Update: Seems as though the hardware is dual mode, with two separate radios inside the phone. The comment on the Apple site is purely due to carrier locking agreements, not a hardware limitation.
Not that it really affects us much here in Australia, but it looks like none of the new iPhone 4S's are dual GSM/CDMA. It's interesting that this is the case, as even after the Apple launch event people were expecting a single hardware version to be both GSM and CDMA capable. There was lots of "world phone!" excitement from the press. (Well, the US press.... I think everyone outside that country considers any GSM phone to be a "world phone".)
How do I know that there's two separate versions? Apple states it about as clearly as they can (without actually stating it) on their website for pre-ordering the 4S in the USA:
The unlocked iPhone works only on supported GSM networks, such as AT&T in the U.S. When you travel internationally, you can also use a micro-SIM card from a local GSM carrier. The unlocked iPhone 4 will not work with CDMA carriers such as Verizon Wireless or Sprint.
The positive side of it is that all of us GSM only countries aren't helping to subsidise the cost of the CDMA hardware. From a geeky point of view though, I was really looking forward to seeing how they'd managed to combine the two separate analog/digital transceivers into the one unit. Oh well, it's possible I'm wrong - iFixit will have the definitive answer soon I'm sure.
I'm wondering if volume/mute buttons are in the iPhone 4 GSM spot, or the iPhone 4 CDMA (Verizon) spot. Given the antenna design of the phone seems to match with the "Verizon iPhone 4" then I'm guessing they'll be slightly moved from the existing Australian iPhone 4 location. Which means that existing iPhone 4 cases mightn't quite fit.
1 comment:
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