As September rolls around, so does a new flagship iPhone and this time, it’s a pretty major update. The new Apple iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max brings with it a new chassis, a new button on the side, new cameras and yes, even a new charging port.
Apple kicked off the iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max showcase by highlighting that they’re now using the most premium material ever on an iPhone’s chassis: titanium. This new titanium chassis is not just stronger and more durable than before, but it’s also lighter than the stainless steel iPhone Pro models of yesteryear, making the iPhone 15 Pro series the lightest pair of Pro smartphones from Cupertino ever.
This new chassis not only has ‘Grade 5’ titanium on the outside for the highest strength to weight ratio of any metal—the same metal used on the Mars Rover—but on the inside you’ll find an aluminum substructure made of 100% recycled material. The outside finish has a PVD coating over it for a brushed texture, while Apple also mentions that the internal chassis structure has been redesigned for better repairability too. Incidentally, Apple has also reduced the bezels on the iPhone 15 Pro and Pro Max, slightly reducing its dimensions without sacrificing screen size.
And speaking of the screen, the iPhone 15 Pro and the iPhone 15 Pro Max retain the 6.1-inch and 6.7-inch Super Retina XDR displays as its predecessors, with a the Dynamic Island making a return along with ProMotion technology for adaptive refresh rates up to 120Hz as well as support for Always-On display, HDR, a 2,000,000:1 contrast ratio, True Tone, Haptic Touch and a peak outdoor brightness of 2,000nits. Also just like before are the resolutions for the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max, with a 2556 x 1179p and a 2796 x 1290p resolution on them respectively for a pixel density of 460ppi. Layered over the display meanwhile is of course Apple’s Ceramic Shield front, with both devices also having an IP68 dust and water resistance rating.
Titanium on the outside isn’t the only major change though. The iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max comes with the new A17 Pro chip under the hood, with Apple dropping the nearly iconic ‘Bionic’ suffix on its mobile platforms. This new generation of Apple Silicon is built on the 3nm process, with 19 billion transistors for improved performance and efficiency.
Specifically, we’re looking at two high performance cores that are up to 10% faster with improved branch prediction and wider decode and execution engines delivering what Cupertino claims is the fastest single threaded performance seen on any smartphone that’ll even um, ‘challenge high-end desktop PCs’. Complementing that are four high efficiency cores that have three times the performance-per-watt compared to its competition, though in usual Apple fashion there’s not any charts or data to back this up during its showcase.
It’s 16-core Neural Engine meanwhile is twice as fast, capable of up to 35 trillion operations per second, allowing for on-device machine learning, alongside dedicated engines to handle things like the ProRes codec and an AV1 decoder. The A17 Pro also comes with a USB controller with USB 3 support; Apple didn’t specify what version of USB 3 this is, only stating that it supports up to 10Gbps—if you get an optional USB 3 cable from Apple.
The real kicker on the A17 Pro though is its new GPU, featuring a new shader architecture and support for upsampling too in conjunction with the Neural Engine. The six core GPU is up to 20% faster than before with support for mesh shading and hardware accelerated ray tracing, all while using less power, leading to Apple dubbing it as one of the best mobile gaming platforms out there.
Another thing worth mentioning that’s new on the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max is the new Action Button that replaces the classic mute switch on iPhones of yesteryear. If you find yourself regularly toggling between Ring and Silent, you can still do that with the Action Button simply by press and holding on it, with haptic feedback to let you know when you’ve changed between the two profiles. However, just like additional buttons on Android flagships from before, you can customise what the Action Button does. You can have it launch the camera, start recording a voice memo, launch accessibility features and more.
It’s hard to talk about Apple’s new Pro smartphones without bringing up its cameras, and just like every year before this Apple claims that its their best camera system yet. Both the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max feature an improved 48MP, f/1.78 main camera with a larger sensor, a new nanoscale coating over the lens to reduce lens flare and better low light performance. You can also shoot ProRaw in 48MP HEIF, and select a higher 24MP default resolution when simply pointing and shooting everyday photos. The main camera can also now be used to shoot at 24mm, 28mm and 35mm focal lengths, while Portrait Mode has been improved with new features like better low light performance too. You can even record ProRes video directly to an external drive, thanks to its new USB 3 capabilities.
Another major change though is with the zoom lenses. On the iPhone 15 Pro, you’re getting a 12MP, f/2.8 telephoto camera that offers a 3x optical zoom equivalent to a 77mm focal length, while on the larger iPhone 15 Pro Max, Apple says that the larger real estate has allowed them to kit it with a 12MP, f/2.8 telephoto shooter that can do 5x optical zoom for a 120mm focal length. This achieved with a ‘tetraprism’ lens that has the light rays bounce around four times before hitting the image sensor, allowing them to reduce the usually long 120mm lens down to something that fits on the iPhone 15 Pro Max. A new 3D SensorShift module meanwhile is capable of up to 10,000 microadjustments a second to get a stable shot even while fully zoomed in.
Rounding things off is its 12MP, f/2.2 ultrawide shooter with better low light performance, while up front is an unchanged 12MP, f/1.9 TrueDepth front camera. Oh, and you’ll even be able to capture Spatial Video by using the main and ultrawide camera simultaneously, which you can then relive again using the Apple Vision Pro.
Other features meanwhile remain mostly unchanged from before, with the iPhone 15 Pro and iPhone 15 Pro Max having a battery life of up to 23 hours and up to 29 hours respectively with support for 20W fast charging. There’s also Emergency SOS and Crash Detection like the iPhone 14 Pro family, as well as MagSafe wireless charging.
Available in Black, White, Blue and Natural Titanium colour options, as mentioned earlier this really is the lightest Pro iPhone yet, with the iPhone 15 Pro weighing in at just 187g compared to the iPhone 14 Pro which weighed 206g; the iPhone 15 Pro Max meanwhile weighs in at 221g. The iPhone 15 Pro will start at RM5,499, while the iPhone 15 Pro Max will start at RM6,499, with pre-orders beginning 22 September with full availability from 29 September onwards.
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