Design
Not much has changed on the surface since the iPhone 6 introducedan updated look with a laminated screen and comfortably roundcorners. This time around, though, Apple is beating its chest forincorporating Series 7000 aluminum instead of the anodized aluminumit's been traditionally using. Anodizing increases the material'sresistance to corrosion and wear by adding an oxide layer outsideof it. Combined with dye, the process is also used for coloringmetal.
7000 Series aluminum, however, is a different alloy that combinesaluminum, zink, and magnesium for a significantly tougher, butharder to work with material. Apple altered the recipe inunspecified ways, creating a material 60% stronger than mostaluminum at one-third the density of stainless steel. The stuff isalso used in the Apple Watch Sport, and hopefully, it's going tomake the iPhone 6s less prone to damage such as, you know, bendingand such.
At 5.44 x 2.64 x 0.28 inches (138.3 x 67.1 x 7.1 mm) the iPhone 6smatches the size of its predecessor. It's certainly one of the mostreasonably sized smartphones around, even if the screen to bodyratio of 66% isn't exactly an example of efficiency.
image:http://i-cdn.phonearena.com/images/articles/207577-thumb/hero-6s-large.jpg
Display
Save from the addition of a pressure-sensitive layer, which we willrefer to in a minute, the screen on the iPhone 6s is virtuallyunchanged from what the iPhone 6 brought to the table. This is a4.7-inch panel with the odd-but-works-for-Apple resolution of750x1334 pixels, which accounts for an acceptable pixel density of326 pixels per inch. It's a fine example of an IPS LCD screen, evenif its properties don't have the sheer impressiveness of Samsungand LG's Quad-HD displays, not to mention the Sony Xperia Z5Premium's outlandish 4K screen. While we don't the have exactdisplay measurements, we expect what has become typical of Applescreens u2014 a tolerably cool color temperature, nicely evened outcolor balance, near perfect gamma response, and fantastic viewingangles. It is these characteristics, and not obscenely high pixelcounts or super wide color gamuts that make for a high qualitydisplay, though we don't have anything much against thelatter!
Now, about that 3D Touch thing we mentioned. Borrowed from the newMacBook's trackpad and the Apple Watch before it, the technologyrelies on tiny electrodes surrounding the display that let usersdeliberately choose between a light tap, a press, and a "deeper"press, triggering a range of specific controls. In the Apple Watch,we saw how pressing firmly on its screen brings up additionalcontrols in apps and allows for additional interaction. Right now,the technology is merely being toyed with and emulated by othermanufacturers, such as Huawei, but as a the first new frontier ininteractive surfaces since multi-touch, its potential could expandto building fingerprint sensors and other interactive elementsinside screens. It could potentially let Apple get rid of the homebutton one day, although removing such a long-standing elementwould have to be a very radical decision.
image:http://i-cdn.phonearena.com/images/articles/207588-thumb/display.jpg
Processor and Memory
The iPhone 6s introduces a major hardware upgrade in the form ofthe new A9 chipset and an alleged increase to 2GB of RAM memory.The A9, which is fabricated by Samsung and TSMC's foundries, hasnot been properly documented yet. However, we know that the chip isproduced on a 14nm or 16nm process, rather than the A8/A8X's 20nmprocess. Thanks to that, the A9 packs more transistors on the samesurface area as the A8, theoretically boasting better performanceand power efficiency characteristics.
Some early benchmarks that originate from a Chinese sourcesuggest that the A9 enjoys an around 19% jump over the A8, and a 6%improvement over the A8X in single-core performance, in addition toa 69% multi-core improvement over the A8 (8% from the A8X). Thatsounds like a steady growth in processing power, certainly in theballpark of what could be expected of Apple. Moreover, we've heardthat the A9 relies on a quad-core setup, with two cores pushed to1.7GHz and two cores at around 1.2GHz. The A8X before it uses atriple core design, so this leap is certainly within the realm ofpossibility.
To provide another perspective, the Apple A9 could very well be inthe same league as the 2009 iMacs, 2010 MacBook Pros, and 2011MacBook Airs in terms of raw performance, yet more power-efficientto the point of not requiring external cooling. However, this ismostly speculation we're dealing here, so hold your horses untilwe're able to throw more reliable information your way!
image:http://i-cdn.phonearena.com/images/articles/207606-thumb/a9hedr.jpg
Camera
The iPhone 6's camera setup has been eligible for an upgrade for along time, and Apple finally delivered u2014 a restrained, butcertainly thought-out 12MP rear camera bump (up from 8MP), and acomparatively generous increase to 5MP for the front cam (from just1.2MP). Photo quality improvements aside, the most notable newaddition is 4K (3840x2160) video recording, which puts the iPhone'scamcorder on par with Android flagships.
The 12MP imaging sensors are sourced from Sony, and there's littlethat we know about them at this point, other than that theyincorporate RGBW subpixel technology for better low-lightperformance. This technology uses an extra white (W) subpixel,arranged alongside the RGB sub-pixels, to compensate for thesmaller-sized pixels in the sensor. We've seen a sensor of thistype in action with the Huawei P8, and we came off pretty satisfiedwith the way it handled itself across different scenarios. However,RGBW itself didn't make for stand-out photographic performance inany regard. It will be up to the ones responsible for the cameraalgorithms at Apple to make the most out of the camerasensor.
image:http://i-cdn.phonearena.com/images/articles/207608-thumb/camhedr.jpg
Battery life
The iPhone 6s has a battery at about 1500-1900mAh capacity. Wedon't know for sure at the moment, but we can't see Apple goingbeyond this capacity, given the smartphone's dimensions. Itspredecessor managed to rack up a score of 5 hours, 22 minutes,which is far from the Galaxy S6 edge+'s impressive result, butstill decent for most people. Unfortunately, the iPhone 6s Pluscouldn't catch up to the fast charging developments of Android forsome reason. Maybe Apple is being complacent. Maybe integratingfast charging or wireless charging comes at the expense ofsomething else that's more valuable to the typical iPhone user.Only the gang at Cupertino knows, but regardless, fast chargingtech is pretty high on our list of iPhone demands, and the samegoes for any other up and coming expensive smartphone,actually!
image:http://i-cdn.phonearena.com/images/articles/207609-thumb/battery.jpg
Conclusion
The iPhone 6s goes pretty far for what's considered an incrementalupgrade by Apple standards. The increase in hardware and camerapower is quite welcome, and the addition of Force Touch makes for anice usability improvement, not to mention being a classic case ofApple introducing polished (hopefully) new technology for users andapp developers to tinker with. For what it is, the iPhone 6s makesfor a good, meaningful yearly upgrade over its predecessor.