Leaked Photos of iPhone 3G S with Matte Finish were Real?

Posted under Reviews on Friday, 12 June 2009 by john

When Apple announced iPhone 3G S at WWDC 2009 Keynote address earlier in the week, one of the first things people noticed was that there are no changes to the physical design of iPhone 3G S as compared to iPhone 3G.

It has the same shiny black finish as iPhone 3G, so we quickly dismissed the leaked photos of Apple’s new iPhone with matte black finish as fake.

But MacRumors believes that the leaked photos were of iPhone 3G S case produced by Apple.

MacRumors has made the following observations:

“The leaked matte case design was clearly marked with a new model number A1303 and FCC ID BCGA1303A. Based on the official records released yesterday, this FCC ID does correlate to the new iPhone 3G S:

These model numbers and FCC ID’s followed no obvious progression at the
time so it seems unlikely that someone simply got lucky in guessing.
We’re not sure if plans simply had changed at the last minute, but the
original leaked case was clearly produced by Apple.”

There are some like John Gruber who think it could be a trap planted to identify leakers.

Based on reader comments, the opinion about the matte black finish seemed to be divided. Some didn’t want the change while there were some like me who would have preferred the less scratchable matte black finish over the shinny black finish.
Are you happy that Apple left it unchanged or would you have preferred the matte black finish? Please let us know your opinion in the comments below.[via MacRumors]