Chinese rumor claims 2009 iPhone will be modest upgrade

Posted:
in iPhone edited January 2014
A forum thread on a Chinese Apple fan site is generating some interest by AppleInsider readers because one commenter claims to have used prototypes of Apple's next-gen iPhone because he purportedly has a friend working at the company's manufacturing partner Foxconn.



The commenter, who goes by the name patapon200, describes the next iPhone as a "repeat" in physical design with many of the changes relating to speed and other less overt upgrades.



Supposedly, the largest changes are increases in clock speed and memory: the roughly 400MHz Samsung ARM processor used in the present-day iPhone 3G will be upgraded to a 600MHz part, he says, while system RAM will be doubled to 256MB. After testing, the tipster maintains that the speed of using the phone has "really improved" versus current models.



The commenter, who posted to one of China's largest iPhone fan sites, also claims that the handset will ship in 16GB and 32GB configurations while echoing earlier rumors of a 3.2-megapixel camera. He adds, however, that the new camera will autofocus. Other claims include an electronic compass to get the phone's heading independent of GPS, per recent rumors.



In his series of posts, the commenter provides an alleged internal model number of the new iPhone, N88, while noting the M68 and N82 model numbers used for earlier iPhones. He also posted a screen capture supposedly taken on the device, showing the 32GB of storage (29.3GB after formatting), iPhone 3.0 firmware, and Apple model number, MB717LL, that doesn't yet exist on the public record. The latest iPhone 3G revisions range only up to MB705LL. No evidence is given of the external model number that drew attention in February.







The commenter expresses disappointment when claiming the screen will still be the familiar 3.5-inch, 480x320 model used in the past. He doesn't provide a timeframe for this alleged new iPhone but claims the hardware was thought to be in a Process Validation Test, or PVT, as of late April; it's unclear what this means, but it may refer to testing assembly shortly before production.



Some aspects of the rumor are dubious enough to call into question at least some of the story. It suggests that the next iPhone will have FM, for example -- a technology Apple has left out of all iPhones and iPods to date. The screen capture also makes reference to connecting to an AT&T network as the carrier, though it's not the same revision number seen by most US iPhones, which usually connect to ATT3.1 and not the ATT3.5 mentioned in the screenshot.



The poster makes brief mention of Apple's long-in-development tablet and even gives it an internal model number, K48, but provides few other details besides mentioning a 9.7-inch touchscreen that has surfaced in previous rumors.



AppleInsider isn't sure what to make of these two week-old claims but republishes them for interest's sake.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 172
    macxpressmacxpress Posts: 5,801member
    Oh boy....here we go with all of supposed "claims" of seeing prototypes and having access to supposed new Apple hardware. Happens every time!!!
  • Reply 2 of 172
    I find it hard to believe that there won't be any changes to the form.



    I know the Mac side moves more slowly, but the iPod side of Apple is always evolving the look..



    There's lots of areas to improve like the scratchable chrome frame, only available in black and white, (I never understood the point of...) the square on the home button. They could move towards some utilization of the unibody theme like the speaker grille detail the macbook pros have, the MB Air edges...
  • Reply 3 of 172
    syklee26syklee26 Posts: 78member
    so If I go to China and post something on iPhone fanboy site, will Appleinsider post my take?
  • Reply 4 of 172
    hmurchisonhmurchison Posts: 12,419member
    Sounds plausible to me.



    I bet if you look at ARM's site there's a 600 Mhz core and the extra RAM is a given.

    I really don't expect a huge change in this upcoming rev for the iPhone. I was hoping they'd

    sneak in AMOLED screen but my guess is that we see some fireworks with iPhone 2010.



    We can likely expect custom Apple chips, dual core processing and very fast graphics with HD output. AMOLED or some sort of OLED technology is a given and perhaps Bluetooth 3.0.
  • Reply 5 of 172
    I have to admit, I don't always read every post here despite them coming up on my google reader, but this one caught my eye. I loved the writing style so just felt the need to comment!
  • Reply 6 of 172
    akf2000akf2000 Posts: 223member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by neiltaylormade View Post


    I have to admit, I don't always read every post here despite them coming up on my google reader, but this one caught my eye. I loved the writing style so just felt the need to comment!



    Yeah apart from a fixation with using commas it was very well written.
  • Reply 7 of 172
    ajayajay Posts: 117member
    downloaded the original image & messed around with image levels in Pixelmator... this is what came up.

    is this normal?

    or does anyone think that this is just some (un)imaginative photoshop-job?



  • Reply 8 of 172
    8corewhore8corewhore Posts: 833member
    That's not a modest upgrade. That 50% more processing and 100% more RAM. The FM could be a modulator to play in your car.
  • Reply 9 of 172
    virgil-tb2virgil-tb2 Posts: 1,416member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by AppleInsider View Post


    ... Some aspects of the rumor are dubious enough to call into question at least some of the story. It suggests that the next iPhone will have FM, for example -- a technology Apple has left out of all iPhones and iPods to date. ...



    There was a recent rumour that the new iPhone had parts that were technically *capable* of receiving FM signals.
  • Reply 10 of 172
    Devices with 3.0 say "AT&T 3.5" , not "AT&T3.5"
  • Reply 11 of 172
    donlphidonlphi Posts: 214member
    Forget about the FM receiver... are you joking? That's funny. I wrote it down on a piece of paper and laughed harder. There will be no FM receiver on an iPhone. We're more likely to see an 8-track player on the front of an iMac.



    I also heard that Apple is adding a turn-table to AppleTV and a mini-disc to it's iPod Classic.



    Good times...
  • Reply 12 of 172
    infobhaninfobhan Posts: 14member
    These rumors sound completely believable. What else were people expecting? Similar form factor, upgraded speed and RAM, better camera, better performance. All makes perfect sense. I agree that the FM, if it exists, is probably a transmitter to let you use it in your car.
  • Reply 13 of 172
    solipsismsolipsism Posts: 25,726member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Virgil-TB2 View Post


    There was a recent rumour that the new iPhone had parts that were technically *capable* of receiving FM signals.



    The upgrades mentioned from the original article seem plausible because they aren't going crazy like most of these rumors. Everything mentioned was either something that we expect within a margin or error or was something we know now exists, like the integrated FM capable radio chip. But I can't see Apple enabling that aspect even if they do use that chip and I find no case changes a big hard to swallow. Using the same processor and no display resolution changes could happen, but it seems that a better CPU again under-clocked would offer more power savings, and the display resolution would be fine in and of itself if every new smartphone wasn't trouncing Apple's display resolution so I can't imagine a 3rd year at 480x320. Anyone know if the iPhone SDK is designed to scale dpi without issue, using the same screen size as a constant.
  • Reply 14 of 172
    solipsismsolipsism Posts: 25,726member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by infobhan View Post


    These rumors sound completely believable. What else were people expecting? Similar form factor, upgraded speed and RAM, better camera, better performance. All makes perfect sense. I agree that the FM, if it exists, is probably a transmitter to let you use it in your car.



    I know this will sound lame, but it all sounds too believable.
  • Reply 15 of 172
    le studiosle studios Posts: 199member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by ajay View Post


    downloaded the original image & messed around with image levels in Pixelmator... this is what came up.

    is this normal?

    or does anyone think that this is just some (un)imaginative photoshop-job?







    This may be true!

    Why? Last time someone posted up pics of the new 2009 Mac mini, then everybody said its a fake. Then came the video. After that it was released exactly as the pics and video confirmed. C'mon people lets think Apple 3.0 OS Upgrade is good but I already imagined that it will run faster on a iPhone with more processing power and memory this fits. I bought the 3.0 SDK from Apple two months ago. It's great! All Apple need is a phone to run it. I mean 32GB 3G iPhone is all I really wanted anyways. If it can do more than that's great for everybody!
  • Reply 16 of 172
    ph0en1xph0en1x Posts: 2member
    People do get access to the phones. I was able to play around with an iphone 3G last year two months before it came out, i was chatting to a guy that worked for one of the telco's that was doing testing in Australia. They are out there and some will remember the prototypes that have been seen of the first iphone (they were black)

    I do hope that a new one does not come out this year as you will start getting people a little angry bringing out new phones every 12 months, I would suggest work on the software over the hardware, build that up and spend the extra time coming out with a phone with 4g technology, far better cameras, tiered product releases and pure integration to both mac and windows.... just my 2 cents
  • Reply 17 of 172
    ajayajay Posts: 117member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by LE Studios View Post


    This may be true!

    Why? Last time someone posted up pics of the new 2009 Mac mini, then everybody said its a fake. Then came the video. After that it was released exactly as the pics and video confirmed. C'mon people lets think Apple 3.0 OS Upgrade is good but I already imagined that it will run faster on a iPhone with more processing power and memory this fits. I bought the 3.0 SDK from Apple two months ago. It's great! All Apple need is a phone to run it. I mean 32GB 3G iPhone is all I really wanted anyways. If it can do more than that's great for everybody!



    well, the rumors may be true... but the image certainly has the marks of digital manipulation!

    just my $0.02
  • Reply 18 of 172
    solipsismsolipsism Posts: 25,726member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by ph0en1x View Post


    I do hope that a new one does not come out this year as you will start getting people a little angry bringing out new phones every 12 months, I would suggest work on the software over the hardware, build that up and spend the extra time coming out with a phone with 4g technology, far better cameras, tiered product releases and pure integration to both mac and windows.... just my 2 cents



    What! one device every two years? The current iPhone 3G is already composed mostly of the same internals as the original iPhone from 2 years ago. Besides the fact that I like to get a new phone every year it's overdue for a major system overhaul.



    As for 4G technology, Apple is probably going to build their own radios as they have no expertise in this arena. They'll leave that to the experts, the experts that haven't completely finalized the air interface standard, have yet to produce any working tower hardware outside of the lab and, most telling, we have yet to see LTE in EC/34 and USB cards for notebooks or built in with miniPCI cards, which will predate any cellphone by quite a but as the tech will be large and power hungry, then we'll see it in the larger cellphones and finally in Apple's slim media phone after the tech is tried and true. 3G has a long life ahead of it before LTE will be needs. Enhanced HSPA (HSPA+) is 3G with 42Mbps down and 21Mbps up.
  • Reply 19 of 172
    solipsismsolipsism Posts: 25,726member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by ajay View Post


    well, the rumors may be true... but the image certainly has the marks of digital manipulation!

    just my $0.02



    We know they manipulated the photo to cross out serial number. Saving it from the native PNG to JPG could have added the artifacts.
  • Reply 20 of 172
    bloggerblogbloggerblog Posts: 2,462member
    256MB RAM is very much appreciated
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