The MacRumors Show: Mark Gurman Talks iPhone 15 Event Final Expectations

Welcome back to another episode of The Mac Rumor Show. Not only are you going to be listening to myself and Hartley, or Hartley and I, however, the English police will come after me. But we do have a very special guest and we're going to do something a little different because we're actually doing this before he jumps on.

But we are going for the third time, we will have Mark German on to finally discuss the last bit of information surrounding the iPhone 15 event and the launch. I know we've been talking about this for so long, but it's nice to finally like this is it. And then next week we'll still be talking about it.

But we'll have things to talk about and hopefully there are a bunch of surprises, maybe, I don't know, little things that we know. Dynamic island was a surprise basically up until the last minute. Hartley, what are you expecting going into this event in terms of that one little nugget of information? That's like a surprise.

Do you have anything? I don't know about specifics, but it's always something that we're looking out for in these final days. So I've been watching Chinese social media in particular really closely as these days sort of draw to a close before the event because usually there is something like that. Last year.

It was Dynamic island. I remember a couple of years ago it was the notch on the MacBook Pro. There's usually something that sort of captures the rumor mill last minute.

So although if you're getting a little bit fatigued with iPhone rumors at this time of year, I think that it's quite exciting over this weekend in particular, because chances are we might get a little something. This is a big I mean, this is like the time of the mean. We've got iPhone stuff, we've got new Apple watches, and then in October we assume we have something coming around with then, you know, for those who are just technology enthusiasts, we have a couple of other Android manufacturers.

Google just announced its event and so this is techtober and I don't know what the whole thing for September is, but September kicks it off usually into October and November a little bit, but then not really. And then we're just kind know Apple over the last couple of years has had some products spill into November. Even last year, right.

Then the iPads kind of come out like right around the beginning of November. They were announced in October, right, but they didn't come out until the end. The iPads, I'm not sure I remember.

I thought the goodness I don't know if I remember actually when the iPad Pros came out, the M two ones, were they not in January? No, I thought they were alongside the 11th gen or the 10th gen iPad. Hold on, I will have this in a second. Okay, so it was October 26.

So it was just like right around the end of and then the Apple TV, or was it the Apple Watch Ultra came out in November. I didn't get it and post stuff until around that time. That's what I'm basing this off of.

Yeah, it shipped later, I believe. Yeah, I don't think that's going to happen for the Apple Watch Ultra two. But last year was a different thing.

But it looks like everything should launch pretty simultaneously this year at this event at least. Yeah, I'm not expecting anything. We have heard many reports over the last, like, five to six months that the iPhone was going to be delayed and then like, oh, no, just kidding, everything's fine.

And then I heard that it could be delayed again. And then it's just I have no idea what's going to go on with that. We should expect everything, but if you're looking for a pro models particularly, I would just get your preorder in right away.

We already know, based off of Apple's just history, that they're going to be launching next Friday. So you'll be able to preorder next Friday and then you'll get them the following week, the 22nd, I believe. So get them in right away.

If you are planning to upgrade now, or you can wait until the end of the year where there's probably going to be some holiday sales and all that. All right, before we jump into, we'll start with the Apple Watch series nine. Before we do all of that, we're going to bring on our very special guest, Mark Erman.

So we're just going to do a quick little transition right now. All right, Mark. Ehrman, the third time.

I'm so happy that you are able to jump on right before the iPhone event and you dropped like, a ton of new information. So this is like absolute peak perfect timing. And so we're going to run through some of these last minute leaks because there's a lot there.

And we'll start with the iPhone 15. I think that's going to be the main headline, by the way. I don't want anyone to think that I'm being rude.

We've talked beforehand. But Mark, how are you doing? I feel bad for not just even, like, doing great. Is third time a record? Yes.

I don't think anyone else has been on three times. Okay, the iPhone 15. Yeah.

Tell us what's new. The iPhone 15? Yeah, I mean, it's what we've all heard about for months, what you've written about, what all your listeners have read about on Mac rumors and hopefully Bloomberg for many months. Pretty big year for the iPhone compared to last year and the year prior.

The iPhone 15 Pro and Pro max, that's the first redesign for the iPhone in three years. And it's actually quite significant. It's not only a material change with the titanium, it makes the phone quite a bit lighter and quite a bit durable as well.

And so you may see a section of people deciding not to use a case with the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max this year. Certainly that's something I'm considering. The one problem with Titanium is that because the material is a bit lighter, it's more dent prone than the stainless steel.

If you've dropped your stainless steel iPhone, like many of us probably have, including myself many times, you know that if you drop it on concrete or wood or what have you, the stainless steel is so strong that you really have a tough time putting a dent in it. Obviously, you can scratch it up. Some of the material could flake off, but it's pretty dent free over time.

And I think that's the risk with Titanium. But the benefits are it looks much nicer. It's not fingerprint prone anymore.

You can do some cool new tricks color wise. Certainly the combination of thinness and durability and lightness, I mean, not thinness, is, I think, going to be pretty compelling. And it's a nice upgrade.

And I also believe this is just the start, really. Apple started playing with Titanium, believe it or not, with the Apple card in 2019. That was sort of their first test of using Titanium in products.

And then they eventually grew confident enough to bring that to versions of the Apple Watch, right? You have the Apple Watch Titanium Editions, and then you also have the Apple Watch Ultra, which is obviously titanium. And now you're moving to the phone. My expectation is that at some point, they'll be moving to Titanium on the iPad as well, and maybe bring Titanium back to the Mac at some point.

Now, Titanium, the benefit there is that it is a premium material. It is a durable material, it is a light material. But the other benefit you get from it is that it could be manufactured in many more ways.

What Apple is doing is they're wanting to bring 3D printing technology for their enclosure development and enclosure production, starting with the watch, eventually bring that to the iPhone and many other products. And you can't with the current 3D printing technology, 3D print, aluminum, you need to use more of a high end, finer metal. And so those metals that you really think of, or you would want to use in a gadget would be stainless steel, Titanium, things of that nature.

And so Titanium is the material that makes more sense for iPad enclosures, for some Apple Watch enclosures, certainly iPhone enclosures, and maybe one day Mac enclosures. So certainly that's the direction they're going into. And so the Titanium is a starting point for that in these new phones.

The other interesting thing is this new display technology called Lipo, or Lipo that they're using for the 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max. And that makes the borders about a third thinner. And it's a new injection molding based manufacturing process that allows them to get the screen closer to the borders on the 15 Pro and Promax itself the screens are not actually bigger.

Maybe they are by a few millimeters, but it certainly would look bigger because of the smaller bezels and the overall frame size of the phone. Now, why is that interesting? Because that also plays into the company's future plans. Eventually, I expect them to bring this lipo technology to the iPad, maybe to the Mac.

And for those who aren't familiar, the lipo technology, the first test of that actually also appeared in the Apple Watch at the Apple Watch Series seven. And so you can see that the Apple Watch is sort of like a lower volume playground for Apple to test these new manufacturing technologies, new materials, new technologies overall, and then eventually bring them up the line to the higher volume products. So I think that is the interesting underlying story.

Some of these manufacturing processes and technologies that they're finally able to bring from the Apple Watch to the iPhone with this generation. And then what does that mean for future generations of the iPad Mac? I suppose that also applies to micro Led display technology as well, that you've reported on in the past, coming to future MicroLED models in the long term. Yeah, that's exactly right.

And so you'll see micro Led appear in the next two years on the Apple Watch, either next generation or the one after, and then you'll see that eventually come to the iPhone. One day the iPad, and then one day the Mac. Now, just to set expectations here, I wouldn't anticipate a micro Led Mac before 2030.

At this point. I can't believe it's already 2023, but you're going to start to see a transition to yeah, you're going to start to see a transition to OLED on the Mac in about two years from now. And so they're going to need to have some runway for that.

And then if you think back at it, the Apple Watch, there had been so many other technologies on the Apple Watch that appeared there first before coming to the phone and then coming to Apple's other products. OLED, right. Starting the watch went to the phone.

It's gone to the iPad next year, and then the Mac a year after that. Force Touch, that started with the Apple Watch and then that eventually made its way to the iPhone before Apple nixed that. So certainly you can see if you're going to get a new type of technology in the Apple Watch, you can already take that as a hint.

That thing is eventually going to show up nine times out of ten in an iPhone. So I think that's a big part of what's going on this year. You're starting to see that play out.

So switching over to the processor, we've had a lot of talk about the A 17, three nanometer. It's going to be faster, more powerful, but there's also apparently going to be some improvements to battery life, right? Isn't that kind of like a main focus. Now that is a main focus.

My belief is that the battery life on the Pro models at least is going to be quite a bit better, perhaps 10% better, just like the phone is going to be about 10% lighter. Again, these are sort of my estimates and that is going to be a big improvement. There have been so many people complaining about the battery life on the 14 Pros.

And I'm not talking about the battery capacity dipping over after twelve months of use, I'm talking about actual usage time. I remember when I had the eleven Pro max in 2019 and they added that big battery life jump. I could not believe how strong the battery was on that product.

And since then it feels like battery life has sort of went back to the Mean and the 14 Pro promax battery life is I don't think it's up to par, especially some of the other smartphones out there. And so I certainly think that the battery life improvements, if they pan out would be very much appreciated by customers, certainly by me. I have one of those Apple MagSafe chargers that you put on the back of the phone and constantly having to use that, constantly having to leave my phone on a charger at my desk.

So certainly battery life is a real world improvement that I think a lot of people would appreciate. So hopefully that pans out like I think it will, definitely. One other really interesting point that you raised in your article that you published this morning was something that we haven't really heard too much about, which is improvements on the Pro models to the telephoto and the ultra wide camera in terms of megapixels, because these have been at twelve megapixels since their introduction.

So that would be a pretty significant first of its kind improvement. Could you tell us a little bit more about that? Yes. So the megapixel increases on the telephoto and on the ultra wide camera.

So the two non main sensors on the phone is slightly, slightly higher in terms of like on paper I believe it is negligible, but the resolutions are slightly higher and the pictures look a lot crisper on those lenses as well. And so you're going to see when they announce these phones next week in terms of their marketing. That the new cameras.

That is the biggest part of the announcement, especially on the Pro models, even on the basic models moving from the twelve to 48 megapixel on the main sensor. So camera is going to be the main focal point of their marketing next week on the phone, just like performance is going to be the main marketing message around the watches next week too. What about the action button? What about it? Oh, on the phone? Well, I mean, I don't remember last time you were on.

We probably talked about that rumor, but what else can you tell us about it? Any more details, or is it just it is what it is. It's going to be remapped to a few different functions. Will we have more control over that? Like what we can remap it to? It's extremely customizable in the Settings app.

As you can expect, there's a new Action button panel in the Settings app, and you can choose through all the same things you'd expect. The stuff that Steve Moser found and you guys reported on that's exactly it. Those are the functions.

And then when you tap it to shortcuts, you can certainly expand upon to anything you can want to use it for. And so the Action button, I think it's so interesting because the volume controls and the mute switch is the only thing on the iPhone that probably hasn't changed in 16 years, right? 15 years. And so that's a big improvement there.

They had Project Bongo, which was supposed to go with the action button that would make the volume buttons Haptic and the power button Haptic, but they scrapped that. I'm not even sure it's coming next year either at this point. They haven't decided.

There were two major issues with it cost and manufacturing. They were not getting the yields they needed on those buttons. Right? I mean, these buttons are fragile buttons and there's multiple keys there that would be Haptic.

Right. Remember when they moved to the Haptic iPhone home button? That was one button. But then moving four buttons simultaneously to Haptic, that is a big lift on the manufacturing side as well as on the cost side.

And that also required a new taptic engine as well. So it was really at least five major components that needed to be remapped and rebuilt for this phone, and it just was not able to shake out correctly in time. So, thinking of another component change this year, one other thing you mentioned is the U Two chip, which sort of is really something that we could see across the lineup, is what you mentioned because it will also be included in the App Watch Series Nine on the standard models.

And if I understand this rightly, it would also probably be enhanced by reducing the fabrication process, because I think the current U One chip is made on a 19 nanometer process. So I assume we can see something that is going to be on a much smaller process to deliver these improvements. Can you tell us a little more about this U Two chip and why we should be excited for it in the Apple Watch Series Nine as well? Maybe because there's not so much coming to that.

Yeah, I don't know about the manufacturing process, the reduction from 19 nanometer in terms of the chip. I do know it's made by TSMC, like Apple's other components, but I can't speak to that. What I can tell you is that the chip is going to come to all of Apple's major products, including all the new phones and all the new watches this year.

And it's going to mark a big improvement for accuracy and efficiency to more accurately be able to find devices and find people in the Find My app. So I would expect big improvements to find my and just as a follow up on that point, do you think that in the long term, some of these enhancements with the U two chip could have anything to do with Vision Pro? With sort of spatial awareness? I actually don't think so. I mean, certainly the Vision Pro probably would get that chip, but I don't necessarily think that there would be a big benefit to spatial awareness between an iPhone and a Vision Pro added by a new chip.

I think that the pairing mechanisms that Apple has had between devices, whether you're setting up a new iPad, a new iPhone, a new whatever, a new watch, I think their pairing mechanisms, I'm not sure how they can improve on that. So I know there have been rumors about it having to do with the Vision Pro, but I think this is entirely about accuracy in terms of device location, right? Like how you can find Air tags and AirPods, I think expanding that to more devices, but also if you're trying to find someone on a map, being able to do so without relying entirely on GPS. So I think that's where the improvements are going to stem from.

It's certainly not the hottest part of this launch, but it's certainly a new component. So I felt it was worth highlighting in my roundup. Here's what I think is the hottest part of this launch, the colors.

And so we're going to play a little game of hot or not, and I personally think that the Pro colors are a big knot. And can you tell me what you think? I mean, for me, personally, I'm not so opinionated as everyone on Twitter or X or the Mac Rumors forums appears to be about the colors of the new iPhones. I'm pretty bland when it comes to that.

I mean, why don't I tell you which color phones I've had in the past, and you'll get a sense of my style. So the original iPhone, obviously was the silver and black. I did have the white iPhone 3G because I actually thought that was pretty cool.

I had the black three GS, I had the black four, and then when they came out the white one, I got the white one. I had the white four s, the black and slate five, the space gray six s, and then the jet black seven plus then the space gray ten, the space gray XS max. All right, so what you're telling me is this monochromatic style that we have here.

It's perfect. This is Mark German edition iPhone 15 lineup. Well, yes, and my favorite color in recent generations was the Pacific blue.

And so I'm excited that there you go. Midnight blue is. Yeah, this new midnight blue is coming out for the new phones.

I have the Space black 14 Promax currently. So I like the blue, but I also secretly like the new gray. That titanium gray.

I'm not sure it's actually called Titan gray, by the way. It might be, but I think they might just call it gray. Gray natural, but Titan gray makes sense.

Titanium, and it's more of a natural titanium. But I don't know. I'll either get the gray or the blue.

Probably the blue, but I am going to take a hard look at the gray. I did like the Sierra blue as well, and the Sierra Blue, I think, is kind of similar to the gray, depending on the lighting. So certainly you're not going to hear any complaints about me or from me about the colors of the iPhone.

Just about everything else, but not the colors. Hartley, what are your thoughts on the standard iPhone 15 colors we have no what's the one that's being removed this year? Why am I starlight? Starlight? There's no starlight and product red. No thoughts on that.

But Apple seems to alternate between a bright color palette one year on the standard models to a more muted one the following year. I think they've sort of fallen into that trend. So last year we got some pretty bright colors.

I think this year it makes sense to have some more muted ones. But people always colors. This year they are different.

Previous years, I just wanted something not boring on the pro. Honestly, the red that was I don't know if that was made up or what, but that red that was floating around for a while, I kind of liked it. Red floats around every year, doesn't it? It's one of those color options because we've never had, like, a true product red pro model every year.

There's always some rumor about that. All right, on a serious question, though, the USB C port. The point is, obviously Apple has to do this, and thankfully they're not just doing that thing that I kind of expected them to do, which was just make one model for the EU and it just be USBC and everybody else gets lightning.

But is the Pro model actually going to be a Thunderbolt port where we're getting 40gb/second in transfer speeds, or do we not know yet? That's kind of been the talk, but I feel like it hasn't been super definitive in that aspect. Here's what I know. I don't know about the number.

I don't know about the 40GB transfer speeds. I don't know if it'll be graded as a thunderbolt port. What I do know with 100% certainty is that it will have faster data transfer speeds than the USBC port on the regular 15 and 15 plus, and they're going to certainly market that difference.

In terms of the actual speed rate, I don't know. But all four of the phones should have faster wireless charging with Qi two. All right, I'm good on the iPhone 15 unless you have something hartley before we move on no, I think let's move on to the Apple Watch, because really, so far, we were only really thinking about the processor this year.

But in your article this morning, you report a couple of new things. So we mentioned the U two chip, but the other thing is the more accurate sensors and the next generation optical heart rate sensor. So could you give us a little bit of an idea of how Apple is going to present those changes if there's not too much else going on with the device? Let's not beat around the bush here.

This is going to be the most minor set of changes to the Apple Watch, I would say, ever. This is a very modest minor Apple Watch. You are not going to be able to tell the difference between this year's Apple Watches and last year's Apple Watches, aside from some colors and material changes, they are going to market this as a brand new watch under the hood.

So swapping out the processor, swapping out all the sensors, swapping out all the internal components for something that is much faster and higher performing. The question that I have is, does a faster Apple Watch like I don't know anyone who's ever said the Apple Watch is too slow. And certainly the fact that they were able to stick to the same processor for three years in a row would portend to the fact that people have not been complaining about the processing speed on that.

Does marketing a watch as a performance overhaul move the needle or mean anything? And the answer to me is a flat no. And so I would say that only a very small percentage of any obviously, some will Apple Watch Series Eight and Apple Watch Ultra. First generation users are going to upgrade to these new models.

Certainly the idea being that they're trying to get series six and series seven and series five and new Apple Watch customers into the fold and by coming out with any new hardware, no matter how big or small the changes are, that will accomplish that goal. And so I certainly think that it's going to be a great upgrade for anyone coming from a series seven or older. But certainly if you have a series Eight or an Apple Watch Ultra from last year, I would hesitate to recommend upgrading to those models unless there's some curveball that I don't know about.

But I'm basically certain that this is a performance upgrade. This is like less than an S year for the Apple Watch. If you remember, when they moved on the iPad Pro 2020, when they went from the A twelve X to the A twelve Z, that was a very minor iPad update.

And this is in the same vein. The processor, I'm sure they'll market as twice as fast. I'm sure it is at least twice as fast.

Certainly this is something they planned out. I think I wrote two years ago that the Apple Watch Series Seven and Eight would have the same chip and then the Series Nine would move to that new processor. I believe it's based on the A 15 generation.

And so certainly that would be a bit of a hike going from, I think, an A Twelve or a 13 based chip to an A 15. If you find your Apple Watch too slow, I doubt you'll find this one too slow. But performance new bands move away from leather on some of their bands.

Some new materials, more of a recycling focus. I certainly think this Apple Watch will be as compelling as ever for people new to the Watch, but not for people coming from last year's models. Go on and tell us more about this new material because we've had some talks about the whole fine woven cases.

Is that the whole thing that's going to be making its way down to the bands as well? I know some of the bands will move away from leather, too. In terms of the overall focus, I think there's going to be a strong environment focus at the event and I think that the new bands and new cases and such will play into that. They're also testing new 3D printing based enclosure processes for the Apple Watch Series Nine, the stainless steel models.

I heavily doubt they're going to discuss it in any shape or form at the event, but they are certainly testing this new manufacturing process on the Series Nine. And my belief is that some of the units that are coming off the assembly line are going to be sporting 3D printed enclosures and they're also going to start moving next year to 3D printed enclosures on the Ultra second generation, the one being announced next week as well. I'm not sure they're going to talk about it, but Hartley may get a Series Nine and it's 3D printed and Dan, you may get a Series Nine.

It's not 3D printed, so it's going to start very small and expand over time. It's still very nascent. So thinking about these accessories, accessories seem like they're going to be quite a big deal at this event because if we're looking at new Watch bands that are moving away from leather, we're looking at cases that are moving away from leather.

We're looking at, I guess the AirPods Pro Minor update is also really an accessory. Are you expecting any other accessories? Things like maybe the MagSafe battery, the MagSafe duo? Do you think anything like that's on the table for this event? There is a new MagSafe battery pack in development. I don't think it's ready for this event.

And the idea with that is that you can daisy chain the MagSafe battery packs together and sort of stack them and wirelessly charge multiple devices. So I think the idea. Being that you can charge a phone on one end and then charge another phone on the other side of the MagSafe battery pack as well.

That's something they're working on. I don't believe that's coming yet. Maybe that will be a subsequent generation.

They are obviously going to move to USBC on that. They're going to move to USBC gradually on the AirPods, they're going to move to USBC soon on the Mac accessories. Essentially everything was going to move to USBC and the goal is to be USB C across the line by next year.

Is that just going to be more of like a silent update then, on some of those things? Yeah. Do you remember when they moved to Lightning in 2012? They sort of quickly moved to Lightning across the board. They're aiming to do the same with USBC.

The big question is, what are they going to do about the entry level iPad? $329 iPad, by the way, no iPads next week. But I think that they're either going to just discontinue that low end iPad or eventually they'll refresh it just with USBC. It depends if they're able to get the cost down enough on the 10th generation or I guess 11th generation entry level iPad, which already, I believe, has USBC.

Right. And so they certainly are going to have to go USBC across the line and they're going to go all in on it. They've kicked and screamed all they could about not wanting to move to USBC, and now publicly, they're going to move to it and fully embrace it and position it as the best thing since life spread.

I just did a video on what to expect. Literally posted it right before this. And I started off with things that might happen.

And I did clarify that it's kind of hit or miss. It could happen because these things get updated annually, and the iPad was one of them. And now you just completely shut down.

Like the first, I don't know, minute and a half of my video. So thank you. I will go update that after this.

There is a new iPad Air minor spec bump in development, which I think is coming soonish, and the major new iPad Pros next year. So I don't think you're terribly off and to your credit, I believe what you said is true, that they've updated the iPads probably the last few September launches. Right.

And so I certainly think that the entry level model at least has been updated every year. Yeah, it's not an out of this world idea. And I do think we may get an iPad refresh in October.

Right. There will be another launch in October. I am not sure that it's an event.

I think it might be something along the lines of remember when they released the M two pro products earlier this year? And they did sort of like a 20 minutes online sort of quasi event they just published on the day and didn't tout in advance. I think it's going to be along those lines. I'm not sure they have enough to drag people down to Cupertino to watch the video like they do for this launch.

So I know that I've been harping on colors, but this is a real question, and we were talking about the Apple Watch, and I didn't get a chance to say this real quick. The Apple Watch Ultra is coming in a darker color, correct? That's my understanding. That there should be a black Apple watch.

Ultra. Yeah. Okay.

I think that's no, no, but I'm going to probably get one anyways. Well, it might too. I might too, but we're not normal.

Well, that's what I was going to say. Consumer, any normal person. Probably not, but I do not mind this color, but I would much prefer a darker color.

And so that's why I'm like, I'm actually kind of excited about that personally. So I wanted to get the clarification there and then go ahead. The value of the iPhone that it's able to retain after a year of use makes it so that you can upgrade if you game it correctly, you can upgrade to a new iPhone every year without paying out of pocket.

I can tell you this is my favorite example for the iPhone 13 Pro, which was like a ridiculously minor update from the twelve Pro. I was able to get that new model and put, I think, $50 cash in my pocket. So I was able to get the new iPhone and make a few bucks.

And that's because these iPhones hold incredible amount of value. And it's because of these trade in specials and carrier deals that all these carriers in the US. At least, are offering at this point.

The Apple Watch is not the same story. This new Apple Watch Ultra will probably continue to cost $800. We paid $800 for these Ultras last year.

I would bet that the trade in value for the Apple Watch Ultra, if we were to trade our watches in next week, 250 tops, around 250 tops. Right. And so that's holding about a fourth of value, probably less, whereas the iPhones, they can hold 100% plus of their value.

So I think at some point maybe there's a discussion to be had about the value that these watches hold over time. Okay, so I've got two final questions. I think, looking at the event as a whole, I'm really interested to know from you, Mark A, what you're most looking forward to seeing, just personally, and what one thing do you think you don't know about that you are most intrigued to see what happens? Okay, I am most excited for the iPhone 15 Promax for selfish reasons, because that is the new device that I want.

Right. And so I'm excited to see how it all shakes out. I'm excited to be excited about it.

I'm excited to wait in line to pick one up when it goes on sale and just be part of that buying process and get the latest and greatest phone. And people ask me all the time, do you get the new iPhone every year? And if I was just a normal consumer, I probably wouldn't. I would still probably be happy with, to be quite honest with you, with an Eleven Pro.

I thought that was a great phone. I don't really see the day to day benefits of 5G anyways and so if this was not my passion, it would probably be on a phone that's a few years older. But I do have to get the other phone because you all trust me to write about these products and give my opinions about these products.

And I think I'm an honest person. And quite frankly, it's as simple as I would not feel comfortable writing about these products being as opinionated as I am about these products, writing about these products in power on every weekend without actually owning the products and using them on a day to day basis. I don't think it's fair to myself, but more importantly, I don't think it's fair to the readers who trust my opinions and make buying decisions and maybe form their own opinions based on what they read or hear from me.

And that's the same reason why I'm going to have to get a Vision Pro as well. Not that I'm not excited about the technology. Oh, darn.

I have to get a vision pro. Yeah, I know, but I will figure out a way to get one. And I definitely think that that's going to be something where so much discussion is going to be had on that product next year and the years to come.

And it would be, I think, disrespectful and irresponsible to the readers to not be ingrained in this ecosystem. So that's why I'm excited about the 15 Promax because I need to be as familiar with the product as anyone in order to be trustworthy about it. In terms of what I don't know about the event and I want to learn more at the event, that is a good question.

Nothing comes to mind. Why don't we do this a different way? What do you think people don't know about the event? And I can tell you if I am in agreement with you or not. Well, I think that was the thing that I asked you a little bit earlier, which was about accessories that we could see and how the sort of transition to USB C is presented.

Does that even get stage time? How is that really marketed given how much discussion there has been about this after so long? And what other devices will we see potentially other than just the AirPods Pro case and how much stage time will that even get? I think it's the most sort of unknown element of the event to me personally. Yeah, I certainly believe that USBC will get some stage time. They'll talk about some of the benefits there.

I don't think they're going to go wild about it, but certainly they will mention it. And I think in terms of the AirPods, they'll probably reiterate some of the software features coming in iOS 17. I think it's fair to say that the software update for the AirPods this year is probably the most significant software update for the AirPods that we've seen after initial hardware release.

So I think they'll spend a little bit of time on that and then they can throw in that they're transitioning to USB C on the AirPods case as well because I certainly think that is a prominent change that they're going through with their ecosystem right now. In terms of additional accessories, I don't know, I certainly think the AirPods are a given. I think that some of the other accessories, I mean, they certainly can update the MagSafe battery pack.

You know what, on that internal employee website where they were giving those massive 90% discounts on the Hermes bands, they also had the Apple Watch magnetic charging dock on there. I think that may have been discontinued already. I'm not sure.

I couldn't find it on the consumer store website. Yes, it was, but perhaps it was. So perhaps there's a new version of that coming with the USBC as well.

I certainly think they're going to need to do a new MagSafe duo with USBC. And so the quicker they're able to refresh all these products and get these new cables and accessories, the hardware accessories out, I think the better. But I'm not expecting any curveballs or any brand new types of accessories or anything like that.

At least at this event. I did mention that new MagSafe battery pack in development with the daisy chaining. I certainly think that is something that could arrive eventually, but I'm not sure it's ready at this point.

So the other thing is that there were some people asking if Apple's going to rebrand USBC to a different name. I have not heard one way or another, but I think that would be quite fascinating. I'm not sure there's precedent for that.

Right. Is thunderbolt. An apple marketing term.

It is on top of what was the generic, was it USB something? I don't remember. But Hartley, wasn't it with intel that they created thunderbolt? Yeah, so I don't think it was in a sort of artificial marketing name, but they were involved in the creation of the standard so they obviously had some say over the way in which that was marketed. And then Lightning is not as cool, lightning is not as cool and Lightning is that's obviously an Apple standard.

So they can name it whatever they want. I don't think there's anything stopping Apple from naming USB C on the iPhone. Anything that they want.

The only thing that pertains to them not going that direction is on all their other products, the iPad, the Mac, this magic keyboard I have in front of me, what have you. I think the Apple TV has USBC as well, or at least it did. It's USB c everywhere.

So naming it something else on the iPhone and then having to rename it on all their other products I think is just going to create more consumer confusion that's already going to be created from this. I would it would be the more Apple like thing to do to name it something. But I think that cooler heads probably prevailed and they said if we just keep the name USB C, it's going to create less confusion, probably do better for us.

Okay, so I have one last question and then if Hartley's got one last one, then we'll wrap it up. Okay. Do you think I have mean we can go? Well, Hartley doesn't quite have as much time as we do.

You're just starting your day. I'm midway through Hartley's ready for bed. But my one question is, if it's a no, you can just simply say no.

But not in terms of curveballs for products, but for features like a software feature, whether it be the iPhone or the Apple Watch. Last year we saw Dynamic Island. I know that's kind of hardware and software, but it did kind of come out of nowhere.

No, it's software. Software more than anything. It's not hardware in terms of the smaller notch.

Right. They changed the hardware of the notch and then they were like, well, we should do something with this area. Which is honestly genius compared to most other companies, but I'm in full agreement with you.

Is there anything like that that you think we could see in terms of software curveballs? Nothing that I can think of at this point. Okay. Nothing immediately comes to mind.

Is there anything that you guys think would make sense based on what we know about the hardware? No, I was just hoping for something exciting. I think the closest we may be, I'm sure there will be about the action button. Yeah, the action button super customizable.

But then I went and looked on my Apple Watch settings for my action button on the Apple Watch Ultra and that thing is super customizable already. But then the market for the Apple Watch Ultra in terms of how many people have it, is very small. So for a lot of people, I think the customizability of the action button on the iPhones only on the Pro models will know received quite well.

I'm curious what the default is going to be. I would bet they keep the default as mute, but who knows? What's the default on the Apple Watch Ultra? Is there a default or up a it brings up a menu, so my guess is it'll probably do that. Right.

Oh, I see. Yeah. And then it does that in the buddy or the onboarding.

Yeah. So I've got two just final little questions. And the first is related to that with the Action button.

Do you think that we will get multiple actions for the Action button based on double press, long press? Is it going to just be a single press? I don't know. On the watch, I think there's a couple of double presses. Right, right.

Or you press once you get into whatever you launch, then you press again and it sort of remaps it to a function within that. If you want to do like a lap or something like that. That is a good question.

I don't know, that'll be a surprise. And the other question is related to the USBC AirPods Pro. Do you think that they are singularly going to say, there is a new MagSafe charging case with USBC, it's available separately, but is available on all second generation AirPods Pro that we sell from this day? Or is it going to be third generation AirPods Pro with USBC with basically no other changes, but you have no way of accessing that charging case because it's not available separately, so you have to buy it.

Oh, I think it's a little bit more nuanced than that. I certainly don't think these are going to be marketed as third generation AirPods Pro. I think those are coming next year or early the year after.

I have to check. I'm not sure if they're going to sell the USB C cases separately. I hope so.

It would be the Apple like thing to not sell it separately and make you buy a whole new pair to get USB C. But there's precedent for them offering the cases separately. Right.

Remember when they did the MagSafe transition there, they offered those cases as a separate purchase. I could tell you that I don't really see the point. Like for me personally, I probably wouldn't buy the new AirPods Pro case because let me just take a step back.

This is a funny question. Do you guys plug in? Rarely. Rarely, right.

Rarely. I don't plug in, so I don't see a reason to get the USBC charging case and pay that $80 or whatever they'll charge to get that. For me personally.

I have the AirPods pro. I'll probably just wait until the third generation to get a new pair of these. For me personally, this lightning to USBC transition means essentially nothing.

I probably plug in once a month. Again, we're not the mass consumer. Most people I know plug in.

I always say I plug in my AirPods when I'm in, like, oh man, they're dead, I need the quick charge or whatever, then I'll do it. But it only means something to me, USBC, in the sense that I only have to carry one cable now when I travel, and that is a huge benefit. Or if I'm just looking in my bag and I find a USBC cable, which is ultimately what always comes up then, and then when I'm sharing videos that are know, if I go to an event, not necessarily the iPhone event, but if I go to CES, I film all of that content on my phone.

Now I do not take my camera. It doesn't need to be like that. So I can just use my phone.

And when I'm transferring over and using AirDrop, it's so slow when you're trying to transfer all of that. So that's really the benefit that will come in handy for me, like two or three times a year at that. But it is a benefit.

I don't know. I agree with you that it is a benefit in terms of the unification, right. Having one cable that can technically charge your Mac, your iPhone and your iPad.

There are some circumstances maybe I go travel and I didn't bring a wireless charger and so I would plug in. But then again, I'm thinking about it. I always bring my MagSafe Duo with me.

So hopefully there's a new MagSafe duo. If they release a new MagSafe Duo with USBC I look at that, that might be the only product that I would pay out of pocket for just a component change or just a port change. I tend to find myself plugging in more though, when I'm on the road because I'm using my phone more and it's draining faster.

And so when I get to the hotel, putting it on the MagSafe Duo is not fast enough than plugging it in. It's slow, right? Yeah, it's pretty slow. So I usually try to plug in.

It's a 40 main product. Yeah, I'm hoping they update that and then they give away to MagSafe Trio or whatever so that you can actually charge all three at the same time. But I don't know if that's going to see Hartley.

There you go. That would be a surprise. That would shock me.

Yeah, well, I don't know. I think everybody at this point knows where to find you and where to read you. You're obviously at Bloomberg.

One more thing. Do you guys think they're going to talk about the Vision Pro at all at the event? Not directly. Not like updates to it? No, I do not think so.

I think they'll maybe mention like, oh, this feature goes, it works perfectly with Vision Pro in the future. But I also wouldn't be surprised if they do not mention Vision Pro at all. Just wouldn't be surprised.

Personally, I would be shocked if they did not mention it. Considering this is their most important product in decades. I think they've got to mention think.

Okay, so my take is that maybe they'll mention it like Hartley said. But then on the other hand, I agree with Dan that they're probably not going to announce anything new related to it or show it in any real capacity. Maybe it'll be a throwaway line just to get a mention out there of it.

If you remember the first Apple event in october 2014 after the September 2014 announcement of the Apple Watch. They didn't talk about the Apple Watch in terms of new product features at that event. I believe that's when they announced the Imac 4K or five K.

But what they did do is I think they did a slide presentation and they showed it working with an Apple Watch as the keynote controller. And then I think they also mentioned the Watch is part of their ecosystem, but they didn't really talk much about it. So I think maybe the Vision Pro will be in a similar that's just if it's not coming out this year, I just can't imagine they're going to talk about it, which is not good in my opinion, because I feel like a lot of the buz online recently has been the fact that there's a lack of buzz about the Apple Vision pro.

At this point, it's all gone. Nobody's talking. Nobody's talking about it.

So they're seriously in for a need for a big media PR marketing push for the Vision Pro next year. And one thing that I'd love to know is when exactly is the Vision Pro coming out? I would seriously doubt that it's a January February release. I'd probably lean more towards March April, but it's certainly something that I'm very excited about.

And I think that the Vision Pro, I really think it could go either way. There's really no in the middle for Apple. It's either going to be an incredibly massive flop or a big success.

There's really no intermediate for that company. And I think it's going to be a flop out of the gate, and I think it's going to be a huge success in a few years. I certainly think there's going to be so much discussion next year about how it's impossible to get a Vision Pro.

This is not going to be something where anyone can walk into an Apple Store and get it. But I still think people are going to come away unimpressed with why they need it. But impressed with the technology.

I can see that. I would say it's very impressive. Have I figured out a reason to what I would use it for? Absolutely not.

But we also do not know the ins and outs of it. So that's what they need to do next year. You can see the same thing about the iPad, right? I mean, I have an iPad pro.

I don't know why do I need it, right? What do you really use it for? But it's cool to have but again, we're talking about $800 versus $3,500 starting my favorite product. My favorite product that I never use as much as I should. Yes, exactly.

It's good for an airplane. It's great for an airplane. Okay, I'm good.

Unless hartley, you got I think I think Mark's given us a bunch there to think about. I know Mark, we all know that you are at Bloomberg, but is there anything else that you'd like to tell us? Maybe a fun fact that nobody knows. Or if you want to pitch more of yourself, you can do that, too.

A fun fact that nobody knows about me. I am a massive Lakers fan and a lot of is that something that nobody knows? Is that something that nobody knows? I don't know. Maybe the Mac Rumors forums.

People don't know that. But I am a Lakers fan and I think that they are going to win the title this year. And I'm saying that with some level of objectivity.

I am higher on the Christian Wood signing than I think most people are. I think you saw what LeBron and Ad in that organization was able to do with Dwight Howard and Chevail McGee a few years ago and really make the center as an important part of the team. And I think that you're going to see the same with Christian Wood.

And so I think he's going to be a real key piece for just he's a new center the Lakers just signed. I know it's not UK football, Hartley, but to me it's very interesting. So I thought they could have won last year when they made those moves at the end of the year and then really started to pick it up and got so much better and then rolled it into the playoffs and then they just kind of ran into a wall that was Dallas destroyed.

I mean, so did everyone did. So it's okay if you're going to lose to somebody, you lose to the people. That he has a combination of LeBron James four general skills.

He can shoot with the best of them, and he can play the big man role like a Joel Embiid. He's got it all. He's like, if LeBron James was 25% bigger.

Mark, you want to start a basketball podcast? Maybe. Would you co host? Sure, why not? Why don't you tell everyone what you and LeBron James have in common? We live very close to each other, or did live very close to each. I went to his high to I didn't go to his high school, but we would go to their high school for basketball games, and I saw him play in high school when I was in school.

So that was fun. That's amazing. Yeah, but that's about it.

Otherwise, we have absolutely nothing in common. I mean, I'm pretty good at basketball, too, kind of like he is, but I am not. That was fun.

Anyways, you guys can find me if you're looking for more@bloomberg.com Bloomberg.com slash PowerOn to subscribe, you can subscribe for free or you can get a paid subscription.

So you have both. And there's certainly a lot more news to come ahead of the Apple launch next week, so stay tuned for my live coverage there. And I really appreciate you, dan Hartley and obviously the Mr.

Team for having me, and it's always a pleasure to be on here and talk about my Bloomberg stories. So thank you both. Thanks, Mark.

Also, real quick, if you guys made it this far, I will actually be at the event. So, of course, check out Bloomberg, all of the articles there, all of the articles on MacRumers, and then subscribe to the channel so you can see my roundup from whatever is going on at the event. But, yeah, we'll catch everybody in the next episode.

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