the line a little bit airpods 4 everyone's impressed everyone who ever thought about getting airpods Pro for the noise cancellation but couldn't stand the rubber tips are now buying these in droves I'm sure we're going to see these stubby little guys everywhere um going forward uh not much to say there excellent it works it's not as good as airpods Pro obviously but the air noise cancellation and transpar transparency modes do work without ear tips I really really miss my airpods Pro uh because I have this fault on one of them that can't be fixed but I actually and and this is meant I have considered buying the new airpods so I've gone down the route of uh airpods 4 with noise cancellation versus airpods Pro 2 and I think Apple's very clever in how they space these apart by £50 or $50 so that it's not unreachable to get to the next one but it's still quite a chunk of change uh and then I had I highly recommend airpods Pro two right but I had an epiphany which saves me money can I show you that I found my original airpods from way back in the day and they're actually on my desk now and they're tiny and cute and they don't have any air noise canceling or anything like that but they're here and I know they worked when I stopped using them I'm guessing the batter's a bit rubbish but I'm going to charge this up and I might have some airpods back without spending any money that's funny I believe I have my original air ODS in my original Apple watch in a drawer in here but yes I have original watch somewhere yes I I I wouldn't rely on those no um airpods 4 are great definitely uh interesting I'm on the pro train so I'm waiting for airpods Pro 3 uh to to launch in inevitably sometime in 2025 with some new kind of features and a probably H3 chipset that still won't be in the airpods max but we discussed the Apple Watch series 10 the reviews are good people are liking it um I think as I said the uh various upgrades to the display and case shape and everything gave it enough of a refresh that people can see the difference and that's important uh when you're talking upgrades especially on a device that got no new features it's still running watch OS 11 it's still doing the same apps and same things it's just a slightly bigger display and a a lighter design a thinner design so maybe the look and feel of it has changed enough I'm excited to get my hands on that and check it out um I won't be doing that review but I will be doing the iPhone 15 uh 16 Pro Max this year really excited for that one there's there's reviews on the iPhone 16 Pro these are a little more mixed uh what do you before I say what I've seen what do you think about the reviews here on the 16 pro and pro Max what mixes the word for I don't think anybody says it's a bad phone uh I just think the worst you can say about it is it's the same as last year's phone until Apple intelligence comes out that is the the big missing spot um which I think is not unfair at all but you know there are things to like I don't Tetra come to it I agree that Apple intelligence was a big promise but Apple intelligence still doesn't really do enough to put so much weight on it like oh the phone's going to be so much better when you can ask Siri you know how much butter to put in a cake like I it's fine Apple intelligence is going to be fine and it's going to take a while to really wow people I think it'll be interesting but it's not all that's cracked up to be the actual devices themselves I think are quite impressive and their own way yes the external design didn't change that's what helped the Apple watch but for some reason if the I phone looks the same as last year's it will always get worse reviews just because it doesn't look any different um so take it that that said what did change well we didn't really get into it much last week we focused mostly on the capture or camera control I I'm still doing it we're we focused mostly on the camera control um and we discussed a little bit about what was different but primarily the camera system got a huge upgrade the sensor for the main camera is improved with the new Fusion sensor that is doing a different pipeline than before so it's going to have it's going to produce different photos than the iPhone 15 Pro Max the 48 megapixel ultrawide is going to allow for better macro and better overall uh video anytime you're doing spatial or anything like that even though it's still recording at 1080 the improved sensors and Pipeline on those should result in better images in video and on top of that uh you got a better image signal processor which should allow the uh 5x tetr prism lens to do better as well even though that one actually didn't physically change at all this year so camera system new almost all the way around except for the uh tetr prism but that one came to the pro and the pro Max this year so that's a big difference on top of that we got got the new charging speeds we did mention last week for mag safe and the USB port which is a quality of life difference battery life is the longest ever um 33 hours is nothing to sneeze at that is insane for a phone and finally if I a stronger front glass and the obviously the a18 pro processor did I miss anything the colors uh once again I focus on the on the the real technical differences between these I mean ultramarine versus tail we could talk for an hour couldn't we know I really like the colors I mean uh it's interesting to me that the regular iPhones get a much wider range of colors than the Pro Models ever do and okay I like the pro colors as well but yeah what's wrong with a bit of color in the of course also the the devices are bigger I forgot to mention that 4K 120 frames video recording and then the camera control so this is not just an you know there have been just like the Apple watch there have been iPhone years where it's here's the same iPhone as last year with a new processor and the image signal processor makes the photos better we might have tweaked a camera but that's it and that is not what we got this year so the people classifying this phone releases boring it it's just odd to me I I get that it's iterative iterative is totally totally valid that is a valid name I would give this year but it is definitely not what I would call boring I I don't I don't like that descriptor for this one this is the kind of thing though that makes me think um I'm glad I skipped the 14 and went from 13 to 15 uh should I skip 16 and go to 17 and so be more conscious of the bigger steps that I'm taking with it I think that's a reasonable particular if you have an iPhone 15 Pro and so you will be able to use apple intelligence then I I think there's a strong argument to hang on till next year for it but then isn't there always an argument to hang on next year yeah at some point you know you need to jump in I would definitely say that this is so there's different hats okay so if I am being a rational human being and talking to a person I'm going to say probably if you have a 14 pro or a 15 Pro you don't have to get the 16 Pro but um there are reasons to get it over those devices uh like if you have the money go for it if you're on the upgrade program go for it but um this isn't a oh my God you have to buy this device but I don't think that's ever really been the case um every iPhone has been iterative since the 10 and we're never going to get a 10 again uh not not as far as I understand it just we're reaching the point where these can only get so every even Austin man mentioned in his review we can talk about that a little bit of I he used to be more um he loved the sensationalist way that iPhones every two years would just get this leaps and bound upgrade and that just doesn't happen anymore and I would agree with that there was a few years where we had to get over a few different hurdles different camera limitations different device and display limitations the notch to the dynamic Island but we've kind of hit this equilibrium point where um updates need to are going to be for quality of life versus dramatic changes to the Paradigm and that's fine everything has to get to this point Apple isn't Reinventing what a desktop computer is every two years they just released a new iMac it's thinner but it's still an iMac it's still as imy as it was in 200000 whatever it's fine it's a display with a computer behind it how that looks and feels changed because of the technology but the concept has remained the same an iPhone is a slab of glass with a bunch of cameras attached to the back that's where we are this episode is brought to you by Zach do have you ever had to search for a new doctor oh you moved to a new town a new state or your doctor's moved and now well you're asking absolutely everyone for a recommendation friends neighbors Facebook strangers passing by and maybe you get some names hopefully you even get good recommendations but then there's the issue of whether they take your insurance now being in the UK I had no idea that it 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book a toprated doctor today that's excuse me not Z zo do.com slapple Insider ZD do.com slapple inssider and thank you to zdoc for supporting the Apple Insider podcast so I hear you you're saying for drama leave the iPhone go to Android yeah oh yes of course the Android phones where there's definitely a revolution in um unique design choices like camera bars and 15 cameras on the back yeah that's definitely no I I I think we want to talk about Android what's interesting here is um it's you have to look at the source you have to look at who's talking but like the Android commentators will be the first to say how amazing a device is because they got the new z uh what is it Snapdragon processor um and nothing else would change about it or year-over-year the device is dramatically different they've just completely it's like they hired new designers and completely changed the the entire device so if you like the old product too bad the new one's completely different or if the new product is bad uh the old you know there's just no consistency whereas iPhone somehow has remained remarkably consistent but still worth buying because the upgrades make it worth buying so it's it's a difference in Philosophy for sure I just find it interesting how people cover these products they're graded on different curves where Apple can change five things about the the device improve the processor uh in a way that Intel could only dream of and make the cameras even better even though they're already being used for professional video and photo shoots those kinds of gains are unheard of anywhere in the rest of the industry and yet for Apple they're boring to be fair though Snapdragon is a much better name than a isn't it so there's that I'm a sucker for a good title but you know okay I just feel I don't use the iPhone cameras remotely enough I I just I don't even take the time to understand how the different things work I mean last week we talk you about this you were very reassuring that I use it the right way but I know I could be getting a lot more out of it than I do I just don't put the time into try and did you look at Austin man's uh review I saved it into insta paper to read this weekend so I'm aware of it I saw the headline uh think about the fastest way to take a photo that was nice but I haven't read the details yeah he skipped 15 for whatever reason I think there was actually like some clash with the schedule uh there wasn't really any other particular reason but uh he usually does every year he just didn't do this one apple just gives him a phone and he goes to some part of remote part of the planet to uh test the photo and video this this time he went to Kenya it was awesome he he has a YouTube video component to this uh pretty much tells you most of what's in the written review but you get more photos in the written review um of like actual examples uh like he set up a tripod and used his Apple watch to uh take photos of some lion cubs that were checking out the phone which was pretty cool but nice overall really really glowing um I I'm going to agree with a lot of what he says here because I it it it's like you're not going to rush out here to buy the new iPhone because of the camera control it's not a game changer it just it's useful it gets you to the camera faster it gives you options he did say that it's fiddly enough that when he's you know shaking around in a helicopter that his finger will accidentally slide along the thing and change the zoom level that kind of stuff but how many of us run into that in our day today life okay but well I did actually have helicopter flying lessons so I could you know I just couldn't afford to keep him up uh seriously but there you go uh so overall um really positive yeah um well I just wanted to say the takeaway go go look at his review go watch the video excellent review as always but the takeaways were 48 megapixel Ultra wide is going to be amazing for anyone especially those who take uh big landscape shots or macro um he prefers Ultra wide uh to main to the main camera because of the intimacy it provides in a lot of settings and some photographers do as well that it just makes all the difference the photo pipeline is huge he was really really positive on photo photographic Styles and how those have changed they're not just filters I know everyone likes that Meme of Apple reinvented filters no really they're not filters um but anyway the key takeaway from this was between the upgrades to the camera system uh the new camera photo Pipeline and photographic Styles upgrades this makes taking photos easier for people who are not professionals you can just pull out your phone point and shoot pick a photographic style and you have a professionall looking edited looking thing that normally would have taken uh understanding like professional grade work and Lightroom to achieve but you're getting it straight out of an iPhone sensor and that is impressive on its own and no one else is doing that right now do you know if it's non-destructive if I change my mind this is what's so cool so yeah we didn't get to talk about the iPhone cameras last week so we can dive in a little bit more um so the pipeline has changed enough that Apple has actually made photographic Styles uh reversible excellent right now if you do a photographic Style on your iPhone 15 it is a permanent application you cannot reverse it it becomes the photo but now with the iPhone 16 it's non-destructive it's part of the package AG so you can go in edit and remove the photographic style you can change to a different photographic style or you can change the um different settings that photographic Styles have so you can no you you I actually never relied on those because I was too um afraid of regret of shooting with one style and wanting it to be another way but now um like Austin man's example was just go in and duplicate the photo and choose the black and white photographic Style just to see the differences and like you can really kind of go crazy with this now um and so I'll explain do you know why this isn't just a filter well I think so I'm going to say I've just totally ignored filters for the same thing uh I figure whatever effect I want if I ever want effect I can do in Photoshop or Affinity or something like that I'd rather take the photo of the thing as it was and deal with it later so I kind of half tuned out of the photographic Styles thing until they showed that example of some sort of Field of Corn or barley or something and then they changed the style of it and it instead of just putting a a color over the whole thing it separately adjusted every shade that was in the shot so it was proper film style grading and suddenly I was wishing I was paying more attention uh so I take it as that it's like it's not just a blanket um piece of glass over some it feels I that's a good word for it it feels more like you're grading it professionally rather than just slapping an Instagram filter on it um so what's happening and it's always worked this way it's just now you can um kind of go back and undo it uh but right now it was permanent but what they what Apple's been doing with these photographic Styles is in the pipeline it's adding it in to the the camera pipeline so you you when you take a photo it does that some absurd number 10 billion calculations in the instant you click the shutter to combine multiple exposures and um choose the best one and uh rewrite all the pixels to the right location and ensure the sharpness levels and all that right all of that is happening when you click the shutter every time and um what this does is add photo your photographic style to that process so the end result is um under so basically while it's creating that jpeg while all that raw data is still available it is going through layer by layer and applying skin tone Sky background texture on top of the photographic style that you've provided it to ensure the most accurate representation as if you took the photo in that condition to create that those effects um it's very intelligent when it comes to skin tone so so everyone's skin tones will be preserved which is something filters really just can't do um it is very intelligent when it comes to object and people and just everything kind of recognition and it's not unilaterally dousing it in a color or light scheme or changing the Shadows it's just taking the photo with this information added in and what's fascinating about iPhone 16 Pro and I'm assuming this is part of jpeg XL which is that package of information that that photo contains is able to kind of deconstruct back to the point that the photographic style was applied remove it and then reconstruct the image given the leftover information without harming or degrading the photo in any way it is as if you took it again just now but without the photographic style that's what's really impressive about this this isn't quite the same thing but you put it back in my mind he was saying that um shelin low on and Gadget uh was writing a review of the uh 16 Pro I can't remember if it's a pro or the max but one of them and she was trying to do one of those things where you know you throw a cushion or something in the air and you take a shot of it in mid-flight and it was proving impossible she just couldn't get it to work she finally found out that the camera is so fast at taking the shot that as it's where you used to just kind of time pushing the button the moment the instant you press that button the shot is taken so she was having to physically relearn when to do something because the cameras are that quick and they're doing all of that calculation at the same time that's that's a lot faster than my old roll of 16 films cameras shots that I remember from a long before you were born again anyway yes so a good point very impressive and very quickly impressive will I use photographic Styles well I'm definitely going to play with it now if I ever get uh such an iPhone well I think it was uh nyia Patel from The Verge that said um he's been very unhappy with some of Apple's um highlight enhancements and sharpening so he went in and created a photographic style that's basically uh make the highlights minus 50 automatically just taking it to the most extreme setting and just making that his default shooting option and he is uh able to get a much more true to life um Shadow representation at least that was his words I I'm going to have to try it myself I don't think I'm going to go that dramatic I actually quite enjoy um Apple's default camera output but I will definitely be checking out photographic Styles if only as a way to shoot but maybe as a way to edit as well um this could be really cool it's never going to be as powerful as something like taking a raw photo into dark room and applying their intelligent filters cuz dark room also isn't just a filter system they're taking into account all of the raw data in your photo um photographic Styles is an in between if you use Pro raw you cannot use photographic Styles because of how Pro raw Works um and pro raw gets you more data and you can get a better image graded if you know what you're doing than with photographic Styles photographic Styles is a lossy format it is a JPEG format you're going to use it when you're just quick firing from the hip kind of stuff but if you really want control you're still going a default to Pro raw you can't do both at the same time either that's interesting though it's like apple isn't taking anything away it's giving you options once you know those options are there and what that's why that's why I agree with Austin man on this this iPhone in particular this camera system as powerful as is as amazing as it is for pros it's the best it's ever been for casual Shooters as well that's an amazingly difficult Bix to pull off isn't it and yet iPhone does it I'm I'm trying to remember I I read a quote that was ascribed to somebody from Apple so can't remember where the quote was can't remember who was claimed to say it don't know that they really did but the quote and also got remember the word so you know look at the quality of information you're getting here but the gist of the quote was that Apple's uh opinion about photography is that photographs are trying to capture what's going on now it's not trying to I think it was faithful reproduction of what's in front of you is the key aim of all of it which doesn't quite fit with then adding photographic Styles but having that option of getting it what it is not you know uh artificially replacing the moon or something is Apple's aim and I I kind of liked it there was a purity to the honoring of why cameras have been what they have been forever so I like that Apple has for all that it does I mean it's technology firm but the cameras this sounds like they really care about the history of photography and we know with watches that they really do cuz the whole reason we have complex ations is that's what they used to be called on watches in horology so there's yeah there's art in apple I think so good on them in general you're making me think I should get an iPhone 16 I may have also just revealed what happened there but no I I wish I had it in front of me but I I believe maybe it was The Verge but um there was a statement about Apple photography photog graphic Styles um artificial intelligence all of that stuff and it kind of it highlighted what I've been saying this whole time Apple's push for consistency and realism capturing what is in front of you what is a photograph is so important I believe this was in The Verge as well um but uh the idea is like go go read the iPhone review and go read the pixel 9 Pro review on the verge and um you can see where they've landed there were it was two different reviewers to be fair but um pixel9 Pro with its photog generative nonsense um made The Verge question what is a photo and then Apple comes out with their iPhone and they were able to answer it uh funny enough so nice that it's it's it's an interesting binary so you you look at their answer for what a photo is an iPhone because in in pixel9 Pro they were questioning what what is a photo like you because beginning to end this new P like what Google is doing Chang is the definition of a photo and then Apple comes out with their Pipeline and they're like no actually this this is what a photo is not that AI garbage and they kind of just landed on this idea that photography as it has existed as a medium for you know a very long time now gosh again I'm not going to try to remember history at the moment back like going up back to Deo types or something but um yeah photos have been around for a while we really like them they capture what's in front of us for memory for a moment for for historical purposes news whatever but that is what it is it captures what is in front of us and Apple has done an exceptional job producing a camera even with all of its algorithms even with all of its machine learning even AI it still preserves what is in front of us uh down to the detail the color and the texture of someone's sweater whereas Android's priorities have shifted away from reality to masking what is real to creating an ideal world that no longer exists so that when you go back and look at it it's no longer there sorry you know I've been rereading um 1984 so my brain just keeps going to um you know Ministry of Truth and changing changing the past to reflect what big brother said so that way it it's accurate with what actually happened and my goodness it is it doesn't it feel kind of like that like you know those balloons were in the sky when we were in the field do you not remember that look at this photo that I took that I altered with AI because that's actually what happened look how interesting I am now because I have balloons in my photo that weren't actually there please don't let us go down this line but yes you put in her mind of all the politicians at the moment that are saying I didn't say that and then I did say that no I didn't and uh also let us know on a happier note you're reading 1984 I'm reading Night Rider I think there's a there's a spread here of we should swap at some point I'm very concerned was such an excellent writer wasn't he yes yes it's a long time since I read that but I should go back to it it's it's always good to just revisit it because um I had I hadn't read it in many years um I I might read Animal Farm next just for fun that one's a little bit more silly but I enjoy it too um I don't think I've read that one but oh yeah that that one's fun you you might actually enjoy Animal Farm um it like I said it's it's it's takes on much less of a uh the grayscale background of dreariness but it's um once you realize what's happening it's like oh oh no this is um very dark just in a different way you do know the George orw World worked at the BBC and a lot of the things in 84 listen to me the hip kit 84 uh 1984 were shall we say um not uninspired by the hallowed Halles broadcasting house I'm sure I'm sure I I I yes no I believe it I hope maybe it isn't um as Drey as the it may have changed a little bit just a little um no um yeah the anyway yes the way he talked about speaking into some of those machines I can see the relation to the BBC now but in any case moving on from 1984 uh there was an Apple ad you know that there there we go we're back to Apple well done see how you did that yes 1984 won't be like 1984 yes remember it well so speaking of Mac you reviewed Mac OS Sequoia right yes I did and I found it really hard um because there are new bits in it and I like it and within about an hour I I mean I used the beater and I know you shouldn't use beaters too early but I was writing about it so I put the beater on one machine and I kept uh my MacBook Pro on last year's one and that meant I was constantly comparing the two and that constant comparing became actually slight constant annoyance because there's just enough difference in the new one that I mean every year the old one suddenly seems so old and ancient so I would go back and I I came within one pixel of uh upgrading uh both me machines to it and risking everything and now they're all out um officially I'm very tempted but I'm I'm hanging on for another week to see if there are any big problems but yeah I just I like SEO without really been able to pin down why I mean yes uh iPhone mirroring ridiculously useful I truly can't explain why but most days I will fire that up rather than get my iPhone are are you writing your journal on your Mac Now using iPhone mirroring do you know I never even thought of that once that's a very good point uh yes will be the answer okay truly I hadn't thought of that I I really wish that app would just launch literally anywhere else put it in my vision Pro I don't care just put it somewhere else I like it on my phone but um anyway iPad OS 18 I reviewed um this was interesting so you don't really have anything no no Revelations for Mac OS COA it's another Mac OS the iPhone is really cool I'm having permissions problems and I realized today that it might be because I'm on two different Mac os's so it's probably not Apple's fault but um the separate the related thing of uh do you want to Grant permission for a month um I'm finding that already annoying that's managed to come up a couple of times so the month goes by very quickly and like yes that's why I installed it kind of thing this isn't Vista is it but uh generally speaking um I just I like squer and I can't justify it but since it's free do you have to justify it no it's good it's there yes yeah this I always find it interesting when I finish a review and I don't have to put like price section it's like and uh go download it there you go yes for I actually I gave it a reasonably low rating because um more so than I think maybe with the phone because of writing tools and things Mac OS a is going to be different when Apple intelligence is here and without it it did feel a little bit Hollow there's almost nothing there uh the phone mirroring and Screen tiling I believe were the only exclusive features that's true yes uh there's also the uh the Mac wallpaper and screen saver I I know I talk about colors a lot uh but I do actually like uh the screen saver for it just quite absorbing uh seeing uh Susan car's yeah Susan K's icons blown up to giant size and the odd little text appearing where you don't expect it it's really well done and most of the time you know you kind of use your Mac for work but every now and again sitting there have a cup of tea and this comes in it's nice so not a reason to buy a Mac and upgrade but since you know it's there I feel I'm sounding more and more defensive here but I just like it so did you see my iPad review actually you know my insta paper pile it's growing I like Sunday afternoons I try to create like a magazine of of longer interesting articles just read with my feet up kind of thing and and you made it into the snack for this weekend I don't know what it is I don't do this on purpose but when I write these kinds of reviews they just kind of become 3,000 words without even thinking about it it's just I guess it's I'm passionate about it so I have a lot to say even though to note at the top there's two count two exclusive features to iPad OS 18 this year uh the smart script handwriting recognition oh yeah yes and they toolbar is well okay so I guess there's tool yeah the toolbar the it's the new top bar I believe they call it lowercase top bar sorry yes give it or t tab tab bar that's it um okay tab bar it's not even an uppercase name um but yes again a tab bar it gained a calculator with math notes which I counted as a unique um iPad feature because you can write the math notes unlike you can on other platforms so I gave that to them so that's technically three features calculator with math notes handwriting with smart script and the tab bar fine um good features all around good evolution of the operating system but um the title says it all uh Apple made iPad better for everyone but Pros now Pros are included in everyone so it's improved for me as well I enjoy the new t uh tab bar handwriting with smart script is really cool I can't wait for the day Apple Journal comes to iPad and I can do handwritten uh entries hint hint Apple Come On Let's Do It um I would love to do handwritten entries that'd be awesome and then have like a text transcript next to it ah come on let's go but then you then everything else is just iOS customizable control center dark icons on the home screen the if there's anything revelatory about this it's that all of the iOS 18 things came to the iPad at the same time so we didn't have to wait a year for customizable controls Center whereas these last few years we would have it took a year for us to get the home screen it took us a year to get the new lock screen but this year no we got everything alongside iPhone and I'll give them that that was a good that was a good update so it was less harsh four stars yeah true by the way the mac review is 3,000 words it just it takes that long to cover all of these things even when there's not a lot to say I really like iPad OS 18 in the same way I like iOS 18 I find the whole kind of look and feel of the iPad is nice I haven't done much of the app customization the way I have actually done on the iPhone uh for it so I'm not really aware of that but control center it's great um the you got to remind me cuz I keep the name wrong the top bar the tab bar The One You tab bar tab bar right uh in certain apps that's really good in others it's completely pointless but I like the concept of it I have a concept of a plan of how to use the top bar oh goodness yeah reference but I think the thing I wanted to note here the most is the pro stuff because um this was kind of a spiritual successor to my iPad 13-inch iPad Pro review they're they're well read in tandem actually if you haven't read that yet but um the iPad Pro review was written just before WWDC I did that on purpose to ensure it would not be spoiled by Apple's announcements because we were kind of hopeful that M4 would make impact it did not there was no new workflows for pros no new Pro apps no new Pro app updates um and if anything this entire beta cycle between 18 and 18.1 there's new bugs specifically for pros um there you go you see some right they're thinking of us they're thinking of us so I if you're connected to an external monitor stage man stage manager has fallen apart frankly I still use it every day um I fight through through it it's not cons it's not constant but it is definitely annoying when it happens but uh I can no longer swipe between stages reliably without stealing a window from my my monitor really so so if I have my drafts and my Safari open on my monitor on my um Studio display and I go to the iPad and swipe from slack to mass it on to Trello at some point if I keep swiping it's going to grab the Safari and drafts from my monitor and and treat it as an active window on the iPad and move that stage over that is very broken it should not behave that way the stages should be separate from the iPad and the monitor but they are no longer separate for some reason in the latest updates uh well there is an answer to that don't bother with Stage manager you can't on an iPad wait uh on an iPad when it's plugged into an external display I learned that from you yes uh this isn't why I don't plug my iPad into an external display but it it but it helps yeah the um if I have Safari open full screen or any size and I bring drafts in it dramatically changes my Safari layout and I have to readjust it every time then there's also that like and it seems to be specific to Safari I've tried this with other apps and it's less dramatic but for some reason bringing Windows into where Safari is Safari explodes um then there's also the cursor issue which has been a issue for a while I I can't pinpoint when it started but let's say I'm typing in drafts on my monitor and then I go to answer someone on slack I click in the cursor field start typing I'm still typing in drafts I click in slack I've done that by accident not realized which app I'm still in no it forces it you can see the animation it jumps it like and for some reason because it's selecting a different active window all of stage manager does this kind of like jiggle and like so you keep you can you can either do one of two things uh for me if I'm frustrated I will just keep clicking until it stays because I'm like you will listen to me okay or you can do the rational thing and uh what actually fixes it every time is you just click the icon of the app you want to type in on either the home screen or in the uh in the um bar so right that does sound the dock the dock yes that sounds less stressful but I will fight it sometimes and just be like no you will stay here I'm going to keep clicking until you stay where I want you to anyway uh just just out of frustration but that has been there for so long now it's just part of the operating system I I it's I I I I put it in the review of just kind of taking a jab of like these bugs between the windows switching and this cursor either I'm the only only one with this issue or it is intentional at this point because I do not understand how stage manager can be this broken through the entire beta cycle and it not be addressed at all hopefully it'll be fixed very soon but again this not it's not a deal breaker for me I'm still working from iPad every day but still it's just like come on I I have I shouldn't say this but I have the developer beas of course cuz I'm writing about it I think once in this cycle I filed a report over something I can't remember what it was uh did you pester them with Radars as I think they called them or just trust they would get it right radar is the is the old name now they're called feedbacks and I've submitted feedbacks um right it's that's really boring feedback instead of radar A8 instead of Snapdragon what's the matter with these uh USBC instead of lightning all the good names are gone usually when I file these things it's kind of pointless because they just get they're just missed because it's redundant there's already an existing whatever for this problem fine it's I cuz I know I'm not the only person on the planet with these issues so fine but it's just one of those things of okay but why is it like this in a shipping product and everyone's going to say well you use it during a beta it was like this pre beta through the beta and now in release I promise you it's just there I don't know why it's there but it is there are you in beta uh should you be updated yes that because that would explain a few things yes okay and one last thing before we close up um I updated my whole home to all the new operating systems immediately uh because I had everything on beta but the one thing you cannot run betas without an apple seed program which I've never been invited to um is the homepod especially the older hom pods so my office has the original homepods I can never run a beta on those without being in the apple seed program um I updated them to iOS 18 or uh well tvos 18 I guess audio OS whatever they yes I get really confused by that but it is TV o they just don't even call it that they call it homepod operating system which is really silly but anyway update it to version 18 and now my while I'm listening to music the left speaker makes a pop and then suddenly it's just my right speaker playing for about five minutes and then it just joins back and it's been doing I've had I haven't had the popping but I've had the suddenly only one works uh months ago now unfortunately I cleared out my office to fix a problem and I haven't put everything back in including the home pods but I was meaning to just try repairing doing all of them to see what would fix this really irritating this is happened before it's uh likely to do with the fact that it's still running an ancient chipset it's they're they're going to age out eventually I'm counting down the days it's going to break I'm going to have to go buy new homepods it's fine the fact that they haveed lasted this long they've I've got my money's worth I've literally used them every single day for years now at medium to high volume I have worn them out so I'm not going to be upset when I have to replace them I'm just going to keep using them until they stop working I've had this bug before it's going to get fixed so I'm not going to rip them out of the wall just yet but um it's just like another just another silly thing to have to deal with it just works apparently that's the thing it does I mean none of this is to really disparage Apple I let let let the Fanboy out for a second honestly speaking it's still nothing compared to what I've dealt with with Sonos before so let's just not even get started on that there's a reason why as weird and finicky as homepods can be I abandoned Sonos a few years ago now and looking at Sonos today I'm just like man I dodged a bullet there thank goodness wow cuz they're having a rough time over there yeah you've said and I I've just I've never even tried them so I don't know if I'm missing out in any way but it doesn't sound like I am so thank you very much that's good yeah is it's it goes back to our earlier discussion about like Android updates and you know iPhone boring Android amazing whatever reviewers do because of this uh I I like turning the reality Distortion field inside out it's no longer about making apple better it's about um grading apple on a curve so that's how I use reality Distortion field today is everyone's treating apple as if they need to be perfect anything less than perfect gets them a bad score whereas if Google shows up wearing clothes and their shoes are tied they get an A+ you know so it's it's just one of those kinds of situations um so the reality Distortion field I think is inverted because correct me if I'm wrong the original uh use of that was basically to say um Apple was always viewed as perfect because of they were apple and if if it was an apple branded object it would automatically be seen as perfect because anyway it was more specific than that it was Steve Jobs could convince you of anything and then you left the room and suddenly no hang on kind of thing so now I can poke holes into it but with him here I couldn't even see the holes yeah yes yes um but no that that's what's interesting here as awkward as things can get with some of these updates like stage manager being silly or uh like losing a cursor or what Windows switching being kind of broken or homepods dropping out randomly because of a software update it is still a walk in a park compared to what I have dealt with with other software with other companies and other devices that are supposed to just work so let me be clear as we're As We complain because we're passionate We complain because we want these things to work well but I have tried the other things and it would be a you get so used to disappointment that it stops being an issue good point yes I I think I said this sorry very briefly I know we're running out of time but I use an Android phone recently to do something for somebody and I just found it so confusing and I I put it down to it's just it's a different system but actually the more I've looked into it since it's just a crazy the opinions they have about their operating system is very different from Apple so of course it would be difficult for anyone who hasn't gotten used to Android to just use it but I agree with you from the other end of the spectrum of I think Android is just poorly thought out it's not well it's just it's good that you can configure it to me better because uh you can literally do anything to Android to make it run differently but um better or worse but I I do think there is something to that that Android is just poorly conceptualized compared to I iOS i iPhone is definitely the designers platform made by designers for designers um in that way uh Android represents a little bit more chaos so on that note I think uh that's a show we can close up here my goodness we've still only barely penetrated the uh event and what's happened in it but next time we talk we're going to have new goodies to talk about um might even will we because we don't know yet whether I vought anything well I will of course um I'm excited to I'm excited to write the review for the iPhone um 16 Pro max if anyone has any questions please send them my way you can email me um if it's something I haven't thought of great I'll include it in the review uh I'm really excited to try out the new camera systems I still haven't figured out what I want to do yet because this is the weekend I'm going to be able to do it um I need to conceptualize this weekend write it next week and have something uh of a completed platform by the week after so this is the weekend to do the stuff so I'm still trying to figure out what I'm going to do uh two years ago I went to Dollywood and did photos around the park uh that's a amusement park in Tennessee um last year I went on a walking trail and out in town uh just kind of stuff like that kind of a little bit more generalized I took pictures of a little iMac G3 robot toy which was cute uh still haven't figured out this year I'm thinking about it but if anyone has any uh great suggestions for what to discuss if you have any questions throw them my way but I feel like this is going to be a fun one this year camera controls are going be great I have one thing to say by the way uh sorry you're about to ask me where can people find me should they wish to and it's usually William ata.com but by absolute weird chance this coming Monday as we record this goes out I am a guest on both the Omni show and Mac power users I can only assume they were both let down at the last minute but I'm on both of those and I am not and as yet have never been on homekit Insider Monday's Apple Insider podcast I'm not taking it personally but you know wow I am jealous of Mac power users see I would never be invited there because like my Mac's on a bookshelf so they the only reason why they would invite me is to ridicule me uh I would I would gladly go on the show to be ridiculed though that would I was on it for an hour and a half and I talked about nothing except you and your Mac and what you do to it oh goodness of I I'm excited for that that'll be a good listen I that is already in my queue because I listen to macow users regularly so yeah but uh yes as William said you can find us via email that's at the top of any article we've written click our name you can shoot us an email question comment whatever um I am on Macedon William has his YouTube show what how many keys8 keys 58 keys can you not remember a number that's steeped in Apple history let's just leave it as a mystery like that yes no 58 Keys it was a joke the um calm down William but that being slow I'm sorry yes right no anyway that that's the show this week everyone uh want to thank our sponsors Zach talk again please reach out with any comments or uh let William know how much um you want him to buy some new airpods and uh we'll talk next week oh and I do this every time guys St Jude it is still September child C Cancer Awareness Month see I put it in the right order that time donate it's just it's just a good cause they over the guys over at re FM they do it every year just go uh give him a little bit of money even if if it's five bucks it helps but with that I'll say talk next week\n"