IPhone 5 rumour roll-up for the week ending October 28

The iOSsphere hungers for news about iPhone 5. It can't let go of LTE (Long Term Evolution, latest standard in the mobile network technology), and new images of what the Then iPhone will look like again rear their Photoshopped pixels. Contemplating a quad-core mobile processor causes swooning.

And on time for Halloween, authoritative word that the late Steve Jobs will not introduce the iPhone 5. He'll introduce the iPad 3.

"I don't know about you, nevertheless the stretched out iPhone 5 is starting to look a fair bit like the Android superphones that are out there with their 4+ inch displays." -- Michael Kwan, Mobile Magazine, commenting on imagined "concept art" for the non-existent iPhone 5

The published account is as a matter of fact headlined "Competition for LTE-enabled smartphones to heat up in 2012," however the story itself is about the U.S. LTE smartphone market. "Competition among handset vendors for a bigger share in the US LTE-enabled smartphone market is set to intensify in 2012 when Sprint Nextel starts kicking off its LTE services in the middle of the year."

The industry sources refer to Apple almost incidentally. "Nokia, Apple, RIM and Sony Ericsson are expected to join the LTE club in 2012 ...,"using the Passive Rumor Tense which always makes rumors sound more like facts.

The headline when it reported the DigiTimes story

So CNET rewrote the headline when it "reported" the DigiTimes story: "Apple expected to launch 4G LTE iPhone then year."

The bulk of the CNET is a summary and linknest of previous stories dealing with LTE market projections, other LTE handset vendors, Apple's rare comments on LTE technology to cut a long story short on. The general iOSsphere assumption seems to be that Apple will miss the tidal wave of LTE adoption, or reveal itself as technologically inept, if it fails to introduce an LTE iPhone 5 in 2012. CNET repeats some ABI Innovation projections: "To keep up with the likely consumer demand, the number of 4G smartphones shipped annually is forecast to reach 245 million in 2016, compared with just 4.6 million last year ..."

That sounds like a lot. But at the time Morgan Stanley is forecasting near 2.8 BILLION "3G+" users by the end of 2014. It's likely that a somewhat more "mature" cellular market like the U.S. will have a higher penetration of 4G by 2015, however the bulk of usage will on the whole be 3G-related. Apple can afford to wait on the 4G iPhone.

Christina Bonnington, writing for Wired's Gadget Lab blog, slaps the LTE dreamers upside the head. "LTE support isn't something that Apple can just instantaneously 'flip on' for everyone," she points out. "A host of technologies -- from network towers to hardware chipsets -- must first converge, and if the short history of 4G deployment is any indicator, Apple's 4G future could be bumpy."

The iPhone 5 with LTE is a distant reality

The iPhone 5 with LTE is a distant reality. "We'll believe it when we see it," Bonnington writes. "And at the time we'll without warning begin testing the handset in various locations to see just who's actually served by LTE support."

We enter, once more, that strange land where virtuality imitates reality imitating virtuality imitating reality. Several rumor sites again are posting renderings, mockups, concept art or, more simply, made-up images of the At once iPhone. At the time, they're talking about them as if these were real.

What are those current rumors

What are those current rumors, you ask? They include an "aluminum or 'liquid metal' unibody type body, a capacitive home button in an oval-like shape, a larger 4.3-inch screen that goes near edge to edge, an upgraded Apple A6 dual-core processor, and improved versions of both iOS 5 and iCloud."

But Kwan is as well dubious. Perhaps this isn't such a clever concept taking everything into account. "I don't know about you, however the stretched out iPhone 5 is starting to look a fair bit like the Android superphones that are out there with their 4+ inch displays," he writes. "The edge to edge display looks nice, yet I'm not sure I'm a fan of that grey-ish curved back."

The iPhone 5 News Blog

Over at the iPhone 5 News Blog, they're not so sure either. "I tend to agree with MobileMag's general observation, particularly as it relates to the larger screen size on the iPhone 5," writes Michael Nace.

He as well references the metal unibody "construction" "thanks to groundbreaking 'LiquidMetal' innovation, which many believe will as well debut on the iPhone 5."

That's a nice touch: "many believe." That could be a reference to "industry sources in Taiwan" or the legions of "graphics designers" furthering the conversation about what the Then iPhone will look like.

The alloys created

"LiquidMetal" to all appearances refers to the alloys created by Liquidmetal Technologies: alloys that have, among other properties, more than twice the tensile strength of conventional titanium alloys. But Apple has created aluminum unibodies for MacBook Air and more recently the MacBook line itself without any liquidmetal.

"Hardware-wise, this iPhone 5 concept purportedly packs an A8 1.9GHz dual-core processor, 10-megapixel rear camera, 7-megapixel front camera, 4.5-inch Retina Display, a touchpad integrated at the back similar to the Sony PS Vita, 2100mAh battery and clearly, iOS 5," gushes Steve Taylor.

"We can't even imagine just what a 1.9GHz dual-core iPhone 5 is capable of," he writes, anyway you look at it on the verge of swooning over an imagined phone with made-up specs created by a graphics designer.

To be honest, we missed this rumor from last week. Living up to its name, MacRumors carried a story based on a story in Korea Times that Apple will shift from to TSMC instead of Samsung for production of the straightway-generation, Apple-designed A6 and A7 chips for future iOS devices.

But at the time it gets confusing because the MacRumors story goes on to say that Apple actually is sticking with Samsung for the A6, a quad-core processor "to be used in the then iPhone." Citing an anonymous "executive from an Apple parts supplier based in Korea," MacRumors/Korea Times said Samsung "has been increasing the output of the Apple-designed A6 chips in its manufacturing plant in Austin, Texas."

Given that he's dead, this would seem like a no-brainer. However there are now rumors that Jobs recorded a product introduction to either the Then iPhone or the Then and there iPad or both.

Forthrightly, if ghoulishly, Beatweek debunks any expectation that Jobs will introduce iPhone 5 from beyond the grave. "If Steve were to make a posthumous product introduction, it would be at Apple's then and there event -- and that'll be the iPad 3 event," writes the assured Bill Palmer.