New iPhone 8 Hardware Leaks, iPad Pro's Secret Power, MacBook Pro Battery Problems

Taking a look back at another week of news from Cupertino, this week’s Apple Loop includes new details of the iPhone 8 design and screen, Apple dropping Touch ID, the processing power of the iPad Pro, problems with the latest iOS update, LG courting Apple to supply OLED screens, how to replace your own MacBook Pro battery, and lessons from two years of Beats 1.

Apple Loop is here to remind you of a few of the very many discussions that have happened around Apple over the last seven days (and you can read my weekly digest of Android news here on Forbes).

Everything About The iPhone 8’s Design

The latest news on the iPhone 8 tops Apple Loop once more. While Apple will continue with the idea that nobody knows what is coming, the latest leaks from case manufacturers and a dummy CNC-manufactuered shell unit answer many of the design questions of the 2017 flagship. Forbes’ Gordon Kelly reports:

Like the unit shown off by famed leaker OnLeaks on Thursday (though from a different source), it [the CNC manufactured iPhone 8 dummy unit.] sports the same 5.8-inch display, “missing” home button (Touch ID will be integrated into the display, unlike some) and those now-familiar AR optimised vertical dual rear cameras.

In fact all we can’t verify at this stage are the exact iPhone 8 build materials, widely tipped OLED display (with its much increased resolution) and a working version of iOS 11 showing off the all new bottom based Function Area.

Screen Details Are Coming Out As Well

While we might not have the final specifications for the screen, we do know the design and layout of the elements around it, thanks to the screen protectors that are appearing. With the curved glass, new notification area, and the shrunken bezels, expect the new iPhone to be ‘all screen’ in the marketing information:

The screen protector shows the biggest changes to the iPhone 8 design thanks to the expansive glass screen it will be covering. Examining it in conjunction with a 3D print of the iPhone 8 chassis, the tiny bezels of the new model are on show. As part of the increase in the screen size, the removal of the home button and the push up to the top edge of the device are also visible.

More on the screen protector and the implications for TouchID from myself here.

One curious discussion point raised this week is the aforementioned lack of Touch ID in the iPhone 8. Recently published patents show Apple’s work on facial recognition, which could be used by the flagship iPhone instead of the fingerprint reader. Ben Lovejoy investigates how it would work on the Mac - no doubt the principles would be similar for a smartphone:

The patent describes how Macs in sleep mode could use their camera to look for faces. This would presumably be a feature added to Power Nap, where a sleeping Mac is still able to carry out certain background activities without using much power.

If your Mac spots a face, it then uses facial recognition to wake the Mac if the user is identified.

More at 9to5Mac. It would be a very courageous Apple to rely on this completely, which leads me to think that the iPhone 8 will have some sort of fallback in the design:

And that could explain the larger power button. This is a curious change to make given the consistency the on/off toggle has had in the size department over the years.

To me this feels like the practical answer to a replacement Touch ID system. It appears that Apple has designed the iPhone 8 with a better software-based solution to replace Touch ID but wanted a place reserved in the design for a fall back solution if the under-glass or facial recognition did not meet the high standards that the geekerati expect.

More on the potential backup Touch ID sensor here.

As Apple continues to push the idea of the iPad Pro as a laptop replacement, a closer examination of the chips inside the tablet reveal the power available to take on the desk-bound generation. The A10X breaks new ground, as I found out earlier this week.