iPhone 5 To Ride The Lightning

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We’re mere hours away from the introduction of the next iPhone. Whether or or not it goes by “iPhone 5” there’s been a rash of leaked hardware photos (assuming they’re legit, as last year’s rumored wedge design never made it to market) and, hidden within our bounty, is a new dock connector. Many appear fixated on faster data transfer speeds, given the possible internal “lightning” codename. Yet I never tether my phone to a computer and, as the owner of an iPad 3, I sure hope this foreshadows faster charging technologies. Related, given Motorola’s RAZR MAXX battery life success, I’m hopeful the miniaturization of the dock connector alludes to additional part shrinkage… making way for a larger iPhone battery with, presumably, additional power saving techniques attached. Dan Frommer, a reluctant Mophie owner, pines for similar.

What’s on your iPhone 5 wishlist?

12 thoughts on “iPhone 5 To Ride The Lightning”

  2. I guess THIS is what happens when you give up caffeinated coffee. Need to rethink that approach. And thanks for the polite heads up – fixes are in.

    Related to charging, I almost forgot one of my top requests. We’re big fans here of “wireless” charging. Would be nice to see it make its way to the next iPhone. We shall see.

  3. I’d argue you don’t plug in your iDevices because it is too slow, if you could sync much faster and easier than via wireless, I think people would still do it from time to time. I know I was having problems with my backups because they were too big to fit in my 5GB of iCloud storage because I never plugged and removed the photos off of them — didn’t seem necessary thanks to Photo Stream.

  5. Wireless charging is everywhere, but it’s probably still too hard to miniaturize to the point that Apple wants it in an iPhone, even 3-4 years after Palm put it in their phones. I’d expect to see it in an iPad first.

  6. Here are the items that drove me crazy about the iPhone 2 years ago, and whether or not they eventually got fixed. (notice no mention of resolution, voice recognition, charging speed, body style, or camera quality.)

    1) Podcast catching requires manual download to iTunes, then complete sync of phone. – partially fixed.
    2) Changing screen brightness is too difficult – yes
    3) Changing wifi connection (on/off/select network) too difficult – no
    4) Connection to Bluetooth audio devices is too difficult – no
    5) AT&T voice and data services fail when >20 people are around – yes (more carriers)
    6) Battery is weak/no replaceable battery – no
    7) No multitasking – yes
    8) Notifications completely interrupt current app – yes
    9) Screen is too small – yes (9/12/12)
    10) Icons are static (always 73 degrees and sunny) – no

    I have an Android phone, but an iPad3. The iPad is really good, however the act of putting photos and videos on the device is absolutely horrible. I hope this is easier with iPhones than it is with iPads.

  7. MHA, I dunno… Samsung Galaxy S3 supposedly has it built in and we’re just waiting on pads?

    Dana, I agree getting to and changing iOS settings is inefficient and the the home screen icons don’t match Windows Phone or Android in terms of richness and interactivity. I believe alerts can be customized to only show at the top of the screen, versus in the middle. It’ll be interesting to see what sort of impact, if any, the rumored taller screen has on usability. Probably not much. Which may be both good and bad. Hm. But my desire for a larger screen was driven by eBook reading… and I’ve decided there’s too many smartphone distractions and upgraded to the new Paperwhite Kindle. So size may be less of an issue for me than it was.

  8. It’s not yet clear if the new adapter/cable charges faster, but looks like NFC and inductive charging are off the table for this generation. I’m kinda bummed. But will probably still upgrade from the 4. (And will hang onto my Windows Phone and Galaxy variants a bit longer. Not to mention my archaic work Blackberry.)

  9. Seems like a nice, if a bit boring, upgrade. Yup no inductive charging. No NFC as expected (AnandTech was right I guess, though they were wrong on the A6).

    Didn’t hear anything about the iPhone charging speed. Even the synching over the new connector didn’t get mentioned. Honestly the biggest fix here could be the iTunes rewrite. I’m not at all certain the transfers are limited by the cable. That Windows software is one big steaming pile of … something.

    If you haven’t already done so, just use an iPad charger to charge your iPhone. Its a bit faster.

  13. @Sully,

    I love docks, but I think the street has decided… most people don’t use ’em. I’ll be upgrading my Elevation Dock to support Lightning at some point I guess, and obviously there will be other third party versions available, but I’m not sure Apple is making these anymore. They certainly don’t have anything for sale right now…

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