There is probably nothing that can be announced or rumored this week that will be able to take away from the Apple iPad launch and I know we are gearing up for some heavy weekend coverage. How about Apple rumors to tide you over for a couple of days? Engadget posted a summary of the next iPhone from talk coming out of the Wall Street Journal and John Gruber’s Daring Fireball. One bit of the rumors was that an iPhone would be coming to Verizon Wireless and Larry thinks this would freeze smartphone upgrades, but after playing with the Palm Pre Plus, Google Nexus One, and T-Mobile HTC HD2 I don’t think Apple is going to have such an easy time with the iPhone this year. Other rumored info includes the name iPhone HD, an Apple A4-class processor, 960×640 resolution display, front-facing camera, and 3rd party multitasking. Nothing rumored here is a surprise and pretty much what we all expect for Apple to compete with the latest Android and Windows Phone 7 Series devices.
I personally think we will see a new iPhone with a higher res display, better camera, and updated operating system. I am still not sold on Apple rolling out full 3rd party multitasking though since I have only seen Palm do it extremely well with webOS and Nokia with Maemo 5. Google Android, RIM BlackBerry, and Windows Mobile support multitasking as well, but these devices all seem to experience performance issues with mismanaged multitasking. If you have tried a webOS Palm Pre Plus, then you know what I am talking about when it comes to excellent multitasking that is hard to leave.
Apple could stand apart a bit with actual implementation of video chat or video Skype with that front-facing camera since no one else has ever done anything in the US with these. Then again, if the iPhone launches on AT&T that would probably be a worthless experiment. This may also tend to indicate that Verizon Wireless is getting such a device. I wonder if Verizon would suffer the same fate as AT&T’s network with millions of iPhones and think this summer will be quite interesting.
Honestly, with my expensive iPad purchase and mobile phones like the Pre Plus, Nexus One, N900, and HD2 I have no plans to buy a new iPhone, especially if it is back on AT&T. There is a better chance that I would buy one if it came to Verizon Wireless, but I am pretty happy with my current collection and need to see something extremely compelling from Apple.
