We Revisit the iPhone 15 Pro Max, 7 Months After Its Launch – Video

Speaker 1: This is the iPhone 15 Pro Max, and I’ve had it for seven months. I’ve traveled with it, watched TV and movies on it, taken it to concerts and even played connections on it. And it’s time to check in

Speaker 1: For seven months. I have lived with the iPhone 15 Pro Max and there have been high points like standby mode and check-in and five times Zoom photos. And there have been low points like the whole overheating software bug that hit iPhones [00:00:30] running iOS 17 last fall, which didn’t hit my phone, but has since been resolved. Now for months I’ve journaled. I’ve name dropped, I’ve casually sworn in messages without the fear of being autocorrected, and I have thoughts. But let me first say that the video you’re watching was recorded with an iPhone 15 Pro Max by C Nets, John Kim. So if you see this label on the video, you know it’s footage from the iPhone and if you don’t see it then [00:01:00] you know it’s not. And we’ll talk about the thing on the back of his phone later. Let’s do some basics. Now. Here’s how the phone looks after seven months of use.

Speaker 1: Now I don’t use a case. I know I am a monster, so the titanium sides look good, but there is a small nick on the left. The glass back looks good. The ceramic shield screen looks well less good. There are some tiny scratches on it, especially in the lower left corner. And the oleophobic coating seems to be wearing down in a couple of spots. And this isn’t [00:01:30] a negative. I don’t baby this phone, and it’s nice to see that it can hold up mostly to the everyday Patrick Holland experience. The battery health is normal, yay. And the max capacity did drop from a hundred percent to 99%. And my cycle count sits at 112. And remember, this is the 15 Pro Max, which has a larger battery than the regular 15 Pro. In terms of battery life, not much has changed. It still lasts a full day on a single charge, and I can get through a day [00:02:00] and a half when needed and when I’m not using the phone heavily.

Speaker 1: There are times like when I was at the Consumer electronic show in Vegas, or at an event like January Samsung unpacked event when I push the phone super hard, taking photos, recording videos and video, calling in for C Net’s, live video stream over 5G. And I find on those days using low power mode helps offset the battery drain just a bit. The iPhone’s display [00:02:30] is so good, whether I’m watching the bear on it, reading a story, laughing at a New Yorker cartoon playing a game, or well just taking a photo, it looks so good. But if you saw my iPhone 15 Pro Max versus Samson Galaxy S 24 Ultra Camera test video, you might know where I’m going next. See the S 24 ultra screen. Well it looks better in one way. It’s less reflective. And this is one of those situations where [00:03:00] once you see how impactful less reflections are on a screen, you can’t unsee the reflective mess that is the iPhone’s display or the majority of screens on smartphones out there.

Speaker 1: I hope Apple adds the coding or whatever Samsung is doing to the next iPhone screen. And you know what? Let me know in the comments any features you’d like to see Apple add for the next iPhone. I’m also kind of hoping for that rainwater touch feature [00:03:30] that’s on the one plus 12, which lets you use the phone even when the screen is wet. Perhaps the biggest change to the phone besides the cameras which we’ll get to is iOS 17. And let’s start with Dynamic Island. Now we are 19 months from when it debuted on the iPhone 14 Pro and 14 Pro Max, and it still feels underutilized by apps. Yes, it’s great for Uber and Cystic patrols for Apple apps, but I feel there’s more that can be done with it. And I’m not sure this is on Apple. I mean Apple [00:04:00] can’t force developers to use the dynamic island, but it feels like the early days with Dynamic Island, even though it’s not.

Speaker 1: We also have stolen device protection, which protects your accounts and personal information in case your iPhone gets stolen. Turn it on. If you haven’t in iOS 17.3 or later, you go into settings, you tap base ID and passcode and you can enable it there. You’re welcome. In my earlier check-in video for the iPhone 15 Pro, I noted [00:04:30] that I experienced some software bugs in iOS 17, like having Safari freeze and become unresponsive. I’m happy to say I haven’t had this issue in months. And the last thing I’ll say about iOS 17 is there’s a lot of small improvements, which have been really lovely, but the most telling feature that I see more and more people adopting is standby mode, which turns the iPhone into a mini hub when it’s charging in horizontal. Now I like this because you can see widgets [00:05:00] on it, you can see your weather and time on it, you can see photos on it.

Speaker 1: But it’s fun when I go over to a friend’s house and I see people have a stand for their iPhone in the kitchen or in their home office. And it’ll be fun to see what Apple does with standby mode next if they expand it further or what features I might add for iOS 18. Hey, by the way, if you want a more in-depth look at the iPhone 15 and 15 promax. Check out my video review as well as my one month later video, which has the results of C Net’s [00:05:30] battery and charging test for both iPhones.

Speaker 1: Let’s talk cameras now. The cameras are always a big deal on the iPhone and the 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max are no different. Essentially they both have the same cameras, but the 15 Pro has a three times telephoto lens and the 15 Pro Max has a five times telephoto lens. And it kind of makes me wonder what an iPhone 15 Pro Ultra would be like with both a three [00:06:00] x and five x lens. Kind of think like a Galaxy S 24 Ultra. Now, photos from the phones are great and on par with those for the S 24 Ultra and Pixel eight Pro, especially that five X lens. But let’s talk about video for a moment. The iPhone 15 Pro and 15 Pro Max have the ability to record ProRes video and even save files as S-D-R-H-D-R and logs. And so log files might look a little odd to you because they’re designed to be graded later, and that way you can get [00:06:30] the look that you want out of it or match the footage from another camera.

Speaker 1: And one of my favorite parts about video on the 15 Pro is being able to record straight to an external hard drive thanks to the USBC port, which supports USB three speeds. Now to get footage I shot from the iPhone to a computer for edits, I can just unplug the drive from the phone and plug it into my laptop and I don’t have to wait for it to upload and download or use airdrop. [00:07:00] And for this, we’re using a couple of my favorite accessories, the Black Magic Cam app and a Samsung T nine SSD. The Black Magic Cam app is basically the pro camera mode I’ve wanted from Apple on the iPhone for years, and it’s just for video, but it gives you waveforms, zebras to show where an image bright parts are clipping to white. There’s controls for shutter speed. At ISO, I could select Codex, I could select audio formats.

Speaker 1: Heck, there’s even a mini slate. But perhaps [00:07:30] my favorite thing about this app is the fact that it’s free. So mounted on the back of John’s iPhone is the Samsung T nine SSD. Now I’ve used Samsung T drives for a number of years because of their value and portability. Now this T nine drive is rugged too, and Samsung claims it can handle a drop from 9.8 feet. We have not tested this claim, nor will we try to test this claim with this drive. But in my experience traveling and using other T drives, they seem very robust, especially for everyday use. [00:08:00] Speaking of accessories, I also want to highlight this mobile tripod from Peak Design. It’s made of aluminum and attaches to the back of the iPhone and it goes from this tiny slim form factor into this mini tripod. Hey, there’s even a tiny Allen wrench key that magnetically stores in the legs to tighten the ball joint. And I keep this in my backpack with me all the time. It comes in handy for recording video, but also for watching videos. So [00:08:30] in conclusion, the iPhone 15 Promax is doing great. It’s been my everyday carry for the past seven months, and that’s the best approval I can give a phone. If you’re thinking about getting one, I definitely recommend it. And as we get closer to summer, keep an eye out though for Trade-in deals and sales. Lastly, if you enjoyed this video, give it a thumbs up and thank you for watching.