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By golly, I think I figured out the biggest incentive for the 5S.

K

Kendo

macrumors 68020
Original poster
Apr 4, 2011
2,363
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I think faster speed and a better camera is a given, but I think the single biggest incentive for people to upgrade to the 5S is that they will offer the base model at 32GB, and the top model with 128GB of space.

16GB has been the base storage since the iPhone 3GS. The iPhone 3G before it had a base of 8GB. It only makes sense for them to increase the base for the 5S because in 2013, 16GB will have been the entry size since 2009. That is 4 years of the same space (or a lifetime in technology).

It will immediately target power users who need more than 64GB, and will give those who get the base model immediate satisfaction knowing they have twice the space for the same price as their iPhone 5 counterparts.
 
By that logic, why would they now DOWNGRADE the iPhone 4 to 8GB (a size it never was before) to make it free....
 
Kendo said:
It will immediately target power users who need more than 64GB, and will give those who get the base model immediate satisfaction knowing they have twice the space for the same price as their iPhone 5 counterparts.
Click to expand...

I'd be willing to bet a ton of money the 16GB phone is by far the most popular, indicating most people don't think they need the space.

How many people have a music library larger than 16GB but smaller than 32? Most people I know have either 5GB library or 100GB libraries (mine is the latter--include videos and we're looking at 500GB). A base 32GB isn't going to change anything for those people.

The only time I've found 16GB too small is when traveling for a long time without a full laptop, just iPad. I can't quite get enough TV Shows and Movies on there to be happy, though, I can sometimes delete one then download a newer episode via iTunes in the cloud if there is a good net connection where I'm going. My iPhone has about 5GB of files on it, most of which are photos, as with iTunes Match you don't need any space.

I'm not willing to stake my reputation on a claim that Apple won't change the storage capacities of the next phones, and they may do it if they can't find anything else compelling to improve, but I doubt they will do it because it's not a compelling feature for most people, which just drives up the cost of the phone to apple but doesn't increase sales.
 
I can actually see them not changing the storage capacities at all...forever. Apple's all about iTunes Match, Photo Stream, and the iCloud. And with wireless technology becoming much faster and more ubiquitous, they may be on to something.

NFC is going to be THE feature of the iPhone 5S. Plus other fluff.
 
a 128gb iphone will be the first iphone where i don't feel cramped. here's hoping for next year!
 
Kendo said:
I think faster speed and a better camera is a given, but I think the single biggest incentive for people to upgrade to the 5S is that they will offer the base model at 32GB, and the top model with 128GB of space.

It will immediately target power users who need more than 64GB, and will give those who get the base model immediate satisfaction knowing they have twice the space for the same price as their iPhone 5 counterparts.
Click to expand...
More storage capacity does not make one a power user. It has nothing to do with anything except how much data can be stored.
 
miamialley said:
Dude, this is macrumors. We are not a representative sample of the average user.
Click to expand...

This is correct. We are also pre-order customers, so even less representative. Even if you took all pre-order customers, the distribution is going to be biased toward what was available, as people will take the 64GB option if that's all that's left even if they didn't want it.
 
I don't think they will for two reasons:

#1. They are pushing cloud services. Best way to do that is to limit on board storage.
#2. They make an absolute ton of money on upgrades. $100 for a $10 piece of memory is a nice profit. Moving to 64GB is a smaller profit but still nice. I can see them adding a 128GB model but not moving the base to 32GB.
 
I'd love them to do it, but apple loves gouging us on memory prices.

Also, for those saying that apple won't do it because the 16GB is the most popular, you're wrong. Apple won't do it because they like money, but the 16GB is the most popular because it's the cheapest.

Most people don't want to pay more than 200 bucks for a phone. They'd gladly take extra space, but aren't willing to pay 100 bucks for something that costs a fraction of that.

With pics and video taking up more and more space with each new update to the camera, and some game apps taking up to a gig of space, we'd all welcome the base model to be pushed up to 32GB, but most people aren't gonna shell out 100 bucks for it.
 
all of my stuff is in the cloud or itunes match, which is why im going from a 32gig 4s to a 16gb 5. ill never come close to filling it up. even with apps.
 
I agree with many of my friends on this thread. I think Apple will keep the 16/32/64 model for the foreseeable future. They will continue to improve and market more aggressively the cloud services -- iCloud and Photo Stream etc. The reason for that is if you have a large trove of data stored on your phone's memory, you can very easily port that to a phone by a different manufacturer (there's nothing proprietary about mp3 and jpg's). But Apple wants users to be locked into their ecosystem. iCloud, Photo Stream, and those services lock users into the Apple ecosystem even further, beyond just the app library that locks-in users presently. You can't carry your iCloud music, photos, documents, to phones by other manufacturers.

I think the big feature of the iPhone 5S will be NFC and fingerprint-to-authorize and fingerprint-to-unlock support.
 
I bet the 5S adds an improved camera (since this is their first attempt at making a camera much thinner than it is usually). A faster processor is almost a given (that's something that gets upgraded all the time) and perhaps better battery life (as a result of improved electronics that are more efficient).

I can't imagine what else they would do (all the things I mentioned are more or less what the 4S was to the 4) unless they pull another Siri and create a killer software feature that is artificially locked like Siri was to get you to buy the new one.

Oh, perhaps NFC.

So let's review:

- Better camera optics
- More battery life
- Faster processor
- NFC Chip with Associated Software Improvements

The iPhone 5N (N for NFC)
 
M87 said:
Not. Gonna. Happen.
Click to expand...

What's not going to happen?

If you are talking about my prediction I would beg to differ. Apple is a late adopter and by next year NFC will be more "mature" and thus Apple will include it. Through Apple's marketing the perception will be that NFC was a geek only technology until Apple did it right.

Otherwise, I can't see a slightly better camera, processor, and battery being significant enough to make people line up around the block. The only reason 4S got away with it was because of Siri.
 
My hope was for a 128gb iPhone 5 but that didnt happen:( hopefully the 5S will be the one... I've got TONS of music, apps, and photos and with my 64GB iPod touch not too much longer for the world I really want to retire it and go back to relying on one device for all my media. I'll be upgrading my 32GB 4S for a 64GB 5 but I fear I'll be cramped for space sooner rather than later
 
homerun360 said:
iPhone 5s will offer different colors.
Click to expand...
Probably not. They have been offering black/white since the 3G, and I don't see them changing it now. If they did I doubt it would be on an "s" model. But either way I don't see it, and I hope they don't different colors seem gimmicky to me.
Apple will do the bare minimum to upgrade the 5s and just like in the past they won't drop any major upgrades. I think NFC is a possibility but I've heard the aluminum back would really interfere.
Most likely it will be faster, better camera, better battery and maybe an exclusive OS feature (similar to Siri) the "s" stands for speed, so really all you should expect are spec upgrades. The size upgrades don't really make sense based off what other phones are using. 64GB is still at the higher end of internal phone storage and is also the largest amount of storage you can get in an iPod touch.
 
ziggo said:
My hope was for a 128gb iPhone 5 but that didnt happen:( hopefully the 5S will be the one... I've got TONS of music, apps, and photos and with my 64GB iPod touch not too much longer for the world I really want to retire it and go back to relying on one device for all my media. I'll be upgrading my 32GB 4S for a 64GB 5 but I fear I'll be cramped for space sooner rather than later
Click to expand...

Maybe you should look into getting rid of some stuff. Digital hoarding is a real problem - and it's expensive too.

As for Photos, I figure having them readily accessible via the cloud or external HD is enough (at least for stuff that's older than a few months). That really cuts down on how much you store on your phone.

For music, there's iTunes match. What I did was put together a play list of all my favorite songs I listen to all the time and I keep that downloaded on my devices, while the rest can live in the cloud.

As for apps, I also regularly delete any app I haven't used in a few weeks. Since you can re-download anytime I don't think it's much of a hassle.
 
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