By now, we all know  the S in 3G S stands for speed, but perhaps it should really be 3G S*, where S* stands for “Speedy, but could be faster.”

After the guys at RapidRepair tore down the new iPhone hardware, revealing a couple of discrepancies with the hardware and the actual performance. Most notably, the CPU in the iPhone, the Samsung S5PC100, is capable of much more than Apple is letting it do. A quick look at the spec sheet shows that even though Apple is running the processor at 600 MHz, it runs natively at 667 MHz, and can be clocked up to 833 MHz.

More interestingly, though, it is capable of processing 720p video smoothly. Before you run towards Cupertino with a pitchfork, though, they probably had good reason for making it run slower. A slower CPU means better battery life, and 720p video would both take up extra space and probably require an even higher quality camera. That said, this does elucidate Apple’s plans for future iPhone spec bumps, because even if they keep the same processor, there is space to improve.