iPhone 5 could get smaller dock: report
(Read article summary)The iPhone 5, expected to launch later this year, may ship without the familiar white connector and 30-pin dock.
The white cord and 30-pin dock: They've been a fixture on the Apple iPhone since the launch of the first-generation device, in 2007. But according to the tech site iMore, Apple is considered ditching the old dock, and replacing it with a smaller connector, which would purportedly debut on the iPhone 5 – a handset expected to launch later in 2012.
The reason for the purported change-up, Rene Ritchie of iMore writes, "isn’t anything political, like a new desire to conform to an outdated micro-USB standard, but typically Apple: to save space inside the iPhone 5 for what are now more important components." Not that the current dock connector takes up gads of space. But in a relatively slim handset like the iPhone, every inch and ounce counts.
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iMore, of course, does not specify the source of the rumor – presumably it came from somewhere up the Apple supply chain. And Apple is staying mum. Still, the gossip provides some interesting grounds for speculation: What if Apple does ditch the current dock, in favor of what Ritchie calls a "micro dock"? As Adrian Kingsley-Hughes of ZD Net notes, it could alter the entire Apple eco-system.
