“Changes to Apple’s published tech specs for various products are rare, but when they happen, they’re typically interesting — and under-the-radar,” Jeremy Horwitz reports for 9to5Mac.
“At some point following the September 9th announcement of the 2015 iPhone 6s, iPhone 6s Plus, iPad Pro and iPad mini 4, Apple quietly modified the tech specs and comparison pages for 2014’s iPhone 6, iPhone 6 Plus, and iPad Air 2 to bump them all from Bluetooth 4.0 to Bluetooth 4.2, the latest version of the increasingly popular wireless standard,” Horwitz reports. “While the sixth-generation iPod touch shipped with Bluetooth 4.1, the original iPad Air, iPad mini 2, and iPhone 5s all remain on Bluetooth 4.0.”
“Bluetooth 4.2 notably promises up to 2.5x faster speeds and up to 10x greater data capacity over its predecessor, as well as improving privacy, security, and power efficiency,” Horwitz reports. “Apple is expected to release a new keyboard, Magic Mouse 2, and Magic Trackpad 2 featuring Bluetooth 4.2 technology.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Laying the foundation for some Magical peripheral releases.
SEE ALSO:
Apple’s Magic Trackpad 2, Magic Mouse 2 and Magic Keyboard revealed in OS X 10.11.1 beta – October 8, 2015
FCC filings leak Apple’s ‘Magic Mouse 2’ and new Wireless Keyboard with built-in Li-Ion batteries – August 17, 2015
So Bluetooth 4.2 is simply a firmware/software update for the iPhone 6?
I love new features…
It was probably there the whole time and they kept it quiet not to tip off the new hardware peripherals. I assume it would require a new chip and a firmware or software update.
So the iPad Air 2 bought in Jan 2015 has BT 4.2?
Yeah, I wanna know this too. If existing inventory of iPad Air 2 doesn’t have it then I’ll wait for a bit as I am just about to upgrade from my iPad 3.
I have an ipad 3 on ios7 and it’s a real dog. Sorry I upgraded from 6. How is yours doing?
I’m on iOS 9pb5 with no complaints. I would hardly say it runs like a dog but if you put it beside an Air 2 well then….it runs like a dog! lol
That’s interesting. I have an iPhone 6 but Lirium Info says the phone has BT v4.0. Maybe it’s a stealth update!
They probably just updated the chip in the newly produced iPhone 6 models. Apple continues to manufacture older model iPhones for a few years to sell them as entry level devices, and as replacements under AppleCare.