The iPhone 6 Plus Mini-Review: Apple's First Phablet
by Joshua Ho on September 30, 2014 8:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Apple
- Mobile
- iOS
- iPhone 6 Plus
Display
While the iPhone 6 Plus’ display is largely similar to the iPhone 6’s display, there are still a few areas worth talking about. The first area is resolution, which is noticeably better on the iPhone 6 Plus on close examination. In general, there’s less aliasing that is visible on the display. While text rendering in general is even better, the improved resolution is most obvious in the rotation lock symbol, which is noticeably smoother and rounder. The use of the 2208x1242 resolution with downscaling should also have a similar effect to FSAA (Full Screen Anti-Aliasing), which will reduce the effects of aliasing on the display.
Outside of simple resolution testing, we also need to test all other aspects of the display. In order to do this, we turn to SpectraCal’s CalMAN 5 with a custom workflow. As always, we use a spectrophotometer to measure color to ensure accurate results. For this review, I won’t go over viewing angles as that’s covered in the iPhone 6 review.
Our first test is of peak luminance and contrast. At maximum, the contrast difference between the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus is relatively small, and the difference in peak luminance is relatively small as well. I suspect that this means that Apple isn’t quite at the point where backlight luminous efficiency is rapidly falling off the way it seems to at 500+ PPI RGB LCD displays.
While I normally walk through each type of calibration test, there’s relatively little need in this case as the iPhone 6 Plus is close to the iPhone 6. There are some differences and the iPhone 6 is nearly perfect while the 6 Plus ends up being better than the 5s but not quite at the same level as the 6. I suspect this could be due to production variance, but these are different panels so without additional test units we can't say for certain. The iPhone 6 Plus display is quite close to the iPhone 6’s display in most regards, only larger; this is effectively as good as it gets for an LCD display.
Camera
Ultimately the change to the camera is the one difference that really sets the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus apart outside of the change in size. This one difference is optical image stabilization, or OIS. However, at first it's almost impossible to tell whether OIS is active. As someone who has used multiple cameras with OIS, this is a very odd sensation. Normally, OIS means that it's possible to see the effect of reverse accommodation in either the camera preview or while recording video, but I never saw these effects while recording video, whether in daytime or at night. In fact, I'm not even sure that video is ever optically stabilized, as seen in the videos below. I'm not sure why Apple chose to do this, as video recording is already cropped and would hide most of the odd effects that occur at the edges of the field of view when using OIS.
Putting aside OIS in video, it's obvious that the one area where OIS would be put to use is low light photography. Examining the EXIF data of low light photos, I was rather surprised to discover that in single shot mode (burst mode caps shutter speed to 1/15s) that the iPhone 6 Plus never exceeds 500 ISO. However, in order to keep pace with the iPhone 6's maximum of 2000 ISO and 1/15s exposure time, the iPhone 6 Plus drives exposure time as far as a quarter of a second, which is four times as long.
I really can't emphasize how incredible it is that Apple has pulled this off as it felt like something was wrong when I was testing low light photos as seen below. Normally, such a long exposure time entails noticeable trade-offs, but as far as I can tell motion blur is close to what I see on the iPhone 6 in low light. This seems to be the product of the multiple exposure combination that was mentioned in the keynote, and it really does work as advertised. While some benefit can be seen in the lightbox shot above, it's really in low light conditions like the photo below where we see significant benefits.
As you might expect, there's not much difference in daytime photos. I'm guessing that OIS is disabled above a certain shutter speed in order to reduce the distortion and blurriness that can come from OIS.
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WinterCharm - Tuesday, September 30, 2014 - link
Hahaha This guy has been running around and posting this comment on EVERY single iPhone review over the web.He's so desperate for attention, and so put off by the iPhone 6 that he feels the need to go about justifying his choice to love android.
darwinosx - Tuesday, September 30, 2014 - link
Everything you said is wrong of course and you sound like you have a personality disorder of some sort. I would seek therapy if I were you.Alexey291 - Tuesday, September 30, 2014 - link
He's deffo not correct but you certainly have always been on par with him when it comes to random bs :3option7 - Tuesday, September 30, 2014 - link
Moron. 1080P is a waist on a small screen. All it does is increase the file size of every video you watch which then requires more RAM and mor memory.You wouldn't know this because you are one of the lemmings that jump off a cliff for overkill specs that cause other "back door" issues you are too stupid to recognize.
What other great products do you own? ...a Dodge Ram pickup? ...a Kia Soul? ...or are you a big fan of all those high quality products from "As Seen On TV"?
Maybe you should hold off on critiques of engineering, design and asthetics and learn how to dress so you can get a girlfriend someday. Here's a tip for you...don't use a coupon on your first date when you take her to Denny's. Good luck, Moron...
shtldr - Wednesday, October 1, 2014 - link
Wow, someone whose life revolves around cars and dating women calls someone else a moron?iphone4ever - Wednesday, October 1, 2014 - link
You are the tool.Did you read the article (you do know how to read numbers and graphs I hope) and notice that iPhones totally dominate every display statistic and the Samsung S5 lags behind two prior generations of Apple iPhones and the iPhone 6 is so far ahead that Samsuck may never catch up.
I noticed you conveniently forgot about the 64bit Processor that runs at 1GHz lower speed on only two cores but is still faster than the Quad core junk that Android uses and oh yeah the battery life is significantly better and thats on a much smaller battery. Yeah no innovation there, Apple is really falling behind. In terms of memory the iPhone 6 comes in 16, 64, and 128GB - no need for some extra RAM modules because Samsuck decided to cheapen out and only include 32GB.
You Sumsuck troll just go away and play with your me too devices from the copy cat foreigners and come here and tell us when Samsunk/Android actually invents something significant or innovative - remember the tilt to scroll feature (HaHa what a piece of crap and they let be seen by the public). Ohh a bigger display no one would ever see that coming, except for Apple and the iPhone 1.
bigstrudel - Wednesday, October 1, 2014 - link
This is a copy and pasted post from the iPhone 6 review.MODS please delete.
RandomReader - Wednesday, October 1, 2014 - link
In contrast to you I very much enjoyed reading the differing viewpoint mentioned above, albeit the facts that it does display a healthy dislike for apple products in general and has been written by an obvious android fan-boy.Now what I don't like that much is your request to censor the aforementioned post and all related answers out of purely private motives.
Just because you deem something inappropriate and dispensable, it doesn't has to be that way, thus I politely ask you to respect the right of others to enjoy unhindered freedom of speech in general and the existence of other peoples personal opinions.
Hereby I politely ask you to abstain from censorship requests out of mainly egoistic, egocentric motivations, please respect other peoples rights and opinions.
As a side note, based on your behavior and the totalitarian nature of your requests, I suspect you to be either a member of some law enforcement entity or
an individual blessed with a pretty weak character, apparently unable to deal with differing viewpoints in a grown up, factual manner.
klutzak5 - Wednesday, October 1, 2014 - link
Wow, just WOW. Most apple users probably earned enough money to pay the price differential while you were codifying your irrational hatred in your never-ending screed.Why so much bile? As much as you condemn apple users, its clear that your have tied your self-worth into your non-apple purchase to a much higher degree than any apple fan.
Grow up. Its pathetic.
akdj - Thursday, October 2, 2014 - link
There's really no where to start, other than your 'name' with your falsehoods and reek of 'Android Zealot/Evangelist' attempting to discredit today's BEST option for a 'phone' ...rather pocket computer on the maket. Period. Silly. Silly. Man. Apparently there were about ten million 'idiots' in the first 72 hours ....and probably triple that today that see things a bit differently. Including myself and I'm ambidextrous. Note 3 for my personal business. 5s as my personal phone. Still have the original Xoom and a pair of Nexus 7s collecting dust. Why? No one wants them. They're worth nothing.iPhones on the other hand? I've owned em all. I've got a pair of sixes on order. My wife wants the larger, 6+, myself the standard. You're so incredibly wrong about literally EVERYTHING you've said it's impossible to even get started without laughing myself to sleep.
Thanks for the incredible reviews. I've just finished the '+' addendum and I'm excited. Delivery date through my 'business rep' ordered the 'launch day' albeit in the afternoon is sometime between November 3-29th I think ...lol.
...and then the conspiracy theory. Apple is a business. If you had a million dollars you'd managed to save from your 'worldwide' business ...and one of the countries you do business in, your home country wants to tax it at a 40% rate to 'bring it home', WTF would YOU do? Forget s million. How about 200 billion? While still a helluva lot of cash, $80b is a big F'ING check to write to help our dumbass spend their government recover interest rates and bonds. Juvenile.
Get outta mom's basement
Let the spider go
Get some sunshine
Don't buy an iPhone. You'll 'enjoy' it and forget all about defending it. Too much fun 'using' it. And when you're done you can actually 'sell' it. Unlike ANY Android device I've owned! Not just sell it, but typically recover your subsidy payment, often up to 50% more selling locally! Try that with an LG G2, Note 2 or an S3/4. They gave me a hundred bucks when I turned my Note ones in and update to the Threes. AT&T did. No one else would
Record busting weekend. So much so, I ordered a couple for the business as we provide 17 employee phones, and I upgrade my wife and I. Ordered it launch day, lucky to get it before turkey day!
What. A. BUST!
Ignorance is bliss I guess. Unreal
PS. I forgot to see who did the review, but thank you again to the Team! Very well done, both reviews. As always, not rushed. Detailed. Objective and subjective as well, from the POV of a daily Android user made it all the more enjoyable as I guess I just don't 'get it'.
Generational maybe? We had baseballs and bats. Bikes and 'jumps' when I was a kid. I was in my second year of graduate school when I got my first massive brick for a cell phone. You could talk maybe an hour before you had to re-charge it. No texting. Monochrome (or whatever Orange on black is;)). And a buck a minute to chat. And I'm young. I think! @46 I'm astounded by these (obviously 'paid') schills spewing their bullshit after such an incredibly written and informative piece
To take an entire page and not ONCE reference the review or data. Just. Pure. Vitriol.
J