Roger Fingas
New sets of alleged "iPhone 7" and "7 Plus" schematics purportedly leaked on Thursday may support rumors the Plus will ship with a dual-lens camera and a Smart Connector, although the standard model may still have some form of camera upgrade.
Unlike similar sets of plans that emerged earlier this month, the new ones obtained by LetemSvetemApplem include measurements. These suggest that the standard iPhone 7 will be 0.1 millimeters thicker than the iPhone 6s at 7.1 millimeters, whereas the 7 Plus will be unchanged from its predecessor at 7.3 millimeters.
In this sense the schematics suggest that Apple has reached a practical limit on thinness, or at least that it's no longer an overriding design priority. Indeed the 6s is already 0.2 millimeters thicker than the iPhone 6.
Another supporting element for this argument may be the standard iPhone 7's camera, which in the new plans not only retains a lens "bump," but has a wider opening. Older rumors hinted that the product would lose the bump — it may now be necessary, though, if the device includes optical image stabilization, previously a Plus-only feature.
A more questionable aspect of the schematics is a lack of top and bottom bezels on the Plus. While Apple is rumored to be working on an edge-to-edge display, more likely is that the schematics contain a mistake or are simply inauthentic, since that technology isn't expected until 2017.
LetemSvetemApplem suggested that the Smart Connector on the 7 Plus will be used for wireless charging. The component would presumably support data transfer as well, allowing for more advanced accessories like keyboards.
Notably the schematics also imply that both iPhone 7 models will ditch a 3.5-millimeter headphone jack, turning to Bluetooth and Lightning connections instead.
Apple is expected to ship its new iPhones sometime in September following its regular fall press event.
Malcolm Owen
Christine McKee
Amber Neely
25 Comments
And next week they'll be another rumor confirming the deletion of the smart connector again. I think it's time to wait and see what Apple has in store for us.
That juicy camera bump.
The iPhone 7Plus schematic is messed up. Why is it showing a lightning connector on top (it isn't a duplicate of the bottom one as the camera is correct for each end). Also it isn't stereo on either end, but the 7 is? These are pretty sloppy. I'm not believing these are real.
This is a portion of the official iPhone 6S case design schematic. It's all in B&W, no color for numbers. I highly doubt Apple would provide engineering schematics for any of their products that would be significantly different that the ones they provide for case designs. ref: https://developer.apple.com/cases/Case-Design-Guidelines.pdf
Apple more than likely uses a standard CAD program for designing all their products, which normally don't use fonts like shown above. The fonts used in these drawings are constructed by the CAD program as line segments, not TrueType or OpenType fonts.
Until I see something that looks like the drawing below, I'm not willing to accept it as being from Apple. If it's from a manufacturing partner, I hope Apple fines the person and has them put in jail. There's too much industrial espionage going on and websites that continue to display this rumored material are simply enabling this behavior.
disclaimer: If you read the fine print on the actual drawing contained in the referenced pdf (available without an ADC membership), you'll see I'm violating some of their rules, however, the drawings are available for free for use in building cases so everyone is able to get them.