Behind the Scenes of the 'iPhone 5' Case Gamble

[dBeats]

Brilliant. Apple now knows who the leakers are and they are probably being skinned alive as we speak.


My bet is still that the "iPhone 5" leaked pictures are really an iPad mini, sort of a super iPod Touch. Probably coming out in the spring. Cellular enabled, but not a phone. Honestly with Facetime/Skype/GVoice and iMessage-like services, WTH do you need a "phone" for anyway. It's all data in the end.

 

[pewra]

Brilliant. Apple now knows who the leakers are and they are probably being skinned alive as we speak.


My bet is still that the "iPhone 5" leaked pictures are really an iPad mini, sort of a super iPod Touch. Probably coming out in the spring. Cellular enabled, but not a phone. Honestly with Facetime/Skype/GVoice and iMessage-like services, WTH do you need a "phone" for anyway. It's all data in the end.

Let's just keep making up crap, yeah?

 

[pooryou]

It's not just millions in wasted inventory, what about the environmental impact?

 

[shompa]

Just save the cases to the iPhone 5/Iphone Air reveal next year.
An educated guess is that the iPhone 5 prototype is finished and will match these cases.

28nm engraving is almost one year delayed. It should have been ready by now.
TSMC said that less then 3% of income will be from 28nm Q4 this year with ramping starting Q1 2012.

Apple got back test wafers from TSMC a couple of month ago. 28nm A class chip. A6 for the next generation iPad/Iphone.
Qualcomm/TSMC will start to manufacture 4G 28nm chips Q1 2012.

Iphone 5 was probably meant to be released with iOS5 but lack of 28nm parts stopped it.

If Apple follows how they have done last 3 years:
Ipad 3 with A6 + retina + siri introduced Feb-mars.

Here Apple can choose: to release Iphone5 or to wait for iOS6 before releasing it.

If Apple catches up with the delayed iOS. iOS 6 beta will be released Mars-April for iPhone 5 launch june 2012.

Iphone 5 with larger screen. A6. NFC. 28nm 4G LTE. 12 megapixel.

 

[SilianRail]

Are cases that big of a business? To me it just seems like too much of a waste of energy and resources to do all this massive planning ahead just to sell a 3rd party products such as cases.

They cost 20 cents to make and they sell them for $29.99

 

[kingtj]

Uh, not necessarily ....

First of all, a tapered design is a tried and true method of making a given device as slender as possible while still fitting some thicker/bulkier components inside. If you only need the larger width in one part of the device to provide adequate clearance for a larger part or two, you can taper off the rest rather than wasting space with a box-shaped shell.

Who says the next iPhone will even have physical buttons on the side to press for volume? There are other ways to do that, you know. Perhaps they'll use a touch-sensitive portion of the side of the case to detect your fingers placed on slightly indented or raised spots that serve as virtual buttons? If everything is shaped ergonomically enough, I don't see why a taper would make it impossible to hold without dropping.

The other consideration here is that the next iPhone will almost surely feature a larger screen, since so many people view that as a negative of current models. That means the current shape will HAVE to evolve anyway.

Why in the world would Apple create a tapered iPhone design? Think about it. Trying to press the side buttons while holding it would be ridiculous. Just to turn the volume up or down while holding it with one hand would consist of actually sliding the phone to the tip of the fingers to be able to press anything, which could cause people to drop the phone constantly. The tapered the design on an iPad however is different, since people are constantly using two hands.

Plus, the current iPhone design is a marble that's going to last for a couple generations like the awesome Mac Pro design. Why make any drastic ridiculous changes like that.

 

[the8thark]

This case company ****ed up. But not in the way most would think.

I think this case design is good, but only for an unreleased prototype not ever released for sale to the public. So yeah that's a $50k gamble and this company lost.