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Analyst Speculation on $99 iPhone and Higher Resolution iPhone 3G

You don't need resolution independence to support different screen sizes. Thank about that, traditional PCs and Mac applications have been doing that for years. Making your application work on multiple screen sizes and true resolution independence are two related but different things. Developers could be doing the former right now with no new Apple technology, and they should be planning their apps from the start for dealing with different resolutions. If we ever get system-wide true resolution independence, that's great, but it's not necessary.

Even if you change nothing, increased resolution should provide higher-quality antialiasing for text at the same viewing size (particularly with apps using a lot of text drawn into Core Animation layers, since the iPhone and Core Animation don't support subpixel antialiasing). 720x480 would be perfect, and while I don't think we'll see it, I wouldn't mind the screen also being 10%-20% physically larger (much of which could be taken from the current faceplate without increasing the device dimensions much. 720x480 is about 2.25x the current amount of iPhone pixels, and that would make a huge difference on the amount of things you could do on the device. That's getting into the range where you have real estate for serious things if you wanted to (spreadsheets, coding, more complex games such as RTS).
 
I don't see a market for a cheaper iPhone. If someone isn't buying the iPhone, it's because they can't afford the monthly data plan, not because they can't find an extra $100 up front. If the monthly fee were lessened, that might help, but Apple doesn't seem like a company to play to the bottom line. There will be an Apple netbook before there's a new, downgraded iPhone.
 
raggedjimmi said:
Hmm 32gb is right up my street. I can't imagine them sticking in a higher res screen, what would be the point? The resolution is high enough for a 3.5" screen.
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Exactly. On a screen that small, higher resolution doesn't help with anything. It's not like you'd want your text any smaller, or more screen real estate (without a magnifying glass, that is) and you wouldn't honestly be able to tell the difference between a "HD" screen while watching a movie on a device that small.
 
I'll buy it, as long as it's not an iPhone nano.
And by the impression I'm getting from this, the new $99 iPhone and the upgraded iPhone 3G will be available on T-Mobile?
 
MHerstand said:
I don't see a market for a cheaper iPhone. If someone isn't buying the iPhone, it's because they can't afford the monthly data plan, not because they can't find an extra $100 up front. If the monthly fee were lessened, that might help, but Apple doesn't seem like a company to play to the bottom line. There will be an Apple netbook before there's a new, downgraded iPhone.
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agreed 100%
 
kastenbrust said:
No updates = no annual plan upgrades = no retention for network carriers = bad in recession

2MP camera, are you kidding me? My old Samsung had 8, and my friend who lives in China, had a China Mob phone 4 years ago with a 12MP camera, so basically Apples joking again.
Plus the App stores a joke anyway, the person who approves or disproves apps should be shot.
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What model is it? I pretty sure you mistaken it as 1.2 MP. By the way, good cameras does not necessarily mean good megapixels. It's all about the lens.
 
HiRez said:
You don't need resolution independence to support different screen sizes. Thank about that, traditional PCs and Mac applications have been doing that for years. Making your application work on multiple screen sizes and true resolution independence are two related but different things.
Click to expand...

It's important to note that PCs and Macs often build applications independently of resolution. If the resolution is smaller, then the window is bigger. If it gets so small that the window doesn't fit, then the window doesn't display all of its contents.

On the iPhone, the app is built to a resolution, much like saying Team Fortress 2 running at a certain resolution. To change the resolution, you have to change game settings, because the graphics engine has to account for the difference.

To change the resolution on the iPhone would take the iPhone SDK being smart about scaling apps up to the new standard, at least temporarily until developers built the apps natively to the new res. The good news is that developers don't have resolution in mind (most of the time at least) when they build their app: they pass the messages and arguments alone and let the drawing algorithms take care of the rest. This could be invisible to the developer community if Apple does this properly. I don't think it'd be a restructuring of the platform, though, since Cocoa and CoreAnimation and all the others are already drawing with the x320 in mind.
 
MHerstand said:
I don't see a market for a cheaper iPhone. If someone isn't buying the iPhone, it's because they can't afford the monthly data plan, not because they can't find an extra $100 up front. If the monthly fee were lessened, that might help, but Apple doesn't seem like a company to play to the bottom line. There will be an Apple netbook before there's a new, downgraded iPhone.
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I still have the original iphone because i don't live in a 3g area. I would get a new iphone if it had larger capacity and i didn't have to pay the extra for 3g that isn't available where i use my phone the most. I'd love 16gb capacity(not that this is what is offered) and an edge service phone. I believe there is a market for this.

By the way my original iphone is looking worn but still works great.

Eric
 
I'm new here, although I've been reading this site for a while and figured it was time to hop aboard and take part in the discussions...

I love the luster of the iPhone. Even though it's been out for a year and a half now, people who don't own one love it (unless they're biased of course), and I'm constantly letting friends and family play with my apps. I own the 3G and desperately wanted the 1G, but the timing wasn't right and I was eligible for an upgrade when the 3G came out.

Obviously, Apples intention for the iPhone 3G was to get the phone in more peoples hands with the lower cost. Ever since I've been following Apple, that is a drastic measure for Apple to do such a thing to do what they did with the 3G, but it paid off. I took interest in Mac after using a friends in college and I was always intrigued by the uniqueness and quality of their products. Even if Apple made underwear, there would always be something there that had never been done before.

What would be the point of a 2MP camera + video? I'm not a genius on how video works, but it's been done before and they could implement it within a major update. I think the OS and current hardware right now alone has more potential than they're giving into. I will go ahead and bet on a 32+ gig model and a lower price for the 8 gig.
 
iMule said:
What would be the point of a 2MP camera + video? I'm not a genius on how video works, but it's been done before and they could implement it within a major update. I think the OS and current hardware right now alone has more potential than they're giving into. I will go ahead and bet on a 32+ gig model and a lower price for the 8 gig.
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It's something that hasn't been done before... on an iPhone. One that's not jailbroken at least :)

Now that they've broken into the market with a product missing a few features can they make periodical refreshes and additions to maintain their increasing grip in market share and to keep their sales alive. They could tackle their entire list of upgrades in a single device, but that's not a great idea for them for several reasons. It makes it more likely that one of them doesn't work as the public intends. It'll be a bigger surge in R&D proportional to sales than they'd rather have. It will kill the list of upgrades people want, making it harder to come up with something incremental in the future. Amongst others that I can't think about because this 1700 calorie diet doesn't let me think right.
 
Is that all??

I just think if that's all the "updated" new iphone is going to be then Apple are going to fall behind on the mobile phone technology war. Already you can argue many other phones have better stats (battery life, camera).
 
I'd buy an edge-based iPhone in a heartbeat with a reduced plan.

I'd love to have an iPhone but $70 a month is pretty ridiculous.
 
How is Apple going to release a "low grade" iPhone on the ATT network that will probably only have EDGE when ATT is basically trying to kill off their entire 2G network? Something is a miss here...
 
One thing that is certain - there will be a higher resolution iPhone at some point. Apps will be scaled somehow, but it will happen. There is demand for it. VGA resolution at least!
 
teme said:
I think the future changes to iPhone will be based on the AppStore requirements (= they can't change iPhone too much, because apps has to work in all models). I think it's too soon to release a iPhone model that will require new revisions of AppStore apps. Next model could have a better camera, more capacity, maybe better processor to allow multiple apps at the same time. I think the screen resolution will stay the same for sure.
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Apps don't have to work in all models. I would love to believe that I will be able to use my iPhone Original until it completely dies, but I know that is not likely. Third party developers will eventually decide that the demand for iPhone original compatible games is just not high enough, and Apple will have to post a compatibility graphic of some kind with each app published. Maybe sooner than later, I don't know.
 
air-ick said:
I'd love 16gb capacity(not that this is what is offered) and an edge service phone. I believe there is a market for this.
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Right, there's a market for a cheaper monthly plan; there's also a market for an Apple netbook, but Apple doesn't like going back in time just to please the market. They like looking to the future even if it means fewer purchases (compare Macbook Air to a Mac Netbook - the netbook probably would have sold a lot more). Of course, they also like their "Apple tax" which they don't get from the 3G plans, so it should be interesting to see how it plays out.
 
I don't have a problem paying $199 or $299 for an iPhone. I do have a problem with an $85 a month payment when I don't use the actual phone part of it that much. That's a huge jump over the previous monthly charges.

AT&T and Apple need to work together to lower the price of the service plans. I didn't have a problem with the previous basic $59 a month charge. But I was laid off from my job at that time. After I got a job, the 3G version came out and the rates jumped.

The true beauty of the iPhone is in the way Apple has integrated the cellphone, ipod, internet, GPS & applications together, but not all people use their cell phone that much for talking. A lot of people don't need even the 450 a month minutes. I have thousands of roll over minutes that just go unused. So if they work on the service plans to reduce the monthly cost, I would purchase one. Even a plan of 250 or 350 minutes a month (only available with an iPhone package) to reduce the cost somewhat. That would make a lot of people more interested in the iPhone.
 
Changing resolution...

Could easily be done to still let everything in the App Store work without changes.

A "tag" on the app could say it knows about the new higher resolution. If not there, then the hardware could simply scale to fit the new resolution.
 
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