Rumours fly over Apple unveiling

Apple is traditionally tight-lipped about unreleased products

Speculation is reaching fever pitch about what Apple will announce in its 7 September press conference.

Most pundits and analysts are expecting Apple to unveil a mobile phone that works with its iTunes music download service.

But other possible candidates include a high-capacity iPod that stores songs in memory chips rather than a hard drive or an iPod that can play video.

The announcement will be made in San Francisco at 1000 local time (1800BST).

Late arrival

Apple kick-started the speculation when it sent out invites to the press conference featuring text that read: "1,000 songs in your pocket changed everything. Here we go again".

Apple watchers and analysts have concluded that this means that the long-awaited unveiling of a phone that can play songs downloaded from the iTunes service is imminent. Motorola is known to be developing the music-playing phone.

What is under dispute is how many songs this phone can hold. Some experts expect it to hold about 1,000 songs which is roughly equivalent to that of lower capacity iPod Mini. Others say it will be able to hold less than 100 tracks.

As ever Apple declined to comment on the speculation. Motorola too has batted away enquiries and has only say that its companion announcement is "music industry" related.

US phone firm Cingular is widely expected to be the partner for the eventual launch of the iTunes phone in America.

Although Apple has a policy of never talking about products before they are ready to be sold in the shops, the iTunes phone has been expected for more than 12 months. It was originally due to be unveiled at the Cebit technology fair held in Hanover, Germany in March.

However, if Apple does not unveil the music-playing handset, other candidates for launch include an iPod that can play movies or an iPod with 4GB of Flash memory on board.