The iPhone 5 Wishlist/Predictions Thread

[arctic]

For those still jonesing for a bigger screen...

4" screen and I'm in. They'd also kill the rest of the market. I was really disappointed the iP4 didn't squeak out even a slightly larger screen (and why I kept my 3GS). It seems positively tiny next to the competition now. As everyone says, 4" is the sweet spot. 'course if they still retain that squarish chunky shape, 4" will not be pretty.

Not gonna happen.

Like Merkie mentioned, screen size increase will be an App community nightmare. All current iPhone Apps will be useless.

 

[kdarling]

Like Merkie mentioned, screen size increase will be an App community nightmare. All current iPhone Apps will be useless.

They'd be fine.

Going a bit larger is okay for touch apps (it's going smaller that can be a problem).

One benefit of a slightly larger (4") screen is that it draws in the older (and usually richer) crowd who like/need visuals to be a bit bigger

 

[nutmac]

Sigh, again with these wild predictions.

iPhone 4 is the first major update to original iPhone (3G and 3GS represent iterative improvements over predecessor). Redesigned antenna excluded, Apple isn't going to make drastic change in 2011. If component price improves, look for $199 32GB and $299 64GB models. And if manufacturing is sorted out, white iPhone. Otherwise, we may see LTE 4G arriving for iPhone, supporting both AT&T and Verizon (I suspect rumored Verizon iPhone will stick with older EVDO, however).

Most of the real upgrades will be software based (iOS 5).

 

[Merkie]

They'd be fine.

Going a bit larger is okay for touch apps (it's going smaller that can be a problem).

One benefit of a slightly larger (4") screen is that it draws in the older (and usually richer) crowd who like/need visuals to be a bit bigger

It's okay for you maybe, but not for Apple. They designed their UI to be x by y inches. Not in pixels.

I'm 95% sure that the screen size will not be increased.

 

[arctic]

Sigh, again with these wild predictions.

iPhone 4 is the first major update to original iPhone (3G and 3GS represent iterative improvements over predecessor). Redesigned antenna excluded, Apple isn't going to make drastic change in 2011. If component price improves, look for $199 32GB and $299 64GB models. And if manufacturing is sorted out, white iPhone. Otherwise, we may see LTE 4G arriving for iPhone, supporting both AT&T and Verizon (I suspect rumored Verizon iPhone will stick with older EVDO, however).

Most of the real upgrades will be software based (iOS 5).

Apple releases a new iPhone generation annually, every June/July. If you are right and it's gonna be only an additional color, price drops, iOS tweaks (that the iPhone 4 can upgrade to as well) and CDMA for Verizon support, it'll be the first lame iPhone keynote.

 

[Xenc]

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Physical camera button! Plus all of the above.

 

[Rooftop voter]

I'd like to see a back button on the keyboard. I think that would be very useful when trying to get the cursor right where you need it.

I'd like to see a better notification system. Something like bitesms for texts, and emails.

I'd like to see apple make use of the lock screen with pertinant info, weather, missed calls, texts, voicemail, etc.

Better camera and software. The iPhone pretty much blows the competition away as it is, at least from what I've seen from looking at my friends droids, droid2, droid x, and evo. I'd like to keep this going, lol. 1080p recording and 60 fps or so would be awesome. I'm thinking a better lens or faster frame rate would help smooth up the video. A good camera in a phone is very important to me because I don't/won't carry an actual camera.

Better battery, and battery management. It gets better every hear so this will probably be a given. I'm using a jailbrake app called auto3g, and it has saved lots if juice on my phone when idle. Apple should have implemented something like this from the get go.

Voice to texts for emails and texts messages. This is something I know I would deffinatly use a lot.

Text to voice for emails and texts.

Voicemail transcribed to texts.

Customizable tones for email, texts, alerts.

Better/ louder speaker for iPod and speaker phone functions.

I like the screen, but I would be happier with bigger, no more than 4 inches, with retina. That would be awesome.

That e wallet thing that I saw posted up on the front page of macrumors not to long ago would be sweet aswell. I find cardstar very usefull, so I bet this would be very usefull also.

Real multi tasking similar to backgrounder. I find that way better than apples method.

A storage bump would be nice. Some people have a lot of stuff on there phone, which is awesome.

I'm sure there are some other things that I'll remember later, but that's it for now. I doubt highly that most of this stuff will make it in there though, but it's nice to dream!! Lol. On the upside though, I think next year will be a good year for android. If they get a phone that can match the iPhones screen, camera (there phones may have more MPs, but the photos and videos dont look near as good IMHO) and overall smoothness, I will be very tempted.

 

[aluren]

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Sigh, again with these wild predictions.

iPhone 4 is the first major update to original iPhone (3G and 3GS represent iterative improvements over predecessor). Redesigned antenna excluded, Apple isn't going to make drastic change in 2011. If component price improves, look for $199 32GB and $299 64GB models. And if manufacturing is sorted out, white iPhone. Otherwise, we may see LTE 4G arriving for iPhone, supporting both AT&T and Verizon (I suspect rumored Verizon iPhone will stick with older EVDO, however).

Most of the real upgrades will be software based (iOS 5).

Apple releases a new iPhone generation annually, every June/July. If you are right and it's gonna be only an additional color, price drops, iOS tweaks (that the iPhone 4 can upgrade to as well) and CDMA for Verizon support, it'll be the first lame iPhone keynote.

The 3GS keynote was pretty lame. I doubt we'll see major improvements next year, aside from maybe a newly designed antenna, verizon, and increased speeds.

 

[arctic]

I think next year will be a good year for android. If they get a phone that can match the iPhones screen, camera (there phones may have more MPs, but the photos and videos dont look near as good IMHO) and overall smoothness, I will be very tempted.

I think they are already getting there. Even their app market is catching up fast. The only stuff they are having trouble perfecting is the smoothness of their OS and their camera sensor optics. For the OS, even with Gingerbread coming, there are tons of factors affecting it including the differences of hardware from different manufacturers (plus all the crapware every brand and network will include). See them flaunting 1.3ghz power but still, they lag. And they also pay for their battery management. There are even dual core processors in Androids about to come out soon. We'll see if they can balance things. As for their optics, all the 8 and 12 megapixel phones out there still doesn't have the quality that's expected. They cram the megapixel figure in such a small sensor because of the battle to be "thinner". But I am keeping an open mind. Perhaps we'll see some good phones next year, whether it's from Apple, Android, et. Al. Android could be in the right path if they perfect their shortcomings. A good year: big quality screens, smooth interface, quality camera optics, must have features like notifications, powerful, decent battery life, etc.

Competition is good.

 

[FMJPhoto.com]

I love my iPhone 4, but if it were up to me I'd improve:

-Battery life
-Storage capacity
-Better notification methods (think blackberry)
And a few minor tweaks to the OS dealing with photo handling/file sorting.

The ip5 would have to have all of those things for me to upgrade from my new beloved 4.

Just my $0.02. It's fun to wish lol

 

[lexvo]

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- Fix for the antenna
- 64GB model
- Same screen size
- Support for multiple network types
- Improved notification system

And that will be about it.

 

[Bye Bye Baby]

Just two major improvements, a 4.0" display and a phone that functions properly.

I trust that Apple has learned it's lesson from the iPhone 4 debacle known as antennagate, and will do a better job of engineering the next model.

Some of this antenna thing is in some ways due to AT&T's network. speaking from someone who uses the iPhone in the US and outside, the network does suck.

 

[JASApplications]

everyone seems to be saying they want a 64GB model. I would have to agree. Lets hope Apple are looking at this

 

[netdog]

• Prioritize the home screen in a useful way. Enough with the icons grid.
• Improve battery life (a given)
• Drop size of top and bottom bezel.
• Improve the lens
• Lower the price
• Offer an unlocked model in the USA.

It's a great phone poised to get even better.

 

[Merkie]

Some of this antenna thing is in some ways due to AT&T's network. speaking from someone who uses the iPhone in the US and outside, the network does suck.

Indeed, I've never experienced any reception issues with my iPhone 4. I can maybe replicate only 1 bar going down using the death grip for about 30 seconds. I've never lost signal.

 

[kdarling]

It's okay for you maybe, but not for Apple. They designed their UI to be x by y inches. Not in pixels.

Apple already allows their UI elements to be resized. In fact, they push it as a feature, even when done with horrible pixelation.

Anyone who owns an iPad with its pixel-doubling for iPhone apps, knows this.

 

[JulianL]

We probably won't need to wait until June to get some idea of the CPU/GPU direction for the iPhone 5. It was the iPad that gave us our first look at the A4. The first iPad was announced well in advance of availability, just like the first iPhone, and like the iPhone I expect the gap between announcement/launch and availability for future generations of the iPad to narrow to weeks rather than months.

My guess is that we will get an iPad launch event in March 2011 and that will include a revision to the A4 chip which will almost certainly then be used in the iPhone 5, although maybe slightly downclocked in a similar manner to the current A4/iPhone4 arrangement.

- Julian

 

[applefanDrew]

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Pretty sure screen size bump is NOT gonna happen. At the keynote, jobs said they expect the iPhone's retina display to set the standard for 3-4 years. The screen won't be changing anytime soon.

 

[alent1234]

Was on the phone with AT&T for approx 2 hrs dealing with adding family members, etc to my account, adding hardware and so on... Rep actually went into detail as to what information they were given shortly after the iPhone 4 was released about the iPhone 5's launch next summer.

She said based on the schedule they relayed to her, and her frustration in buying an iPhone 4 herself right before this information was made available to her sales team, the iPhone 5 is scheduled around July next summer. As soon as I started asking more in depth questions, she clammed up, but all the same our mutual frustration with the process of going through my account changes resulted in a blurting of much previously assumed information.

This timeline has probably already been stated here before, but figured I'd pass the information along.

it's not even certified by the FCC yet, but a CSR knows all about it. Right

 

[JulianL]

it's not even certified by the FCC yet, but a CSR knows all about it. Right

Clearly the CSR doesn't know anything but it hardly takes insider information to predict the iPhone 5 in July.

OK, the past isn't a perfect predictor of the future, but given that every iPhone had first shipments in late June or early July (except the 16GB capacity boost on the iPhone 1 which was first shipped in Feb 2008) then the smart money would be on the same happening in 2011.

(Shipment dates taken from Wikipedia iPhone entry.)

- Julian

 

[kizaw]

This is simple. Just a phone that doesn't drop about 35% of my calls. Not necessarily an iPhone problem an AT&T service in N.Y. problem. So when an "iPhone" sucks at making phone calls something needs to change.

 

[samven582]

• Prioritize the home screen in a useful way. Enough with the icons grid.
• Improve battery life (a given)
• Drop size of top and bottom bezel.
• Improve the lens
• Lower the price
• Offer an unlocked model in the USA.

It's a great phone poised to get even better.

[*]Offer an unlocked model in the USA.

That would be awesome

 

[Sedrick]

Someone mentioned Steve Job's Keynote for next year's iPhone (perhaps 5, but more likely 4s or something).

When you think about what would be keynote-worthy, and possible in 8 months, it's not going to be an newly redesigned phone. It will have to be limited to software updates, maybe a new processor, 8 megpixel camera and a redesigned external antenna.

They still could shoe-horn in a 3.7" screen with the same case though and a shatter resistant back panel.

 

[JaSuS]

A bigger screen isn't gonna happen. iOS is all about the user interface, and Apple doesn't think in pixels but in inches (or centimeters if they're really smart ). A button in iOS corresponds to a certain size in the real world, and that's how iOS is designed. The SDK is based on that. Increasing the screen size will result in huge buttons or developers having to rewrite pretty much EVERY app out there.

Correct I don't know why everyone keeps saying a bigger screen size

 

[acurafan]

This is simple. Just a phone that doesn't drop about 35% of my calls. Not necessarily an iPhone problem an AT&T service in N.Y. problem. So when an "iPhone" sucks at making phone calls something needs to change.

yeah, how about an antenna that "just works!" and 64gb model.