I think I posted a while back that my plan was to get a new phone this year. In past years, I’ve always gone for the year old models but this year my plan was to buy the latest model. I waited, sometimes patiently, for Apple to announce their new phones. There really weren’t many secrets on it since almost everything had been leaked ahead of time.

My resolve was to get a new phone with these new releases but when the time came I started wavering a bit. Part of me thought maybe I should stick it out another year and wait for the next models. Apple is likely to release 5G phones and a few other changes are expected to fall more in line with other similarly priced phones. I even considered getting the low-end model this time but then there were concerns about the resolution which is actually worse than my old phone.

On Friday, I had to take Lego Lover to an appointment in West Perth so we walked into the city proper and met the Scientist for lunch. After eating we walked across the street to the Apple store. We’d been watching it while eating outside and the lines weren’t a big deal at this point. Lego Lover wouldn’t go into the store so the Scientist waited with him outside while I went into check out the new models. It was crowded but honestly not really much worse than usual. They had several tables with the phones displayed so I checked out the low end model and it fit in my hand nicely. But I knew from early on the screen just wasn’t going to do it. It just looked rather flat. I went on to look at the Pro model and it was lovely but it was kind of small. When I was younger this wouldn’t have been an issue but my eyes like the larger screens now. I tried out the Pro Max and it felt similar to my old phone. It was kind of a no-brainer and I went back outside to the lines to put in my order. That led me back inside to wait for the next available Apple person to assist me. It was all stream-lined and went pretty smoothly. They had older model phones off to the side to try out. I was met by a few store people who were just almost over-the-top gung ho about the new phones. Before I knew it, I was at the front and was being assisted and then I had this fancy black box in my bag and was walking out. It didn’t take too long at all.

We had a few other things to do then we came home by bus and once I was settled in at home, I opened my new box. This just reminded me there are people who unbox new items on Youtube, which I find kind of hilarious. I could have had my new phone set up in store but I am quite okay to do it myself. Once I plugged it in, it was smooth sailing. I will say the process is really easy these days if you have another Apple product. It just gets the information and transfers it over. It then was able to transfer my files from my old phone. The biggest time waiting was for all my apps to download and even that goes quicker now we have the faster NBN access that goes at higher speeds.

I ordered a case online that night and the next day I ended up buying another one to use in the meantime. This is the down side of buying brand new because in the past I was able to get a cheap case easily. I spent more than I normally would have but also got a protective film put on. I spent far less for the case this time than last even though it’s the same company (Spigen) that makes it.

As for the phone to use, it’s been a dream so far. I’m still getting used to the slight differences to the screen but it’s all been pretty good. I finally tried out the fancy camera yesterday and it was brilliant to use. I’m amazed at the quality of the images shown and will definitely be making more use of this camera.

The other cool thing is I can use the Qi charger that the Scientist uses for his Samsung phone.

I will add that the guy that helped me in store also mentioned an update to the WatchOs and I updated it on Saturday. There’s now a noise level sensor you can turn on to see how loud it is where you are. It can remain on all the time but I don’t really see much point of it and turned it off that night. It’s kind of neat but I find it kind of a weird addition to go on about like the Apple store dude did. :D

With the phone camera I took a new photo of the Scientist and now have it as my watch face. It came out really well. :)