Next-Gen iPhone & iPhone Nano Speculation

[Mariner]

Latest rumours are for a 4" screen but with a different aspect ratio to previous iPhones:

http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=24746

 

[Grall]

Personally I really hope Apple does NOT increase the size of the iPhone. You already look douchy enough holding a giant thing like that up to your ear, an even bigger one? No thanks. Also, it starts to become difficult fitting a bigger phone into your pants pockets (wouldn't want to crack the screen or casing when sitting down for example), and bigger size also usually means bigger weight, which is an issue when you're out and about.

 

[warmi]

Personally I really hope Apple does NOT increase the size of the iPhone. You already look douchy enough holding a giant thing like that up to your ear, an even bigger one? No thanks. Also, it starts to become difficult fitting a bigger phone into your pants pockets (wouldn't want to crack the screen or casing when sitting down for example), and bigger size also usually means bigger weight, which is an issue when you're out and about.

The latest on that is the they will only increase the resolution and not the physical size of the phone.

 

[Mariner]

I find my Atrix, with a 4" screen, is absolutely fine to use and doesn't look too big at all. If Apple can trim a couple of millimetres off each of the dimensions of the Atrix with the iPhone5 (I assume that will be the name!), it would be very usable and not at all unwieldy.

 

[zed]

Personally I really hope Apple does NOT increase the size of the iPhone. You already look douchy enough holding a giant thing like that up to your ear, an even bigger one? No thanks. Also, it starts to become difficult fitting a bigger phone into your pants pockets (wouldn't want to crack the screen or casing when sitting down for example), and bigger size also usually means bigger weight, which is an issue when you're out and about.

And this is where my suggestion comes in, 3.5" too big choose a 3.0" one (same specs) or too small choose a 4.5" one.
Hopefully they dont go with a wider ratio, I fear they will.
my latest game has an onscreen button IIRC 6% of screens height its a bit too fiddly, but any bigger and youre starting to cover up quite a bit of the playing field, making the screen wider is not really gonna solve that issue. I'ld hope they'ld go the way of the ipad 4:3ratio which is ideal though that will prolly be inconvient to hold/use as a phone (then again what % of a devices use is this nowadays?).

 

[wco81]

There are rumors of a 16:9 screen, where they'd hold the width the same.

Better maybe for movies but apps. and browsing are probably more common than viewing video.

 

[RudeCurve]

Personally I really hope Apple does NOT increase the size of the iPhone. You already look douchy enough holding a giant thing like that up to your ear, an even bigger one? No thanks. Also, it starts to become difficult fitting a bigger phone into your pants pockets (wouldn't want to crack the screen or casing when sitting down for example), and bigger size also usually means bigger weight, which is an issue when you're out and about.

The iPhone 4/4s is pretty darn small actually. It's actually shorter than most flip phones when open. It's also fairly thin. Of course when you start adding big bulky protection armor onto the phone it starts to look ridiculous. With that said I prefer the next iPhone not to increase in overall size too much but I do want a larger screen not to exceed 4".

If they go with a 16:9 AR they could still offer backwards compatiblity via pillarbox cropping. New software and/or new updates to existing software would be able to leverage the larger screen + extended resolution.

 

[ltcommander.data]

http://9to5mac.com/2012/05/31/hardw...-n41ap-iphone51-and-more-on-the-new-maps-app/

Latest leaks from iOS 6 betas say the next iPhone will use the S5L8950X which is still considered an A5 variant. I suppose that means it'll remain Cortex A9 instead of Cortex A15. It incorporates a new SGX543MP variant called SGX543RC*. If it isn't a MP2 and it isn't a MP4 could it simply be a MP3? Or has Apple designed a custom SGX543MP like Sony did? Other than adding dedicated memory what else could Apple change while still keeping it part of the SGX543 family? Overall system memory will be bumped to 1GB.

 

[tangey]

http://9to5mac.com/2012/05/31/hardw...-n41ap-iphone51-and-more-on-the-new-maps-app/

Latest leaks from iOS 6 betas say the next iPhone will use the S5L8950X which is still considered an A5 variant. I suppose that means it'll remain Cortex A9 instead of Cortex A15. It incorporates a new SGX543MP variant called SGX543RC*. .

It's probably just "Release Candidate 1/2/3" and perhaps refers to the driver status as opposed to a hardware variant.

 

[ltcommander.data]

It's probably just "Release Candidate 1/2/3" and perhaps refers to the driver status as opposed to a hardware variant.

The article is pretty specific in calling it a new GPU that doesn't currently exist in the wild. "RC" might refer to driver status, but I would think their claim about a new GPU isn't just an assumption based on OS references but is also substantiated by their source.

 

[tangey]

The article is pretty specific in calling it a new GPU that doesn't currently exist in the wild. "RC" might refer to driver status, but I would think their claim about a new GPU isn't just an assumption based on OS references but is also substantiated by their source.

The entire article is begun with "But what will it have under the hood? 9to5Mac delved deep into a beta version of iOS 6 to find out… "

The protected "source" is whoever provided them with the beta, and appears to be fearful that betas can be individually tracked via some reference numbers, which have thus been removed.

 

[ltcommander.data]

The entire article is begun with "But what will it have under the hood? 9to5Mac delved deep into a beta version of iOS 6 to find out… "

The protected "source" is whoever provided them with the beta, and appears to be fearful that betas can be individually tracked via some reference numbers, which have thus been removed.

They talk with the source to quote several pieces of information regarding the status of the next iOS and iPhone such as:

"Our source indicated this might be because he/she does not need access to any new baseband that they might use."

"We are told Apple is far along in its iOS 6 development, so an October new iPhone deadline should be relatively easy—barring any unforeseen chip, part shortages/labor outages, etc."

"We were told that in the iPhone version of Maps, the 3D button is now under the bottom right scroll/menu to avoid accidentally hitting the wrong button."

I'm just thinking, perhaps hoping, that 9to5Mac's investigative process is more of a back and forth dialogue with the source than just obtaining the iOS build and being left to their own devices. Pardon the pun.

 

[Lazy8s]

I still expect that it'll be either an MP3@ 250 MHz or an MP4@ 200MHz.

That'll establish leading performance for a phone again and leave enough room for the big SoC update in 2013.

 

[anexanhume]

Is there any need to update past the MP2 before Rogue hits? Just die shrink the MP2 to 32nm and use the savings for LTE, bigger display and quad core CPU peak usage.

 

[Lazy8s]

The 32nm process plus improvements to the power management can easily afford an A5X variant for the new iPhone. The increase from the phone's new, larger display is minor when compared to the burden for which the new iPad had to account with its "retina" update.

A Cortex-A9 with four cores is where I suspect the lack of a need, currently.

 

[Pressure]

Is there any need to update past the MP2 before Rogue hits? Just die shrink the MP2 to 32nm and use the savings for LTE, bigger display and quad core CPU peak usage.

Why bother with a quad-core Cortex-A9?

 

[ltcommander.data]

Is there any need to update past the MP2 before Rogue hits? Just die shrink the MP2 to 32nm and use the savings for LTE, bigger display and quad core CPU peak usage.

With the rumoured transition to a 1366x640 screen, the MP2 would need to be clocked 20% higher in the next iPhone to prevent performance regression. (Admittedly performance regression occurs in the iPad 3.) If Apple were to stick with a minor performance bump for this refresh, envisioning say a 50% clock bump on the MP2, which is only ~30% more performance adjusting for the new resolution, moving to MP3 is still a viable alternative. ie. a 1.5x clock speed MP2 vs a 1x clock speed MP3. Apple certainly isn't afraid of spending transistors. It'll be a question of which is more power efficient.

 

[anexanhume]

Why bother with a quad-core Cortex-A9?

They may have coded iOS 6 with some features that actually take advantage of it. I think a MP3 or MP4 is definitely overkill on the other side. If they are going to stay with an A5 family device, there's isn't much to do but shrink the die and end up with something similar to the $400 iPad 2 CPU. It's not really hurting in CPU or GPU performance, but the battery now has to power a bigger screen and LTE, potentially.

 

[Pressure]

They may have coded iOS 6 with some features that actually take advantage of it. I think a MP3 or MP4 is definitely overkill on the other side. If they are going to stay with an A5 family device, there's isn't much to do but shrink the die and end up with something similar to the $400 iPad 2 CPU. It's not really hurting in CPU or GPU performance, but the battery now has to power a bigger screen and LTE, potentially.

At this point I wouldn't be shocked to see the new iPhone adopt the 32nm A5 honestly.

I don't really care about LTE, simply because Apple have shown a complete disregard for the rest of the world with the new iPad and the bandwidth spectrum it uses for it.

That could change of course.

 

[anexanhume]

At this point I wouldn't be shocked to see the new iPhone adopt the 32nm A5 honestly.

I don't really care about LTE, simply because Apple have shown a complete disregard for the rest of the world with the new iPad and the bandwidth spectrum it uses for it.

That could change of course.

LTE networks are even less mature than US ones in most overseas countries. Plus additional spectrums require antennas and transceivers capable of them. Their compatibility will mature as adoption rises. I think it's pretty obvious the next iphone will have the 28nm all-in-one LTE solution from Qualcomm. That's why Qualcomm is scrambling to source 28nm chips (and for their own Krait chips too).