Posted in Apple, Rants, Technology

Oh COME ON!

In a follow up to my previous post about Apple copying Samsung, I came across this story about a new phone that Samsung just released in the UK on Vodaphone. It is the Galaxy S II carrying the android gingerbread OS. When I saw the announcement on Engadget Mobile, I had to laugh again. Mainly, because if the rumors are true, it seems it is only half true. They just have the who is copying who backwards. If the next iPhone is suppose to be the mockup that MacRumors is showing off, man do these phones look awfully close. Again, I submit for your consideration the evidence:

click for larger image

-Rusty G

Posted in Apple, Technology

Apple copying Samung or Samsung still copying Apple? Who knows? Who Cares?

Looking at a post by MacRumors this morning almost had me laughing. I have been watching the IFA in Germany through many of the tech blog websites and seeing all of these cool new gadgets being announced. As I was watching the Samsung announcement, I was looking at their new GIANT Galaxy Note phone coming with a 5.3″ screen. WOW. What I had interest in was the overall design of the phone. I thought the phone had looked kind of familiar. I went back to look at the rumored iPhone design from Macrumors. Then I went back to the announcement of the new Samsung Phone. Wait a minute! See if you see what I see:

Wait a tick, if I move the camera over to the other side, and I make the button longer.. I would swear they are the same phone. Now this is a little early to tell. Especially since all the parts (parts, and more parts) are still leaking. So until the phone actually gets here we can’t say. I am having a hard time believing the phone will be different, especially since the one of the newest “leaks” show the same front face again! Even the same metal band that goes around the current iPhone 4, CDMA and GSM. The other rumor that seems be popping up is that there will be an 8GB cheaper version sold of the iPhone 4 or 4S due to the iCloud upgrade that is coming. This does make some sort of sense, so you can get more people on the iPhone and make more money. Why have huge memory when everything comes from the iCloud? All of this is pure speculation and rumor at this point, but we shall see in the coming months. I will say though, if they do go with the bigger screen and bigger home button, it looks a lot like Apple copied Samsung.
-Rusty G

Posted in Apple, Rants, Technology

Why I still think the Verizon iPhone will be LTE not CDMA

It’s just days past CES 2011 and apparently the only rumor that seemed to hog the floor was the Verizon iPhone. It was apparently confirmed by WSJ and “people that are familiar with the matter” (which was repeated several times in the article) that the phone will be announced on Tuesday Jan. 11th and launch next month on February 3rd. The only problem that I have with this is that EVERYONE is still saying CDMA, based upon reports that Qualcomm has been ramping up inventory and is now selling baseband chips to Apple. Qualcomm is apparently the largest provider of the CDMA based chips, so this is why this seems to be the loudest theory out there.

Well, as much as I want to go with this, something tells me that this is just wrong. No matter what my favorite tech blog Engadget has to say. Just based upon the latest “evidence” that we have.. it doesn’t seem to mesh well. I am thinking that the Qualcomm story is something to throw us off the scent. Let’s look at the picture that Engadget posted with their story:

Do you see what I see? There is still a SIM card slot in that ever so slightly “tweaked” iPhone chassis. Oh you want a little more evidence? Let’s take a look at the video that was pulled down by Apple due to copyright issues (then later reposted with a different title & Engadget re-encoded it for their own player):

Did you see that? There is still a SIM card slot on that phone. Now, anyone with any Verizon CDMA 3G phone, please feel free to email me with a picture of your SIM card that you got from Verizon. It just doesn’t add up. I recently just helped a friend install the VZ Access Manager on their new laptop with the new LGv600 USB modem (or whatever that thing is) that supports 4G. You want to know what was inside that modem? It was a SIM card that said Verizon 4G LTE. You want to know why? It is because Verizon is now a GSM carrier! You can read more about the history on that in my previous post.

I just don’t see Apple choosing to go with a dying technology. Same as with the reasons they chose to keep flash out of the iOS enviroment (i think they are just trying to kill flash all together), they want to be on the forefront of technology, and since Verizon is one of the first to launch LTE stateside, why not? iPhone 4… iPhone 4G… it makes better since, then to stick with old 3G technology that we have all grown to hate when there are no towers… Even At&t is finally announcing 4G, even though they are the last on the bandwagon.

I’m calling this one… right now.. even if I’m wrong, thanks for reading this far.

UPDATE: It seems there are some people that are starting to agree with me, but saying it will be a dual mode phone. I just don’t see CDMA being the technology, especially since CDMA doesn’t allow for simultaneous calling and surfing. That was the big thing that AT&T was touting last year in their ads with that Wilson brother. How Verizon can’t do that with CDMA. So why would iPhone 4 be a multitasking phone, that couldn’t multitask under CDMA???

More Evidence: Back in 2009, the CEO Ivan Seidenberg at Verizon said: “Apple will be more willing to work with Verizon in the future on an LTE-equipped version of the iPhone.” According to Seidenberg, Apple never considered building a CDMA version of the iPhone due to CDMA’s more limited distribution footprint.

Posted in Apple, Rants, Technology

Why I think the iPhone will be 4g on Verizon by February

So as the year begins, so starts the rumor mill again, but it seems that this time it has been much more loud than normal. It appears that Apple will be holding some event by Valentines Day and after CES. This is no surprise as they have held their annual MacWorld Expo every year at the end of January. (This year – 26th thru 29th) The rumor is starting up that this WILL BE THE YEAR they announce Verizon as a new provider of the iPhone. The only thing that doesn’t make since, is that AT&T has exclusivity until 2012. It looks as though, be the top selling Jesus Phone that it is, Verizon wants a piece of the iPhone pie and is willing to pay for it. So could 2011 be the year we finally see the iPhone on the Verizon network? Most people seem to stick with the Wall Street Journal report saying that Apple has been preparing CDMA versions of the iPhone (provided by Qualcomm) for quite some time now and will be ready for a 1st quarter launch this year. There is even a crazier rumor that reason why the unicorn white iPhone is being delayed for a Verizon launch. That last one aside, I think this CDMA Verizon rumor is only half true…. and I’ll tell you why.

I’ll bite on the Verizon rumor, AGAIN. Only because it seems viable this time around, but by this time next year, I may be eating my own words on this; but being only one year short of the AT&T contract, and Verizon wants to pay a pretty penny to keep it among the top 2 wireless providers (forgot my source on this one… sorry, but you can look it up),  I don’t see why not. So you’ve got me sold on that, but the problem with the CDMA thing I have, is why would Apple put an iPhone on a dying technology? The rest of the world seems to run on GSM of some sort and it has been that way for while. Its almost a world standard at this point. Another reason why I say dying is because since 2001, there have been reports of Verizon wanting to go to GSM, to join the rest of the world. Now the original idea that they were testing was wCDMA (an upgrade from GSM, not CDMA as you might think), but by 2007 it seems they have finally ended up choosing LTE for future proofing their networks. It seems they wanted the crazy fast 100Mbps that was being tested by Nokia to be the next 4G technology. Now Verizon has been switching over to the new LTE technology since 2008, and was finally announced publicly back in October of 2010. By December 1st, Verizon began selling their 4G LTE modems and in the coming weeks, it seems they will begin selling the HTC Thunderbolt and more 4G capable phones.

So you see where I am going with this? Now that they are officially a GSM carrier, and their phones and modems will connect to the network via SIM cards, why would Apple go with CDMA? Especially since Verizon has been preparing for GSM since 2001? I just don’t see it. So I am putting my call out there.. yes we will see a Verizon iPhone by the summer, but I think it will be an LTE “4G” iPhone 4, GSM based instead of CDMA. I think it will be the “Oh and One More Thing…” right after the announcement  of the iPad 2.

We shall see…

Posted in Apple, Technology

Let the rumor mill begin

I am typing this from my iPhone in Mobile, AL, and its 4 a.m., so bare with me; @kevinrose will have started a blazing fire in the rumor mill within the next few hours on TechCrunch, Engadget, ArsTechnica, GigaOm, CNET (Brian Tong specifically) & probably will be explaining himself on @diggnation this coming week all due to this little gem here:

“AT&T sucks in SF, very very excited to get the iPhone on Verizon next year :)”

Status Link (mobile):
http://mobile.twitter.com/kevinrose/status/8789305124192256

Screenshot:

http://twitpic.com/3azkeq