It happened. Gizmodo has somehow managed to get the much rumored iPhone 4G model we’ve been talking about for days now, and the thing seems definitely real. They’ve posted a complete teardown and analysis of the iPhone, which is real - it’s even got internal components labelled with Apple.
About the OS:
“According to the person who found it, this iPhone was running iPhone OS 4.0 before the iPhone 4.0 announcement. The person was able to play with it and see the iPhone 4.0 features. Then, Apple remotely killed the phone before we got access to it. We were unable to restore because each firmware is device specific—3GS firmware only loads on 3GS devices—and the there are no firmwares available for this unreleased phone. Which is another clue to its authenticity.”
Ok, so it’s been remotely wiped. Sounds very likely, considering that it should be a pre-production model.
Resolution:
“We can’t tell you the exact resolution of this next-generation iPhone, but it’s much higher than the current iPhone 3GS.”
Gizmodo goes even further, and claims that this iPhone, even if it’s not booting, it’s recognized from Mac OS X:
“This iPhone behaves exactly like an iPhone does when connected to a computer, with the proper boot sequence and “connect to iTunes” restore functionality. Xcode and iTunes both see this as an iPhone.”
About the specs:
- Front-facing video chat camera
- Improved regular back-camera (the lens is quite noticeably larger than the iPhone 3GS)
- Camera flash
- Micro-SIM instead of standard SIM (like the iPad)
- What looks to be a secondary mic for noise cancellation, at the top, next to the headphone jack
- Split buttons for volume
- Power, mute, and volume buttons are all metallic
- The back is entirely flat, made of either glass (more likely) or shiny plastic in order for the cell signal to poke through. Tapping on the back makes a more hollow and higher pitched sound compared to tapping on the glass on the front/screen, but that could just be the orientation of components inside making for a different sound
- An aluminum border going completely around the outside
- Slightly smaller screen than the 3GS (but seemingly higher resolution)
- Everything is more squared off
- 3 grams heavier
- 16% Larger battery
- Internals components are shrunken, miniaturized and reduced to make room for the larger battery
Youtube video:
Now, a few considerations about this. Surely this is a bad situation for Apple, and Steve must be livid. Leaks happened before, but they’ve never been this huge and bad for Apple, revealing an important product like the iPhone months before its release. And if this may not look like the final design, surely the specs and features are there. Camera, glass back and all the other stuff.
I could see a “Cease and Desist” coming for Gizmodo, but that would be a way to admit that this thing is real. Either way, this thing is real and if Apple decides to keep it quiet people now know everything (sorta) about the new iPhone anyway. What’s gonna Apple do about it? Let’s wait a few more hours and we’ll see. But my money says they won’t say anything. A C&D would be a surprise at this point.
Many of you guys are also saying on Twitter that this could be an “on purpose leak”. I don’t think so, not this huge. Apple has done controlled leaks before, but they really haven’t been like this one: a lost prototype? Someone has been fired at Cupertino. And even worse, he has to face Steve’s rage.
