Apple is preparing to bring some motion from the Apple Watch to the iPhone 6S. One of the new device’s differentiators over its predecessor will likely be a spiced up set of animated wallpapers, according to three sources who have used internal iPhone 6S prototypes within Apple. The new animated wallpapers come from the same family as the set of “Motion” watch faces that dominate the main screen of the Apple Watch, where the user can choose from jellyfish, multi-colored butterflies, or brightly colored flowers.
As we approach the iPhone event, with invites very likely to go out to press shortly, we have more iPhone 6S rumors to discuss. Firstly, Hamza Sood has once again peeked into the iOS 9 source code and found references to ‘deep press’ gestures. This seems to confirm the existence of Force Touch in the new iPhones, which at this point is no surprise. Force Touch is widely assumed to be coming to all of the new iPhones and iPads Apple will announce this year. 9to5Mac reported that Force Touch will be used for various things across the OS: Sood found the Force Touch code reference in text selection code and appears to mean that a Force Touch gesture will activate the keyboard trackpad scrolling … a new feature for iPads in iOS 9.
A packaging photo has also leaked, although the validity is highly questionable. It appears to show packaging for the iPhone 6S Plus …
Apple has called the iPhone “the world’s most popular camera,” a title originally earned by aggregating all iPhones together for counting purposes. But while the exact sales numbers for each iPhone model are difficult to quantify, there’s no question that Apple has already sold over 750 million iPhones, and well over 100 million iPhone 6 devices. Those are huge numbers, and well beyond the typical sales of individual point-and-shoot cameras.
Few people appreciate that growing iPhone demand has created an unusual challenge for Apple: reliably sourcing the tens of millions of parts needed to meet first month demand for tens of millions of iPhones. To that end, Apple’s camera maker Sony had to upgrade its manufacturing plants twice this year to produce more of the CMOS image sensors needed for smartphones including the iPhone. Even with a partner as large as Sony, however, iPhone-specific engineering requirements and the risk inherent in brand new technologies have led Apple to hold off on using the latest and greatest camera innovations in its devices. Instead, iPhones go with thin, lower-resolution sensors that offer great overall image quality for their size, and never eclipse rivals on raw specs.
So what can we realistically expect from the iPhone 6S and 6S Plus cameras next month? Here are my educated guesses…
Taiwan’s top court has ruled that former TSMC R&D director Liang Mong-song revealed to Samsung trade secrets that enabled it to copy the chipmaker’s FinFET manufacturing processes, reports DigiTimes. The processes are used by both companies to produce the A9 chips used in the upcoming new iPhones.
It was recently suggested that Apple was playing off the two companies against each other, with Samsung reportedly offering discounted prices in order to “grab the majority of A9 chip orders.”
The ruling of the second-instance court was according to an analysis conducted by third-party experts regarding key manufacturing processes of TSMC and Samsung […]
“The 16nm and 14nm FinFET products that both companies will mass produce this year were even more alike,” the report indicated. “It could be hard to tell (if the product) came from Samsung or TSMC if only structural analysis is used.”
Liang resigned from TSMC to take up a position at a Samsung sponsored university where all the students were said to be Samsung employees.
As Patently Apple notes, the penalty for passing on the trade secrets hardly acts as a deterrent: Liang has merely been banned from working for Samsung for a period of four months.
A new YouTube video claims to show parts from Apple’s upcoming iPhone 6S assembled into a working handset. The device doesn’t boot into iOS, but does power on and show a gear icon on the screen. Several photos also claim to show the phone’s internal components, which do appear to show some changes over the current generation, while the outside remains mostly unchanged.
A social media rep for China Telecom has made a Weibo post in which he echoes a number of the specs we’re expecting to see in the iPhone 6S, but says he has heard nothing to confirm the rumored option of a pink case color to match the rose gold of the Apple Watch. The post was spotted by GforGames.
He went on saying that, despite all the recent rumors hinting at a pink variant, he did not hear anything regarding this iPhone 6s flavor.
The fact that the rep ‘confirmed’ the 2GB RAM, improved camera and Force Touch doesn’t mean he has any hard info – these expectations have been out there since a KGI note back in May – and you’d expect China Mobile to know better than to reveal any info provided by Apple. It seems most likely he’s simply repeating rumors, and merely opting to question one of them.
While we’ve described some of the images of a pink-colored iPhone 6S as questionable, a rose gold/pink option still seems a strong possibility. You can check out what we’ve heard about the upcoming new model from our own sources, together with the latest rumor roundup.
Apple releases at least one new iPhone every year, and the coverage has become predictable: reviews (accurately) herald “the best iPhone yet,” typically based on “small but important changes that refine the user experience.” Based on everything we know about the iPhone 6S and 6S Plus, you can expect the same narrative again this year — starting with the obligatory sigh of similarity that precedes the review of every S model, and ending with the common recommendation to “go buy one unless you can wait until next year.”
For professional reasons, I’ve owned every iPhone since the original 2007 model, and upgraded every single year regardless of how small or large the differences were between models. This year, for the first time, I sold off my current-generation iPhone to maximize the cash I’d get towards the purchase of a new model, and as an experiment, I went back to using the iPhone 5s (updated to iOS 9) to see whether any of the differences really mattered. After a week with the old iPhone, I can’t wait for a new one: there are a lot of reasons to prefer Apple’s bigger, better 6-series phones. So if you’re on the fence about going from any iPhone 4/4S or 5/5s/5c to a new iPhone 6S, trust me, you’ll want to get ready to upgrade now…
We are just weeks away from the launch of the iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus, Apple’s newest addition to the iPhone lineup, but the fate of the iPhone 5c successor, a new 4-inch iPhone dubbed by the rumor mill as the ‘iPhone 6c’, remains unclear.
When Apple upped the screen sizes last year, it did not offer an update to the iPhone 5c. This has led much speculation that Apple was saving an update for the 4-inch iPhone to next year to allow the big screened iPhone 6 take the limelight. Since then, there have been many conflicting reports over the release of Apple’s next 4-inch iPhone. A Chinese media report indicates that Apple will actually release a smaller iPhone 6c in November.
Apple releases new iPhones every fall, guaranteeing that a massive number of old iPhones will be traded in or sold. The rush will dramatically change the market for used iPhones, so I wanted to help you stay ahead of the curve and get the best deal possible. Having just sold my own iPhone 6 Plus to upgrade to a newer model, I have some strong opinions about your smartest options.
Below, I’ve put together a guide to some of the iPhone selling and trade-in options you should consider. There’s no single “right” answer, since some options trade greater convenience for lower prices, and others have higher prices but greater risks or hassles. You can choose the one that’s best for your needs, but whatever you do, make your choice before iPhone values begin to fall…
Looks like Apple has a couple of new accessories launching in the future and these haven’t been refreshed in a while. It’s no surprise that iPhone 6S rumors are in full effect, but which ones should you believe? Also, is Apple Music as much of a success as expected? All this and slightly more on this incremental “27S” version of the Happy Hour Podcast. (Just kidding, it’s episode 28.) The Happy Hour podcast is available for download on iTunes and through our dedicated RSS feed.
iPhone 6S hasn’t even been officially announced by Apple yet (although we know a lot about it) and we’re already seeing answers to the ‘does it bend?’ question everyone will inevitably ask after last year’s overly hyped ‘bendgate‘ episode. Following initial analysis of a purported iPhone 6S shell with increased dimensions, presumably for added durability, an in-depth round of testing with the current iPhone 6 casing and expected iPhone 6S casing shows even more differences between the two shells beyond just weight and size.
As expected based on rumors, the alleged next-gen iPhone shell will reportedly bring to the upcoming iPhone 6S a more durable grade of aluminum and a change to how the iPhone casing is anodized. Expand Expanding Close
While we’ve reported extensively on what to expect from Apple’s next generation iPhone 6S — including Force Touch in May and what enhancements it offers last week — a fresh set of rumors are floating around today regarding the pending iPhone model ranging from expected, known, and spoofed. We’ll unpack each one below: Expand Expanding Close
Tech investment company Pacific Crest has echoed KGI’s prediction that year-on-year iPhone sales are likely to decline following the launch of the iPhone 6S, but says that investors shouldn’t be concerned.
We believe iPhone 6/+ models drove abnormally high share gains and upgrade rates that are likely to moderate somewhat in the 6s cycle, which is likely to drive total iPhone units down year-on-year in the first part of financial year 2016 (Q4 of calendar 2015) …
Apple and Best Buy have agreed to begin selling both the standard AppleCare protection plan for Macs and the more premium AppleCare+ for iPhones, iPads, and the Apple Watch through Best Buy stores, according to sources. The plans call for Best Buy to begin offering the AppleCare plans in its stores at checkout around the week of September 14th, just ahead of the iPhone 6S launch. This will mark a notable expansion of the Apple and Best Buy relationship, and Best Buy will become one of the only retailers, aside from select U.S. carriers, to offer AppleCare outside of an Apple Store.
Less than a month from now, Apple is expected to officially unveil its new A9 chip. This will be the ninth A-Series processor including the original A4, which powered the first iPad, iPhone 4, fourth-generation iPod touch, and second-generation Apple TV. It’s hard to overstate the importance of the A-series chips to Apple’s devices, as they’ve helped the company to achieve everything from major processing leaps to impressive power efficiency and — often taken for granted — guaranteed UI smoothness for every year’s newly-launched devices.
With the iPhone 6S just around the corner, we’ve started to receive tips purporting to reveal how much better the A9 will perform than the A8 processors found in the latest iPhones, iPad Air 2, and iPod touch. While we wouldn’t characterize the numbers we’ve seen as reliable, they led us to look back at the history of A-series chips, and consider what can reasonably be expected from the A9. Read on for our thoughts…
Nearly one year after launching its first devices with NFC chips, the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, to enable the Apple Pay mobile payments system, Apple has joined the official NFC Forum as a top-tier sponsor. Along with the sponsorship role, Apple has joined the forum’s Board of Directors, according to the forum’s official website. The site lists representation from Aon Mujtaba, a Director on Apple’s Wireless Systems Engineering team for the iPhone. Paula Hunter, the NFC Forum’s Director, made the announcement by saying that the organization is “delighted to welcome Apple to [its] board of directors as an NFC Forum sponsor member.”
Every time Apple is expected to release an S-series iPhone — the 3GS, the 4S, the 5s, and now the 6S — pundits rush to discount the value of each anticipated new feature, claiming that it won’t be enough to boost iPhone sales. Yet historically, every prediction of iPhone sales peaks or declines has been wrong: each iPhone, whether a big “tick” or small “tock” on Apple’s upgrade schedule, has outsold its predecessors. Even without form factor or screen changes, speed sold the iPhone 3GS, Siri boosted the 4S, and Touch ID and camera improvements helped the 5s. (In S years, improved distribution, new color options, and price and capacity tweaks have made a big difference, too.)
This week, analysts and pundits have co-opted my colleague Mark Gurman’s scoop that Force Touch on the iPhone 6S will be used for shortcuts across iOS, suggesting that Force Touch isn’t going to be exciting enough to make people upgrade. That’s true, but also so obvious as to be ridiculous: Apple certainly won’t pitch a pressure-sensitive screen as the iPhone 6S’s marquee new feature. Force Touch debuted in the Apple Watch, but it’s not even mentioned on the first Apple Watch page on Apple.com, instead showing up in the fifth paragraph of the “Technology” page. It’s similarly found only paragraphs down on the page of the 12″ MacBook where it made its Mac debut.
With the notable exception of the iPad mini 3, Apple never releases new devices with only one new feature to hook customers. Even a month before it’s announced, it’s a virtual certainty that the iPhone 6S will arrive with camera improvements and faster processors, most likely a new color option, and Force Touch as one of many small but nice additions. So long as Apple gets distribution and international pricing right, the iPhone 6S is going to do just fine…
While there’s little question that Apple will release an iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus next month, analysts and supply chain rumors have been all over the map as to when Apple will introduce a so-called iPhone 6C. Prominent leaker Evan Blass chimed in today with a tweet countering the general consensus, writing: “Sounds like iPhone 6s, 6s Plus, and 6c will all arrive concurrently.” Given Blass’s track record of accurately revealing details of unreleased smartphones under the @evleaks Twitter account, it’s worth considering that Apple could indeed release a new iPhone 6C alongside the iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus at next month’s expected event. Expand Expanding Close
KGI – which has an excellent track record – has predicted a strong possibility of either zero or negative growth of iPhone sales in Q4 2015. The investment note cited by Taiwanese site Apple Daily (via GforGames) forecasts that Apple will sell between 65M and 75M iPhones, compared to 74.5M in the same quarter last year.
We predict iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S could be the first S-series models to see flat or lower shipments versus their predecessors.
KGI bases its pessimistic prediction on two factors. First, the weak state of the Chinese economy. Second, the very same argument I made in my opinion piece yesterday: that the headline feature of the iPhone 6S, Force Touch, doesn’t seem likely to wow customers … Expand Expanding Close
While Force Touch on the Apple Watch allowed Apple to add an additional layer of buttons to a small display, the iPhone 6S and iPhone 6S Plus screens don’t lack for either real estate or buttons. So why would Force Touch be desirable on larger displays? Following up on our May report that Force Touch is coming to Apple’s next iPhones, sources who have used the iPhone 6S have provided new details on how Force Touch works and feels under iOS.
While rumors out of the supply chain have claimed for a while that the next iPhone hardware will include a more durable build, a new video analyzing a purported iPhone 6S shell shows some expected and surprising differences in the updated casing compared to the one used by current iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus models.
The thinner and larger iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus launched to a bit of a controversy with ‘bendgate‘ becoming a meme as users questioned the new hardware design’s durability. If the new casing is indeed used on next month’s expected iPhone 6S hardware refresh, the shell will include added strength around the volume buttons where the current iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus are believed to be weaker and susceptible to pressure. Expand Expanding Close
Following last week’s leak of a substantially complete iPhone 6S display assembly, another screen has slipped out into the wild, where it has been placed alongside and compared against the same part from the iPhone 6 (shown above at left). European part and accessory vendor MacManiack shared this image, the photos in the gallery below, and a YouTube video contrasting the components.
While very few differences between the components are worth noting, the iPhone 6S part again appears to have a place for the much-rumored Force Touch/haptic feedback component introduced in the Apple Watch. MacManiack claims that at least part of the “Touch ID home button is integrated in the LCD and digitizer connector,” and points out that the connectors are different on the parts. Two galleries showing the parts in much greater detail follow…
The iPhone 6 was the iPhone many had long been waiting for, offering a larger screen size and NFC support for Apple Pay. Unsurprisingly, it opened to record sales, and has continued to break sales records ever since.
But Apple’s ‘tick tock’ strategy –a major new iPhone one year and an updated model based on the same form factor the following year – means that the company has to work much harder to sell its S models. With little visual difference (and the average mass-market customer oblivious to processor upgrades), Apple has to rely on a headline new feature to persuade people that it’s worth the upgrade.
For the last couple of S models, Apple has offered pretty convincing reasons to buy: the 4S gave us Siri, and the 5s introduced Touch ID – both appealing features that were easy for non-tech customers to understand. But if the rumors are correct that Force Touch is the headline new feature of the iPhone 6S, this is one of five reasons I think the company’s rumored ambition to make 90M units by the end of the year could be a tough number to turn into sales … Expand Expanding Close
