iPhone 12 Pro Max
An experience beyond compare
Smartphone segments are expanding beyond the premium and lagship categories and the Pro series of iPhones fairly justify that segment and pricing. And for those who do not have such deep pockets, luckily, Apple has kept a few more segments populated including the SE, XR and 11. Being a photography magazine, we are committed to review the device with the best camera in the series. So here we have the iPhone 12 Pro Max on our test bench.
Design & Build Quality
The latest iPhone 12-series brings a feeling of déjà vu to Apple fans because the company has revived a design that debuted with the iPhone 4 and continued till the 5S. The lat bezel was one of the design elements that set iPhones apart from the herds of devices with rounded edges. This time, the band has been crafted out of surgical grade stainless steel, similar to the 11-series. The only rounded elements are the corners apart from the buttons and camera module. The iPhone 12 Pro series is available in Paci ic Blue, Gold, Silver and Graphite inishes.
The screen of the 12 Pro and 12 Pro Max are protected with a layer of Ceramic Shield, which, Apple states, is the toughest glass in any smartphone. By Apple’s statement, this has been made possible by altering the toughness and optical properties of ceramic and introducing such nano-scale ceramic crystals into glass. Further, to make the glass scratch-resistance, Apple used dual ion-exchange process that is usually used on the back glass. The glass panels now sit inside the protective ring offered by the stainless steel band and hence enhances survivability in accidental drops compared to curved glass designs. The camera lenses are protected by sapphire crystals.
The iPhone 12 Pro Max offers IP68 ingress protection rating, which means that the device is completely protected from dust and is protected against water ingress even in continuous immersion in 6 metres of water up to 30 minutes in original shipping condition. The phone measures 78.1 x 160.8 x 7.4 mm (W x H x D) and weighs 226 g.
Key Features
The iPhone 12 Pro and Max are powered by Apple’s latest A14 Bionic chip, claimed to be the irst SoC integrated with a 5-nanometre process. With 11.8 billion transistors packed onto a single chip, it is blazing fast and offers greater power ef iciency. The 16-core Neural Engine can reportedly handle 11 trillion operations per second, making it an AI and machine learning powerhouse, capable of up to 80 percent faster processing of data compared to the previous edition. The device also integrates a new image signal processor (ISP) that aids in Dolby Vision recording.
The iPhone 12 Pro Max features a 6.7inch Super Retina XDR all-screen OLED display offering a resolution of 2778 x 1284 pixels at 458 ppi.
The 12 Pro Max sports a triple camera system similar to the 11 Pro Max, yet more re ined. This includes an ultrawide angle, a wide-angle and a telephoto camera. While the ultra-wide and wide cameras offer the same focal lengths (13 mm and 26 mm respectively) as that of the 11 Pro Max, the telephoto lens range has been increased from 52 mm (2x) in the 11 Pro Max to 65 mm (2.5x). The ultra-wide lens offers f/2.4 aperture, and the lens is constructed with ive elements. The wide-angle lens offers f/1.6 aperture and is constructed with seven elements. This camera features a sensor-shift Optical Image Stabilisation (OIS), a irst in a smartphone. The telephoto lens features f/2.2 aperture and is constructed with six elements. This camera offers lens-shift OIS.
Apart from the focal lengths, the camera
system now offers Apple ProRAW, providing you with all the details for creative control. The Raw format embeds all the standard Raw information, along with the Apple image pipeline data. Noise reduction and multi-frame exposure adjustments are already applied even in the Raw image so that you can start with an image that already carries the best quality possible from the device.
However, the hottest technology in this device is probably, the LiDAR (Light Detection and Ranging) scanner, also known as TOF (Time of Flight) scanner. This scanner allows the camera to form an accurate depth map of the scene by calculating the optical path followed by a laser beam from the delay between the incident and re lected beams. This aids AR apps to render realistic imagery quickly and accurately. This also assists the camera in fast autofocus even in low light, thereby enhancing the quality of night mode portraits with beautifully blurred backgrounds.
Night mode is now available in both wide and ultra-wide cameras. The wide camera now has a 47 percent larger sensor and larger pixels so that it lets in more light. The 12 Pro Max offers a total optical zoom of 5x. The sensor-shift IS in the wide-angle camera makes up to 5000 adjustments per second. The 12 Pro Max features Deep Fusion, which was introduced last year. This is an advanced form of HDR that utilises the power of machine learning and computational photography along with stacking of multiple images to deliver results that are beyond what normal HDR can deliver. The phone also features Smart HDR 3 for both still and videos along with 4K Dolby Vision up to 60 fps. The new devices offer 10-bit HDR, up from 8 bits in the last year’s models. The neural engine has been trained to distinguish most scenes that you are likely to capture, and adjust the various settings according to the scene without over-saturating or oversharpening the inal image. Videos are captured in Dolby Vision end to end from capture to playback. The 12 Pro series allows you to edit Dolby Vision videos in the Photos app, iMovie or Clips. The wide camera with the large sensor allows you to capture Night mode Time-lapse videos with a tripod. The cameras also feature cinematic video stabilisation in 4K, 1080p and 720p along with continuous autofocus during video.
The front facing TrueDepth camera is a 12-megapixel unit with f/2.2 aperture. This time, Apple has extended the premium features such as Night mode, Deep Fusion, Smart HDR 3 and Dolby Vision to the TrueDepth camera as well. The cameras offer portrait lighting and True Tone lash. For audio playback, the device uses Dolby Atmos spatial audio.
The iPhone 12 Pro Max is available in storage capacities of 128 , 256 and 512 . The phone accepts dual SIM in
Ergonomics
the form of one nano SIM and one eSIM. The device supports 5 (sub-6 Hz), Wi-Fi 6 (802.11ax) with 2x2 MIMO, Bluetooth 5.0 and NFC with reader mode. The phone uses a built-in Lithiumion battery, reported to be 3687 mAh. The device supports MagSafe wireless charging up to 15W and Qi wireless charging up to 7.5W. With the 20W Apple power adapter (sold separately), it supports fast charge that can top up 50 percent charge in around 30 minutes.
The 12 Pro Max certainly looks and feels larger than the 11 Pro Max, but if you keep one over the other, we can understand that the thickness and breadth are almost the same, though the 12 Pro Max is slightly taller. The apparent change in depth and width are because of the lat bezels and larger camera bump on the iPhone 12 Pro Max. The phone offers a good grip and the larger screen area offered by the reduced bezel size provides a great experience while watching movies and playing games. It also helps if you are in the habit of editing images and videos on phone. The phone might not it small pockets, but it can be comfortably carried around in your jeans front pockets. Here we are not repeating the immaculate features of the 11 Pro Max such as Face ID, which have been ine-tuned further in the 12 Pro Max.
The iPhone 12 series does not include a charging adaptor in the package: only a
USB-C to Lightning cable. Apple mentions environmental impact for this change. The package is considerably smaller, allowing the company to accommodate more units in a single shipment, thereby reducing carbon emissions. You can use any USB Type-C adaptor to charge the phone. Since most mid-to-high end phones are compatible with wireless charging, getting a Qi-standard wireless charger will let you charge these phones, irrespective of the brand. The phone is compatible with MagSafe magnetic accessories including wireless charger, cases and pouch.
Performance
The 12 Pro Max came along just when we thought we had found the perfect iPhone in the 11 Pro Max with lots of power for gaming and multimedia, and probably the best camera we have seen in an iPhone. The 12 Pro Max happens to exceed the capabilities beyond what we normal users would be able to perceive in our normal use. The cameras have been improved with Night mode and Deep Fusion getting polished further and extended beyond the main cameras. These improvements indeed make photography a pleasure with this device, especially hand-held low-light images.
The phone could be considered a perfect blend of hardware and computational photography, though we feel that it is time for Apple to move beyond the 12-megapixel camera to a slightly better resolution. Night Mode with Deep Fusion picks up ine details while retaining the ambient colours without making them look arti icial. Low-light images were comparatively less noisy than what we saw in the 11 Pro Max, thanks to the larger sensor. Videos were smooth and crisp as long as we remained within optical zoom limits, beyond which, the clips turned noisy as expected.
The 12 Pro Max is power-packed for most high-frame-rate games and multimedia. And it provides great sound, thanks to the Dolby Atmos experience. However, the phone heats up considerably while playing games and also while charging wirelessly. We are not sure whether to be worried about this since this could also indicate that the phone is dissipating heat more ef iciently via the metal bezel and back surface. The battery life is probably the best in an iPhone and a single charge would last about two days on light use and more than a day on heavy use. The 20W adapter charges phone fast enough with about 50 percent charge in 30 minutes and up to 85 percent in an hour. Thereafter, the charging reduces to a drip, probably to protect the battery from extreme temperatures and thus extending battery life.
The 12 Pro Max is not without its laws. At times, while browsing a web page, the top corner menus and buttons become unresponsive, probably due to the overlay of network information. And there are times when web pages display at a reduced size while switching between landscape and portrait orientations. However, these are common glitches with iPhones when a new device with a different screen size hits the market and these last only till a few irmware and app updates.
Value for Money
The iPhone 12 Pro Max is the most expensive series of iPhones in the market with prices starting at Rs.129,900 for the 128 B variant. The 256 B version retails at Rs.139,900, while the 512 B variant is priced at Rs.159,900. We would not call these as value-for-money, but these devices reign in a segment where money is not the criteria for sales.
| SP