Apple is widely believe to remove the more than century-old 3.5mm analog audio jack from the iPhone 7 in favor of Lightning-enabled headphones and wireless Bluetooth headsets. Chinese vendor Tama Electric is advertising at Computex 2016 in Taipei the first Lightning-to-headphone that would let folks connect their existing analog headphones based on the 3.5mm audio jack to the iPhone 7.
The listing was first discovered by the oft-reliable Japanese blog Mac Otakara.
Purported iPhone 7 schematics, leaked by Czech website LetemSvetem Applem, suggest that neither the 4.7-inch iPhone 7 nor its 5.5-inch iPhone 7 Plus counterpart may get any thinner than their present-generation iPhone 6s/Plus counterparts.
KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo claimed last September that Apple's next iPhone would be iPod touch-thin, measuring between 6-6.5mm for the 4.7-inch model.
Differences between the 4.7-inch iPhone 6/6s and the 5.5-inch iPhone 6 Plus/6s Plus are mostly confined to screen size, battery and optical image stabilization on the bigger model.
With the next iPhone, this imaging gap between the regular-sized model and its 5.5-inch brethren is expected to widen by a significant margin.
Purported iPhone 7 technical drawing discovered on Chinese forum Baidu by Italian-language HDBlog serves as yet another indication that the flagship iPhone 7 Plus model will be exclusively outfitted with a rumored dual-camera system, leaving the regular-sized iPhone 7 model with modest photography improvements stemming from a larger camera package.
Apple's next smartphone refresh may or may not bring a major design overhaul to the iPhone that fans have been holding their breath for, but we still fully expect the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus to be worthwhile upgrades in terms of both the looks and the features.
The rumor-mill does think, however, the device could have a cleaner look and feel due to the antenna lines being relocated to the very top and bottom.
The rear camera is said to protrude less from the housing and have a bevelled look and we might even get a pair of grilles at the bottom for stereo speakers. Taking it all in, Dutch 3D artist Jermaine Smit has imagined the iPhone 7 Plus in a concept video.
A claimed photo of an alleged 4.7-inch iPhone 7 backplate, which surfaced on a Weibo account this morning, gives us a closer look at the handset's protruding camera, cleaner antenna lines and more. Prior leaks showed a camera design not flush with the housing, but the new photo suggests that the rear camera could be slightly bevelled, too.
Peak iPhone? If the latest supply chain report is to be trusted, the Cupertino firm doesn't envision iPhone sales tapering off anytime soon, at least not this year. Barron's said Monday, citing a report in the Taiwanese publication Economic Daily Times, that Apple has now asked its contract manufacturers and Asian suppliers to prepare for a much higher-than-expected iPhone 7 production volume in 2016.
Instead of ordering about 65 million handsets, which would have been in line with what Wall Street had been predicting, Apple needs between 72-78 million units of the new iPhone produced this year.
French leaker Steven Hemmerstoffer yesterday republished an image of some claimed iPhone 7 Plus components, found on Weibo.
The photo appears to show an alleged dual-camera module said to be destined for the handset's refresh, along with NAND flash chips which suggest that the iPhone 7 could include a new 256-gigabyte model.
The presence of both 16GB and 64GB memory modules on the photo might indicate that, disappointingly, the iPhone's highly criticized low-storage 16GB model won't be going away with the forthcoming hardware refresh.
Thus far, we've heard conflicting rumors regarding the next iPhone's speaker setup, with some sources being adamant that the handset would arrive outfitted with stereo speakers and others shaking their head in disagreement, suggesting the iPhone 7 would have the plain old single-speaker setup, like prior models.
Well, how about four speakers?
Prolific leaker Steven Hemmerstoffer today posted on his French-language blog NowhereElse.fr a set images of images of an alleged iPhone 7 prototype case which shows not one, not two, not three but four speakers, two at the top top and an additional two at the bottom.
Remember the rumor, backed by a report from reliable Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, that only a 5.5-inch model of an 'iPhone 7' would have a dual-lens camera while its 4.7-inch brethren would get stuck with a boring single-camera module?
Now we know where that came from: Apple's camera supplier Sony has fallen behind schedule, prompting the iPhone maker to add another dual-camera supplier to the mix: LG's Innotek division. That's the current word on the street, according to a Barron's report citing Nomura Securities analysts.
Recently leaked images of a purported iPhone 7 backplate have since puzzled technology watchers, who scratch their heads over an additional hole that sits between the rear iSight camera and the LED flash. iPhones already have one hole on the back for a microphone that improves Siri reception and suppresses background noise during phone calls.
Rumors continue to swirl that Intel had been commissioned to build LTE modem chips for Apple's upcoming smartphone refresh, a marquee win for the semiconductor giant.
Tuesday, Taiwanese trade publication DigiTimes reported that Intel may supply up to fifty percent of LTE modems for the forthcoming iPhone 7 models.
Although Intel itself will package the modems, the chips will be mass-produced by contract manufacturers TSMC and KYEC, as per DigiTimes, indicating that the iPhone 7's 'A10' system-on-a-chip may integrate an Intel-built LTE modem. These Intel-designed LTE modems for the iPhone 7 are said to be faster than those in the iPhone 6s.
Apple's Taiwanese suppliers have kicked off the recruiting process in preparation for an 'iPhone 7', CNBC reported Tuesday citing Economic Daily News. The mass-hirings have started earlier than usual because the iPhone 7 design is said to be “more complex than previous models,” which meant that Apple's suppliers needed to start work on iPhone 7 parts earlier than on previous iterations.
Both Foxconn and Pegatron had ramped up hiring as they prepared to assemble the upcoming iPhone 7 models, ahead of their expected September release.