Apple is planning a launch event for September 12th when the company is
expected to unveil the long awaited iPhone 5 as well as a smaller 7 inch
iPad “mini”. These two new devices, if rumours are to be believed, may
represent some of the biggest design changes for iOS products for the last
few years.

For one thing, the iPad mini will be larger than existing iPhones but not
quite as big as the three existing iPads; representing an entirely new
product niche for Apple. A number of competitors have released tablets with
a smaller 7 inch screen, including Dell, Samsung and HTC, so it will be
interesting to see how Apple’s new iPad mini will affect sales for these
existing products.

Overshadowing this news however is the speculation that the next iPhone
will be the first to come with a screen larger than 3.5 inches. The iPhone
is by far Apple’s biggest success story, and a change in design here could
have more far reaching implications than the introduction of Apple’s new
iPad mini. Could this drastic change make a significant dent in the
iPhone’s popularity?

Many people have been calling for a larger screen on the iPhone for some
time, as Android competitors have becoming increasingly large – almost to
the point that there is a very thin a blurry line between many Android
smartphones and the miniature tablet category that the iPad mini will fall
into. A larger screen has many benefits for users, especially for videos
and apps, but Apple has always been reluctant to move away from its
original choice of screen size.

Apple has insisted that its 3.5 inch screen size was chosen after intensive
research determined that it was the optimum size for most people to use a
phone one handed, but the popularity of larger competing phones has made
Apple think again. The company has managed to work around its concerns by
increasing the iPhone screen height while maintaining a similar width. This
will provide greater screen real estate and a new widescreen aspect ratio,
but also give the iPhone 5 the same comfortable in-hand feel as earlier
models.

The new screen will measure just under 4 inches and will have a higher 1136
x 640 screen resolution. It has already been demonstrated that many
elements of the Apple UI will be able to adjust themselves to this new
screen size. As an example, an extra row of app icons will be included in
the app drawer to make use of the extra space, and the on-screen keyboard
will be expanded when in landscape mode.

With the new iPhone and iPad Apple will also be changing its proprietary
dock connector that has been used for a number of years. The existing 30
pin connection will be replaced with a new 8 pin design (or possibly 9 pin,
or 19 pin, depending on your source). The new connection is claimed to be
faster, more efficient and will occupy far less space within the iPhone and
on the exterior of the phone. This extra space will allow the headphone
socket to be moved to the bottom of the phone, although the new design may
potentially cause problems for iPhone users who have already amassed a
large collection of accessories.

The iPhone 5 could see some other upgrades including a faster processor,
more memory, a better camera, and perhaps even LTE and NFC. One of the most
interesting new hardware additions is the ETSI approved Nano SIM card
design. The iPhone 4 and 4S models already used a smaller Micro SIM, but
the Nano SIM design is smaller by another 40%. As this new design has only
just been accepted as an industry standard it is quite likely that the
iPhone 5 will be the first phone to use it.

If all of the rumours turn out to be correct then the iPhone 5 could
introduce some of the most drastic changes to the phone series for a number
of years. While the new SIM design may not be an issue, the increased
screen size and redesigned dock connector could have the potential to
divide opinion when it is finally unveiled. While the iPhone 5 will be
launched with the new mini iPad on September 12th it is thought to go on
sale in most markets on September 21st. Apple will begin taking pre-orders
for the phone on September 13th.

This post was written by Simon from
http://www.best-mobile-contracts.co.uk/ Best Mobile Contracts, a UK
mobile phone comparison website.