In what apparently are the first pictures of the functional circuitry for Apple's highly-anticipated next-generation iPhone, some photos of the logic board of the forthcoming handset were posted on Chinese language forum WeiPhone. com on Sunday.

Posted by the same forum member who had exposed the logic board of the iPhone 4S last year, the WeiPhone. com images - via Nowhereelse. fr - seemingly reveal a thus-far-unseen logic board of the new Apple iPhone, with most of its inner mechanism covered with a massive EMI shielding on the base of the board.

The EMI shielding on the new iPhone's logic board being on the underside underscores a notable change in the forthcoming handset vis-a-vis its predecessors, which had the shielding split into two or three disconnected sections.

Though the WeiPhone. com photos give a slight peek at the SIM card tray slot on the forthcoming iPhone, it is not clear whether the logic board will make use of the nano-SIM standard which was backed by Apple, and has recently received the approval of the European Telecommunications Standards Institute.

The evident indication that the pictures of the new iPhone's alleged logic board are authentic is the placement of the screw hole which is fairly akin to screw anchors visible on some recent images of a "fully assembled" iPhone formed on the basis of several `leaked' external components.