Apple Launches iPhone 5S with M7, A7 Chips, and Fingerprint Sensor

At its special event in Cupertino, Apple today launched the next-generation iPhone 5S, which features an innovative fingerprint-sensing Home button, A7 and M7 chips, an enhanced camera, and new colors.

Apple’s new iPhone 5S will be available in gold, silver, and graphite-grey. “The iPhone 5S is a huge leap forward in mobile computing performance,” Apple has said. The A7 presents a modern instruction set with 2x general purpose registers, 2x floating point registers, over 1 billion transistors, the works. It has twice as many transistors for about the same size as the A6 chip. The processor is 64-bit and iOS 7 has also been updated to support this. The phone uses an M7 “health sensor” chip and GPS to keep track of your physical activities. Battery life is capped at 10 hours 3G talk time; 250 hours standby; 10 hours LTE browsing; and 40 hours music playback. The iPhone 5S sports a brand new camera with a 5-element lens with f/2.2 aperture and 15 percent larger active sensor area. The LED flash is also new, called True Tone. The phone now bursts shots and slow-motion video at 120 fps.

The fingerprint sensor is confirmed as Touch ID. Built right into the home button, “It reads your fingerprint at an entirely new level,” according to Apple. The sensor is 170 microns thin, has 500 ppi resolution, and scans sub-epidermal skin layers with 360-degree readability. Around the Home button there is a stainless steel detection ring which senses that your finger is actually on the button, so you don't have to actually press it. “Since it's built in, you can make iTunes purchases by using your finger to authenticate,” Apple says. Best of all, your print is never stored on Apple servers or backed up to iCloud.

Commenting on Apple’s breakthroughs with the iPhone 5S, Jony Ive says, “We believe technology is at its best and most empowering when it simply disappears.” The device is priced identically as the iPhone 5 (starting at $199/€199 with a two-year contract).

iPhone 5S announcement
Image credits to Engadget

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