With Apple virtually certain to announce a release date for the next-generation iPhone next week, lots of current iPhone owners (always an excitable bunch) are no doubt counting down the minutes — and wondering what to do with their current phones.

While some retailers offer discounts for a trade-in (Radio Shack was offering $100 for some previous models when the iPhone 4 was released), Apple stores and their designated carriers generally don’t give back as much cash, or credit, as an owner might earn outside the store.

But a growing online resell market has emerged to give folks another option.

Between now and Monday, the day before Apple has scheduled an iPhone-related event, one of those sites, Nextworth, is offering $250 for 16GB and 32GB iPhone 4s that are in good shape.

The company, which also has trade-in programs at some retail stores, bills itself as a way to get value out of your aging electronics while keeping the products out of landfills, where they can cause environmental problems.

The services wipe all data from your phone as soon as they get it, they say.

Nextworth, and others like them, refurbish used electronics and resell them. In the case of items like the iPhone, they sell them in countries where the items are typically unavailable, presumably bringing a healthier price.

Gazelle.com is offering $250 for a 32GB iPhone 4 in “flawless” condition and $169 for one in good condition. Got a busted model? It’ll give you $85 for one even if it won’t turn on or is physically damaged.

Of course, there are always the direct-sale sites like eBay and Craigslist.

You might earn more in exchange for the hassle of posting, selling and delivering the phone yourself. Folks were selling 32GB iPhone 4s on eBay on Friday for prices ranging from $245 to $634. In Atlanta, people had listed 32GB iPhone 4s for prices ranging from $290 to $450.

(We’re using prices on that model because it’s the top of the line. Older phones, like the 3GS, and 16GB and 8GB models obviously have a market as well, generally at lower prices).

Of course, the low-effort way to deal with a phone upgrade is to buy the new one at full price and just hold on to your current model. Even retired, your current phone can be a music player or Internet-surfing device when you have a Wi-Fi connection.

[Thanks: http://edition.cnn.com]

Unfounded innuendo, however, is increasingly giving way to facts that indicate release of the iPhone 5 is imminent. To that end, both Bloomberg and Forbes are reporting Deutsche Telekom is already taking pre-orders for the iPhone 5 in Germany.

“The parent company of T-Mobile is reportedly taking pre-orders for the iPhone 5, despite the fact that Apple has not announced details on the device’s release, price, or even its very existence,” Forbes reports. “Deutsche Telekom has not commented on the reports and is supposedly keeping the pre-ordering process low profile. The carrier is allegedly not taking online reservations and only letting customers pre-order the device in-store.”

The looming launch of iPhone 5 isn’t preventing consumers from buying the iPhone 4, which was still the best-selling phone in the U.S. for both Verizon and AT&T in August, ZDNet reports.

“Most companies have to worry about upcoming models cannibalizing sales of existing ones, but not Apple. The next generation iPhone, presumably the iPhone 5, is expected to be launched in October, so logic would dictate smart-phone buyers might wait on the new one. That’s not the case as the iPhone 4 is still outpacing other smart-phones at the two big carriers.”

A new report projects that Apple will ship more than 86 million iPhones worldwide in 2011 surpass Nokia as the global leader in smart-phone sales.

“Apple’s smart-phone shipments are projected to top 86.4 million units in 2011, up 82 percent from 47.5 million units in 2010,” Digitimes Research reports. “In contrast, Nokia’s smart-phone shipments in 2011 will decline to 74.4 million units from over 100 million in 2010.”

[Thanks: http://www.deseretnews.com]

The new iPhone 4, according to Reuters, will have 8GB, half as much the current version. If we look back though, this isn’t actually a surprising move, since Apple did the same thing with the iPhone 3GS when the iPhone 4 was launched. The iPhone 3GS’ memory was reduced to 8GB and its price was also lower. It seems that Apple will do the same thing when the iPhone 5 takes over as Apple’s premier smartphone. If you ask me, this is a bit of a risky move, as consumers might consider it obsolete.

By releasing a cheaper iPhone 4, with cheaper materials and other possibly other slightly downgraded specs, Apple could compromise it’s premium brand image. However, with the arrival of the iCloud you could argue that smartphone memory will become a less important asset.

On the other hand, this move could “educate” Apple’s client base that you can wait for one year and get a big discount on the device you want. That is unless you are lured by the charm of the newest unit.

[Thanks: http://www.itproportal.com]

Apple is preparing to release a cheaper 8-gigabyte iPhone 4 for launch within the next few weeks, to complement the iPhone 5.

Asian suppliers say it will be cheaper than the 16- and 32-gigabyte models and use flash memory. The device is expected to sell alongside the iPhone 5 as a replacement for the iPhone 3GS.

The point, the strategy behind this, is that the iPhone is simply too expensive for large parts of the market. Those parts being many of the people in developing markets. But of course, Apple doesn’t want to reduce the prices that we rich world people are willing to pay for a phone: that would be silly, leaving money that Apple could have had on the table.

So it makes perfect sense to introduce a “lower grade” of iPhone at a lower price point. Thus they can still charge us what we’re willing to pay for the top end models and also start making inroads into those developing markets.

Which is rather what I said a week ago:

A sufficiently large number of these phones have been sold that we’re seeing local apps for local needs being developed: the start of a self-reinforcing process. This is great news for Kenyans and East Africans, of course. The people it might cause a problem for are Apple. If Apple decides that the iPhone is always going to be a high end product then those vast and currently underserved markets in the developing world are going to remain closed to them.

I would, of course, dearly love to be able to say that it was my warning of that week ago which has led to Apple’s upcoming release. You know, fear and tremble at the power of the Worstall in the tech marketplace?

Unfortunately, given the length of time it takes to design, source the components for, manufacture and get ready to distribute, a new phone, I have to reveal that this would not be a true claim. Rather, that Apple managed to grasp this point, oooh, 6 months before I did?

[Thanks: http://www.forbes.com]

Radio Shack is currently running a week-long promotion that drops the price of the 16 GB iPhone 4 to US$169 and the 32 GB iPhone 4 to $269. You can cut these prices by an extra $100 if you bring in an older iPhone model as a trade.

Target is also slashing the price on the 16 GB and 32 GB iPhone 4 to $149 and $249, respectively. All the quoted sale prices include a two-year customer agreement.

Big box retailers may be ready to move existing inventory of the iPhone 4, but checks with Verizon and AT&T suggest the wireless carriers are not quite ready for a fire sale on Apple’s popular smartphone. Prices at both carriers remain steady at $199 and $299 for an iPhone 4 with a new wireless agreement.

[Thanks: http://www.tuaw.com]

According to Boy Genius Report, an anonymous source says Apple plans to launch a prepaid, contractless version of the iPhone 3GS for just $350. BGR also reports that a newer model of the iPhone will be coming out or “at least announced by the end of summer, late August-ish,” and that Apple will continue to sell the iPhone 4 alongside the newer model (likely dubbed the iPhone 4S or iPhone 5).

This is no real surprise–in the past, Apple has sold previous-generation iPhones at a reduced price alongside the latest models. This year, however, Apple may reach back two generations and continue selling the iPhone 3GS as a cheap, prepaid alternative–giving Apple the full range of devices, as BGR points out: high- (new iPhone), mid- (iPhone 4), and low-end (iPhone 3GS).

Apple has already demonstrated its willingness to be aggressive with iPhone 3GS pricing: in January, the company started selling the 3GS for just $49 with a two-year AT&T contract. Selling the 3GS for $350 with no contract would give Apple access to a prepaid market which, in the United States, is currently getting lots of love from Android, thanks to offerings such as the Samsung Intercept on Virgin Mobile ($250) and LG Thrive on AT&T ($179).

The
standard Apple rumor disclaimer applies: The latest rumor is just one report based on a single unnamed source, but we’ve heard this song and dance before. In February, the New York Times, Bloomberg, and the Wall Street Journal all reported that Apple was planning a cheaper iPhone, though they disagreed on the size of the handset. The Times speculated that Apple wanted to attack the prepaid market, particularly outside the United States, where carrier subsidies are uncommon. I’d be surprised if this rumor doesn’t pan out.

Still, don’t expect wireless carriers to make a big deal out of a prepaid iPhone 3GS, even if the rumor proves accurate. They’d much rather lock you into a two-year contract, and if you’re okay with that, I’m guessing you’d much rather pay less money up-front for better hardware.

[Thanks: http://www.pcworld.com]

The iPhone 4 16GB is reported to be on sale for $150.99 with a two-year contract. That’s about the same price as a refurbished iPhone 4 usually goes for at Verizon.

The 16GB model normally runs you $199, so the $50 price break may suggest that Verizon is gearing up for the new line or iPhone 5 models rumored to be hitting shelves this fall. In fact, as we reported toda,  Apple has ordered 15 million new iPhones from Pegatron Technology. With that many iPhones in production, it’s no wonder Verizon is starting two months early and clearing out the old stock before the September launch.

Though we can’t confirm the sale to be real, it sounds like a reasonable thing to do. Walmart did the same thing when it offered the iPhone 4 for $147 in the month of June to get rid of some excess stock in preparation for the new iPhone 5.

The purported sale will also include the HTC Thunderbolt, which will be free. That’s not bad considering the phone was previously $249.99. Other phones on sale include the Motorola Droid X for 50 percent off, and the BlackBerry Bold 9650 also for 50 percent off.

The sale date is still to be determined, but keep a lookout on the Verizon website to be the first to grab your discounted iPhone or Android handset.

[Thanks: http://www.geek.com]

The Galaxy S2 smartphone is expected to arrive on Verizon network as the “Function” phone in July, and Sprint may have it in September. Even AT&T will have its hands a version called “Attain.” There was no confirmation on any version going to T-Mobile, but a new rumored smartphone, known as the Samsung Hercules, has emerged out of the blue and is expected to be T-Mobile’s flagship phone.

Samsung’s Hercules handset,with a rumored $350 price tag, can tick all the boxes on the super phone list, making a big impact in the crowded smartphone market.

If the speculated rumors related to Samsung Hercules are true, then the new smartphone will come with 4.5-inch 800 x 480 Super AMOLED Plus display which is very similar to AT&T’s Samsung Infuse 4G as far as screens go. Motorola Droid Bionic is the other smartphone to feature a 4.5-inch HD display screen, but with a better resolution of 540 x 960 pixels. The newly announced HTC Eternity is expected to come with 4.7-inch display, which is slightly bigger for a smartphone. The iPhone 5, on the other hand, is expected to feature a display screen between 3.7-inch or 4-inch.

Samsung Hercules will also be identical in terms of 132 x 71 x 9 mm dimension similar to that of Infuse 4G.

Powering the Hercules would be a 1.5 GHz dual core Qualcomm APQ8060 processor which can make it the fastest smartphone in the market. Other smartphones that are expected to feature a 1.5 GHz dual core processor are Google’s upcoming Nexus 4G smartphone, also now known as Samsung Nexus Prime and, of course, the iPhone 5.Even the HTC Eternity launching in September features a 1.5GHz CPU processor, but it features a single core processor unlike dual core processors found in most of the recently released smartphones.

Also a Samsung smartphone usually runs the ARM Cortex processor so its choice for a Qualcomm processor is new, making Hercules its exception. The Galaxy S2 is powered by Samsung’s Exynos CPU, which is Samsung’s dual core processor but Hercules is not expected to have it.

As it comes to camera, the Hercules smartphone will have an 8-megapixel 3264×2448 pixels camera found in most of the smartphones but it can shoot 1080p 1920×1080 pixels full HD video which is not found in many smartphones. However, iPhone 5 is also expected to come with 8-megapixel camera but with dual-LED flash compared to Hercules which will have LED flash support.

With NFC support, Hercules will have rare privilege to stand alongside Google Nexus S, Google Nexus S 4G, Samsung Galaxy S2, Samsung Wave 578, BlackBerry Bold 9900/9930 and Nokia N9 as all of them have NFC support. There are many other phones outside which also support NFC. However, the upcoming Samsung Nexus Prime will surely feature NFC and even iPhone 5 is rumored to have NFC support.

The biggest of all the surprises is that the smartphone is having category 24 HSDPA capability to exceed the max speeds of 42Mbps downstream which will make the Hercules the fastest HSDPA plus for a smartphone in the market.

Today, HSDPA speeds found in most of the smartphones are 21 Mbps or 14 Mbps. Also, the phone is expected to have hidden radios for AT&T HSDPA plus as well, which is a unique feature. The phone also will have MHL port which combines microUSB and HDMI port as one single port.

The Hercules phone may make its first appearance in August.

[Thanks: http://www.ibtimes.com]

Analysts, tech blogs and consumers oscillated between hyping the phone as the second-coming or deriding it as much-ado about nothing. In 2007, I was both an Apple fan (I purchased my first iPod in 2002) and a mobile phone fanatic. Still, I had my doubts about the iPhone because of its outlandish price, its carrier lock (and the carrier of choice) and the lack of third-party applications. I thought, OK, the iPhone will probably sell pretty well, but it’s not going to change the mobile phone industry.

The details and investment into the narrative surrounding the iPhone’s launch wasn’t like other tech products — or even other Apple products. It was more like a highly promoted, well publicized and much buzzed about movie. The only question was, would the iPhone be an Ishtar (a highly publicized failure), or a Titanic (surpassing even the most hopeful expectations)?

In four years, the iPhone has utterly transformed the mobile industry. One can debate how much Apple innovated versus refined when it comes to certain features (touchscreens and app stores existed before the iPhone), but when we look at the mobile industry, there is a very clear line between what happened before June 29, 2007, and what happened after. I would argue that every major smartphone that has gone into production since the iPhone’s release has, in some way, been a response to the iPhone itself.

The iPhone not only transformed the mobile industry, but changed Apple as a company. In 2007, Apple was nearly 10 years into a fantastic business turnaround. Propelled by the early success of the iMac and pushed further into the black with the iBook, iPod, iTunes and the transition to Intel processors, the iPhone took Apple into an entirely different direction.

As our lovely infographic showcases, Apple’s stock has nearly tripled over the past four years. The company now has a market cap of more than $300 billion, exceeding that of Microsoft. Apple’s revenues are now higher than Microsoft’s, too — something that would have been a laughable suggestion four years ago.

Four years after the first iPhone was released, a lot has changed in the mobile space. Smartphone adoption has finally gone mainstream. The fortunes of Nokia, RIM and Palm (now HP) have significantly changed. The big leader in the mobile OS space is Android, Google’s open source OS that debuted a year and a half after the original iPhone.

One thing that hasn’t changed (aside from Apple’s aversion to Flash on mobile devices) is the hype and furry that the iPhone still incites in both its supporters and its detractors. Rumors of the iPhone 5 are likely to continue to build throughout the summer, ebbing the hype to the point that all of us will ask, “Can anything really meet these expectations?” Only this time, we know how this story ends.

After all, if the iPhone was Titanic, the iPad was Avatar. Now we just have to wait for the sequels.

[Thanks: http://mashable.com]

According to Gartner research, Google’s Android operating system accounted for 36.2 million smartphones sold worldwide in Q1 2011 giving Android a market share of 36 percent compared to with 27.4 percent from Nokia Symbian. And Symbian was replaced by Android as the world’s leading smartphone platform during the last quarter of 2010.

Meanwhile, Apple’s iOS came in third with 16.8 percent of the market share and iOS sold 16.8 million iPhones, according to Q1 2011 report from Gartner.

So here is a look at 10 reasons why Android-powered smartphones may displace iPhone 5 in days to come.

Innovation:

Even before Google Android platform came into existence, Apple with its brand name was considered to be the most innovative company in the industry. But after the release of Android-powered smartphones, Google has been following the path which Apple has set like coming up with something new and fresh that appealed to consumers in the form of iPhone. The Android-based smartphones’ innovative approach has attracted more consumers to their shores helping them match Apple’s iPhone.

Increased Fan Base:

The recent sales figures show how people weigh the Android-powered smartphones. In fact, iPhone is still an iPhone as it only gets upgraded and added with new features. Although, iPhone continues to sell well, the “wow factor” that once pulled consumers is giving way. The excitement from the original iPhone is slowly fading away. Recent rumors suggest that iPhone 5 will be another revolutionary upgrade. And as the iPhone 4 proved, delivering major upgrades takes time. With no alternatives in the block, more and more people are shifting to Android-based smartphones as it blends in with many different varied smartphone makers helping consumers to choose from lot of available options. The Android developers understand the need of the customers and provide the compatibility that OS needs with different devices. Also most consumers are happy to see the increased availability of different apps and modifications that can be done in Android smartphones compared to iPhone.

Speed:

There is no word on whether Apple is planning to integrate the 4G technology in the upcoming iPhone 5. Even if Apple brings out the 4G technology, it is still new in the block compared to Android-powered smartphones (like HTC Thunderbolt) which are receiving rave reviews for the technology. Moreover, Android powered smartphones come with increased RAM memory compared to the latest version of iPhone to give that added advantage in terms of speed.

Pricing:

The price factor is very important as most users tend to change their smartphone as it ages and the availability of cheaper and more sophisticated Android phones (Motorola Atrix is now priced at $99) at a cheaper price making it more viable than others. Moreover, Apple maintains high prices for the iPhone. And surely Apple will plan to keep that momentum with iPhone 5.

Different Designs:

The Android smartphones come in different shapes and sizes compared to Apple iPhone. The manufacturers like HTC, Motorola, and Samsung give Android smartphone user the options and tastes they want. They give different user interface, better cameras and different display size jelling well Android operating system.

Brands Involved:

Apple is well-respected brand, hence, iPhone 5 will gets all the adoration. But one cannot forget the brains behind the entire Android operation, the Google. And Google teaming up with different carriers along with different manufactures has increased the credibility of Android devices. Google along with HTC, Motorola and Samsung has same track record as Apple, enjoys a similar standing in the market and is generally liked by the mainstream.

Open Source:

Anyone can get access to the source of Android to better the system. This is also a double-edged sword, in the sense, it allows those will less-than-ideal intentions to discover any weakness of the phone. But that can be seen as an indirect plus because when weaknesses are found in the open source community, they are quickly fixed. The same thing cannot be expected in iPhone 5.

Flash:

Flash has become a major setback in iPhone. Android phone supports flash that even Apple iPhone 5 will not support.

Handsets:

There are more than 100 Android varieties and still counting but iPhone 5 will just be an upgrade. Android has choice of feature, features you want, features you don’t, choice of removable battery and memory expansion slot.

Carriers:

Apple iPhone is generally available with limited number of carriers, hence, iPhone 5’s appeal, but Android is available with almost all the carriers and offers plans suiting to each and everyone’s individual needs.

Meanwhile, iPhone 5 rumors show that the device is expected to come pre-loaded with:

• iOS 5 enriched by 200 new features
• Edge-to-edge display
• Speech recognition capabilities
• Improved flash unit for camera
• Strong gaming capabilities supported by multi-core A5 processor and Imagination Technologies’ PowerVR Series6 mobile graphics processing architecture
• 8-megapixel camera
• 1080p Full HD videos
• Panoramic photo capabilities
• Bigger screen between 4 and 5-inches
• New design
• White model
• Just like the iPad 2, sixty percent possibility that the iPhone 5 dock connector could be used, using an adapter, HDMI output with 1080p HD support
• With the new iOS 5, the existing voice controls could be enhanced and new ones added
• Higher capacity battery than present Li-Po 1420mAh to support iOS 5
• NFC technology
• Apple increased the RAM memory to 512 MB RAM in iPhone 4 from iPhone 3GS which had 256 MB eDRAM, also iPhone 3G had 128 MB eDRAM before iPhone 3GS came out. Hence, speculation of a 1 GB RAM is a possibility to counter Android smartphones.
• As iPhone 4 is already featured in Verizon network, possibility of 4G LTE support cannot be counted out
• Facebook app is expected to come to iPad, and iPhone 5 is expected to feature iPad’s OS.
• The iPhone 5 may be launched in the first week of September, and few websites predicted the release date to be September 7.

[Thanks: http://www.ibtimes.com]