Gray SIM card tray for iPhone 5S points to a fourth color option

The gold / champagne colored iPhone 5S has been getting a lot of attention from the rumor mill, but there might be a fourth color option on the way. A grey SIM card tray popped up in a repair shop in Japan and it looks just like the leaked iPhone 5S trays.

The image above compares it to the gold iPhone 5S nanoSIM tray and the white iPhone 5 tray.

The gray SIM tray is too dark for the white iPhone and too light for the black iPhone. It's possible that Apple will tweak one of the two standard flavors of its next iPhone but it's also possible that the company is trying out a fourth color.

  
White and grey trays • color comparison with white, gold and black iPhone

Even if Apple is indeed testing a fourth color, there's no guarantee we'll see them all at the iPhone unveiling (which is allegedly scheduled for September 10). Companies usually try different prototypes before settling on a final design.

Source (in Japanese) | Via

A pair of new leaked videos show more iPhone 5C panels

File this under rumors with a capital "R." While they may be a bit misleading in their titles, the latest iPhone 5C video leaks show off an "unboxing" of the device panels, as well as a "scratch test."

This scratch test video doesn't really put the panel through its paces, but it does include some measurements - though they're oddly of still images rather than a live shot. Take the 124.55 x 59.13 x 8.98 dimensions with perhaps more than the usual grain of salt.

Not much is revealed in the second video either, but if these panels do turn out to be the real deal, then the iPhone 5C will come in white, blue, green, red, and yellow.

We'll hopefully find out more as the rumored September 10 Apple announcement date nears.

More Apple iPhone 5S concepts surface, suggest 2 screen sizes

We came across a couple of iPhone designs which we haven't seen before. The first appears to be made out of plastic and closely resembles the popular iPod Touch. It will allegedly be the rumored cheaper new iPhone. It also appears to have a slightly smaller screen than the current 4" Retina on the iPhone 5.

iPhone 5S and cheaper new iPhone

The second device is the more interesting one and is slated as the iPhone 5S (or maybe even iPhone 6). It's larger than the current iPhone 5 and sports a bigger, almost bezel-less screen with sloping edges. It sports a rather strange-looking cyan color and the front appears to be entirely made of glass. The back, like on the smaller device, looks to be plastic as well.

The images aren't of the best quality so the material used on the concept phones could be something other than plastic, like glossy aluminum. The edges around the screen look to be precision cut - just like on the iPhone 5.

 
The two new iPhone concepts

We urge you to take these images with a pinch of salt as they can prove to be nothing more than clever renders. That being said, there is always the possibility that what we're seeing are prototypes that Apple's working on prior to launching the final hardware.

This is not the first time we've seen an alleged iPhone render-slash-concept and these are likely to start popping up even more with the summer just around the corner.

Source (Dutch) | Via

Oppo working on a quad-core smartphone with 6.1mm profile

The Chinese manufacturer Oppo had created a buzz among the tech enthusiast with its Find 5 smartphone, which was the slimmest FullHD flagship when it was announced. As we found later it was also able to stand its ground quite successfully against the established players in the smartphone game.

It looks like Oppo is going continue its trend of build slimmer devices as the company is rumored to be working on a quad-core smartphone, which is only 6.13mm thick.

Information about the specifications of the Oppo R809T is scarce at the moment, but the smartphone is rumored to sport a 4.5-inch 720p display and is expected to feature a quad-core Mediatek MT6589 processor along with 1 GB of RAM.

The Oppo R809T is rumored to be announced on April 26 and the device is said to carry a price tag of 2500 yuan (about $400) for the unlocked version.

Source | Via

Samsung Galaxy Mega handsets with 5.8" and 6.3" screens coming

Samsung is preparing to introduce a new series of Galaxy devices carrying the Mega moniker, a report by SamMobile suggests.

The information comes from an inside source, who confirmed that two Galaxy Mega smartphones are in the works. The first is codenamed Galaxy Mega 5.8 with a model number GT-I9152. Obviously, we are talking about a handset with 5.8-inch display and the model number pointing to its dual-SIM nature.

More interestingly, the second one is carrying the codename Galaxy Mega 6.3, which hints at a 6.3-inch display - the same as the Galaxy Note III is rumored to pack. However, the model number GT-I9200 doesn't correspond with Samsung Galaxy Note naming convention Nxxxx (Galaxy Note II N7100, Galaxy Note N7000), so it will most likely lack S Pen functionality.

Everything should be revealed once those two phones get out of Samsung's factories. The Galaxy Mega 5.8 should do so around the end of May, start of June (week 22, as per SamMobile), while the Galaxy Mega 6.3 around mid-June (week 25).

Source

Snapdragon 600 to power 70% of the first Galaxy S4 batch

Latest reports suggest Samsung will use Snapdragon 600 chips in 70% of the first Galaxy S4 batch. This was already confirmed by the leaked list showing the availability of the two Galaxy S4 versions around the globe.

In case you need a refresh, the Samsung Galaxy S4 will be sold in two flavors - the Exynos 5 Octa-powered I9500 and the Snapdragon 600-powered I9505. The "octa" units are reserved for Asia and Africa and few European countries that don't have wide LTE availability just yet.

According to the reports coming from Samsung's homeland, the company is having issues with the Exynos 5 Octa production and there was no chance for it to meet the tremendous demand of the flagship. So the Snapdragon 600 switch was necessary, and the reach of the I9505 model was expanded beyond the US borders to most of the developed markets.

We already met the Snapdragon 600-powered Galaxy S4 and it turned out to be the fastest phone currently available, so no one should worry about the performance of the device. It's a beast that easily outruns the competition. And we are yet to see how those four 1.6GHz Cortex-A15 cores within the Exynos 5 Octa chipset are doing compared to the four 1.9GHz Krait 300.

Samsung has already announced the Exynos 5 Octa chipset will enter mass production in Q2 this year, which probably suggest the octa-core Galaxy S4 will get wider availability in June or July.

Source | Via

Samsung Galaxy Note III rumored to launch in US with 5.9" display

Samsung Galaxy Note III, the potential successor of the popular Galaxy Note II phablet was said to come out with a whopping 5.9" display. Now, an executive from one of the main parts suppliers for the company has confirmed the screen size.

According to a report from Korea Times, the next generation Galaxy Note will launch in the United States as confirmed by the local suppliers. The report also claims that the South Korean manufacturer will be showing off its Galaxy Note III concept to the US carrier AT&T in the coming days.

Samsung Galaxy Note III is also rumored to sport the latest OLED technology for the display, which is expected to offer a full HD resolution.

The successor of the Galaxy Note II is expected to be launched by the end of August, falling in line with the IFA 2013, but Samsung might chose to skip the show and hold its own Unpacked event in the US as it did for the Galaxy S4.

Source | Via

Galaxy S4 mini appears on official website, LTE version confimed

The Samsung Galaxy S4 mini will have four different versions, according to info spotted by Twitter userst7761. He found the I9190 model number on Samsung’s support page, along with three other I919X devices.

One is the I9192, the dual-SIM version that was promised by the initial leak. The other point to an LTE version, the I9195, and a China version, the I9198. This is judging by the final digit of the model number, Samsung’s naming scheme is fairly consistent here (though there are exceptions).

Anyway, the only other info we have on the Galaxy S4 mini is that it will have a 4.3” Super AMOLED screen of qHD resolution (540 x 960 pixels, 256ppi) and it will run Android 4.2.2 on a 1.6GHz dual-core processor.

The official announcement of the Galaxy S4 mini is should happen around June or July this year. The info on Samsung’s support page identifying the I9190 seems to have been taken down now, but we’ll be on the lookout for more info.

Source | Via (in Italian)

RUMOR: The next iPhone will likely be a marginal update

Sources from the Apple supply chain are at it again. This time the rumors circulate around the end of May arrival of components, which would point to an arrival of the next iPhone in the the third quarter of this year.

According to said sources the next iPhone will allegedly be a marginal upgrade of the iPhone 5 (perhaps called the iPhone 5S). The next-gen iPhone should come with an improved processor, perhaps a higher-megapixel camera with new module or even a redesigned flash ("Smart Flash") with white and yellow LEDs in order to improve color reproduction.

Foxconn Electronics chairman Terry Guo has noted that he expects company performance to start picking up after April or May, which could coincide with the beginning of the production of the latest iPhone.

According to the sources if the components supply goes smoothly the next-gen iDevice could be delivered to retail channels in 1 to 2 weeks time, which would mean a realistic Q3 launch (Apple needs to gather up stock as the production rate is far lower than initial demand).

Finally reports are mentioning a cheaper, plastic-made iPhone too, but as we are getting the "cheaper iPhone" each year we take those rumors with an extra pinch of salt. Besides, every time the new iPhone comes out last-year's model gets discounted, technically making it the "cheaper iPhone".

Source | Via