Apple Building Cheaper 8GB iPhone 4, End of September Launch alongside iPhone 5

[Stella]

But Apple already do sell unlocked iPhones ( out of contract )... in most countries, even in the u.s now.

Apple selling unlocked phones would destroy Apples ability to manage and control their product. It would be like Android bastardized on a dozen different products.

Apple is winning because they have control of the product, what it will do, and how it is used. If they loose that control by unlocking the product they sell, they'll be flooded with problems beyoond their control. Apple would be a big looser if they did it.

Apple Insider are calling the iPhone 5 - the iPhone 4S. I fear this will be a minor upgrade, even after 18 months or so.

 

[igazza]

I Hate samsung size and galaxy s2 !! is **** !

Thats a 4.3 inch display. iphone 5 is most likely only gonna get a 3.7 maybe 4

 

[tasset]

I think everyone is missing a point here.

Cheap iPhone--yes. Why not a very cheap iPhone with low margins?

Why then would it have to be carrier subsidized and locked?

Cheap iPhone, carrier independent (i.e., buy it and choose your SIM)--game changer.

Add a 3G touch with VOiP.

The carrier dominant model of telecommunications is then over--and not a moment too soon. Talk about disruptive.

Sell your ATT and Verizon stock, boys and girls.

Ahh this makes magical thoughts dance in my head. It WILL happen, just a question of when (how long Apple will continue to milk $600 per device from the carriers). I wish it were this year. But it might be a year or two, when either Google tightens integration with ICS and Google Voice/Plus or Microsoft with Skype/Facebook.
Apple is already piecing it together with iMessage, Facetime, and CDMA/GSM chip. Once competition puts pressure on Apple they will go Facetime for calls (voice only) and carrier free. Then carriers will be the utility pipes they should have always been.

 

[CFreymarc]

...and i doubt someone would go "oh the display sucks now".

Never underestimate how low some can go on this board.

 

[aeaglex07]

That's precisely the point.

As Winston Churchill once said to a woman (to paraphrase): "We've established that it's possible. Now we are just haggling about price."

Not saying that Apple should lose money on a cheaper phone--just not make as much per unit. Much higher volume of sales, carrier independence = same if not more profits, a better user experience, and total disruption of the carrier space.

The issue then becomes: what's the correct pricing of the cheaper iPhone?

The $180 cost iFixit for the 3GS is a few years old. 8 GB NAND flash is no more than a few $$$, and Apple owns the A5 and A6, so they can charge what they want. The antennae--a few more $$$. Then all you're talking is the case and screen--for which Apple has control over pricing, since they're the big gorilla and have signed long tern supplier contracts.

I think they could do it, and it fits right into their philosophy of control over the user experience.

Will they? Not sure. But why else would they want to create a cheaper iPhone?

right but Apple doesn't eat the cost of the subsidized phone, the carrier does. I certainly don't make those decisions at apple but i doubt they will lose money to sell a cheaper phone. In the end that would hurt their brand, and companies don't like to lose money

 

[mirco15]

Thats a 4.3 inch display. iphone 5 is most likely only gonna get a 3.7 maybe 4

i love my iphone4 because is soo small respect androidshit

 

[thetaylor13]

Wow! You must be a developer to have such intimate detatled knowledge of how it's all going to work. Tell us more!

I believe this feature is already up and running on devices (at least it is for me). I'm not a developer but he explained what I have to do to listen to music from the "Cloud".

 

[iSayuSay]

Whoaa ... iPhone 4 is getting cheaper and cheaper .. closer to competiton.

Or maybe how about iPhone 5 8GB for $400 (unlocked and no contract of course)?

That would be lovely .. and for people who hate cheapening of iPhone and scared of losing the exclusivity of Apple and "Look .. I have an iPhone!" thing .. go screw yourself buddy.

I love Apple being more and more modest and reach into more people. I love Apple being less and less exclusive and not considered as "niche" or "fanboy" product.

This way Apple hater going to eat their own $#1T and stop that "overprice Apple" BS ...

 

[bushido]

Wow! You must be a developer to have such intimate detatled knowledge of how it's all going to work. Tell us more!

just watch the iCloud video from the keynote? duh

 

[aeaglex07]

Ahh this makes magical thoughts dance in my head. It WILL happen, just a question of when (how long Apple will continue to milk $600 per device from the carriers). I wish it were this year. But it might be a year or two, when either Google tightens integration with ICS and Google Voice/Plus or Microsoft with Skype/Facebook.
Apple is already piecing it together with iMessage, Facetime, and CDMA/GSM chip. Once competition puts pressure on Apple they will go Facetime for calls (voice only) and carrier free. Then carriers will be the utility pipes they should have always been.

voice through carrier is a utility, and TBH its much simpler to pay At&T for voice and data than to add a separate VOIP company.

 

[commander.data]

With quite a few apps being hundreds of MBs, especially games supporting the Retina Display, 8GB is going to be uncomfortably cramped. If the iPhone is about the experience, a 8GB iPhone 4 definitely isn't the best entry point. Due to the effects of Moore's law you'd expect 8GB of flash memory to cost Apple less than a quarter of what it did in 2007 when the iPhone first launched. After all this time a 16GB entry iPhone would be ideal.

 

[cvaldes]

And yet, the 8GB iPhone 3GS, a 2+ year-old design is the #2 smartphone in the nation in sales.

Your assumption does not seem to be playing out in the real world behavior of actual smartphone owners.

 

[xwk88]

Speak for yourself. I'm using 4GB of my 8GB 3GS after a year (75% songs, 10% photos, 15% apps). I know people who are barely using 2GB on their iPhones.

he has a point far as I know most phones dont even come with memory included my frind has some LG android I cant keep up with model names on those things but its about 5 months old and it came with no memory he had to buy and he only has 4gb card in there as for ppl in my office 2 HTC evo's from sprint with 2GB memory.... I'd be happy to see a push to 32/64 on the next iphone as I hate having to pick which songs and audio books to not sync its a pain to have to pick only the one's I'll listen to(or have to down load them from the cloud when I want something I dont have) but for most ppl 8GB seems like more than enough.... just cause we're all geeks who must use 100% of our phones doesnt mean the rest of the world does....

so at the end of the day storage is not as important as many ofyou make it out to be as few ppl even have enough media to fill it up with.... I have a 9000 song library cost to get from itunes 9k dollars yea no thanks unless your rich(Im not) or pirated(I did :/ ) you music library (wich is about 80% of my storage needs ) wont be that big..... you dont need that much space.... and your home movie collection put it on ur mac lol plenty of space there.

 

[nicky89]

With quite a few apps being hundreds of MBs, especially games supporting the Retina Display, 8GB is going to be uncomfortably cramped. If the iPhone is about the experience, a 8GB iPhone 4 definitely isn't the best entry point. Due to the effects of Moore's law you'd expect 8GB of flash memory to cost Apple less than a quarter of what it did in 2007 when the iPhone first launched. After all this time a 16GB entry iPhone would be ideal.

But it doesn´t matter what we think would be ideal, it´s Apples game to tell us what is.
Selling a 8GB entry iPhone would still force enough people to buy the more expensive one with 16GB or more (which will be the "new" iPhone), so 8GB would make sense in a low cost iPhone I think.

 

[Sackvillenb]

I would be totally down with an 8 gb iphone 4.... depending on the price. I'd be curious though as to what other differences (if any) there might be between this and the current 16/32 models.

I don't find it that unlikely that the iphone 5 might have a slightly bigger screen. It wouldn't necessarily be a "downgrade" in resolution, because if they have a bigger screen it's not going to be much bigger. While a slightly larger screen would technically have a lower effective resolution, I don't think it would be much of a noticeable difference... I could have a slightly larger display that would still qualify as a retina display.

Well... the end of september... is relatively soon!

 

[igazza]

After all this time a 16GB entry iPhone would be ideal.

Maybe iphone 5 will only come in 16/32GB.

 

[GorgonPhone]

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no bigger screen no sell to me. the iphone looks like a baby next to all the new smartphones

exactly having that same small screen there is now way they can call it iphone5 it will have to be 4s.. its time to make the damn screen bigger iphone does look too small and many apps are hard to use cause ur finger cover soo much of that little screen

 

[number9]

Would an 64GB iPhone make a 64GB iPod touch redundant?

For all of those people who don't want a contract with a cellulat provider? No, I don't think it would be redundant.

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I think everyone is forgetting that the CLOUD is coming so you will not need to have more than 16 gb on your phone. You can update from anywhere and it is free unless you choose the backup service.

Also, I noticed on my ATT account that in early summer they offered me a upgrade option to Iphone 4 but now they changed the upgrade date to sept 28th? I think that is pretty clear confirmation that the new phones are on track for the first week of Oct. I get the impression that they want a large amount of customers going after the new phone vs the current one to create hype and mania.

I am going to get the 5 and only with 16 gigs. I can pay the cheap annual fee to have the large back up of all my music for that price difference on the hardware.

I guess you don't understand iCloud. You can't play music from iCloud, it's only storage. If you want to listen to it, it all gets downloaded to your phone, requiring that you need a good amount of storage still. iCloud isn't a streaming service, it's a back-up and syncing service for iOS and OS X, keeping your documents and files in the same state across all of your Apple devices, while also allowing for wireless syncing of media.

If you want streaming, you need a Spotify subscription, or something similar-a different cloud service. Also, I hope you're grandfathered into an unlimited data plan.

 

[tasset]

voice through carrier is a utility, and TBH its much simpler to pay At&T for voice and data than to add a separate VOIP company.

More simple and reliable, sure. It's probably worth the expense to stay locked into a carrier if you are on the phone 500+ minutes every month. But if you are more heavily data/messaging use, than the $40+ per month is too costly for voice.

 

[number9]

Wow! You must be a developer to have such intimate detatled knowledge of how it's all going to work. Tell us more!

Wow! You must have had a pretty crappy childhood to be so proficient in the area of douche baggery! Please, tell us more.

The information may be trivial to you, but it seems like at good percentage of the people on here don't understand what iCloud really is. They all think iCloud = streaming music = Less need for hardware storage when that is entirely not the case.

 

[alent1234]

With quite a few apps being hundreds of MBs, especially games supporting the Retina Display, 8GB is going to be uncomfortably cramped. If the iPhone is about the experience, a 8GB iPhone 4 definitely isn't the best entry point. Due to the effects of Moore's law you'd expect 8GB of flash memory to cost Apple less than a quarter of what it did in 2007 when the iPhone first launched. After all this time a 16GB entry iPhone would be ideal.

i have a 64GB ipad for all that. for a smartphone, the cheapest will do for me

 

[number9]

Apple selling unlocked phones would destroy Apples ability to manage and control their product. It would be like Android bastardized on a dozen different products.

Apple is winning because they have control of the product, what it will do, and how it is used. If they loose that control by unlocking the product they sell, they'll be flooded with problems beyoond their control. Apple would be a big looser if they did it.

The contract that the iPhone is used on is inconsequential to Apple. The control you're speaking of comes from controlling the hardware, software, and App Store. Apple already sells unlocked iPhones, and I'm pretty sure Apple hasn't been brought to their knees by rampant chaos created by people using them on the service provider of their choosing.

 

[GorgonPhone]

Apple claims that a retina display is defined by the inability of the retina to discern individual pixels at an average holding distance of 12 inches from your eyes, with a 300 dpi screen.

Current iPhone:

3.5" diagonal screen with a 3:2 aspect ratio (1.94" x 2.91")
2.31" x 4.5" overall phone dimensions
329.65 dpi

Assuming the same width and height of a new iPhone, same aspect ratio, and same horizontal and vertical number of dots; the new iPhone could accomodate, if they are indeed going closer to the edges of the phone itself with the screen, a 3.8" screen (2.11" x 3.16"), with a resolution of 303.63 dpi - above the magic number. No backtracking would be required, as Jobs has already defined what makes a retina display, and this falls under the criteria. Similarly, no scaling would be required. Of course, 3.7" allows for a mid-cycle update with a 'slightly larger screen, still with Retina Display goodness'.

^^^very true but its a bad marketing move to say here is the iphone 5 with bigger screen and lower resolution.. critics will immediately start finding evidence of iphone 4 screen looking cleaner due to higher pixel density..lol

no spec can be lower than the iphone 4 if its going to be called iphone 5.. a 4s model would let then get away with compromises in some areas though..

 

[Navdakilla]

Will buy, please release soon!

thanks

 

[bushido]

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i know a bunch of people that have never synched their iphone since activation so 8GB is just fine for people that arent tech nerds or dont always need the latest (*hint* gettin an 4 over 5 for example)