Quote:
Originally Posted by
DocNo42 
Limited shelf life? It delivers a better user experience than 80% of the Android phones shipping today. Then again, since most Android phones last less than six months before being replaced with a new model I can understand his confusion.
Huh? This makes no sense at all. What exactly would it look like? How exactly would it fit into the ecosystem? How could you prevent fragmentation of apps and complexity for users and developers alike?
Just comments from another clueless backseat driver

Well, no. If Apple can do what it's doing now, then they'll be ok. But they do need to replace old phones after a while. Are you suggesting the 3GS stay around another year after this?
The problem is that apps and games must work on the older devices, limiting what they can do on the newer ones. It's not likely that the 3GS will accept iOS 6, or that if it does, whether it will get enough new features for people to care. If that happens in the late summer, it will be a bomb.
I would think that the cost of the old hardware is depreciated enough so that it costs Apple a lot less to make than it did. Surely the old screen must. But it's a not very good screen these days. It must be replaced
My wife and daughter still have 3G's. My daughter has a 3GS for school in London. Neither wanted to upgrade last year when I bought a 4, moving from my 3G.
The performance of the 3GS when compared to my 4 was, well, sluggish. Now I have a 4S, and they will get them in December when my daughter gets home from school. Compared to my 4S, my old 4 is, well, sluggish. Comparing the 3GS to my 4S will have to wait until the 10th when my daughter gets home, but how well do you think it will do? Not very well at all.
It's both kudo's to Apple that the 3GS has still been selling so well, and a Bronx cheer to other manufacturers and OS's that it is as well. But something's got to give, as they say. Other phones will be 3 years newer in a few months, and no matter how good the 3GS might be, it's falling well behind.
I don't see why Apple couldn't come out with a newer model based on the same basic case, which costs less than the one for the 4 series, but with a newer SoC, to better match current performance. A slightly better screen is needed as well. If Apple can do that for slightly lower margins, then it would sell even better than the 3GS.