Apple is expected to unveil its new iPhone 7 in San Francisco on Wednesday – at a key time for the company as sales of the current models are falling.
Advertisement
When Steve Jobs was in charge, the idea of a stylus was overwhelmingly shunned, but Mr Cook said the new Apple Pencil is opening doors previously unimagined. As a result, Apple iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus models will come in 32GB, 128 GB and 256GB variants.
Apple typically gives its main product, which accounts for more than half of its revenue, a big makeover every other year and the last major redesign was the iPhone 6, in 2014.
“The iPhone 7 runs the risk of disappointing investors”, he said.
That means the earbuds themselves are in for a revamp, one that could hint at Apple’s plans for expanded use of wireless technology.
Apple is expected to show off new iPhones, an updated smartwatch – and maybe some new gear for listening to both – during its annual fall product launch event today.
Rumour has it the iPhone 7 is going to have a great new feature: Waterproofing.
Axing the jack may also free up space for other components – but it would be a controversial move which one tech blogger called “user-hostile and stupid”.
But it also means future iPhone buyers will need new headsets that use a digital connection.
Or it could demonstrate Apple’s commitment to wireless earbuds that connect to the phone via a technology such as Bluetooth.
But critics are already complaining that the old analog headphones worked better than most wireless headsets, which can be clunky to set up and sometimes randomly drop their connections.
It’s also not clear how users would plug in their headsets if they are already charging the phone. Already this year, Lenovo’s Motorola division and Chinese smartphone maker LeEco have released phones without analog audio jacks, relying instead on cords that plug into a new digital port known as USB-C – which, of course, is different from Apple’s Lightning port.
You can stream the event on an iPhone, iPad, or iPod touch running Safari on iOS 7.0 or later, a Mac with Safari 6.0.5 or later on OS X 10.8.5 or later, or a PC with Windows 7, 8, or 10.
“It looks like part of the reason they are keeping the design the same this year is there are bigger changes they are working on for next year”, said analyst Jan Dawson of Jackdaw Research.
According to the site (and we’re going to be confirming all of this in any case tomorrow with a follow-up story) the smaller iPhone 7 smartphone will come with a remarkably robust 4K-capable camera which can record ultra HD video at a smooth and very fast 60 frames per second.
Advertisement
Perfect: There have not been too many complaints about the iPhone 6 camera.
