Look and 'Feel' alike?
Does it have a GUI skin that gives it an iPhone 'look and feel' too? If not, some enterprising Android App developer could find a market for such a skin.
Fanbois in China who just can’t wait to get their hands on the much-hyped upcoming iPhone 5 are in for a treat, as an Android-based version of the device modelled on the imminent handset's rumoured specs has made its way online. Yes, hot-on-the-heels of a Japanese fanboi's efforts, China's Goophone is hoping to steal a march …
Is this the liquid metal we have been hearing about?
As to the front, more than likely the screen will be slightly longer and wider but the overall phone size will be the same.
But does it need a quad core processor? At the expense of having to add more battery?
No one knows, and until on is left in a bar (which is part of the marketing scheme) or it is released everything we hear and see is just speculation.
"Which design "faults" did the 3GS resolve then?..."
As a 3GS user I couldn't agree more, mine fails to make and receive phone calls, text messages and emails on a regular basis, requires rebooting on average once every couple of days, phone turns off when trying to take a photo (which helps reduce the number of reboots required!)... oh and as software developer I resent not being able to write my own software to run on it (it's a work phone so I can't jailbreak it and I'm not prepared to pay Apples extortionate costs). I regulary resort to my 5 year old WinMo phone instead!
For the record I'm running iOS 5.1.1 (the latest available) although I wish I hadn't upgraded to iOS 5 as it wiped all of my music and TV programs and it's a PITA to put them all back (so much so that the phone remains largely empty over a year after I "upgraded").
Wish I could afford to replace it with something good :-(
Your phone seems to have a hardware fault - rebooting when attempting to use the camera sounds like an old samsung I had that did the same.
I totally agree on this, though: "For the record I'm running iOS 5.1.1 (the latest available) although I wish I hadn't upgraded to iOS 5 as it wiped all of my music and TV programs and it's a PITA to put them all back (so much so that the phone remains largely empty over a year after I "upgraded")."
So ffffing true!
> our phone seems to have a hardware fault - rebooting when attempting to use the camera sounds
> like an old samsung I had that did the same.
Maybe Samsung should start suing Apple over this then ... clearly it's a samsung design and original idea, shamelessly stolen by Apple ...
>it will be the iPhone 5s which when released next year
The iPhone 6 will be out early in 2014...why not wait for that?
.....rumours are it will be fully wireless [power and all] move to an efficient TI-OMAP 4+1 for CPU, ditching PVR in favour of Nvidia - also will include UK/EU 4G support and much improved battery life thanks to its larger form factor over 5 and the low power 'house keeping' CPU core.
...then again, your logic is also correct - so maybe I'll wait for the iPhone 6s....
"The iPhone 6 will be out early in 2014...why not wait for that?"
Not typical behaviour of an iDevice owner though.
Buy now because it's new and shiny and you've been told to buy it, and buy the one that follows it a year or two later for the same reasons. Doesn't matter that they're all almost the same and you don't actually need a new one. The old one is obsolete by being unfashionable and you *need* the new one.
Its marketing Jim but not as we know it.
Regular little 'snippets' released every couple of weeks keeps the speculation going and the interest alive.
This is all about Apple marketing 101, the next release a couple of weeks from now will be another 'leaked copy) until finally two to three weeks before the official announcement someone will accidentally leave a real one in a bar somewhere.
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By definition you can't 'copy' something that does not exist. Apple have released no images, details or anything whatsoever about any putative iPhone 5, so there is absolutely nothing to copy. For Apple to successfully uphold a complaint they would have to prove industrial espionage had occurred, and that's going to be veeeeery difficult. Otherwise it's just hard luck.
Indeed Apple themselves would more likely to be on the receiving end of a successful legal complaint from Goophone, especially in China!
There is some precedent for a situation like Apple's being un-resolvable in Europe too. Rover (the now extinct British car manufacturer) completely by chance chose a style of radiator grill design that was uncannily similar to that which Audi had also chosen. Rover got to market first. Audi did actually make some very quiet public complaints, but there was nothing they could do. Rover theoretically could have made a formal complaint against Audi, but did the sensible thing and made nothing of it themselves. Commonsense prevailed (and Rover went bust anyway).
"By definition you can't 'copy' something that does not exist"
That's not how Apple sees it. If someone designs something before you did, you release your product with a back dated patent on it, then you sue the ass off the people who "copied" from something that didn't exist at the time (or even where there was no patent on it at the time).
That has been nominally true for a very long time.
1: If you place your manufacturing in China, you cede your IP, trade secrets, production techniques and everything else to the Chinese for free. If you build a factory, an exact copy of it will magically appear somewhere else in the country, including the design errors of the original factory. I haven't heard of it, but in theory the copy factory could appear first.
2: Therefore, the cost savings by manufacturing in China have to be sufficiently large that they cover the loss of the entire business.
3: Go to 1
There are examples of copy products from China hitting the shelves before the originals
There are too many photos and videos being leaked showing this iPhone with the 2 tone back so it must be the real deal as loads of people in the Chinese distribution chain are turning up with the casing
That 2 tone back is suicide in my eyes it looks absolutely shocking ironically like another company trying to rip apple off. There can't be anyone out there who thinks the 2 tone back looks good regardless of what technical merits it may give the device.
If they release it with this it will be the start of Apple losing its style status
Yes, indeed ! And, besides, as Steve Jobs admitted in that famous video, Apple has «always» stolen and copied. Perhaps if those who make the rules listened a bit more to people like Johanna Blakely, instead of «competition by lawyer» we'd get back to competition on price and quality even when it comes to technical apparatus. Make it illegal for Goophone to put an iPhone label on its products without permission from Apple and for Apple to put a Goophone label on its products without permission and then leave the choice between the two to consumers ! Alas, as those who make the rules - in the US at least - are almost exclusively lawyers, these rules are devised in such a way as to promote the well-being of lawyers, rather than innovation or other consumer interests. Moreover, to take the specific example discussed in the article, if Goophone releases a actual product with a «two-tone back design» before Apple does, by the logic that Apple's lawyers developed in their Samsung suit, isn't Apple imitating Goophone and therefore «infriging» on the latter's rights when it releases later a product with this «feature» ?...
Henri
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And if the «copy» is as well or better executed than the «orginal» ? And if, in the case of the Apple iPhone5, the «copy» offers an operating system which a given user prefers to that offered by the so-called «original» (which hasn't yet appeared on the market, so which is to be considered the «copy» and which the «original» is a moot point) ? I'd very much like to see some detailed tests of these Goophone «knockoffs» which compare them to the «originals» ; perhaps we're missing something ? How about it, El Reg ?...
Henri