
What’s Inside Every iPhone, from Retina Displays to Cameras - shawndumas
https://www.bloomberg.com/features/apple-iphone-guts/
======
ggm
As I heard it, Apple boosted VLSI design smarts in the UK to get audio stuff
in the iPod era, got really good FPGA and there was a one-two year boost in
the british chip smarts IPR. Next cycle round, Apple went to the cheaper
foundries and said "do this smart stuff cheaper" and undercut. So the apple
model appears to me to be: get good design work, but don't depend on it,
leverage scale to get cheaper.

Apple is still hugely exposed to the lack of diversity in touch screen and
battery smarts. I expect to see something there, because it must hurt paying
Samsung with one hand, while you are suing for a pound of flesh with the
other.

~~~
simonh
Apple already uses OLED panels frpm LG in the Apple Watch, but LG hasn't got
the capacity or the consistent quality on phone sized panels to rival Samsung.
There are reports Apple put down $2.7bn on LG to help with capital investments
to get them in the game, but volume shipments at iPhone scale wont be possible
until 2019.

One problem is the ELVESS OLED camera tracking vapour deposition systems used
in the manufacturing process are only made by Canon and only in very small
quantities - about 10 a year.

[http://appleinsider.com/articles/17/07/28/apple-
invests-27b-...](http://appleinsider.com/articles/17/07/28/apple-
invests-27b-in-lgs-oled-production-for-future-iphones---report)

~~~
ksec
Apple only used OLED from LG in their first Apple Watch, all subsequent Apple
Watch's OLED are from Samsung.

LG, has yet to prove themselves regarding Mobile OLED display panel. ( Look at
the problems with V30, and soon the Pixel 2 ) I seriously doubt Apple are
putting $2.7B on the Mobile OLED, ( or what LG called POLED, which is the same
as Samsung's AMOLED ), they could have spend the same money on JDI.

~~~
bochoh
Looks like some reports of uneven backlighting / quality issues.

[https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2017/09/lg-v30-hands-on-
lgs-...](https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2017/09/lg-v30-hands-on-lgs-oled-
displays-still-have-quality-issues/)

~~~
ksec
God, Yes. Why did I not point that out LG 's OLED quality were no good. ( My
hand and mind are always out of sync these days )

And one reason why I dont believe Apple will invest in an OLED production line
for capacity and assume their quality standard will improve in the future. LG
had the best Desktop > TV Size OLED Panel ( WOLED ), that is I think where
Apple are heading.

------
NamTaf
Fascinating that the battery of the original was the biggest until the 4
landed - it speaks for the power optimisation that they pursued for those
first 4 iterations. Also amusing how it's literally a completely different
purpose battery cobbled into a phone case to prove the concept before purpose-
designed parts came into fruition.

~~~
leggomylibro
Sometimes, you just gotta work with what you got.

Like today. What is the ubiquitous Energy Unit? There are flat batteries out
to like 2500mAh, but for most applications, it's gotta be the 18650 cell.

And accordingly, ho-lee shit. 2600mAh is around what you can rely on a
factory-fresh authorized 3.7V cell having. But let's look at Amazon. 3000mAh
abound. 5800mAh and above are available as well! And ebay? 6,800-9,900Mah! Ten
fucking amp-hours! 'Optimistic' is one word...'Advertising' is another.

Lying.

~~~
comstock
Yes, it would be interesting to see a graph of states versus actual capacity
for the eBay batteries. I’d guess there would be an inverse correlation
between stated and actual capacity.

~~~
ButchDriveshaft
Well, it turns out there is. Mooch has done some amazing testing and research
in numerous form factors and chemistries. If you're interested you should
check them out:

[https://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/forum/blog-entry/list-
of-b...](https://www.e-cigarette-forum.com/forum/blog-entry/list-of-battery-
tests.7436/)

~~~
TrickyRick
Can someone explain to me what one would use 1800 mAh LiPOs for in an
e-cigarrette? Or is it just a collection of battery tests unrelated to
e-cigarettes?

~~~
comstock
For some reason they seem to be very interested in the peak current.

I guess the higher the current the better you vaporize the material?

~~~
ButchDriveshaft
Actually the most important figure is not just the peak current amp limit, but
the actual continuous discharge amperage limit. While batteries are capable of
higher peak discharge rates in very short bursts, you really do not want to
push this and instead should stay below the continuous discharge amperage
limit.

The higher this limit generally the "safer" the battery performs in high drain
operations like actually vaping the ecig, and this means that not only can you
go to higher power levels, but that lower ones will also generally not heat
the battery as much, and reduce the risk of thermal runaway or venting.

Take a variable power mod using power regulation set at 50w (a relatively
common power setting for enthusiast/higher end vapers but that can be a daily
driver), with an atomizer at 0.18ohms resistance and a Sony VTC5 18650 as the
battery with 2600mAh capacity and a sustained safe current amperage limit of
30A.

To get 50w you will need to apply 3.00V / 0.18ohms or 16.67 amps. If you for
instance choose a poor battery re-wrap, like this Cylaid 3500mAh advertised at
10amp continuous discharge, which is actually just a "re-wrapped" battery
which can only sustain 8 amps, you would be in dangerous territory where the
battery would likely get much hotter than a quality one and have higher
potential for thermal runaway/venting.

[https://www.e-cigarette-
forum.com/forum/threads/cylaid-10a-3...](https://www.e-cigarette-
forum.com/forum/threads/cylaid-10a-3500mah-18650-bench-test-results-a-
rewrapped-8a-battery.801091/)

The most interesting thing you'll notice is an inverse relationship with
capacity in mAh and continuous discharge in amperage. You can either have a
higher capacity battery with lower continuous discharge current, or a lower
capacity battery with higher continuous discharge current, not both.

~~~
function_seven
On a regulated device, the coil resistance is irrelevant to battery amp draw.
50W will consume the same amount of current regardless of what it is being
used for. The right way to figure it is 50W/3.7V = 13.5A. Add a bit more on
that to account for regulator inefficiency. It also rises as the battery
discharges down to cutoff voltage, which _is_ usually 3.0 or 3.2V.

This holds true even if the coil is 0.5Ω

------
KGIII
It's worth a look, actually.

At first, I was thinking, "Surely they mean "current" and not "every." So, I
clicked the link and, sure enough, they do actually mean every iPhone.

It's a bit more in-depth than I'd expect from Bloomberg and that's a pleasant
surprise. Nice find, OP.

~~~
ballenf
Except the short-lived plastic one (5C) and the SE (the 5 with upgraded guts).

Edit: and others that I missed as noted in other comments: 4S, 5S, and the
Plus sizes.

------
chis
It's crazy how the first iPhone is just ten ICs crammed together, vs now when
they fab their own parts on one tiny board. Really shows how ahead of its time
the first iPhone was.

~~~
amq
Cramming ICs together was ahead of time? I don't understand your logical
transition here.

~~~
gehsty
If you look at what Apple could achieve by cramming ICs together Vs what
anyone else could achieve with the same resources, the first iPhone is pretty
remarkable.

I remember reading articles where folks from Blackberry were reminiscing on
the iPhone being unveiled and there were a lot of people who just couldn't
believe what Apple had done was actually possible, I think the line was, "it
must just be a battery with a screen'.

~~~
macintux
Blackberry thought Apple was lying about battery life. It wasn't until they
bought one and opened it that they discovered it was a battery with a screen.

When the iPad was announced, I read on some display-oriented tech site an
analyst who was convinced Jobs was lying about its battery life and would have
to retract the claims before it shipped. "I'm an expert, and no LED display
that size can be powered that long" yada yada.

------
csomar
Am I reading this correctly? The battery for the iPhone 7 costs 3.3USD only?
Isn't it possible to have higher performance batteries which are more
expensive? (like 5 times more expensive which is still cheap, around 15 bucks)

~~~
ksec
Same question i have asked everybody. ( In non tech circle )

Let say these tech for sure it wont be 5 times, but more like 10 times the
cost. So for $30 battery, which offer double the energy capacity of the $3.3
unit at the same volume, an extra $26.7 BOM cost, which translate to roughly
$70-$80 extra in Retail price. ( You have to add all the patents cost % etc,
and then Apple's margin, this calculation is similar range to BOM cost and
Final RSP )

Are you willing to paid extra $80 if the iPhone offer double the battery?

What was I expecting? I was expecting some crazy yes! For _only_ $80, you dont
have to buy an $30 battery pack anymore with cable lying around. And it will
surely last you the whole day.

But the results were a surprise, lots of No. These people think the battery
are fine, it could do a little longer battery, but it is not worth $80.

My guess is that lots of geeks and tech enthusiast wanted bigger battery, but
the majority are simply doing good with what is on offer.

~~~
robert_foss
10x price won't get you 2x capacity in the same form factor.

Maybe you'll get some additional capacity, but probably not a lot. Quite
possibly there isn't a higher capacity option that is acceptable for other
reasons.

~~~
ballenf
And with the Note 4 fiasco, I'd guess there's tremendous reputational value in
playing it well on the safe side for a couple more years at least.

------
amigoingtodie
Missing the best model created. Where is the 4S?

~~~
gm-conspiracy
I would contribute to a Kickstarter for 4S replacement boards a la the Nokia
N900 'upgrade' project.

Replace the 30-pin connector with microUSB, upgrade the processor, modem, add
more storage. Also, use a battery that can be easily acquired (and not just
pulled from other phones).

Use the existing screen/digitizer, speakers, microphones, cameras, and
antennas?

No forced reliance on iOS 11.

Anybody else?

~~~
ktta
This is an insanely difficult project. If you want to replace _any_ part from
the logic board, your best bet is to replace _everything_.

Changing any one thing (SoC, connector, etc) isn't possible because you'd have
to be really good as OS hacking to add support for it, especially when it is
closed sourced.

~~~
amigoingtodie
I think the idea was to get away from iOS.

------
ksec
4.5G LTE or 3GPP Rel 13/14 along with 802.11ax WiFi + Bluetooth 5 Chip will
likely be Apple's next target to bring them in house.

~~~
icanhackit
Reading into the Qualcomm dispute, I suspect it's not for performance reasons
but instead shaving off features/paying licenses for hardware that they don't
use.

Plus you probably don't want to be handing over large wads of cash to a
SoC/baseband chip manufacturer that serves your competition in the phone
space.

~~~
ksec
Yes, Qualcomm doesn't care where you buy your baseband, you still have to paid
them LTE patents tax. And once anyone doing calculation that making baseband
themselves is not worth the hassle when the resulting chips is inferior to
Qualcomm offering.

So Apple wanted to make, my guess a LTE only 4G Baseband, no 2G, 3G attached,
hence Apple wanted a better deal.

------
thisisit
Are the costs adjusted dollars? What I mean is with each iteration of, say
phone camera, the older one's cost will way less than what it might cost back
in 2008/2010\. So a camera might cost $5 but might have cost $15 back then.

------
mtgx
iPhone 8's modem:

> MDM9655 or XMM 7480 modem1 Likely Countries of Origin: U.S., Taiwan 2 Cost:
> $11.50 3 Designers: Qualcomm, Intel

Bloomberg says iPhone 7's modem had a similar price.

But they've just written a story on how Apple is battling Qualcomm over an $18
modem [1]. So I wonder if $11 is what Qualcomm was charging everyone else for
the modem - like those who also bought its Snapdragon platform - but charged
Apple $18, and that's why Apple sued them. Basically, kind of like how Intel
was charging OEMs more for the laptop CPU itself than they would for the
CPU+GPU bundle (until they actually put them on the same die at least).

[1] - [https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2017-10-04/apple-
and...](https://www.bloomberg.com/news/features/2017-10-04/apple-and-qualcomm-
s-billion-dollar-war-over-an-18-part)

~~~
acqq
> So I wonder if $11 is what Qualcomm was charging everyone else for the modem
> - like those who also bought its Snapdragon platform - but charged Apple
> $18, and that's why Apple sued them.

The article you've linked is clear: Apple's claim is that they have to pay
Qualcomm royalties (independent of the price of the part itself)
proportionally to the selling price of the device. When Apple sells a 500 USD
and 1000 USD phones with the identical Qualcomm modem, Qualcomm gets twice as
much royalties for the later, and Apple claims it's unfair, given that the
modem is identical.

Tim Cook, January: "so we were in a situation where the more we innovated with
unique features ... the more money Qualcomm would collect for no reason."

Qualcomm would of course say that the 1000 USD phone without their modem
wouldn't sell at all. But the patents for the standards are supposed to be
fair. Is the deal fair? That's what the courts will decide... or as Qualcomm
hopes, Apple will settle before.

------
laythea
I don't know about the article because I cannot stand these "scroll a whole
page down for 3 more words" style websites. Please make it easy to consume
information.

~~~
stouset
Looking at the article, I can't understand what your complaint is.

There are three paragraphs of introductory information, and literally 100% of
the remaining content is images of completely disassembled and knolled iPhone
components, with a brief description next to the parts.

I'm not actually certain how you could represent this information any _better_
than they already have.

------
ktta
Anyone have an idea why they would spend resources to do this? I have a
feeling this has to do with the recent $18 modem article, but this is _every_
iPhone.

~~~
reportingsjr
IHS tries to track market trends by looking at what devices are made of, how
much they think items cost, etc. A large reason for this is for the financial
world so investors can say "ok, the if the last iPhone sold x devices, the new
one will sell y devices. It has a Bosch sensor that we think costs 10 cents so
Bosch will effectively sell z million dollars of those sensors."

They don't do this with just iPhones fyi, they do it with a ton of different
things.

------
devy
Posted this same article 11 hours prior to this post,
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15459028](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15459028)
somehow HN didn't prevent it from repost it again, hmm.

------
relkci
Awesome!

------
RachelF
The cost section is Interesting.

I see the iPhone 7 cost of materials is $237. No wonder Apple makes so much
money!

~~~
swengw
Tim Cook says he's never read a bill of materials that was anywhere close to
accurate. I believe it- the last time I got an iPhone replaced, I asked what
they were doing with the old unit and the person said they were probably going
to reuse the touch id sensor since that was one of the most valuable parts.

~~~
janekm
The Touch ID sensor value in the second hand market is not reflective of the
cost to Apple... it’s expensive because there are no third party replacements,
so the supply is restricted to parts taken from broken phones.

~~~
otterley
...Or newly manufactured ones.

