Picked up my new iPhone Air

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So, yesterday, my wife and I went to the Apple Store Pasadena to take a look at the new iPhones. I wanted to hold the Air to see if it was really what I wanted, and I decided to get one. I know the tradeoffs, the big one probably being the camera, but coming from an iPhone SE, I thought I’d be okay with that. I tried out the camera systems on all of the new models, and yes, the cameras are super-nice. But, the return to paying attention to cutting edge industrial design really spoke to me, invoking something of the spirit of Apple (and Jobs and Ive) from years ago. I was willing to pay a little extra to get some of that back.

They apparently didn’t have available stock of the Cloud White, which is what I wanted, but they said they’d get more stock in today. We came home yesterday, and I decided I’d just preorder for pickup today. I ended up ordering the Sky Blue version, because Cloud White wouldn’t arrive for a few days at the Pasadena store. Also, frankly, the differences in the back case between white, gold, and blue are very subtle anyway.

So, I picked it up today. My wife, being tied to Verizon, had to go to the Verizon store, where she got some significant discounts along with the white version – and a bunch of headaches dealing with Verizon.

I’ve been spending the evening trying to upgrade from the SE to the Air, and I don’t remember any of my previous upgrades being so difficult. In fact, I tried the simplest, being the Quick upgrade from iPhone to iPhone, with both right next to each other, but during the transfer, the upgrade failed. And that was after multiple attempts just to get started.

I finally retried again, restoring from my iCloud backup rather than iPhone to iPhone. In the past, I used to back up to my Mac and then set up the new iPhones by restoring from the Mac backup.

It’s still going. As I type this, I have about half an hour left, but already, my wife tried calling me – she’s in the house, go figure – and both iPhones rang, so I declined on both iPhones. I’ll figure out the SIM vs eSIM situation once the setup is complete.

The thing is a pleasure to hold and just look at. I figure I’ll get used to not having the Home Button, having a bigger screen, etc.

I think I’ll keep the SE rather than trade it in. Maybe I’ll use eSIMs for travel with it.

One thing that interested me as an investor: I haven’t upgraded my iPhone in a very long time, so I’ve not been to the Apple Store the weekend of a new iPhone release since 2020. Ignoring the pandemic years, have the lines been long for new iPhones? The Pasadena store had a line down the block, entering the door and snaking along one wall for iPhone pickups. The rest of the store was similarly full of people either looking at buying other items or people working with Apple Store employees to finish their pickup purchases and maybe even set up their iPhones in-store. (I’m glad I waited to come home for that.)

I don’t know if recent years have been this good, but for an investor, it felt good to see the new iPhones being obviously well-received.

-awlabrador

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Congratulations on making the move!! As I remember, when we bought our 15 Pro & Max, at the Marin County Apple Store, my wife hadn’t thought about having an iCloud backup for our 9’s, maybe me, too, in any case, we had to do a backup before loading it into the new iPhones, so it took longer then expected… So now we know, but are still OK with the 15’s for now…

We’ve had verizon since their first availability, but sometimes the Apple trade-in was better, or just where we happened to be… I knew Verizon’s overall coverage was better than others in this area as well as on our travels up the coast, as well as other wanderings… Always had a good experience with them, which matches what I saw as we installed, upgraded, many of their cell sites in the NorCal areas, above average techs, good to work with… Also a VZ shareholder as well as T, APPL, so we’ve got 'em all covered…

Swapping SIMs when overseas with a physical SIM chip was great, handy, not sure how that works now, with the eSiMs… Maybe find out if/when we get out to travel again…

weco

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I have a feeling that the iPhone Air will be the hottest selling phone this holiday season. 99% of people don’t need a camera system any better than the Air provides.

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I need a protective case on my phone. That really isn’t optional. I have an Otterbox case on my iPhone 14 Pro Max, just as I had Otterbox cases on my earlier iPhones. For me, I have to wonder whether being so thin really would be worth it with a case making it less thin. I guess it would also be lighter, which the case can’t compromise that much.

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I have a 16 pro with no physical SIM slots (the US version) and I am overseas right now. The company I am using for phone/data service simply emailed me a QR code. I scanned it, and a message “install eSIM” popped up, I clicked YES, and seconds later my phone connected to the network and I had immediate full access (phone, SMS, data).

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Sounds good, so a foreign kiosk likely has a similar method, once they activate it, scan and it loads.. Easier than the chips! London, I think it was !$20 for a month of service, so we did both, let us call each other as well as text back to US, … Once home, I put the VZ SiM back in once we touched down, good to go.. VZ had an International bump-up available, but it was pretty pricey, easier to find once overseas…
TY

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Aha, if you are curious, as I was, here’s a decent article on the iPhone Air, including an fixit video link, as they tear it apart, see just what’s in there and where.. Pretty repairable for an adventurous DIY’r, but so many tiny connectors, it is pretty daunting to me… But, nice to see the internals… Awesome tech..

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I got Apple’s clear case and a screen protector. It still feels pretty thin, though admittedly, it’s less thin than the bare iPhone. The thing I really notice is how much bigger the screen is than my iPhone SE, though.

That, and the fact that I’m still trying to push the now-nonexistent Home button.

I think the case makes it feel more slippery than without the case.

-awlabrador

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I think the days of my doing DIY repairs on these things is long gone. I used to replace batteries in my iPods, and the last battery I recall replacing in an iPhone was either in a 3GS or a 5s. But I never did DIY repairs until after AppleCare expired (e.g. for my current iMac), and nowadays, you can keep AppleCare going for years. So, although I feel pretty confident in my hardware skills, if I’m paying for AppleCare, I may as well get the Apple-authorized repairs. They always do a better job of putting devices back together than I do, anyway.

That 3D model of the internals on iFixit is really cool.

-awlabrador

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Yep, mine, too, but the Luxor lamp magnifier and a collection of other lenses are still around, also, I think the Mac Pro, 2010, was likely my last hardware upgradele Mac.. The early iPods were pretty basic, easy to replace that battery, later the white iBooks kept me busy updating, keeping grandkids up and running, still have a MacBook that needs a battery, might do that, replace my travel MacBook Air… Anyway, I like the fixit guys teardown, nice to see just what’s in there!!

Nearby, my DW’s ex-iMac, a 27" one awaits an SSD, it’s fusion drive is flaky, but opening it, getting it back together, working, is still a possibility;e temptation… Still an awesome screen, should do it as a backup system… Only my fears are slowing me down…

weco

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I recommend the iFixit kits, if it’s roughly the same as mine (2019 27” iMac Retina 5k, easily my favorite of all the Macs I’ve owned). The screen is attached to the body with double-sticky tape, and cutting through that tape and removing the screen from the body was one of the scarier things I’ve done in DIY upgrading. The iFixit kit came with a pizza-cutter tool that kept me from cutting too deep with, say, a knife. It cut just through the adhesive and no futher. Then I had to clean off a lot of gunk with rubbing alcohol.

Then there’s the usual problem of having to keep track of all the little screws, but I’ve done enough of this sort of thing already. I use ice cube trays to hold the screws and keep them organized.

When I came to reattach the screen, I used the replacement double-sticky tape that came with the iFixit kit. Putting the screen back on was harder than I’d have liked: Putting the connectors on, between the two halves (screen and body) was awkward, and then once you’ve pressed the screen onto the tape, that’s it, it’s stuck.

I did what I think was a pretty good job. To the eye, you’d never know it had been opened, but if you run your fingers along the edges of where the screen meets the body, you can feel I was off-center by maybe half a millimeter or so. Maybe even less. Not enough to see, but enough for an obsessive compulsive person to feel. It took a few days to put it out of my mind.

-awlabrador

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I bought the suction cups to handle that front glass, , but all those screws for the next step, spooked me, as I recall.. so maybe the adhesive is a different iMac, we’ve had a variety over the years… I might be confusing the models… Disappointed they didn’t continue the 27" line, so went with the later one a couple years ago..

One of these days… maybe…