The iPhone proved to be a strong influence

Nov 2, 2007 14:16 GMT  ·  By

The iPhone brings some of the most evolved features that mobile phones have to offer nowadays. This has high chances of forcing smartphone producers to add some evolved hardware, also raising the price that their devices come for.

It's clear that the iPhone has had a huge influence on mobile pones since its unveiling. And any doubts we might have can be instantly shattered only by taking a look at all the evolved handsets that leverage touchscreen performances at high standards and now even try to pack the auto-rotation function of this device.

Apple's phone also influenced the type of components that other manufacturers use. "If you took all the memory out of an iPhone and compared its insides to a Nokia N95, you'd have roughly the same cost of components", said Portelligent head David Carey. Moreover, "The component content that is most in demand is flash chips. If everyone starts chasing the iPhone, then the costs will go up, but that will be driven more by flash", he also added.

Considering these facts, it looks like nothing is wrong in the entire picture. The price of smartpohnes might have risen, but so has the quality of their components and the size of internal memory. Those who look for cheaper solutions only have to turn their attention to less evolved devices, that also come for lower prices.

The main drawback that the iPhone came with is that of lacking 3G technology. Still, there are many other devices out on the market capable of bringing this feature, aside all the performances coming from Apple's phone.

Only for adding dedicated graphics chips from companies such as AMD and Nvidia, producers could add USD10 to a smartphone's raw costs, making customers pay for it several times more. The overall tendency is that of differencing one handset producer from another, although touchscreen enabled handsets all look the same as the iPhone.