The New iPhone: 4-inch display, aluminum back, smaller dock connector?

Posted by Andru Edwards Categories: Apple, Smartphones, Handhelds, Rumors

Now that we're more than halfway through the iPhone 4S year, you can expect the rumors about the next iPhone (iPhone 5? iPhone 6? The New iPhone?) to start coming at us fast and hard in the time leading up to the release of Apple's next flagship smartphone. This morning iLounge reports that a source has clued it in on what the next iPhone will look like, and it doesn't seem like that much of a stretch.

As you can see in the mockup above, the information provided says that the new iPhone will sport a 4-inch display, up from the 3.5-inch displays that we've seen on every single iPhone that's been released, from the original in 2007 all the way through the iPhone 4S in 2011. We'd say that it's definitely about time that Apple made the display larger. Interestingly enough, the way that Apple will purportedly go about it is by lengthening the height of the display only, and leaving the width the same. This would give it more of a widescreen aspect ratio, but also solves the fragmentation resolution problem that would come with keeping the aspect ratio the same and making the display bigger. By making the display longer, current apps can run centered on the display with .25-inches of black above and below them, and it'll be the same resolution as any previous iPhone, while newer and updated apps can take advantage of the full 4-inches. The change would result in the phone being 125mm tall, compared to the current 115mm of the iPhone 4 and 4S.

Other changes? Yep, there's more. The new iPhone should also be about 20% thinner than the current model. That's one we didn't expect, what with the rumored addition of an LTE chipset, which would need all the room it could get. The new phone would be 7.4mm thick, compared to the iPhone 4S at 9.3mm thick.

The iLounge report goes on to suggest that the rear of the phone will feature aluminum and glass, similar to the color scheme of the current iMac and MacBook Pro lines. Speaking of glass, it should be Gorilla Glass 2, a stronger, lighter, and more durable glass that debuted at CES 2012.

Lastly, there's mention of a much smaller dock connector that will be used in all iOS devices going forward. The only thing we could think of here is that it would be compatible with Thunderbolt, making syncing and file transfers lightnight quick. That's our hope, anyway. Of course, it could also be that Apple just wants all the room it can get inside the device, and by making the dock connector smaller, they achieve that goal.

Of course, this is all rumor and speculation at this point. Even if all of the above were true, Apple could easily change gears on any of this stuff between now and the iPhone release.