News & Reviews:   Apple iPhone SE announce

Apparently U Mobile have created a page where you can register your interest for the upcoming Apple iPhone SE phone plan from them as well. Unlike the other telcos you can get the iPhone SE using their U MicroCredit installment plans or their UPackage all-in-one installment plan. You can choose to receive updates for both options as well.

Celcom has opened up a registration of interest page where you can sign up to get the latest news about their upcoming Apple iPhone SE offerings. This sign-up page is not for pre-booking purposes, but by subscribing to their mailing list, you can receive exclusive updates and be one of the earliest to know what plan they have in store for the phone. Apple iPhone SE was made available in the US on 31 March 2016. Therefore, the phone might be available in Malaysia around the end of May 2016.

In our first weekly roundup this week at TechNave, Malaysia's Technology hub, the biggest event was quite obviously the launch of the Huawei P9 and P9 Plus where they confirmed their dual camera and LEICA partnership rumours spectacularly. In addition, the Huawei TalkBand B3 was also launched. Fans of Apple devices got an early suprise as the Apple iPhone SE got its official pricing from RM1949 while the Apple iPad Pro 9.7-inch was priced from RM2699. 

Calling all Malaysian Apple fans! The Apple Store website in Malaysia has finally released the price tag for the iPhone SE, and depending on the storage variant you want, it's priced at RM1949 for the 16GB version and RM2449 for the 64GB version, which is considered very affordable due to its specifications inside the hood. To recap the tech-specs, the iPhone SE features:-

So far, from the good reviews we have seen, the new Apple iPhone SE does sound like a pretty good phone and even more so when we found out that the iPhone SE has a better AnTuTu score than its sibling the iPhone 6s. However, how well does the iPhone SE fare against a durability test? Will this phone bend easily like the old iPhone 6s?

Since it is based upon the old 5 inch iPhone 5s, it is not supposed to bend easily because it has an overall smaller dimension than its older siblings. Check out the video below from SquareTrade to see the answer.

While Apple has never said that any of their iPhones are water proof or water resistant, on occasion, some iPhones have taken a splash or dip and survived. ZachStraley decided to put the Apple iPhone 5S, iPhone SE and iPhone 6s to the test, by dunking all three in water for an extended period of time. Suffice to say, the iPhone SE not only survives but seems to be able to work right out of the water. Check out the video to see how the other two iPhones fared.

While the upcoming Apple iPhone SE may have the same tech specs or hardware as the higher-end (and higher-priced) iPhone 6s, it turns out that the smaller iPhone SE may be better, at least where AnTuTu is concerned. A recent testing showed that the iPhone SE scored 134358 in AnTuTu while the iPhone 6s managed 129990. 

Both scores are absolutely awesome though, beating out most other phones but it appears that the iPhone 6s Plus remains the highest of the three at 137420. The iPhone SE is currently available on order at the Apple Store in the US, but it has yet to arrive at the Apple Malaysia Store. The Apple Malaysia Store has stopped selling the iPhone 5S but there are still no specific Malaysia release dates or pricing details just yet. Stay tuned for more updates.

While we still wait for the Apple iPhone SE arrival in Malaysia (God knows when), Apple has provided several iPhone SE review units to some well known publications such as TechRadar, The Independent, iMore, The Daily Mail, Wall Street Journal, and Mashable. The reviews and first impressions are positive so far, mostly praising the device's powerful hardwares, especially smartphone's improved batttery life; since Apple smartphones are known to not able to last a day.

With the reveal of the Apple iPhone SE, iOS 9.3 was also released publicly through iTunes and all iOS 9 users as an over-the-air update. There are quite a few updates from iOS 9.3, but we will be taking a look at the main feature of the update – Night Shift.

Just after a day from Apple's announcement of the Apple iPhone SE and 9.7-inch iPad Pro, Maxis has already put up their “Register of Interest” page for the iPhone SE in their website. For interested customers, all they have to do is input their name and email to submit the form and wait for further instruction. According to Apple, the iPhone SE will be released on 31 March 2016 but it will start in the US first, Malaysia is likely to get the device as well by the end of May.