The Apple iPhone 5 – Rumour Roundup

The next generation of Apple iPhone, the iPhone 5 is certainly on its way. And rumours are rife about the features and launch date, not to mention the design.

One leaked likely launch date is June 5, at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC). This is the same conference that gave us the iPhone 3GS in 2009, and the iPhone 4 in 2010.

The 3GS is more rounded and comfortable to hold than the iPhone 4; will Apple stick with the same case design for the next model? It’s unlikely, although we hope that it will be sleeker, ergonomic and beautiful. Apple will undoubtedly keep the minimalist, one-button design, as seems to be part of their signature (remember the one-button mouse?).

With the furore of the reception problems encountered by iPhone 4 users, Apple will definitely sort out the iPhone 5 antenna, probably siting it nearer the top of the device – somewhere where it is less likely to be shielded by normal use.

The processor in the new iPhone will probably be dual-, or even quad-core, and will consist of the next generation A-series chip. This is necessary as more and more games and apps are becoming increasingly demanding. Along with faster processing power, Apple will increase the on-board memory, probably starting with the base model at 32GB and the top-of-the-range hitting 64GB.

Other rumoured features include such things as:

Face recognition

This could be useful both for sorting photos (something already used in Apple’s iPhoto Mac application), and for security, face recognition to unlock your iPhone would be a pretty good use of this technology.

4G

This is the successor to the current widespread 3G network, and offers expected speed hikes of between 100Mb/s and 1Gb/s – fast enough for just about any use, including streaming HD video.

Video Chat

Already implemented on iPhone 4 with FaceTime over WiFi, the new iPhone 5 will allow the same feature over 3G and 4G too.

Better battery

Universally requested, the iPhone battery life has never been great. Let’s hope that the new iPhone can last longer between charges.

Whatever new features the iPhone 5 has, you can bet they’ll be well thought out, fun to use, and very cool.