Comment on Why doesn’t Apple/Samsung/Google use new tech like every other phone maker?
Buffalox@lemmy.world 1 day agoApple rarely leads the charge.
Absolutely that is how it is now, but they did coin the format every modern smartphone uses today. And originally they were way ahead of the competition in almost every aspect. They were so dominant, that for years there was a shortage for every other manufacturer of components to build smartphones that could compete!
But a lot has happened since the still pretty recent emergence of the first iPhone, that absolutely revolutionized the concept of smartphones.
And the competition is absolutely cutthroat, so even major renowned labels couldn’t keep up.
Like Nokia, HTC, Ericsson that were all major brands, are now almost completely gone. Obviously the Blackberry RIM is almost gone too, and I think Microsoft is out completely now, despite they were a significant factor before iPhone, and investing billions in an attempt at a come back!
So it is quite amazing that a statement like Apple rarely takes a lead is so easily taken as a true statement, considering how different it was just a few years ago. A testament to the absolutely crazy development cycle smartphones still have.
Apple does however still lead on the SOC by a good margin.
adespoton@lemmy.ca 23 hours ago
I’ve been using Apple products since 1979. I’d definitely say that the statement is true; Apple rarely leads the charge. That doesn’t mean they never do, but they tend to, in most cases, wait for a trustworthy tech to come along, and then push forward with it, dragging the rest of the market along behind them. There’s always innovations and synergies, many of which wouldn’t happen naturally in the market, but the stuff they integrate is generally already well tested and proved.
Counter examples include the original Macintosh, the Newton MessagePad and kinda-sorta the iPhone. More common behavior is related to things like PowerPC/ARM, USB, Firewire/Thunderbolt, nVME, trackpads, wireless peripherals, and the like.
Buffalox@lemmy.world 16 hours ago
Apple was built on innovation, and you completely left the original product out.
Apple II, Macintosh, MacBook Air, iPod, iPhone, iPad. In software OSX was also significant, and obviously IOS that worked extremely well for both iPhone and iPad.
The M series of SOC are also way ahead of anything else. Retina display for iPhone was also a first. And finally the technologies Apple has used to completely switch the hardware architecture of major series of products.
First from Motorola to IBM Power, then from Power to x86, and finally from x86 to Arm. No other company has dared doing that, and when Microsoft tried to emulate it, AFTER Apple they did it way worse!
There is no way you can realistically say Apple is not generally an innovative company, and that they aren’t leaders. When 5 times they’ve been leading major changes within an industry. What other company did that? There are very few companies that have brought groundbreaking disruptive new products like Apple has.
I’m saying this as one who has sworn never to buy another Apple product, because I despise the Apple closed garden mentality. So I’m definitely not a fanboy.