Further Indication iPhone 5 Release will be Q4 2011

It’s a rumor which has been around since Apple officially announced the date for WWDC 2011, and now Reuters have added further fuel to the fire.  We’re talking about the next generation of iPhone not being released soon after the conference as has been the tradition, but in September instead.
Quoting a trio of individuals with ‘direct knowledge of the company’s supply chain’, the report says production of the iPhone5 won’t begin until July or August, leading to a September shipping date.This ties in with the previous rumors suggesting a Q4 release for the phone, which given Apple’s preference for short lead times indicated a late Q3/early Q4 announcement.  Why they’ve decided to extend the life of the iPhone 4 this time isn’t known, but it could be down to many things:

1. The White iPhone 4.  It’s still supposed to be on its way, don’t forget!
2. iOS 5.  Perhaps the new software isn’t quite ready?
3. Supply Problems.  Touchscreens, new camera lenses etc.
4. A change in Apple’s release structure across the board.

A September onwards release date should please a few people though, as anyone with an 18-month iPhone 4 contract will be a few steps closer to upgrading to the fifth model than expected!
Reuter’s sources also say the iPhone 5 won’t look all that different to the iPhone 4, something many have also suspected.  If the design doesn’t change, the good news is all those iPhone 4 cases won’t be useless; unlike any iPad 1 cases you may have…
Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference will take place between the 6th and 10th June 2011.

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iPhone 5, white iPhone 4 theories get release this week

Two competing theories regarding the nature of the iPhone5 having been running parallel amidst the vacuum of any official word about a release date, but there can only be one that's right – and that answer should arrive by default one way or the other this upcoming week. On the one hand there's the "white iPhone 4 is arriving this week" theory based on Apple exec Phil Schiller's public proclamation that there will be a white iPhone coming "this spring." The other theory says that the "white iPhone" in question is actually a white iPhone 5, and since Apple's WWDC keynote is in early June, which is technically still spring, we can still expect the iPhone 5 along the lines of Apple's traditional annual updates. Both theories are equally plausible, and both are justifiable interpretations of Schiller's words. But they can't both be right, and one of them is about to get struck down.

There's the popular scenario in which Apple pops out the long fabled white iPhone 4 this week. In that case you can firmly wave goodbye to the idea of seeing an iPhone 5 (or for that matter iOS 5) in June, as Apple isn't about to add a white model to the iPhone 4 lineup a mere month or so before it turns around and bargain-bins the entire iPhone 4 era in favor of an iPhone 5.

But then there's the other scenario in which the white iPhone 4 doesn't get launched. That would tell us two things. First, it would mean that the iPhone 5 must be just around the corner. And second, it would mean that the iPhone5 is sticking with a design which allows for a white model; in other words, so much for the notion of an all-brushed-metal iPhone 5 era.

Either interpretation holds water, but they can't both be right. The only thing Apple has has to say about the iPhone lately is that the iPhone sold 113% better in the first quarter of 2011 than it did in the first quarter of 2010, which says that the iPhone 4 era has been a successful one. The question now is whether it's nearly over in favor of the iPhone 5 era, or whether Apple has plans to extend it longer than usual by adding a white iPhone 4 to the mix. We'll get some answers this week about the iPhone 5, based on Apple's actions (or lack thereof) regarding the iPhone 4. Here's more on the iPhone 5.

iPhone 5 on September 13th: five reasons release isn't worth waiting for

If the iPhone 5 really is to be a September baby, it'll be unveiled in September 13th. And that being the case, our official advice has changed: if you're sitting around waiting for more information on the iPhone5 in order to make a decision on whether to buy an iPhone 4 now or keep waiting, and it turns out the iPhone 5 really is coming in the fall instead of the summer, go ahead and take the plunge on the iPhone 4 now. Bear in mind that this advice is conditional upon the iPhone 5 being held back until the fall; if it does indeed arrive this June then you're best off simply waiting another six weeks. But Apple traditionally holds its fall press event on the second Tuesday of September, namely the 13th in 2011, and if that event is to be the first sign of the iPhone 5 along with the iPod models which will debut that day, don't bother waiting. Here's why.iPhone 4 rocks: Several members of the Beatweek staff have been using the iPhone 4 since last year, and while we'll likely all upgrade to the iPhone 5 as soon as it arrives, here's what we've learned about the iPhone 4 in the mean time. It's by far the most ideal smartphone on the market. It's faster, more versatile, thinner, and lighter than any previous iPhone model, and offers significantly more battery life with a much better screen. The supposed "iPhone 4 antenna issue" simply does not exist except in the minds of the deviants who concocted it. On its own merits, it's nearly the perfect smartphone; we'd be hard pressed to come with things we don't like about it.

4G pipedream: Even if the iPhone 5 does end up offering 4G networking, that'll only work in the scant areas in which Verizon and AT&T have actually built 4G networks. For the vast majority of iPhone 5 customers, it'll be the same 3G or even EDGE experience that they'd have gotten on the iPhone 4. Unless you live in one of a handful of big cities where 4G LTE will arrive early, this is not a reason to wait for the iPhone 5.

Verizon already has the iPhone: For those Verizon customers who wanted an iPhone but skipped the iPhone 4 because they thought the iPhone 5 was just around the corner, we'll ask you this: what exactly have you gained by waiting? A few more months of being stuck with your existing phone, which you clearly don't want? And now you're looking at another few more months of doing the same? You're not winning this battle.

Question marks: In other words, it's all we know about the iPhone 5. Will it offer better specs and features than the iPhone 4? Certainly. What will those specs and features be, and will any of them be relevant to you? No way of knowing. Waiting means you're gambling that the iPhone 5 will offer something over the iPhone 4 which will have justified your wait. Waiting does not equal playing it safe; it's just a different kind of gamble.

Have it both ways: The real clincher is that even if you buy an iPhone 4 now, you can still buy an iPhone 5 later. Sure, you'll end up paying $200 above sticker for the iPhone 5 because you'll have used up your upgrade cycle on the iPhone 4 purchase. But nothing says you can't turn around and sell your iPhone 4 in September (for more than you paid for it, thanks to the magic of unsubsidized pricing), and put that money toward paying your iPhone 5 ransom. You'll still end up having paid at least little bit for the privilege using an iPhone 4 between now and iPhone 5 launch day, but it won't preclude you from getting to experience both iPhone generations. Here's more on the iPhone 5.

iphone : 'Color Keyboard' Adds Flair to Your iPhone's Stock Keyboard

Color Keyboard is a recently released jailbreak tweak that potentially allows you to customize your iPhone's keyboard using whatever color scheme you deem worthy.

I use the word potential, because it's entirely up to you as to whether or not you'll squeeze your money's worth out of it.

The name — Color Keyboard — while technically true, might seem as if it's a tad misleading, especially in the shadow of robust jailbreak tweaks like AlertArtist…

Once you drop the two dollars necessary to purchase the tweak, you'll notice a new settings section placed in your Settings.app.

What lies within proved to be slightly disappointing for me, and most casual jailbreakers will likely feel the same.

Instead of utilizing sliders that allow you to adjust the characteristics of your iPhone's keyboard, you're left with a highly anemic selection of stock themes.

There are a total of five themes bundled in with Color Keyboard, and they are as follows: Black, Pink, MoreRounder, BackgroundImage, and Complex Sample.

You can probably figure out what most of those do by looking at their names. It's pretty disappointing, because although the name of this tweak is Color Keyboard, there just isn't much color to be found initially.

One thing I do like about it, though, is that not only can you change the colors of the keyboard but you can also alter it in a way that adjusts its characteristics; take button roundness for example.

Even better, the themes can stack a la WinterBoard, so you can enable multiple themes at a time to come up with some really funky looks.

While that all sounds kosher, the only way to add additional themes is to pull up your sleeves, and dig into the tweak's property list file with your favorite text editor. There you can alter a theme's various properties, or create all new themes for yourself.

As you may have guessed, while the learning curve for this isn't exactly rocket science, casual users will probably shy away from venturing to such depths.

There is a handy tutorial contained on the tweak's page in Cydia, so if you're interested feel free to have at it.

Is Color Keyboard worth the $1.99 investment? If you're someone who likes to go digging around in code, then absolutely.

On the flipside, for those of us who prefer easy to use sliders to make customizations, Color Keyboard might seem like a waste of two perfectly good greenbacks.

What do you think? Have you tried Color Keyboard yet?

How to Downgrade iPhone iOS 4.3.2

With the release of iOS 4.3.2 this late last week, and the new iOS 4.3.2 redsn0w jailbreak still not completely stable, some of you might not want to wait any longer for a stable jailbreak, or maybe you're having additional issues with the new OS. Whatever the reason might be, you can downgrade from your current iOS version to an earlier version using your SHSH blobs on file.It is important you have your SHSH blobs on file for the iOS version you want to downgrade to. If you don't have your SHSH blobs on file for the iOS you want to downgrade to, you will not be able to downgrade. You can check which SHSH blobs on file you've got by launching Cydia and looking at the top of the Cydia homepage where it lists all your saved SHSH blobs. 

Follow the tutorial below to downgrade your iPhone on iOS 4.3.x, to iOS 4.3.1, 4.3, 4.2.1, or 4.1.

NOTE: This will not downgrade your iPhone baseband.

Downgrade iPhone 4.3.x to 4.x

Step 1: First, download the iOS version you want to downgrade to from our Downloads section here. Save it to your desktop.

Step 2: Now we must trick iTunes into thinking that it is watching Apple servers, while it is really going to change the address to Saurik's server (where your SHSH Blobs are saved). To do this (Windows users) go to:

C:/Windows/System32/drivers/etc locate the"hosts" file and then open it with Notepad (make sure to right-click and select "Run as Administrator").

If you are Mac OSX user, navigate to GO -> Go to Folder and enter the path "/etc" and open the file "hosts" with TextEdit.

Now add the following hostname at the end of the file as shown in the screenshot below. Save the file:

74.208.105.171 gs.apple.com

Step 3: Next, put your iPhone in DFU mode

Step 4: When you've successfully entered your iPhone into DFU mode, iTunes will automatically launch and a pop-up will inform you that your iPhone is in DFU mode.

Now hold down the Shift key (Windows users) or the Option key (Mac OSX users) while clicking the Restore button in iTunes. A dialog box will pop up and you'll be able to choose the firmware you want to downgrade to, downloaded in Step 2.

Step 5: During the restore process, iTunes might give you error message 1004 or 1013, don't panic! This is completely normal. Simply click "ok".

Step 6: Your iPhone should now be stuck in recovery mode, showing the "connect to iTunes" logo. To get out of this, simply download (Windows) (Mac) this standalone .exe file to fix recovery on 4.3.1. Extract the file and double click on fixrecovery43.exe. A command prompt will open, and the program will go through the process. During this time, you will notice scrolling text on your iPhone 4. Your iPhone will reboot.

Congratulations! You've successfully downgraded your iPhone firmware.

AT&T's Q1 iPhone Sales Up 33%, Unaffected by Verizon iPhone

AT&T posted its first-quarter earnings this morning, and the U.S. carrier saw a 33% increase in iPhone activations during the first quarter of 2011. A grand total of 3.6 million iPhones were activated on AT&T, helping to give the carrier a 10.2% overall increase in wireless revenue.

Since the iPhone was made available on Verizon, a drop in iPhone sales on AT&T has been expected. Instead, AT&T announced that this past quarter was its best first-quarter earnings ever. Looks like the Verizon iPhone isn't really enticing customers away from AT&T…A few points from AT&T's press release,

• Best-ever first-quarter smartphone sales of more than 5.5 million
• iPhone activations increased nearly 1 million year over year to 3.6 million, with 23 percent of subscribers new to AT&T; iPhone subscriber churn unchanged year over year

Smartphone Sales Remain Strong. AT&T had another strong quarter of smartphone sales. More than 5.5 million smartphones were sold in the first quarter, the third-highest quarter ever and an increase of more than 60 percent year over year. During the quarter, 3.6 million iPhones were activated. Approximately 65 percent of postpaid sales were smartphones.

It's interesting to see how well AT&T is doing in iPhone sales against Verizon. 23% of iPhone sales this past quarter were from new AT&T customers. The thought was that many people would jump ship and move to Verizon when the iPhone was made available, but it appears that most people are happy with the service AT&T provides.

Although Verizon's iPhone sales have not been released, the numbers are supposed to be lower than expected.

Why do you think AT&T is doing so well in iPhone sales? Did you recently switch to AT&T or renew your contract? Will you be leaving AT&T for Verizon?

Real Racing 2 HD with native 1080p output now available

iPhone 5 on September 13th: five reasons release isn’t worth waiting for

If the iPhone 5 really is to be a September baby, it’ll be unveiled in September 13th. And that being the case, our official advice has changed: if you’re sitting around waiting for more information on the iPhone5 in order to make a decision on whether to buy an iPhone 4 now or keep waiting, and it turns out the iPhone 5 really is coming in the fall instead of the summer, go ahead and take the plunge on the iPhone 4 now. Bear in mind that this advice is conditional upon the iPhone 5 being held back until the fall; if it does indeed arrive this June then you’re best off simply waiting another six weeks. But Apple traditionally holds its fall press event on the second Tuesday of September, namely the 13th in 2011, and if that event is to be the first sign of the iPhone 5 along with the iPod models which will debut that day, don’t bother waiting. Here’s why.iPhone 4 rocks: Several members of the Beatweek staff have been using the iPhone 4 since last year, and while we’ll likely all upgrade to the iPhone 5 as soon as it arrives, here’s what we’ve learned about the iPhone 4 in the mean time. It’s by far the most ideal smartphone on the market. It’s faster, more versatile, thinner, and lighter than any previous iPhone model, and offers significantly more battery life with a much better screen. The supposed “iPhone 4 antenna issue” simply does not exist except in the minds of the deviants who concocted it. On its own merits, it’s nearly the perfect smartphone; we’d be hard pressed to come with things we don’t like about it.

4G pipedream: Even if the iPhone 5 does end up offering 4G networking, that’ll only work in the scant areas  in which Verizon and AT&T have actually built 4G networks. For the vast majority of iPhone 5 customers, it’ll be the same 3G or even EDGE experience that they’d have gotten on the iPhone 4. Unless you live in one of a handful of big cities where 4G LTE will arrive early, this is not a reason to wait for the iPhone 5.

Verizon already has the iPhone: For those Verizon customers who wanted an iPhone but skipped the iPhone 4 because they thought the iPhone 5 was just around the corner, we’ll ask you this: what exactly have you gained by waiting? A few more months of being stuck with your existing phone, which you clearly don’t want? And now you’re looking at another few more months of doing the same? You’re not winning this battle.

Question marks: In other words, it’s all we know about the iPhone 5. Will it offer better specs and features than the iPhone 4? Certainly. What will those specs and features be, and will any of them be relevant to you? No way of knowing. Waiting means you’re gambling that the iPhone 5 will offer something over the iPhone 4 which will have justified your wait. Waiting does not equal playing it safe; it’s just a different kind of gamble.

Have it both ways: The real clincher is that even if you buy an iPhone 4 now, you can still buy an iPhone 5 later. Sure, you’ll end up paying $200 above sticker for the iPhone 5 because you’ll have used up your upgrade cycle on the iPhone 4 purchase. But nothing says you can’t turn around and sell your iPhone 4 in September (for more than you paid for it, thanks to the magic of unsubsidized pricing), and put that money toward paying your iPhone 5 ransom. You’ll still end up having paid at least little bit for the privilege using an iPhone 4 between now and iPhone 5 launch day, but it won’t preclude you from getting to experience both iPhone generations. Here’s more on the iPhone 5.

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Did Sony CEO Howard Stringer Spill The Beans About An 8MP iPhone 5 Camera?

We’re recently reported that very few new features appear to be solid for the iPhone5. But a recent slip-up by the Sony CEO suggests that an 8-megapixel camera might be a definite upgrade for the next iPhone. read Charles Moore’s new article:

MacNN, Appleinsider,, CNET, and several other Apple-watcher sites reported over the weekend that Sony CEO Howard Stringer may have inadvertently revealed that Apple is gearing up to equip the iPhone 5 with an eight-megapixel camera.

9To5Mac’s Seth Weintraub, who attended the event, reports that Stringer, in a Talking Tech with Sony event interview with The Wall Street Journal’s Walt Mossberg at Carnegie Hall’s Zankel Hall in New York, commented that his company’s camera sensor plant at Sendai, Japan, is among 15 of the company’s facilities damaged by last month’s catastrophic earthquake and tsunami, and that the supply interruption will delay shipments of sensors to Apple. Since Sony sensors are not used in the iPhone versions 4 and 3GS, which employ 5-megapixel and 3.2 megapixel OmniVision camera sensors respectively, it’s not a major deductive leap to infer that the higher-resolution CMOS sensors sourced from Sony would most likely be destined for the next revision iPhone 5.A PhoneArena blog from six weeks ago notes that OmniVision shares nosedived last summer when a rumor spread that due partly to complaints about a yellowish color shift in still photos shot with the OmniVision sensor camera, Apple might be moving to Sony for its next generation iPhone camera sensors — possibly Sony’s Exmor R sensor unit that is used in the Sony Ericsson Xperia arc and Xperia neo. That 8MP sensor is backlit to help it finesse low light conditions, similar to the way the iPhone 4′s 5MP OmniVision sensor does. Indeed, rumors of Apple dropping OmniVision in favor of Sony as its iPhone camera supplier are longstanding.

PhoneArena also reports that OmniVision has announced that it has an 8MP camera sensor of its own coming, the OV8820, which incorporates the same low-light performance enhancements, plus HD video at 60fps, and Full HD at 30fps, and which had been projected to begin mass production in March, but that production problems have occurred.

Not everyone agrees that Apple will use Sony CMOC camera sensors in the iPhone 5. Analyst Yair Reiner of Wall Street’s Oppenheimer & Co. is quoted by Appleinisider isaying he expects OmniVision to remain Apple’s camera supplier for the fifth-generation iPhone, corroborated by checks with contacts in Apple’s supply channels, dismissing the notion an Apple-Sony hook-up as “rather silly.”

Whatever, regardless of whether the iPhone 5‘s camera supplier is to be OmniVision or Sony, it looks like camera sensor supply problems may be a significant factor in Apple’s evidently postponing the iPhone 5 introduction from an anticipated Worldwide Developer’s Conference release until some time later in the year. With the iPad 2′s camera performance being that unit’s most unanimously panned feature in reviews, Apple will want to get the camera right in the iPhone 5, where it is arguably a much more important feature than it is with the tablet product.

Also, with Sony Ericsson rumored to be getting 12MP+ camera equipped phones ready for summer release, Apple will need at least the 8MP sensors to remain even ballpark competitive in that context.

[iphone5newsblog.com]

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