the technologist

According to an article on Apple Insider from July 19th regarding a series of recent Apple patents and some juicy tidbits of insider info, Apple is set to introduce a 2nd member of the iPhone family before the holiday shopping season. Taking a turn for the dramatic in their reporting style, they offer the following summary:

The move is believed to be part of a broader, all-out blitz on the consumer electronics sector this holiday shopping season, in which a staggering array of gadgets from the Cupertino-based firm is expected to leave would-be rivals confused and unable to react.

Extremely reputable sources have told AppleInsider in recent weeks that the company’s iPhone roadmap for the 2007 calendar year includes not one but two distinct models, the second of which is set to turn up just months after the first.

According to one source, development of the second model has followed so closely on the heels of the inaugural iPhone that it was making its final pass through engineering around the same time that today’s model hit the manufacturing lines back in May or early June.

Conceived as a scaled back, lower cost alternative to today’s iPhone, the second iteration of the handset is presumed to marry iPod functionality with rudimentary cellular capabilities. More resource-heavy Internet browsing and e-mail capabilities are not expected of the device.

In providing the first visual descriptions of the handset, long-standing industry sources — who’ve continually been in tune with Apple’s future music directions — have dubbed the device “an iPhone nano” because they say it best describes the the handset’s overall form-factor and aesthetic.

Pricing of the new handset is expected to fall significantly below the $500+ asking cost of today’s iPhone models, these sources say, but not so much so as to pinch sales of an upcoming revision to the iPod nano.

The above image is a composite of artist concepts based on the recent Apple patents, taken from this article on Hrmph.com, which details the patents themselves as well as further speculation surrounding exactly what the iPhone Nano might look like and what the potential downgrades in features would represent.

CORRECTION: Someone from Hrmph.com posted below, indicating that the image above that I pirated from their site consists of actual patent filing images…not composites.

Further corroboration for the existence of the iPhone Nano comes from the fact that a JP Morgan researcher in Taiwan predicted that Apple would release the device before the holiday season in the US, only to have the firm’s American headquarters withdraw the statement a day later.

Interesting to say the least. This would suggest that Apple is only building momentum leading into the holiday shipping season. There is still Leopard to come in September, and much of the recent chattering on the web would lead most people to believe that a revamped iMac is coming within in the next two weeks (just in time for the back to school shopping rush).

So, in case you have been one of the iPhone pundits, waiting around to see the dust settle before plunking down $600 of your hard-earned dollars, the wait may pay off sooner than anticipated. All indications are that the two devices were developed almost entirely in tandem so any hope for any iPhone 2.0 firmware that takes into consideration the first round of quibbles with the iPhone is not likely, but at least we know this much:

1. iPod update is imminent with a UI extremely similar to that of the music portion of the iPhone
2. iMac update is imminent, with a brushed aluminum design, possibly extending to the keyboard
3. iLife update is imminent, potentially including iWork as part of the deal this time around
4. All three of the above may happen simultaneously on August 7th, according to the hyperlinked MacRumors article, which in turns cites various ThinkSecret sources (a site which has been known to shoot blanks in the past, so take it with a grain of salt)
5. iPhone Nano now appears likely as well, ushering in a trimmed down feature-set and more affordable price tag

With recent refeshes to both laptop lines as well as price cuts on their Cinema Displays, the introduction of AppleTV, and of course, the iPhone, Apple will have refreshed their entire consumer electronics line as well introduced three key completely new product by the end of 2007.

Perhaps the term “all-out blitz” is not as sensationalist as I originally made it out to be.

Here’s a look at a few conceptual mock-ups (including a schematic discussed on this site a while back):

Stumble it!

~ by Kent Francisco on July 24, 2007.