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Apple fans holding out for a white version of the iPhone 4 will have to wait until next spring.
The bad news, for anyone with holiday visions of a snowy-white iPhone 4, comes via Reuters, which reported Oct. 26 that Apple won’t be releasing the devices until early next year.
“We’re sorry to disappoint customers waiting for the white iPhone again,” Apple spokeswoman Trudy Muller said, according to Reuters.
While a black version of the iPhone 4 was released in June, the white model was delayed until July, then pushed to the end of year, and now again to early next year. Muller offered no explanation for the current delay, according to Reuters, though in a July press statement on the matter Apple explained that the white models have been “more challenging to manufacture than we originally expected.”
Industry rumors suggest that Apple is having a hard time matching the colors of the iPhone 4’s plastic shell and the Home button, since they come from different suppliers. And certainly, as has been pointed out, delays tend to point to design flaws.
Though, certainly, design flaws can also arrive perfectly on time. Following the iPhone 4’s launch, complaints began to emerge regarding its new antenna design, which reportedly led to calls to be dropped when the smartphone’s bottom corner was covered by the user’s hand. The issue – dubbed “antennagate” by Apple CEO Jobs, in a press conference held to address the matter – prompted multiple lawsuits against Apple, and even led New York State Senator Chuck Schumer to send Jobs a letter on consumers’ behalf.
Jobs eventually put an end to the matter by offering rubber cases, or “bumpers,” to iPhone 4 owners, after the cases were shown to prevent interference. Although, soon afterward the offer was rescinded, with Apple saying in a note on its site that the “antenna attenuation issue” was truly a problem for even fewer handsets than it had originally thought, and that after Sept. 30, anyone wanting a bumper would again have to pay $29.
Antenna attenuation or not, Apple has had no trouble selling the 0.37-inch-thin, black iPhone 4. Within three days of its launch, Apple had sold more than 1.7 million of them. And during the company’s Oct. 18 earnings call, executives shared that Apple sold 14.1 million iPhones over the quarter, which represented a year-over-year increase of 91 percent.
Still, if a thin, white device is your bag, perhaps you may consider the BlackBerry Bold 9780, with the BlackBerry 6 OS: T-Mobile will begin offering it Nov. 17.
However, if you’re feeling white-iPhone 4-or-nothing, take heart. It’s been reported that the elusive white iPhone 4, whether with matching white bits or not, does in fact exist, and that some have been trusted to members of the Apple staff. The time may be right for visiting Cupertino-area beer gardens…