© Photo by Monica Chin / The Verge The XPS 13 has a lot in common with the Dell XPS 13 Plus, but it has a very different audience.Tools have worked a certain way since time immemorial.
You release a company. Good, but not perfect. No gadget is perfect. So you do market research and focus groups. You will know who is coming. You will find out what they like and what they don't like. What are you filtering? You solve the problem.
Next year you will release a version of this device that is objectively, strictly, better. This is the next generation device, Device 2.0. You call this device an "upgrade". You invite your customers to abandon the 1.0 device and replace it with the 2.0 device. Some of them do. "Do you want to upgrade?" Tech bloggers weigh the pros and cons.
I know, I know, a huge oversimplification of how consumer tech actually works. I just want to point out that most of us who follow the tool space share assumptions about how products work; Are next-gen devices better than the devices they replace?
But not all technologies work this way. And it's time for all of us - businesses and consumers - to stop acting like him.
There is no perfect device
The “refresh” mentality has come a long way with new product categories trying to figure out what customers want. In the mid-2010s, the smart home space was a good example. It was unclear how people would use Alexa, Google Assistant and the various hardware they included, and as the market learned more, software, speakers, etc. Improved to better address this use case. Google Homes has grown and gained in functionality without losing much in return.
But many popular device categories such as smartphones, laptops and TVs are now permanently excluded from this space. These are mature markets full of established players and products that are already doing very, very well. And that makes "upgrading" in the traditional sense a difficult task.
Just look at this year's laptop market to see how it works. There were very, very few versions of laptops that were significantly better than the predecessors they replaced. All the examples I can think of are in games where some devices have seen a significant increase in graphics quality due to hardware and software improvements.
But nearly every "next-gen" device I've reviewed in the consumer computing space hasn't been what I'd call an "improvement" over the previous generation. In some ways they were an improvement and in some ways a downgrade. Everywhere they were just different.
Some of them were radically different both in design and functionality. Take the Dell XPS 13 2-in-1 for example. Since 2017, this device is a very simple transformer, that is, an ordinary laptop that can be folded 360 degrees. However, Dell ditched that design in favor of the Surface Pro form factor this year. This year's 2-in-1, which is still sold as the XPS 13 2-in-1 and replaces the old one in Dell stores, is basically a Windows tablet with a magnetic keyboard cover. This form factor isn't necessarily better or worse, but it's hard to call it an "improvement" over the previous form factor. It is ideal for different use cases and designed for different customers. It's just different.
But there are plenty of next-gen laptop models out there that haven't had many design updates (if any) but are still targeting new buyers. This is due to Intel's choice for 12th generation processors. Intel has long been the world's largest semiconductor maker and has operated without serious competition for most of the past few decades. It's only in recent years that AMD and Apple have become serious competitors.
While Intel previously managed to avoid a gradual decline in performance each year, it has recently been forced to take bigger and more risky steps. The company has made great strides in clean power this year, and its Alder Lake chips rival (and even surpass) Apple's Arms chips in many ways. But these chips also require more power than the 11-series lineup, and as a result, 2022 laptops with Intel processors have reduced battery life.
So we've generally had a year full of Windows laptops that were more powerful than their similar predecessors, but didn't last as long on a single charge. Seriously, you can click through all the next-gen laptop reviews I've written this year. I can almost guarantee that I enjoyed the performance, but complained about the battery life. These were not improvements, although some of them were improved. These were various devices designed for users for whom power was a priority, but battery life was not. Even if they match, they are not intended for buyers who own previous versions of these devices
However, this does not only apply to the laptop market. Meet the iPhone 14. For example, it's the iPhone 13, but with a new camera sensor. I know very few people who bought this new iPhone; I know people who decide to buy the 13 because they think it's good value for money.
I want to be clear that I don't want to bang next-gen devices or claim they're going away. They clearly serve an important purpose in the tech landscape. But if it's not an update, then what? Listen to me. These are sequels.
Entertainment has done this in various ways over the decades. When a movie comes out with a sequel, we don't assume that the sequel will be better than the movie. This is also the case with remakes. I think we can all be grateful that Nicole Kidman's 2004 version of The Stepford Wives didn't erase Katharine Ross' 1975 title. They are two different movies with different tones and audiences, despite having similar premise and plot. A sequel is sometimes (often, in fact) worse than its predecessor, and that's okay, not a colossal failure or a sign that the studio is doomed.
Obviously, there are myriad differences between consumer technology and the Hollywood business model. Movies can't be pirated and they can't be denigrated (although their elements - their special effects, costumes and hairstyles, scenes and stories - are outdated by time). Gadgets must be replaced so that the films do not change.
However, I think there are parts of the entertainment business model that can provide consumers and producers with other ways to think about consumer technology. (Of course, outside of hardware, there are tech products that are already widely perceived that way — cars being one example.)
Some categories are as good as it gets
I imagine a world where if my XPS 13 fails, I can easily replace it with another 10th Gen XPS 13, even if the 12th Gen model is on the shelves. In this world, chipmakers don't need to release new generations every year; They update when they have something innovative to share. Companies do not replace their devices with new versions of these devices, but sell them with a clear description of who they are and who they are not. And reviewers rate new devices based on their unique strengths rather than comparing them to their predecessors in terms of performance.
I am not saying at all that this world is possible. We're talking about companies that want us to make money from customers who love novelties and shiny new toys. I'm just saying in this world I will work.
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