Last week, we talked about a picture of some partially-assembled iPhone 5 components that showed-off an unidentified component, looking like a slightly-rounded-off square. Everyone wondered about what it might be, and the theory that it had to do with the phone’s rumored NFC capabilities came up. Cooler minds were quick to dismiss that theory, but it didn’t leave us with any better of an idea as to just what that part really was. Some new photos of a disassembly have arrived, along with the new theory that the part is really the iPhone 5′s speaker.

Granted, the component is still off-center, but it does seem close enough to the middle line that it could work as a speaker without causing users too many problems. The shielding we see, then, would be to prevent the speaker’s driving element from interfering with the rest of the phone’s systems.

Sure, that’s a bit anti-climactic as far as explanations go, but you weren’t really expecting that RF shield to hide some top secret as-of-yet-unrevealed feature, were you? Well, knowing Apple, maybe that’s not so crazy. We should get the full scoop on the new iPhone at Apple’s event scheduled for next Wednesday.

Source: SonnyDickson
Via: MacRumors