3G iPhone preview at WWDC, Release July 11 - Who, When Where, What, Why & how much

Edit: It's been a long thread, but as of the keynote - the keynote gave a preview of the 3G iPhone, which may or may not have more features than shown when launched on July 11 in 22 countries.

//Previous initial post below.


I'm starting this thread to look into these again, as I think the 3G is pretty close, but wanted to get some accurate info on dates and such.

Reasons why no 3G iPhone yet: Battery life, 3g chips that hog battery, and the U.S. having eff all 3G i.e. being behind Europe, Japan, etc on 3G cover.

Battery: Incremental update, the 3G iPhone will have a slightly better amount of charge it can hold. Battery life is also related in large part to the use of internet, EDGE and 3G

3G chip: Broadcom BCM21551 - It's the 3G iPhone's saviour chip.

http://www.broadcom.com/products/Cellular/3G-Baseband-Processors/BCM21551
http://www.broadcom.com/collateral/pb/21551-PB02-R.pdf

3G iPhone will, if it goes with the BCM21551 and doesn't sneak some bespoke Broadcom chip it's been secretly working on will finally have FM radio! Up to 5Mpixel camera, Stereo head set. A bonus? An FM radio transmitter (for car stereo music playback).
Optional extra chips compatible: GPS: BCM4750 Single-Chip AGPS Solution
Mobile multimedia, Mobile TV, & Mobile Power Management, DVB: BCM2940

BCM21551 was early access Oct 2007, and said to be available large amounts in 6 months. Which pegs it at March - May max, unless Apple wants to drag it out. Priced at $23.00 in large quantities, and gives decent efficiencies being a System on a Chip.

Contenders
(I'm still looking, but most are 3Q 2008. E.g. 4th edition S60 (which won't be called 4th edition) will be coming out by late 2008, and announced mid 08
(which will tbe finger and stylus sensitive)

Seeing as no other manufacturer is saying they're using them this summer, Apple might have carte blanche to grab as many as it can now.

Seeing as how Apple's iPhone is "a year ahead" and all, you'd think
a) They'd want to retain that lead ahead of competitors rushing out touchscreens this year
b) Only tech parts and controlled timings of product releases hold them back

So people - what events hold Apple back from announcing the 3G iPhone FCC trials next Tuesday? They could keep it secret for a while, but Apple will have to pre-launch it before FCC to get a decent product launch.

http://www.linuxdevices.com/news/NS8838596703.html

Edit: Watch for rumours on Japan or Portugal release dates.
Edit: Currently 2Q is the best bet. Do they lose sales by waiting till June? Are they held up by hardware or software till then? As long as announcement to shipping time is short, they won't lose too many sales in the meantime, and actually make a lot more once it's shipping (that'd be all those people waiting for 3G first).

TXCraig said:

Don't think you will see an early announcment for a 3G version of the phone as it will KILL new iPhone sales. Steve said they have commited to selling 10 million iPhones by the end of this year and will not make an "pre-launch" speach that would stop the current sales of the phone.
...Apple has not said it would use the Broadcomm chipset yet. They may be working with another vendor and it will not be announced until it shows up in the iPhone.
I would not hold your breath on a 3G iPhone in 2008.]
I do think you will see AT&T / O2 / T-Mobile continue to lower tariffs on the phone to attract new customers... and prices to continue to fall on the iPhone itself.

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Early announcement - I don't see it either. What i'm saying is that Broadcom chip usage will come out late 2008 afaik by other Cellphone providers - which will massively eat into the iPhone lead in touch screen phones.
Apple will want the 3G iPhone out as soon as they can after FCC shows it's testing it. If they could they'd want even that silenced till it comes out.

Apple haven't said they'll use it -but from all the reports, it's the first one that does 3G without draining the battery like crazy. That was one of the main reasons we didn't see 3G apparently.

Japan's getting iPhone in 2008 - They don't do EDGE - Ergo it has to be a 3G. So there will be a release in Japan but not the US? As above, they'll want to get the 3G version out to all markets, otherwise the sales would immediately seize up as people wait for their local 3G release.

As for price releases - yes.

I'm going to see if I can find anything that rivals it, and look into the current tear down chips in the iPhone, but as I said, the Broadcom SoC just kicks everyone elses ass right now. Unless Apple's in cahoots with a secret R&D SoC with Samsung etc, then Broadcom is it.

dangleheart said:

This is one of the more intelligent threads on 3G. Kudos to t0mat0. Very good reasoning, whether it pans out or not. So let us keep going. Stop polluting this thread with silly and unintelligent wisecracks

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Merci. I'm a fan of silly and intelligent wisecracks hehe. Worst thing is for the last page to miss out on the thread of the thread, so devolve to offtopic slanging.
Anyhow. A reply:

Japan

Japan's the key. It dictates things. It's going to be 2008, but I have to backtrack - I relooked at Japan material, and it's vaguerer than I thought about date - it could shift to Q3 :/

Alternative chips
Liberty4all did a nice post on a possible alternative - the Samsung

I wrote it off initially, but seeing as it's Samsung... Who do the NAND for iPhone(8-Gbyte MLC NAND flash (K9MCG08U5M)) & the NAND for nano iPod - it's a slap in the face for Q2.5 optimism (i.e. a 3G on iPhone's birthday). Jobs might hold the 3G iPhone till a nice launch on a suitable conference too.


Samsung, supplied the main microprocessor chip for the current iPhone (which is stamped with an Apple logo, but with a serial # that matches closely a chip that Samsung sells. The core design is based on ARM (it liscenses nowadays 0- a Newton Apple irony if you know the history).The Samsung chip features a three stacked die package containing the S5L8900 processor and two 512 Mbit SRAM dies.

It's beyond me at this point as to what the main chip on the current iPhone does versus the new Broadcom chip.

The Samsung chip could get rid of the Infineon PMB8876 S-Gold 2 multimedia engine with advanced EDGE functionality. The Broadcom could get rid of the BlueCore 4 ROM (a Bluetooth component) (and maybe the Marvell 88W8686 (a is a 90-nm Wireless LAN device)).


Samsung's ARM-based S3C6410 "mobile application processor" :
- At the heart of the 65nm manufactured chip is an ARM1176 processor core.

The kicker: "The S3C6410 processor is expected to be available in sample quantities in May, with mass production scheduled for the 3Q of 2008."

That means that if Apple took the chip, its only able to manufacture and get to store by 3Q. And Nokia et al are aiming for that window too. Now the N96 might be a "throw everything at it" phone, but it's a contender in that ring, and the S60 4th edition will be out around then too.


Follow the SDK
The SDK may show up what's in line for the 3G iPhone - Apple you would think would want to make sure every programmer doesn't have to do a rewrite of code a few months down the line just because Apple wanted to keep the 3G quiet.

Could it be Broadcom? Well, Apple does use Broadcom in a limited capacity in the iPhone already (BCM5973A chip in the current iPhone). But it's a major leap to go from the BCM5973A chip to the main stage 3G iPhone SoC fun, frolics & meat&veg provider chip.

My search has gone cold at the moment. Anyone hear who got the second 7 million unit shipment from Balda's touchscreen dept? Apple, or Nokia?



http://blogs.cnet.com/8301-13924_1-9...?tag=nefd.only
http://www.appleinsider.com/article..._reveals_samsung_intel_balda_design_wins.html
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/431982/

Skilgannon said:

Keeping it short you want:
-32 Gb;
-3G;
-Video-recording (I assume 5 Mp camera)
-And able to run PSP games.

A cellphone with 30 minutes of lifetime, wow.

About the 3G only coming out in Q3 2008, it is an almost proved rumor that the iPhone will reach the Portuguese market this March and we don't have EDGE either... we have ony 3G and GPRS.

Click to expand...

If you looked at the stats of the Broadcom chip in my post, you'd see that the above specs are highly feasable bar the PSP - i'd imagine a simulator will get some older games running anyhow (I think they'll be more than Sonic soon). The 3G will def have 32Gb, will be £G and there will be a camera bump. Any main chip will have video capacity by then - heck the iPhone's been modded to do video already, it's just a software issue afaik.

So now we have Japan and Portugal to watch

As an aside - I never knew reverse engineering went so far: http://www.semiconductor.com/resources/reports_database/view_report.asp?pid=4807

natejohnstone@g said:

Apple did file that patent recently for a "gaming device," and although I doubt that they are planning to release a dedicated iPlay or something like that, having more gaming functionality on the iPhone would be sweet.
As far as video, you're saying they'd simply have to add the full "iSight" functionality to it software wise? That would be sweet. I personally won't use the internet functionalities all that much, but I would use Video Chat a lot because, well, who doesn't want a video phone? It's like a Sci-Fi nerd's wetdream.

And yes AT&T has 3G already in many areas of the US (though not mine) and plans to increase it. But for me, the iPhone 2's real advantage is that I could (hopefully!) switch it to a Japanese or European carrier next year when I am ordered overseas.

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The Samsung supports an iSight - i.e. it's got the legs to do video calls. Apparently it can show and record video at the same time - Qik and Mogulus might have a new ring leader not sure about the Broadcom's capabilities on that front (it has USB somewhere - miniUSB out ftw?)

Video phoning hasn't yet hit a critical mass. heck - i got a N73 for the reason i could video call my girlfriend, but it never worked out. never used my front
cam since. Do you know anyone who actually uses it? I'd imagine it'd come more popular if you could start using Skype video calls

Good point about the carrier - An unlocked 3G iPhone has a lot more attractiveness in any 3g market, e.g. Britain. Throw in a local SIM and you're laughing. Makes U.S. to UK/Europe trips easier too potentially.

convergedworld said:

The time from sampling to commercial handsets is much longer than six months. Broadcom has indicated that the first handsets based on this chipset wont be out until 2009 and I think the 2nd half is more likely than the 1st.

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So if you can cite a reference, that's a plus towards Broadcom not being the main chip. How would Broadcom know the turnaround of the chip to handset release? I'm curious, as I haven't seen anything from Broadcom yet saying they're falling back to not release in quantity until say Q3 3008.
You've got to also wonder - if Broadcom *was* getting Apple's trade, they wouldn't really flaunt that. Companies have been been hurt for doing less to Apple. It would be an indication of the next gen's specs, and also a very good eta to market, if you know the turnaround time.

I thought it was open to earyl access customers. Wouldn't Apple potentially fall into that category?