I made it into the Apple Store in Knoxville yesterday.
When I’m ready to replace my aging 6+, I’m pretty sure now it will be with the X.
Hard to explain, but holding it and playing with it feels like the future. The 8+ is fine, but is more of an incremental update - you have to look closely to differentiate the 6’s from the 6s’s from the 7’s from the 8’s. They all are still wonderful devices but now seem like they’re rooted in the past.
Quick observations:
1) The “notch” is a very minor concession and not a big deal.
2) There would be a learning curve to adapt to the lack of a home button. To wit, new and non-intuitive combinations of the “power” button along with up and down volume buttons to turn off the phone, force a restart, take a screenshot, that sort of thing. Probably take a few days to a week to fully “internalize” the new gestures.
3) A screen the size of an 8+ in the form factor of an 8 is nice - while I appreciate the screen real estate on my 6+, it is an awfully gargantuan size. Even
slightly smaller will be appreciated.
4) The X is glass on the back. Apple brags about how strong it is, but there are already tests and real-life droppings revealing how fragile they really are:
OUCH! In my world, a substantial case would be de facto mandatory, robbing a lot of the elegance of the new design, which feels wonderful in the hand. I wish Apple would market a “Sport” edition, like Sony did with the Walkman, for clumsy people like me. But Otterboxes and the like serve that function, albeit in a rather clunky style.
5) For laughs, I picked up an SE, which has the original 4” screen. It felt delightfully small and “right” as a phone. I would never give up the screen size I’ve become accustomed to, but it is a nice little device in its own right.
Anyway, the tentative plan is to soldier on with my 6+ for awhile and let the new phones sort themselves out. But in a few months I do see myself with an iPhone X.
