Apple fans jammed shops from Sydney to Tokyo on Friday to pick up the tech
juggernaut's latest iPhone 5.
The
iPhone 5 is thinner, lighter, has a taller screen, faster processor, updated software and can work on faster "fourth generation" mobile networks.
Order numbers indicate the iPhone 5 has overcome initial lukewarm reviews. Apple received 2 million orders in the first 24 hours of announcing its release date, more than twice the number for the iPhone 4S in the same period when that phone launched a year ago.
Eager buyers formed long lines at Apple Inc stores in Australia and Japan to be the first to get their hands on the latest version of the smartphone. In Hong Kong and Singapore, buyers had to sign up online for
the chance to pick up the device at a prearranged time.
REVIEW: Apple raises the bar with iPhone 5The first customers in Hong Kong were greeted by staff cheering, clapping, chanting "iPhone 5! iPhone 5!" and high-fiving them as they were escorted one-by-one through the front door.
The smartphone is also being launched in the US, UK, Canada, France and Germany. It will
go on sale in 22 more countries a week later.
Analysts have estimated Apple will ship as many as 10 million of the new iPhones by the end of September.
In Singapore, which doesn't have an Apple store, Liu Ting Ting waited 12 hours to be the first of 10,000 people in the Southeast Asian city-state granted the opportunity to buy one at a Singapore Telecommunications launch-day event.
MUST READ: Is iPhone 5 better than Apple iPhone 4S?"I have this I-need-to-be-first mentality because this is the first time I'm buying an iPhone," said Liu, who is dumping her Blackberry because she believes the
iPhone 5's photo and video capabilities will help with her journalism studies.
"If I wasn't the first, I would have gone home," she said.
Not everyone lining up outside Hong Kong's Apple store was an enthusiast.
University student Kevin Wong, waiting to buy a black 16 gigabyte model for $720, said he was getting one "for the cash". He planned to immediately resell it to one of the numerous grey market retailers catering to visiting mainland Chinese buyers.
China is one of Apple's fastest growing markets but a release date for the iPhone 5 there has not yet been set.
MUST READ: iPhone 5 set for Diwali launch in India? Mainland Chinese, who like to shop in Hong Kong because there's no sales tax and because of the strength of the yuan, will probably buy it from the resellers "at a higher price - a way higher price", said Wong, who hoped to make a profit of $129.
Tokyo's glitzy downtown Ginza district not only had a long line in front of the Apple store, but another across the main intersection at Softbank, the first carrier in Japan to offer iPhones.
Hidetoshi Nakamura, a 25-year-old auto engineer, said he's an Apple fan because it's an innovator.
"I love Apple," he said, standing near the end of a two-block-long line, reading a book and listening to music on his iPod. "It's only the iPhone for me."
with inputs from Associated Press
Apple fans show off their iPhone 5 sets outside a store in Tokyo. PHOTO: Associated Press 
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