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iPhone 6 Plus Review
Apr 30, 2024
For years Apple fans have prayed for the day that they'd get a larger screen on their beloved iOS devices, well the iPhone 6 Plus was officially released this past Friday, find out if it's the right phone for you by checking out our review. Make sure to subscribe to Cult of Mac so you don't miss a single video!
View Video Transcript
0:00
Hi, I'm Steve Smith with Cool2Mac.com
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The iPhone 6 Plus has been out for a couple of days now, but I want to know, is this the
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best phablet you can buy right now? Let's take a look and find out
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So let's talk about the display. The iPhone 6 Plus features a 5.5 inch display, the biggest that's ever been on any iPhone
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But it also makes the 6 Plus itself a larger phone than the Galaxy Note 4
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But with the larger screen, that does mean you have a larger 2950 mAh battery and a larger
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real estate for text and images to be displayed on the screen
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Having a larger display doesn't mean you lose out on quality though. In fact, this is the nicest display I've seen on any phone, period
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Apple's new generation Retina HD delivers a 1920 x 1080 resolution, which means there's
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401 pixels per inch in the iPhone 6 Plus, which is the same resolution as a full HD television
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Which means the iPhone is better than ever for watching full HD movies, which I found
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myself doing a lot of, completely forgetting about my MacBook or even my TV
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Also, games look absolutely stunning. The few I tried look jaw-dropping on the iPhone 6 Plus, thanks to what Apple calls dual display pixels
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Colours are brighter and blacks are darker than ever. The contrast is pretty much perfect on this screen, all whilst having much better viewing angles
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Even with the larger form factor, the iPhone 6 Plus still fits in my pocket with no problems
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As it's so thin, I barely even notice it's in my pocket whilst I'm walking about
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But the handset itself is larger, so it is a little bit more cumbersome and I did find
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myself holding it with two hands a lot of the time. Even with the introduction of reachability, where I can double tap the home button to
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bring the top screen down, I still struggled to use the 6 Plus with one hand
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A feature that has improved with every iteration is the camera, and the 6 Plus is no exception
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It features an 8 megapixel camera which has been improved from the 5s, with a bunch of upgrades
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Firstly, they have added something Apple calls focus pixels, which gives you a much faster
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autofocus thanks to a new image signal processor. This means there's always a great continuous autofocus whilst filming, pulling focus back
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and forth between two subjects. With the 6 Plus, there's also optical image stabilisation, where the camera inside moves
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up, down, left and right, much like a DSLR to try and counteract the movements and shakes
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of your hands, resulting in a much more fluid video, almost killing off those shaky iPhone
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videos and vastly improving the quality in low light. Panoramas are also boosted with up to 43 megapixels, and iOS 8 has actually improved
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when stitching all of these photos together, making a much more seamless shot
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Finally, one of the killer features of the iPhone 5s, the slow-mo video, has now doubled
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the amount of frames per second, resulting in even slower, cooler videos, allowing you
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to get shots like this. This is truly one of the best cameras I've ever tried on a phone
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Along with the two new iPhones, Apple also released its latest operating system for the
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iPhones and iPads, iOS 8, just this past week. But due to the 6 Plus' larger display, there's a few extra tidbits for the iPhone 6 Plus
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including a split-screen view for many of the apps, including messages and mail, which
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makes much more sense, especially if you do a lot of work on your iPhone
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You can easily scroll through lists on the left-hand side and still have plenty of space
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on the right to read your messages or emails. You can view avatars in your messages to see pictures of who you're speaking to
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And in the near future, I'm pretty sure developers will make much more use of this
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With the iPhone 5s, Apple introduced the world's first 64-bit processor, giving you better
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multitasking and 3D gaming than ever before. But, as it took developers a little time to optimise their apps for the new processor
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the benefits couldn't truly be seen. But, now apps you'd open run simultaneously with next to no lag, and 3D-heavy games full
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of particle generators, lighting environments and much more look absolutely stunning. Again, the 5.5-inch screen does help that out
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Thanks to the new A8 chip, you'll also be able to run your graphic-heavy apps for longer
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before the iPhone begins to slow down and struggle. And it's up to 50% more energy efficient than the A7, meaning your battery will last longer
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whilst crushing candy or firing birds at pigs. Again, this will only improve with time as developers push the limits of the A8 chip
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which should be a lot sooner than later thanks to the addition of Metal with iOS 8
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Even with the huge growth of the iPhone 6 Plus's screen, this is still an iPhone down
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to its core, and will definitely swing back some Android users who have been waiting for
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a larger screen. The iPhone 6 also brings NFC, exclusively for the use of Apple Pay, which will be great
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when it starts appearing in the US from October. Along with voice calling over WiFi, the iPhone 6 Plus overall brings some great updates to
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the iPhone line-up. It's less of a huge leap for the iPhone, more of a refinement and a larger screen
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The phone has an amazing build quality as you'd expect from Apple, and feels great to hold in the hands thanks to the new smooth edges
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Essentially, it's just an iPhone with a larger screen, but once you start using it
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it's much more. I find myself watching more and more videos, reading more stories and being more productive
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with my work, as I've got a lot more space to do so
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Yes, Apple took longer than most to bring out a larger screen phone, but it's definitely
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the closest to perfect
#Consumer Electronics