The iPhone 5 News Blog

A recent article in Fortune reminded us that Apple stock began a six month free fall just after Cupertino reported record iPhone 5 sales — 5 million units sold in its first three days. I never thought I’d say this, but I am so glad I didn’t invest in any stock in Apple since then. Yet, who could’ve guessed that five million iPhone 5 units sold in three days would be taken as bad news by Wall Street?

On the flip side, Samsung, who, up until this point has never even bothered to post sales numbers of this smartphone, is proudly touting the fact that the Samsung Galaxy S4 is poised to hit 10 million in sales after four weeks on the market. And, as Fortune columnist Phillip Elmer-Dewitt points out, “Samsung is talking about sales to carriers, not end users. Not quite the same thing.” And yet Wall Street applauds.

What’s going on here? Read More

Last week, Verizon caused quite a stir when it slashed $100 off the price of their iPhone 5 on their website for a brief time. Soon after, Verizon confirmed the exclusive price cut deal on their iPhone 5, making it available on-contract at $99, down from the original price of $199.99.

The price drop could be a strategy that effectively tugs on consumers who are on the fence about their next smart phone purchase: to wait for the impending iPhone 5S release, to buy a competing device, or to just go ahead and buy the currently available iPhone 5. The last option, now ringing louder bells, thanks to Verizon’s bold markdown. Read More

New, purported iPhone 5S parts suggest big changes to the inner hardware of the iPhone 5S. Is this a much-needed improvement from the iPhone 5, or making room for something new?

iPhone 5S parts appearances continue to surface around the web, with many people beginning to wonder if the iPhone 5S could indeed show up in June. While that prospect is highly unlikely — we still don’t have iOS 7 beta — the cavalcade of new parts is a good sign; it shows that the iPhone 5S is indeed on track for a late summer release. Last week, we reported on a few 5S parts coming to the surface — a motherboard, complete with camera component and vibrator motor. a new round of photos, however, show a new of inner hardware components that suggest a different set-up for the iPhone 5S.

Is this rearranging of the iPhone 5S components a fix for the iPhone 5, or is Apple making room for one big hardware feature? Read More

A widely circulated rumor that Verizon is set to cut prices of the iPhone 5 by $100 this month suggests that the iPhone 5S release could be earlier than expected.

A fresh rumor is spreading throughout the tech media suggesting that a high-profile promotion set for the iPhone 5 in May suggests that Apple could once again return to releasing a new iPhone in the early summer, as it did in previous years. The rumor, which claims that Verizon is poised to offer the iPhone 5 at an astounding $100 off its current pricing, would ostensibly be a move on the part of the U.S.’s second-largest mobile carrier to dump large stocks of iPhone 5 units ahead of the iPhone 5S’s release sometime in June or July.

Considering that Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), the once-prominent event that Apple co-founder Steve Jobs used to announce new iPhone models, is scheduled for its typical mid-June launch, could mean that Verizon — and perhaps other mobile carriers as well — will attempt to sell off the iPhone 5 just ahead of the new model’s release.

However, given what we know from past iPhone releases, does this rumor really make any sense? Read More

T-Mobile’s announcement that they will offer the iPhone 5 starting in mid-April harkens back to Verizon’s 2011 announcement — which could push back the iPhone 5S release date.

Well, T-Mobile customers’ long wait for the iPhone has finally ended. Beginning on April 12th, the company will offer the iPhone 5, which will also benefit from T-Mobile’s newly, hyped LTE network. T-Mobile will also be carrying the iPhone 4S and 4 is select markets as well, giving the carrier the opportunity to compete with the likes of the big three in the U.S..

The T-Mobile announcement to carry the iPhone gives Apple the opportunity to widen its distribution and sales network in the U.S. — a kind of strategic pivot against Samsung, who appears to be slowly encroaching on the iPhone with its Galaxy S as a contender that can take on Apple mano e mano. For their part, T-Mobile’s new marketing pitch to be the “Uncarrier,” with incentives like only having to put up $99 bucks for the iPhone 5, is a way to take on the likes of Sprint as a price leader in the mobile network market. So, everyone is making their play.

This move by Apple to allow T-Mobile to sell the iPhone 5 come April has. other implications, however. Namely, how will it affect the iPhone 5S release date? Read More

Wall Street has wrung its hands over iPhone 5 sales over the past few months. But a new report reveals that the iPhone crushed Samsung’s GS3 in the final quarter of 2012.

New tech financial news broke today, indicating that Apple’s iPhone 5 was by far the best-selling smartphone in the forth quarter of 2012, beating out the GS3 in mano e mano match-ups. And when analysts combine both iPhone 5 and 4S sales, the gap is even wider. According to BizJournals:

Apple sold 27.4 million iPhone 5s and 17.4 million iPhone 4S models in the fourth quarter of 2012. Samsung sold 15.4 million Galaxy S3 models in the quarter, according to the report.

The news concerning iPhone 5 sales has been dizzying for some months now, after Wall Street turned on Apple stock in the wake of several reports concerning the iPhone, most of which began at the start of the forth quarter in 2012. You’ll recall consternation over supply-chain issues, Foxconn’s proclamation that the iPhone 5 is extremely difficult to assemble, that iPhone 5 sales were flagging early, and that Samsung had become the world’s biggest smartphone provider in Q3 of 2012. Read More

Another financial analyst has weighed in with next iPhone prognostications, this time regarding the cameras.

Appleinsider’s Josh Ong reports that KGI analyst Mingchi Kuo writes in a note to investors earlier this week that Apple’s sixth-generation iPhone may include a full HD resolution capable front-facing camera whose location position would be moved to the middle of the handset, along with “quite a few essential adjustments,” but doesn’t expect Apple to increase the new iPhone’s battery capacity.

Kuo is cited observing that a HD resolution camera would be a better match for the next-gen iPhone’s widely rumored 4-inch display with a more extreme (taller/wider) aspect ratio. WallStreetCheat Sheet’s Aabha Rathee reports that Kuo expects the new iPhone to have a screen measuring 4.08 inches diagonally with a resolution of 1,136 x 640 pixels and an aspect ratio of 16:9, arguing that a taller but not wider screen help minimize app redevelopment costs, while the 16:9 resolution will offer more viewing space while typing in portrait mode.

However, Kuo reportedly thinks Apple will likely opt to stand pat with the iPhone 4S’s current 8-megapixel rear-facing camera’s resolution, while extending its aperture range up to f/2.2 from the iPhone 4S’s f/2.4 maximum aperture. The analyst also predicted that the rear camera on the next iPhone will be noticeably thinner, “making it the most challenging iPhone design yet.” Read More

The answer to the mystery of what Apple was about in paying $20 million for licensing rights to Liquidmetal Technologies’ “amorphous metal alloys” nearly two years ago may soon be revealed.

On Wednesday the Apple blogosphere lit up over a new rumor reported by Korean journal ETNews’s Kim In-soon that the next iPhone will swap the iPhone 4 series’ glass case material for Liquidmetal alloy, the new design to be unveiled at is expected to be unveiled at the Apple Worldwide Developers Conference in June. The high-tech alloy is said in the report to have an outer surface smooth like liquid, and would reportedly allow a thinner, lighter from factor that would also be more resistant to impact damage.

In-soon also reports that the Samsung Galaxy S3, scheduled to be unveiled in London in May 3, will have a ceramic main body. made by applying heat to a non-metallic inorganic substance, is extremely light and comfortable to grip.

Michael Nace has already addressed the potential veracity or otherwise of this rumor or otherwise at some length, but what of the material itself? What is Liquidmetal”

Liquidmetal was developed by a California Institute of Technology research team that later organized themselves into the Liquidmetal Technologies firm. Despite the name, Liquidmetal alloys are not liquid, but solid at room temperature, and are claimed to be hard-wearing and able to withstand thermal cycling, along with a constellation of other desirable material features including high tensile strength, excellent corrosion resistance, very high coefficient of restitution and excellent anti-wearing characteristics, while being able to be heat-formed in processes similar to thermoplastics. Liquidmetal, which was introduced for commercial applications in 2003, has reportedly been used to make golf clubs, golf balls, watches, covers of cell phones the cores of skis, baseball and softball bats, and tennis racquets.

According to Wikipedia, Liquidmetal technology has been used for making the SIM ejector tool of some iPhone 3Gs shipped in the US — done by Apple as an exercise to test the viability of usage of the metal. The alloy is claimed to retain a scratch-free surface longer than competing materials, while facilitating the molding of complex shapes — qualities that suit it to being used as protective coating for industrial machinery, petroleum drill pipes and power plant boiler tubes, and allow it to be considered as a replacement for titanium in applications ranging from medical instruments and cars to military and aerospace hardware.

More specifically, the explanation of Liquidmetal alloys’ properties notes that they contain atoms of significantly different sizes that form a dense mix with low free volume, and unlike crystalline metals, there is no obvious melting point at which viscosity drops suddenly. Rather they behave more like glass, in that viscosity drops gradually with increased temperature, and at high temperatures it behaves in a plastic manner, allowing mechanical properties to be controlled relatively easily during casting.

Because these alloys have relatively low softening temperatures (400 °C/752 °F for the earliest formulation), they can be molded, and allow casting of complicated shapes without need of finishing with material properties immediately after casting being much better than when casting with conventional metals, which usually need a lot of post-casting finish work. They also have low shrinkage during cooling. Liquidmetal can be formed into complex shapes using processes similar to ones used with thermoplastics, making Liquidmetal a potential replacement for many applications where plastics might otherwise be used.

Parallels with Apple’s interest in and development of cast aluminum “unibody” technology seem obvious, and if Liquidmetal iPhone enclosures prove successful, it would seem likely that the material and technique would be expanded for use with other Apple products as well, perhaps displacing the expensive and demanding process of machining device housings from a single piece of aluminum altogether. Casting should be significantly cheaper and faster than machining for volume production, and with Liquidmetal’s other desirable qualities, the upside for both Apple and for end-users could be substantial.

As for that June WWDC release date, as of this morning (April 19) a Bing search for “Apple Worldwide Developers Conference 2012″ brings up only the WWDC 2011 link, which suggests that the June 11 date for the conference to open is looking a bit overly optimistic. It’s been speculated that WWDC might get pushed back to July or August this year. We’ll see.

By Charles Moore

An aluminum back and unibody construction are dominating the iPhone 5 rumor mill this week. Where will Apple’s acquisition of alloy pioneer LiquidMetal, Gorilla glass, and those glass cutting machine rumors from last year fit into the 2012 iPhone 5 form factor?

Over the past couple of weeks, we’ve been highlighting how all of the old iPhone 5 rumors from last year seem to be coming around again in an almost systematic fashion. The recycling of feature rumors for the iPhone 5 can only mean one of two things: that Apple has planned these rumored features for the iPhone 5 for almost two years now, or that the rumors are little more than sensationalized fodder to get people reading tech blogs in a second-generation frenzy over the iPhone 5.

This week, the lead story is, once again, a report that the iPhone’s Gorilla glass backing will be replaced by an aluminum back. There are various stories about this rumor, so let’s pick this one, from Cult Of Mac, says it as good as anyone else: “The Gorilla glass that currently houses the fourth- and fifth-generation iPhones — which is notoriously susceptible to cracks and smashes — will be replaced by aluminum for the sixth-generation device, according to the source.”

Just like the built-in bumper rumor and the slide-out keyboard rumor, the aluminum backed iPhone 5 is a very old rumor. Charles Moore reported on it way back on March 9, 2011. But just because the aluminum backed iPhone 5 rumor is getting its second treatment in the media doesn’t necessarily mean that it is bupkis. And I would argue that there is an equal chance that Apple could wield a metal alloy different from aluminum for the iPhone 5′s back, such as the unique, moldable metal alloy from LiquidMetal technologies.

There is a basis for this speculation: Apple acquired LiquidMetal’s rights back in August of 2010, and they must have done so for a reason: sure, Cupertino might have bought them out to keep their technology out of the hands of competitors, but Apple has a more reliable track record of acquiring technologies that they want to subsume into their design efforts.

Charlie White at Mashable had this to say about the prospect of aluminum on the iPhone 5 last year: “It could be aluminum, but there’s also talk of LiquidMetal, that futuristic substance that’s as easy to work with (and as lightweight) as plastic, but strong as aluminum . . . we’re still thinking it’s a little soon for it to appear on the iPhone. We’re betting on aluminum for the iPhone 5, with Liquidmetal making its appearance in a later version.”

But that was last year, before anyone had anticipated the iPhone 4S being released in 2011. Now that we’re into 2012, the prospect of LiquidMetal playing a role in the iPhone 5′s form factor is more likely.

While we are on the subject of form factors, it is also worth noting that, along with the aluminum backed iPhone 5 rumors of last year, we also had the story of Apple investing in glass cutting machines, ostensibly to cut curved glass screens for the iPhone 5. Charles was on that story in 2011 as well, and had this to say back on May 24th, 2011: “Apple itself has reportedly purchased 200-300 glass cutting machines to be used by glass makers, or so the sources affirm, currently storing them at associated assembly plants to be brought into production service once yield rates for curved glass reaches a satisfactory level.”

So, are we due to hear about rumors of the curved glass display for the iPhone 5 again? Based on the recent trajectory of iPhone rumors, I’d say so. The original report about the glass cutting machines came from DigiTimes, so it will be interesting to see if they pick up that story again in 2012.

One thing is for sure: if Apple is going to craft a new form factor for the iPhone 5 and have it look distinct from Android phones, there are indeed going to have to go to extraordinary lengths to design and craft it. Whether or not you like the form factor of the iPhone 4 and 4S, no one can deny that it is a unique form factor, marrying glass, plastic, and metal in a way not usually seen on other devices. Glass cutting and LiquidMetal could be just the ticket.
By Michael Nace

By the time the iPhone 5 is released, either in the Summer or fall of 2012, it will have been a two-year wait for the tech community. Will the iPhone 5 live up to expectations in the New Year?

Unless the Mayans are right and 2012 marks the end of the world, 2012 should be the year of the iPhone 5.

By the time its announcement and release comes around — which will ostensibly be either in the early Summer or late Fall of the new year — we all will have waited more or less two years since the release of the iPhone 4 for this highly touted device. Just to put it into perspective, the iPhone 5 News Blog was the first blog to cover the rumors of the iPhone 5, and we got our start on August 6th, 2010.

Throughout the course of that span of time, we’ve reported on virtually every rumor, speculation, and angle regarding the iPhone 5, to the point where we are now seeing rumors from 1 1/2 years ago coming back around (such as the rumor of a built-in rubber bumper for the iPhone 5, which was recently reported on by BGR and originally suggested in 2010). This recycling of absurd iPhone 5 rumors only proves that the device’s emergence is long overdue; there is seemingly nothing left to say about it feature-wise that hasn’t already been said.

Reflecting back over the past year alone, it’s interesting to consider what the iPhone 5 has become. In many ways — and by virtue of blogs like this one — it has really transcended that of a mere gadget — it is now part of some heralded “Apple mythology” or lore, with all the stories of Steve Jobs’ own legacy bound up in it. You can argue that no other product in history has ever been anticipated on the scale that the iPhone 5 is: most landmark inventions, like the light bulb, took the world by surprise to some extent. For the iPhone 5, more has been written about it in the abstract than all other smartphones combined.

And because of this, Apple now stands on a precipice. They have to deliver the goods with the iPhone 5 in 2012, or face widespread disappointment from their customers. In many ways, the future of Apple depends on it. Somehow, they have to cram LTE, the A6 chip, a better battery, a new iOS, and a bigger screen into a new form factor that is not Android-like . . . and thinner.

Those are the expectations — quite a list, huh?

That’s why all of the building iPhone 5 buzz is both a blessing and a curse for Apple. The blessing comes in the form of unbridled hype and publicity for a product they have yet to produce — that is a marketing department’s dream. But with it comes what seems to be an unsurmountable list of expectations. Users are looking for more than a quirky gadget. They are looking for a mobile device that will revolutionize their life. That’s a tall order.

But if any technology company is in a position to deliver on such a tall order, its Apple. Let’s hope the legacy of excellence and ingenuity that Steve Jobs fostered at Cupertino carries into this year and yields an iPhone 5 that lives up to all the hype that we, the people, have created.

Thanks to everyone who followed the iPhone 5 news here at the blog throughout 2011. We look forward to another fun year of iPhone 5 speculation and anticipation in 2012. Happy New Year, iPhone 5′ers!

By Michael Nace