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Comment by jayd16 | Hacker News Reader

I find is pretty silly to say smartphone hardware is done when Apple is still sporting a notch.

There's nothing about sporting a notch that's problematic, except when it comes to OCD.

If it didn't have the notch it would just have a larger bezel on a side, or some BS like a popup camera.

The "camera behind screen" idea barely works (for obvious reasons), and is hardly what would revolutionize mobile hardware. It's an aesthetic concern, not a functional one.

Things that might do that, larger camera sensors (e.g. 1"), week or more long batteries, total voice control, etc.

I get what you are saying but that would still be a pretty incremental update right? It wouldn't make the phone significantly more usable, really only a bit prettier.

I think the point here is that the recent "big" features are all pretty minor things like 60fps screens etcetera, they are really nice but nowhere near as important as the new things we used to have every generation.

The notch is a rather small issue that only affects looks. When the display is off, you don't see it. When the display is on, you usually look at the display, not the notch. Sure it's not pretty but personally I don't really care.

I think the notch is a lot less annoying than the weight. Maybe I have small weak hands, but I feel a physical strain from using my iPhone XS. Unfortunately you can’t seem to buy a new SE around here.

That would hardly be the weight, since it's quite (to very much) less than older phones we all used in the 90s and 00s, and early 10s...

I’ve only had smartphones since 2012, but it’s definitely the heaviest phone I’ve owned and my wrist also occasionally hurts after using it. Older phones probably weren’t used as much as we use then today either.

Smartphones I’ve owned:

HTC One X: 130 g

Galaxy S5: 145g

Samsung Galaxy S7 edge: 157g

iPhone XS: 177 g

I’m happy with the screen size vs the phone size on the XS, but I didn’t realize I wanted something lighter too. This phone is way too heavy. The new iPhone 11 Pro is 188g. Hopefully next time around they make something lighter.

Same for me! When I first bought it, I liked that it felt “premium”, but after using it for a while, I definitely have some strain in my wrist from the weight. Maybe it’s because it’s small enough to use one handed but too heavy to actually be comfortable. Have you tried a pop socket or something similar? (I have not) I’ll definitely be checking the weight of new phones from now on. I may even upgrade if the weight is less on any model. I would like to see something like the SE come out, because I want a phone that can do everything but is compact, but their solution seems to be the Apple Watch so you have a super small screen to accompany your phone instead of a smaller phone screen.

I mean the notch is basically the symptom of having gone into anti-feature territory. Removal of headphone jack, removal of physical home button, removal of TouchID for face recognition that is much slower, removal of 3D Touch... the iPhone 20 at this rate will just be a slab of metal.

>of having gone into anti-feature territory

Headphone jack, sure. But after face ID / full screen, I wouldn't go back to home button and touchID if they'd paid me...

The parent is exaggerating but really, 90% of spotlight on these models is the new camera system but Huawei &co. was offering similar features for a long time.

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