10/04/2011

Don’t expect a 4G LTE/WiMax iPhone 5 today

We’re a few hours away from Apple’s next iPhone unveiling, but one thing we can be pretty sure of at this point is that it won’t support new 4G LTE and WiMax networks.

People “familiar with the company’s plans” say that Apple won’t be adopting the new cellular technologies, the Wall Street Journal reports.

Plenty of rumors and analysis over the past year made it clear that LTE is too immature for Apple to implement in the iPhone 5 and that the company likely wouldn’t even attempt WiMax, since those networks are beginning to show their age. I’ve argued since May that you shouldn’t bet on an LTE iPhone coming this year.

The latest Wall Street Journal report doesn’t rule out the potential for the iPhone 5 to support HSPA+ networks, which are marketed as 4G by AT&T and T-Mobile since they perform much faster than standard 3G networks.

But if the iPhone 5 does support HSPA+, users on CDMA networks like Verizon and Sprint will miss out on the faster speeds, since HSPA+ is based on 3G GSM technology, which is only supported by AT&T and T-Mobile in the US.