SMARTPHONE FANATICS eagerly awaiting the release of the white edition of Apple’s iPhone 4 have been disappointed yet again – with the manufacturer announcing that the handset has been delayed yet again.

While the ‘traditional’ (black) version of the latest iPhone was released in June, Apple commented at the time that a white model had been “more challenging to manufacture than we originally expected.”

The customised version was expected at the time to launch in July. It was then announced that the handset would likely only be available towards the end of this year.

Yesterday, Reuters reports, that date was pushed back to the second quarter of next year – when the chances are that the company will be planning the model to supercede the current one.

White editions of all of Apple’s previous iPhones had all been released simultaneously with their black counterparts and had sold remarkably well.

Reuters reports, however, that the absence of a white iPhone 4 has done little to dent the sales of the handset: sales in the 3rd quarter had grown 91% to 14.1 million units, as the handset was rolled out to 89 countries.