What would today’s computers and phones be like without Apple?

Would laptops, tablets and phones be completely different if Apple never existed?

  • Yes

    Votes: 27 34.6%

  • No

    Votes: 51 65.4%
  • Total voters
    78
RetroGamingUK

RetroGamingUK

Member
I recently saw a thread discussing how tech design and innovation has stalled with laptops, tablets and smartphones having largely stayed the same for well over a decade apart from specs.

Thinking back, despite Apple not inventing these devices, they do seem to be almost solely responsible for their designs.

Browse any electronic retails these days and the laptops, tablets, phones and smartwatches all very much trace their user design roots (both in hardware AND software) to Apple products.

Here's 3 that jump out to me due to their designs being ubiquitous today, but there are many more.

1983 - LisaOS
Xerox were actually the first company to come up with these devices concept of the mouse and GUI but Apple were the first to launch the tech, and developed it to work in a way that persists today.

xaI9s1q.jpeg



1994 - PowerBook 500
First ever laptop to include a trackpad, Ethernet and stereo sound. The original PowerBook in 1990 featured a trackball, but it was the first to put the cursor control front and centre.

G2bPs56.jpeg


2007 - iPhone

While not the first all-screen smartphone (that goes to the LG Prada) the big story here was all about iOS featuring a boatload of multitouch features that revolutionised the way we interacted with computers

e0fO2rw.jpeg



What do you guys think?

How do you imagine the direction of laptops, tablets, phones, watches and interfaces would have gone without Apple?

Would we have the likes of Windows and Samsung Galaxy, or would things have gone in a completely different direction?
 
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PC would probably be the same, smartphones would take longer to become what they are, iPhone in 2007 felt like some crazy tech from the future, Android took until mid 2010s to not be garbage
 
SimTourist said:
PC would probably be the same, smartphones would take longer to become what they are, iPhone in 2007 felt like some crazy tech from the future, Android took until mid 2010s to not be garbage
Click to expand...

Everyone was way off the mark.

Microsoft were just plodding along with the awkward Windows Mobile 6 and had to go completely back to the drawing board with 7 after initially shunning iPhone's innovations resulting in it not launching until late 2010.

BlackBerry's reaction was thinking they'd be fine before attempting to copy it with the absolutely dreadful Storm in 2008.

Nokia and co seemed to be just copying BaclkBerryOS with Symbian while focusing on cheap feature phones thinking that they were the future.

 
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No iPhone, no AppStore, no swipe, no pinch, no twitter, no X, no Musk, peace on earth.

Steve Jobs condemned humanity.

Seriously, though: It was inevitable. It´s like asking "What would have happened if we didnt get the game boy?"
 
Trunx81 said:
No iPhone, no AppStore, no swipe, no pinch, no twitter, no X, no Musk, peace on earth.

Steve Jobs condemned humanity.

Seriously, though: It was inevitable. It´s like asking "What would have happened if we didnt get the game boy?"
Click to expand...

I never understood this link between smartphones and social media.

Apple certainly weren't responsible for any of it.

I lay the blame the blame for society's destruction at the feet of this maniac…

lUL30ms.jpeg
 
Phones yes, I remember the iphone 1 I got at launch. That shit was awesome.

Computers pretty much the same as they are now.
 
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So a lot more customisable laptops with a more rugged look.

Kinda miss the physical keyboard on phone. It allowed me to touch type. Though auto correct helps (am trying to touch type )
 
RetroGamingUK said:
I never understood this link between smartphones and social media.

Apple certainly weren't responsible for any of it.

I lay the blame the blame for society's destruction at the feet of this maniac…

lUL30ms.jpeg
Click to expand...

Tom the Terrible and Mark the Malicious.

They ended society as we know it.
 
jufonuk said:
So a lot more customisable laptops with a more rugged look.

Kinda miss the physical keyboard on phone. It allowed me to touch type. Though auto correct helps (am trying to touch type )
Click to expand...

I remember using a Blackberry Bold at work and as soon as I got an iPhone 3G it just became a pain the in the arse to use.

BlackBerry tried to keep the keyboard by making it slide down from behind the screen (Torch and Priv) but by then touch-screen keyboards were ubiquitous and sliding down felt inconvenient.

Nowadays anything that strays from iOS or Android or tries to be anything other than a 6 inch widescreen is an instant flop.

Just as the form factor for laptops hasn't changed in decades I think we've reached the point where phones and tablets have matured in terms of design and calcified.
 
obviously it would. you don't need to like Apple to know that.

the iphone is one of the biggest products to ever have released. sure there were smartphones before but the iPhone is what made smartphones go mainstream. the original iPhone blew my mind at the time... it was an ipod, phone, and mini computer with a touch screen. i do remember browsing the web on my old motorola or samsung flip/sliding phones. so yeah Apple weren't the first but the way they done it was much better. the app store on iPhone OS is another major product. almost everything can be done with an app these days. iphone also helped the rise of facebook/instagram. social media as we know it seemed to blow up around 2009-2010.

nevermind computers....the world would be very different if Apple didn't make the smartphone popular/accessible/user friendly or introduce the app store.

the ipad was almost important. it was the final blow to most people using a desktop/laptop computer. i know a lot of people still use them.... my PC is my main computer and I have a MacBook. but the average person does everything on their phone or ipad.
 
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RetroGamingUK said:
I never understood this link between smartphones and social media.

Apple certainly weren't responsible for any of it.

I lay the blame the blame for society's destruction at the feet of this maniac…

lUL30ms.jpeg
Click to expand...
Social media isn't the problem though per se. Social media on mobile phones is.
Internet should have stayed on the home computer.

@topic: I think it's far fetched to think no one else would have come up with something like the iPhone. Apple were just first.
 
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Makoto-Yuki said:
obviously it would. you don't need to like Apple to know that.

the iphone is one of the biggest products to ever have released. sure there were smartphones before but the iPhone is what made smartphones go mainstream. the original iPhone blew my mind at the time... it was an ipod, phone, and mini computer with a touch screen. i do remember browsing the web on my old motorola or samsung flip/sliding phones. so yeah Apple weren't the first but the way they done it was much better. the app store on iPhone OS is another major product. almost everything can be done with an app these days. iphone also helped the rise of facebook/instagram. social media as we know it seemed to blow up around 2009-2010.

nevermind computers....the world would be very different if Apple didn't make the smartphone popular/accessible/user friendly or introduce the app store.

the ipad was almost important. it was the final blow to most people using a desktop/laptop computer. i know a lot of people still use them.... my PC is my main computer and I have a MacBook. but the average person does everything on their phone or ipad.
Click to expand...
this! I remember using my Psion Revo and a Nokia 6210 infrared modem to read and send emails, for horrendous prices. iPhone also introduced modern tarifs with data volume. Playing Nokias N-Gage online without wifi was soooo expensive ..
When the iPhone launched I bought the Nokia N95 because of the camera, but quickly exchanged it for the iPhone. When the AppStore launched, it was .. magical. First download I have in my list: The Facebook App, lol. Im not even using Facebook anymore
 
It's crazy how much in common 1983's LisaOS has with modern day MacOS, they nailed so much in their first attempt.

When Windows finally launched in late 1985 it didn't even have overlapping windows (that wouldn't come until Windows 2.0 in Nov 1987).



 
Probably nothing changes, nokia already had a touchscreen smartphone in 2004 with the 7710, at most the iPhone accelerated the adoption by a few years because of strong marketing.
 
Makoto-Yuki said:
the ipad was almost important. it was the final blow to most people using a desktop/laptop computer. i know a lot of people still use them.... my PC is my main computer and I have a MacBook. but the average person does everything on their phone or ipad.
Click to expand...

Gen Z is growing up on the iPad and it's going to have big changes for the way all computers work in future.

I remember in the late 90s everyone I know at school had a Windows machine and we could hit the ground running when working in offices. To many kids today PCs are alien, even many schools are using ChromeOS instead.

I think this will have a huge impact on the way software is developed in future and I think MacOS will become more like iPadOS as a result.

 
Reizo Ryuu said:
Probably nothing changes, nokia already had a touchscreen smartphone in 2004 with the 7710, at most the iPhone accelerated the adoption by a few years because of strong marketing.
Click to expand...

Apple had become a status symbol by then. They were already very chique at the time.

It was also the first time I remember seeing a phone not being subsidized by the phone companies. It was only offered at full price ($499) and only on AT&T.
 
I had an XDA IIi in 04-05ish and, while it wasn't quite the same as we have now, I'd still consider it a smart phone. It had an on screen keyboard, you could install apps on it, watch porn, send and receive emails, edit office documents and print them, play games, and use it for sat nav. At the time it seemed a bit cumbersome but nowadays pretty much all phones are as big as it.

O2 XDA IIi - Full phone specifications

m.gsmarena.com m.gsmarena.com
 
Apple really helped with form and function. I think they made a generational leap with it. Tech probably gets there, but not as fast. Market is probably dominated by Nokia.
 
AJUMP23 said:
Apple really helped with form and function. I think they made a generational leap with it. Tech probably gets there, but not as fast. Market is probably dominated by Nokia.
Click to expand...
Nintendo DS Lite would have never happened like it has without Apple. Think about it!
 
NeoIkaruGAF said:
They'd have ports and headphone jacks and keyboards that are a pleasure to use.
Click to expand...

I remember when iMac was unveiled in 1998 without a floppy drive and I, at the time, couldn't imagine not having one. Then the market became flooded with all kinds of USB storage options.

I was miffed when they removed DVD drives though and still wish they had them, but again the rest of the industry flawed as they would do with ditching headphone jacks down the line.
 
RetroGamingUK said:
Point of thread totally missed

Now let's look at Palm in a world where iPhone doesn't exist…

OtTtcOK.jpeg
Click to expand...
Now let's look at iPhone where LG didn't have the first all screen phone with touchscreen that didn't require a stylus. This post is cherry picking at its finest just to give Apple way more credit than they are due
 
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Days like these... said:
Now let's look at iPhone where LG didn't have the first all screen phone with touchscreen that didn't require a stylus. This post is cherry picking at its fines just to give Apple way more credit than they are due
Click to expand...

Ridiculous

The LG Prada wasn't only revealed a few weeks before iPhone, absolutely nothing about it influenced iPhone. That's beside it being a straight up trash phone.

Palm Pre released two and a half years after the iPhone reveal. Just a ridiculous comparison.
 
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RetroGamingUK RetroGamingUK Are you feeling nostalgic for old wars or something? This is the second thread this week where you're trying to pin something as being invented completely by one company/platform :P
 
RetroGamingUK said:
Ridiculous

The LG Prada wasn't only revealed a few weeks before iPhone, absolutely nothing about it influenced iPhone. That's beside it being a straight up trash phone.

Palm Pre released two and a half years after the iPhone reveal. Just a ridiculous comparison.
Click to expand...
It was still first and with a touchscreen. Cope more my point still stands. Cherry picking to give Apple more credit than they are due. Lend me your Apple reality distortion field™ so I can see the light.
 
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The iPhone review was legendary, but hardware-wise (we are not talking about iOS software integration) this would have probably happened in the next 12-18 months. These things mostly converge with time till one company gets a jump, then it opens the floodgates.
 
Cyberpunkd said:
The iPhone review was legendary, but hardware-wise (we are not talking about iOS software integration) this would have probably happened in the next 12-18 months. These things mostly converge with time till one company gets a jump, then it opens the floodgates.
Click to expand...

I believe the same, I think Apple served as an accelerator rather than being a revolutionary new technology.

Apple does do a good job at packaging. They took a lot of existing technology, packaged it in an attractive compact design, and added enough innovation software wise and IOS polish where the typical consumer was blown away at the reveal.
 
Without Apple you'd be able to plug your phone in via USB and easily drag\drop photos and other media to your PC without needing to install some fetid piece of shit everything app.
 
Days like these... said:
It was still first and with a touchscreen. Cope more my point still stands. Cherry picking to give Apple more credit than they are due. Lend me your Apple reality distortion field™ so I can see the light.
Click to expand...

No cope required, neither LG or Palm make phones anymore, the market rejected them. However I will credit the latter for the cards feature in WebOS, which is present in both iOS and Android.
 
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Something like an iPhone/iOS would've emerged simply as a function of Moore's law. Mobile processors got fast enough that you could have a rich OS around ARMv7 times. If it wasn't Apple someone else would've ended up occupying that slot eventually.
 
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Days like these... said:
RetroGamingUK RetroGamingUK per Wikipedia
"After the release of the iPhone the head of the LG Mobile Handset R&D Center was quoted saying he believed Apple had stolen the idea from the Prada after it was announced as part of the iF Design Award, where it won a prize in September 2006.[13][14]
Click to expand...

Are you implying that Apple completely changed the design of the iPhone between September 2006 and January 2007?

If so then you're clearly nuts, talk about clutching at straws!
 
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Days like these... said:
the guy who designed the phone thinks so.
Click to expand...

He would say that.

He thought he'd designed something incredible that was going to catapult his company to the top of the sales chart only for Apple to show something vastly superior in every single way featuring an all body screen mere months later.

Apple stole his thunder, but the allegations are ludicrous, the amount of painstaking attention to detail that went into every aspect of the iPhone was crazy, to suggest they just copied LG is ridiculous and sheer desperation.
 
Almost as ludicrous as apple inventing and or perfecting everything. Can't wait for them to invent the foldable phone in 2026, 8 years after the 1st foldable was released.
 
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I think laptops would be in a better, if thicker, place. Apple always pushed for slimmer, sleek laptops at the cost of better hardware with more room for cooling, larger batteries, better keyboards. Now everything has to be as thin as possible, Though Apple's M chips have corrected the space limitations. I would still rather have a heavier 1" thick laptop with beefy hardware, proper cooling, larger battery and a proper keyboard, none of this chiclet bullshit.
 
The Fartist said:
I think laptops would be in a better, if thicker, place. Apple always pushed for slimmer, sleek laptops at the cost of better hardware with more room for cooling, larger batteries, better keyboards. Now everything has to be as thin as possible, Though Apple's M chips have corrected the space limitations. I would still rather have a heavier 1" thick laptop with beefy hardware, proper cooling, larger battery and a proper keyboard, none of this chiclet bullshit.
Click to expand...
My thoughts exactly.
I really appreciate what they did to make laptops lighter and to bring their battery life into the realm of true portability, or we'd probably still believe that 6-hour battery life for a laptop is a miracle.
But even going from a 2014 Macbook Air to a M1 model, the typing experience has regressed so much for the sake of bezel-less design alone. And I still used to type better on my 2011 Asus laptop than on my first MBA.
The lack of ports is also a bummer. Apple made dongles mandatory for everyone who deviates even slightly from the ideal use they established for their devices.
 
NeoIkaruGAF said:
My thoughts exactly.
I really appreciate what they did to make laptops lighter and to bring their battery life into the realm of true portability, or we'd probably still believe that 6-hour battery life for a laptop is a miracle.
But even going from a 2014 Macbook Air to a M1 model, the typing experience has regressed so much for the sake of bezel-less design alone. And I still used to type better on my 2011 Asus laptop than on my first MBA.
The lack of ports is also a bummer. Apple made dongles mandatory for everyone who deviates even slightly from the ideal use they established for their devices.
Click to expand...
Of course, how could I forget the ports! That's also a huge no-no from me. I refuse to use a laptop that doesn't have at least 2 USBA ports and an Ethernet port, especially for work (IT).
 
Having worked in windows mobile during pocket pc through us finally giving up on the phone, this thread is threatening my mental health ;)

I loved working on that product and it was the most fun I had at any job I had. I was swimming in the corporate kool-aid. When they finally pulled the plug, I was so angry, I lost a lot of faith in the company. I would dare say that is when my depression started because I thought we had a kick ass product and we spent a lot of time just wasted. You think Apple phones were advanced? You should have seen the phones Japan was putting out. They had some kick ass products and really cool ideas.. In my opinion, they are so quick to embrace Western Culture that I think they could have kicked ass in the phone market if they told Apple to go to hell.
 
We have the same discussion with Nintendo. Did Nintendo invent the analog stick? No, but they where the first to implement it in a controller for a successfull console. Same goes for rumble, wireless controllers, the d-pad, etc. etc. etc.

Its like standing before a simple piece of art, saying "Oh, I could have done that as well" - sure, but you didnt.
 
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