days of future plinka

This is starting to shape up as I look at the present state of my phones, numbers and usage. I’ve shed two entire phone numbers since the first of the year, much to my wife’s relief, and I’m down to the streamlined presence I’d hoped for with two and a half months to spare on my 2019 resolutions. So without further nattering, let’s get on with it.

This iPhone SE came out as a 4-inch phone a year and a half after Apple stopped producing a current 4” phone. It had a current chipset and current camera in an older body with an older front camera, older version of TouchID, less bright screen. Basically a hodgepodge of parts from the 6S and the 5S, in the body of the latter. It seems like the SE2, so-called, will be more of the same on that front. Eighteen months after Apple makes the smallest phone in the current lineup a 5.8” full screen monster, they take the smaller size and put the newer chipset in it. From the sound of things, it sounds like the A13 and accompanying RAM in the remains of an iPhone 8, so the only feature gains you might get are some computational effects and improved performance. It doesn’t sound like the newer camera is coming at all, unless it’s the XR’s single camera, and we may not even see the 3DTouch stuff removed (which would suck out loud, as that represented at least another 100mAh of available battery space in the 6-to-6S move).

Now, for me to go from the SE to the notional 2020 5.4” iPhone Pro would be an enormous leap. Same size device as the 8, which is what I care about, but definitely more battery than 3DTouch would allow. Waterproof, haptic touch, all the amazing new A14 processor whizbang, maybe even 5G support – and dual-SIM capable. Which is potentially HUGE. If I could have the work number on the built-in e-SIM (which AT&T ought to be able to manage), I could pop my own VZW-backed USMobile SIM in the slot and have a nice little failover for places where one network fails but the other is fine, not to mention insurance against walking out the door at work. And you just take out the VZW SIM and you’re ready to go abroad without a hitch. 

Basically, the die is cast. I’ll wait a year. If the 5.4” Pro doesn’t materialize, I’ll get the SE2 in September, unless the benefits of the 5.8” 2020 phone are just too good to pass up. If the SE2 doesn’t materialize in Q1 as promised, I’ll wait until September. And come September, it’ll probably be time to hand in both the SE and the iPad Mini 2, which already didn’t get iOS 13 and has the most fleeting battery life as is. A single 5.4” phone the size of the iPhone 8 with all the bells and whistles would suit me down to the ground, especially personally owned with a built-in escape hatch.

And I’m reconciling myself to the the larger size. The Moto X was dead solid perfect and the 6  just a hair too big, but the SE actually feels a hair too small at this point – mostly for reading and keyboarding. Which I do a lot more than I thought. I might not be happy with the SE if I didn’t have the actual Kindle to work with. But the prospect of what will in essence be the lost iPhone 9, in 128 GB size for $500 or less, is definitely a plausible path of last resort going forward, four years after first taking the SE plunge.

It’s a good plan. I like it. I approve. Onward and upward, and enjoy the return of the pocket rocket in the meantime.

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