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Bloomberg, Reuters and the Wall Street Journal all think the next iPhone will have a 4-inch screen. Now, 9to5mac is reporting that sources at Apple HQ have been testing phones with a 16:9 display, provided by a 1136 x 640 resolution screen.
The rumour suggests that, along the lines of previous iLounge speculation, the aspect ratio of the iPhone is set to change.
The current iPhone uses the 640 x 960 Retina Display, conforming to the standards of previous models which have all featured a display measuring 3.5 on the diagonal, equivalent to a 3:2 aspect ratio. This new 1136 x 640 screen size is rumoured to be the same width as the current screen, but taller at 3.45 inches. That makes it pretty much exactly a 16:9 aspect ratio. That seems to make sense: the iPad, for instance, already plays video at 16:9, so it would make sense for this move to occur if Apple wanted videos to play at a native aspect ratio.
The rumoured changes in screen dimension have been confirmed to 9to5mac by “undisclosed” employees, who are testing candidate iPhones in “locked shells in order to disguise the exterior design”. If such a screen appears on the iPhone, you can expect the home screen to feature an extra row of icons—with no drop in quality thanks to extra pixels along the vertical—and for apps to be redesigned to use the new display real estate.
9to5mac also suggests that the new phone will feature a smaller dock connector, a rumour which has been floating around for some time. In fact, it reports that it is “basically a much narrower version of the current… dock connector” and “between the size of a Micro-USB and Mini-USB connector” in size.
9to5Mac’s report mentions “a few next-generation iPhone candidates in testing,” including two that feature the 16:9 aspect ratio. But it’s not clear if and how those two differ from each other, or what screen size the untold rest of the designs being considered employ. There’s also the fact that Apple—and any other company with a half-decent R&D budget—tests multiple versions of every product before final release. Whether these elongated screens are fact or a Jony Ive flight of whimsy remains to be seen.
So, there are some big, big ifs here—but it’s certainly looking like a bigger screen is a very, very strong possibility. [9to5mac]
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Would it have killed apple to just use the micro usb standard and saved everyone having to lug another wire around?
Of course it would. How else would you be able to license out specific docks etc as an additional source of income…
I really hope they change the 30pin connector to something else. All those iPod docks, speakers, cars with iPod docks, become redundant.. heh
Well, that’s a bit stating the obvious, but it did technically have a lot more pins in in order to accommodate extra devices when it was first designed.
That dock connector includes more pins than Micro USB does, which allows it to cater to many more functions than just power and data. The connector includes an audio line out, as well as analogue and digital video out. Without those extra pins, many accessories that use those pins would not have been possible.
However, modern technologies like MHL do negate the need for some of those pins. It’s possible that any new dock connector might incorporate MHL.
This bigger screen is long overdue. Apple will sit pretty at the top of the tree if they pull this one out of the bag…
If they copy what every other phone has been doing for years you mean?
Not just copy, make a massive press release and marketing campaign telling the world that you have given it the most biggest and specialist screen (apart from anything else out in the last year).
Still at least the press release will be fun.
Which tree is this Taf? they already produce the top selling smartphone in the world (currently), so it can’t be that one.
Before people start mentioning fragmentation, this isn’t going to be like android. Here are the number of different android screen resolutions (it’s in the hundreds)
http://d2cpknllkuywe0.cloudfront.net/images/frag_android_screen_res_light.png
Compared to iOS: http://d2cpknllkuywe0.cloudfront.net/images/frag_iphone_screen_res_light.png
Adding one more isn’t going to hurt, also the screen resolution is (supposedly) only increasing vertically, not horizontally. Currently iOS apps have to be somewhat flexible vertically anyway because when you are in a call or recording audio the status bar increases to double height, shrinking the app vertically.
You seem to have the idea that Android developers have to write code to cope with every resolution, this is simply not the case, while there are a wide variety of resolutions as you say they can be handled with very few actual changes, mostly done by having your graphics at different pixel densities and using Androids intelligent scaling.
I am aware of that, I’m saying adding one more resolution won’t hurt as some people think it will.
Yes, but they do have to write code specific to each device for other hardware reason which is where the problem lies.
eh? please link me to sources of such information.
Just read the comments on half the apps on google play and you will quickly discover they don’t work on all handsets.
well that’s either shoddy developing or high-end games, in which case there is more specific requirements with regards to compatibility, but nowhere near “code specific to each device”.
Yea, we actually develop apps for Android. Yes there is code specific to each device sometimes. Sorry to burst your bubble
The first part of the sentence does cover a fair bit though. Decent games do have to deal with different graphics chips especially on that note.
I’ve messed around with the SDK on Eclipse also, and I haven’t come across the need for device-specific code (you have to cater for 4 different resolution ranges, but that’s nominal really).
I’m a long time iPhone user ie I’ve had them all but if this is true it’s not enough.. Steve Job’s has long since been proved wrong about people wanting a bigger screen. With the likes of the One X, SGIII, Nexus and Galaxy Note proving incredibly popular 720P is the minimum res now and 4″ ain’t big enough…
As with all rumours I’ll take this one with a pinch of salt
If you take each iPhone rumour on Gizmodo between now and launch date with a pinch of salt you’ll die of sodium poisoning before it comes out (or suffer other nasty effects http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Salt#Health_effects
)
or I’ll have a REALLY REALLY big pile of salt behind me !
That will be handy if they don’t release till October again as the local councils will be looking to bolster salt supplies for the winter months around this time.
If everybody forms an orderly line behind me when the snow comes they’ll be no unfortunate accidents apart from if I slip up then we’re all doomed !!
Having thought about it, extending height alone is kind of logical if you want to take the media consumption approach, seeing as just about all videos play in that annoying letterbox at the moment.
I’m just not convinced that 4″ is enough. Along with my current iPhone I’m running 4.3″ and 4.7″ screen phones and prefer their size to the iPhones 3.5″
Unlike every other phone manufacturer, Apple don’t make 5 different models. They make one. As such, that one phone has to cater to everyone’s requirements. It also has to please Apple’s millions of existing users, who have gotten used to the size of their iPhone.
4″ is the logical choice, as the resulting phone will be little (if any) larger than the existing handset.
I can see it now…
“Apple Revolutionises the Smart Phone with a MASSIVE 4inch screen”
“magical 4inch Retina+ screen”
“no one wants flash”
Also the second edition of the Seri Beta, exclusive to iphone 5!
I would have thought Apple would have balked at adding dirty great black borders to hundreds of thousands of apps.
The app devs will move pretty quickly to rectify that, particularly if they’re given the software tools to do it before the hardware is made available to the public.
“the iPad, for instance, already plays video at 16:9″
… I don’t even know what to say about this supposed point.