Nirav Patel

The brightness difference is likely that Apple is multi-sourcing the display between Samsung and BOE on the iPhone 12. The BOE panel probably can’t meet the same lifetime spec as the Samsung panel, so Apple is limiting the brightness on both of them to avoid a scenario where some iPhone 12s can get brighter than others. For the 12 Pro they presumably went with 100% Samsung panels and took advantage of the better specs to unlock higher brightness.

I would guess that with six speakers, two fans and a haptic touchpad, they were running out of spots to place the pair of a magnet and hall effect sensor where they wouldn’t get cross-talk from other magnets. Sticking the pair right on the hinge and measuring rotation makes sense in that there was probably less competition for space there. The tradeoff is the need to calibrate the hall effect response rather than doing a more naive binary threshold.

NEW SAM actually refers to their new intern Sam, who you should blame if you see any RF issues.