China's Apple fans on the wane?

Chinese Apple fans seemed to enjoy a sound sleep while the company unveiled its iPhone 5 Wednesday in the US.

Out of more than 36,000 respondents, about 48.1 percent said they would "not buy the iPhone 5" in an online survey by Sina, China's major web portal.

Around a quarter, 24.6 percent of all respondents would "wait and see" while 27.3 percent of all respondents said they would "buy it".

"I will consider buying the iPhone 5 after it is available in China, maybe in several months, but the impulse has dimmmed into inertia," said Wang Yao, a 26-year-old white collar worker in Beijing.

With the iPhone 4S in hand, Wang said she has had three iPhones at one time or another and two iPads, but "the feeling of being unique has long faded away as so many people have the iPhone".

According to Wednesday's media event in San Francisco, the iPhone 5 has a 4-inch screen compared with the 3.5-inch display of the previous models.

"Now, today we're taking it to the next level, making a huge leap," Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook said at the event.

Apple used to be a piece of artwork, said Feixiangwang Xiangligang on Sina Weibo, China's most popular microblogging site.

"The mystical expectation has faded into 'everything known' with the latest iPhone 5," Feixiangwang said.

Analysts have predicted the arrival of the iPhone 5 will spur a rebound in Apple's smartphone sales and also boost the global smartphone market for the rest of the year.

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