Apple Slashes iPhone 5 Part Orders Due to Weak Demand

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Zorachus

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http://www.macrumors.com/2013/01/13/apple-slashes-iphone-5-part-orders-due-to-weak-demand/

Most will think I am crazy for saying this. But if Apple doesn't innovate much anymore, in five years they will become RIM, a company once the top dog, and thought to be unbeatable for years to come. Look back to like 2006, the Blackberry was the Phone to own, now they are 4th place and dying, behind Android, Apple, and Windows.

The iPhone 5 was a major letdown to me, basically still more of the same. Yes it's thinner, and a hair larger screen, but iOS is pretty much the same. A screen full of app icons, or as I call it, looks like the app drawer was left open look. In 2013, that is a very stale, and outdated UI.

But I truly believe this year Apple will bring out a major update in iOS7, with Ive's in control of the iPhone OS, I foresee a very good update in iOS, new UI, and big overhaul of the look, but done the Apple way, very well thought out, and great design sense. I think iOS7 will surprise even the hardcore Android crowd, and help Apple get some of them back.

And maybe not this year, but in 2014, a little larger screen too, bumping up to 4.3" screen size would be good. Don't need to go crazy big to 4.8" like Android, but 4" is too small today, I would like to see a slightly larger 4.3" screen, and new UI in iOS.

Really curious what Apple has in store this year for the next iPhone ? Will it come out in October and just be a iPhone 5S with minor improvements, same case as the current iPhone 5 ? Or will it go back to the Summer release, with all new UI redone iOS, and larger screen and whole new phone design ?
 
Apple will just need to come out with a large screen device. I went looking at phones with my mom (who knows nothing about cell phones, however she can figure them out) and she was checking out the i5 and the GS3. At one point she said "Why would anyone buy the iPhone when you could get a bigger screen?"

Also I don't think Android is really innovating either. They are just slowly cranking out new devices slightly larger than the last and bumping up specs on new devices (that still get beat out by the iPhone 5 in performance testing, while the iPhone 5 manages better battery life as well). I don't think number creep on Android spec sheets should be considered innovation. The real world performance doesn't back up the numbers.

People see the big Android screens and think its better. This is starting to feel like how the HDTV market started making slimmer TVs (often with worse picture quality) and people bought them up like candy. People bought up expensive super thin Samsung TVs without ever noticing they had the viewing angle of a periscope.

The whole thin device thing isn't working out for Apple since the iPhone 5 now feel too thin and light to a lot of people.

iOS 7 is going to be extremely important for Apple. I don't think they need to reinvent the wheel, but they need the phones to look and feel a bit different to keep things fresh. Unless you dig into specific features, it it hard to see where iOS 5 and iOS 6 are any different.
 
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iOS6 compared to iOS5 is near impossible to see the difference. Apple maps :rolleyes: They need to hit a grand slam with iOS7, that's #1 most important right now. A larger screen would be nice, but that would be #2.

What if Samsung comes out with a killer design for the Galaxy S IV, super high quality build like the iPhone 5, using aluminum and polycarbonate, and have a 1080p Super AMOLED+ screen. That will be hard for to Apple to compete with only having the current iPhone 5.

If Apple wants to win back Android users, they need to do things. #1 revamp iOS, freshen it up with a new UI, and not just a screen full of static app icons. #2 offer a larger screen version like 4.3". And offer some customization in the OS, allow themes or options to chnage the way it looks.

If Apple does that, I would seriously consider ditching my nexus, for a new iPhone 6
 
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meh, I don't think it has anything to do with iOS6 being a flop or lack of features - Apple has simply saturated the market and a big part of their market share is people who can't tell the difference between the iPhone4 and 4S as well as those who don't see the point of upgrading from the iPhone4 to the iPhone5 unless they want the bigger screen.

If Apple wants to sell more devices, they need to bust the developing countries (China, India) wide open like what Android is in the process of doing. Their devices are way too expensive for the average person outside of the US and Europe.

Oh and for those saying Apple needs a radical UI refresh, good luck with that. If Apple did that, they'd piss off MILLIONS of people who hate when things change. The way that iOS is laid out is now a trade mark of Apple...just like how the Start Menu was a trade mark of Microsoft for 15+ years
 
Apple Shake-Up Could Lead to Design Shift
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/01/t...d-images-in-software.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

The executive who will now set the direction for the look of Apple’s software is Jonathan Ive, who has long been responsible for Apple’s minimalist hardware designs. Mr. Ive, despite his close relationship with Mr. Jobs, has made his distaste for the visual ornamentation in Apple’s mobile software known within the company, according to current and former Apple employees who asked not to be named discussing internal matters.

“You can be sure that the next generation of iOS will have Jony’s industrial design aesthetic all over them,” said a designer who works at Apple but declined to be named as he is not allowed to speak publicly. “Clean edges, flat surfaces will likely replace the textures that are all over the place right now.”
 
Zorachus said:
Apple Shake-Up Could Lead to Design Shift
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/11/01/t...d-images-in-software.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

The executive who will now set the direction for the look of Apple’s software is Jonathan Ive, who has long been responsible for Apple’s minimalist hardware designs. Mr. Ive, despite his close relationship with Mr. Jobs, has made his distaste for the visual ornamentation in Apple’s mobile software known within the company, according to current and former Apple employees who asked not to be named discussing internal matters.

“You can be sure that the next generation of iOS will have Jony’s industrial design aesthetic all over them,” said a designer who works at Apple but declined to be named as he is not allowed to speak publicly. “Clean edges, flat surfaces will likely replace the textures that are all over the place right now.”
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All speculation based on "sources" within the company.

Besides, I'd hardly call "smoothing out edges" and changing textures radical change.
 
ComputerBox34 said:
All speculation based on "sources" within the company.

Besides, I'd hardly call "smoothing out edges" and changing textures radical change.
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I agree, but at least somewhat of a change is coming to iOS7. For Apple to completely change the UI and OS, that will take them a couple of years, little changes here and there, and by iOS8, be all new compared to the current iOS5/iOS6. But I do expect iOS7 to see the biggest change to iOS in years, whatever that is, we have to wait and see.
 
ocellaris said:
Also I don't think Android is really innovating either.
Click to expand...

Have you used 4.2? I find it has the most (actually useful and cool) new features in Android since 2.1. My three favorite being the new notification bar/menu, lockscreen widgets, and photosphere (which strangely seems to work faster at making panoramas than panorama mode to me).
 
iOS 7 is simply going to steal more features from Android (like notifications), claim to have 'invented' them, patent them, and sue everyone else.
 
Neurofreeze said:
Have you used 4.2? I find it has the most (actually useful and cool) new features in Android since 2.1. My three favorite being the new notification bar/menu, lockscreen widgets, and photosphere (which strangely seems to work faster at making panoramas than panorama mode to me).
Click to expand...

Two things on that. First, no, most people haven't used 4.2, because outside of the Nexus phones and custom ROMs, it's not officially available on any device. Secondly, those "new" features in Android 4.2 have been available to most of us non-vanilla users for 2-3 years now. Many people don't realize just how plain the stock Android UI is until they go it from a TouchWiz or Sense device. I've seen more people jump ship BACK from a Nexus than actually stick with it.
 
But the demand for the iphone 4 is way way up, they can barely keep those on the shelves. All because it has the iphone name and it's free. It just proves people are retarded and extremely cheap.
 
DirtyB said:
But the demand for the iphone 4 is way way up, they can barely keep those on the shelves. All because it has the iphone name and it's free. It just proves people are retarded and extremely cheap.
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The iPhone 4 is an extremely good free phone compared to the junk usually offered up for Android free phones most of the time.
 
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Doesnt the demand always go down after the holidays? They boost production right before to meet the holiday demand.
 
Worth noting

http://bgr.com/2013/01/14/iphone-5-analysis-component-cuts-291307/


The Sunday evening Wall Street Journal article claiming that Apple had cut its iPhone 5 display orders drastically for the March quarter made quite a splash. The way WSJ wrote its piece seemed to support the original Nikkei claim about Apple cutting its iPhone 5 display orders in half from the originally planned order of 65 million units. This would be a massive adjustment. But Apple uses the same new display type for both iPhone 5 and the latest iPod touch. Neither WSJ nor Nikkei addressed this, however — both seemed to be referring to just iPhone 5 displays. The math just doesn't add up."
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Maybe they'll come out with an inovative new top secret invention like the Iphone MINI or the Ipad MINI MINI
 
ocellaris said:
The iPhone 4 is an extremely good free phone compared to the junk usually offered up for Android free phones most of the time.
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I agree 100%, but when your paying the same monthly rates no matter what dont be cheap and spend the extra $.
 
iphone_ipad_iboard_imat_Ste.500px.jpg
 
ocellaris said:
The iPhone 4 is an extremely good free phone compared to the junk usually offered up for Android free phones most of the time.
Click to expand...

Not compared to the galaxy nexus, droid razr, or many other phones. Heck the droid razr maxx is only 50. The iphone 4 is so outdated and the gpu struggles with the os. Its aN sgx535 which is like 3 times slower than the gpu in the original galaxy s. (2010)

I would not sign up for a two year contract for a phone so outdated. Its a cortex a8 single core. Even the free android phones usually have atleast a dual core a9.
 
Apple has always been weak. Every market needs to fill that gap and it seems like all the apple fan boys have had their share.. I guess we wont be hearing "apples next best thing"... I think the apple has been juiced for all its worth..
 
I'll agree innovation is taking a back seat, but I'm also going to agree with the poster above who said "changing the UI will piss off a lot of iphone owners" I, for one, like the iphone UI (minus the lack of quic-access widgets like the "radio bar" that Android has (one tap to turn on/off wifi/bt/lte/gps/etc) and Jailbreaking gives you that option with Activator/SBsettings.

on that same note, some of us like the design of the iphone5, the physical casing is lovely, small, light, and yet *feels* durable and strong. now if they make it any smaller all that will be gone, but personally I think they hit a sweetspot with the design (discounting the difficulty in replacing the back that's so easily scratched up --- the point for that goes to iphone4/4s where two screws allowed you to swap out the back quickly and painlessly)

Also, there's no arguing with the iphone's specs, it beats out every phone of it's genneration in every test (though only by a hair in some cases - but that's still a win)

all accross the market there's not a ton of innovation. as noted the biggest changes seem to be screen-size. really what's left? a projector - those are still to expensive and large to fit a decent one inside a phone. a laser keyboard" - we have those and their a PoS and everyone hates them (though arguably they could be improved to the point they're useable, but they're still annoying as hell simply because they're protected on a tabletop) Samsung tried to re-introduce the stylus with the Note line and really it's just a gimmic, it's barely useful with modern UIs... 3D displays? few of those on the market and they're not only annoying but they DEGRADE the screen quality overall... NFC - how often do you see ANY device or service that currently is compatable with NFC? at *best* this is just future-proofing and realistically this is another WiMAX.

Really all that CAN be changed at the moment is the screen, and outside of making it bigger (and the Note2 and supposedly even larger note3 in development) prove there's a point where you can get TOO big... once the screen all reach 1920x1080 resolution there's no point in going higher in that department either...

untill there's a breakthrough in tech that we're not expecting, there really isn't much that can be done anywhere...
 
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