Apple unveiled the Vision Pro mixed reality headset during its WWDC 2023 event, adding another product to its ecosystem. While the thing itself won’t actually be available until the first half of next year, the company is likely to be giving its upcoming iPhones improved tools for them to be better integrated with the headset. Or so claims analyst Ming-Chi Kuo.
On Twitter, the analyst predicts that with the iPhone 15 that’s coming later this year, the company will be upgrading its Ultra Wideband (UWB) chip for better efficiency and reliability. This will see the production process go “from 16nm to the more advanced 17nm”. Which makes sense, considering the current chip that Apple products use for UWB, dubbed the U1 chip, first appeared alongside the iPhone 11, which itself was released four years ago.
Apple將積極升級硬體產品規格以建構更有競爭力的Vision Pro生態
1. Vision Pro的成功關鍵之一在於生態，當中包括能否與其他Apple硬體產品整合，而與此相關的主要硬體規格為Wi-Fi與UWB。
2. iPhone 15採用的UWB將規格升級，生產製程由16nm升級到更先進的7nm，有利近距離互動的效能提升或降低耗電。…
— 郭明錤 (Ming-Chi Kuo) (@mingchikuo) June 19, 2023
Beyond this year’s iPhones, Kuo predicts that next year’s iPhone 16 will also likely get upgraded to WiFi 7. This will let it “be more conducive to Apple’s integration of hardware products running on the same local network and provide a better ecosystem experience”. That being said, while this upgrade will indeed provide a better experience when connected to a local wireless network, it sounds like an upgrade that any phone would be due to get anyway.
While these are nice upgrades to get anyway, it remains to be seen what sort of direct impact it will have when they are used with the Apple Vision Pro mixed reality headset. After all, the company hasn’t exactly shared what sort of UWB features that it has nor the specific WiFi certification that it uses. And as usual, analyst predictions should always be taken with a pinch of salt.
(Source: Ming-Chi Kuo / Twitter)
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