While it will likely be the star of the show, the iPad mini isn't the only new device Apple is going to be unveiling at next week's event. Word is that the company has a new MacBook and some updated desktops to show off as well.
And according to a new report, Apple is also going to introduce a retooled third generation iPad next Tuesday. The updated tablet is said to feature the new Lightning connector, global LTE support and other improvements...
A smaller iPad has gotta be one of the industry's worst kept secrets in 2012. It will also be competition's worst nightmare. Now, Apple last week issued invites for a media event scheduled to take place next Tuesday, October 23 in San Jose’s California Theatre rather than the usual venues, San Francisco's Yerba Buena Center for the Arts or Apple’s own campus in Cupertino, California. We've heard whispers that general availability was already scheduled for November 2 and now more credible sources are chiming in to confirm the date...
Analysts are almost busting their buttons to tell investors just how big a deal they expect is a smaller iPad, widely thought to be up for an introduction next Tuesday. One well-known Apple watcher foresees huge headaches from rival seven-inch tablet makers, describing the so-called iPad mini as "competition's worst nightmare."
Shaw Wu of Sterne Agee writes the iPad mini will come on the scene as Apple's competitors are already running hard just to keep up with the larger iPad 2.
The Cupertino, Caliornia gadget designer may even phase-out the $399 iPad 2 in order to focus attention even more strongly on the leading brand. Add a 7.85-inch iPad mini expected to sell for under $300 - and rival tablet manufacturers lose both the size advantage as well as the lower price tag...
Apple will discontinue the iPad 2 in order to simplify product choices ahead of next Tuesday's introduction of a smaller tablet, one analyst predicts. Friday, Rob Cihra, analyst with Evercore Partners, told investors the move would be part of Apple's goal of providing "clearer product tiers."
The Cupertino, California-based company uses its engineering prowess in both hardware and software to overcome an otherwise soft technology market. The iPhone maker has increased its revenue by thirty percent this year at a time when demand for PCs has dropped by four percent...
The rumored iPad mini, expected to be introduced by Apple next Tuesday, could eat into up to twenty percent of sales of regular-sized iPads, analysts said Thursday. Such cannibalization caused one high-profile Wall Street Apple watcher to trim one million units from his sales projection for the December quarter.
"We believe that the smaller iPad could cannibalize one million regular iPad units in December or a rate of cannibalization at twenty percent", Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster told investors. In other words, for every five million iPad minis sold, deduct one million sales of the original iPad...
A pair of OEM leaks thought to depict the same display appear to strongly suggests that, despite the skinnier side bezels and a smaller form-factor, the iPad mini might still incorporate the display which has an aspect ratio of 4:3, just like prior iPads and iPhones (except for the iPhone 5, of course).
This means videos played on the smaller iPad will continue to be letterboxed, at least until an iPad mini with a taller display arrives (you heard that here first!). I guess Apple had to save something for future iterations. Also leaked today: another image of a battery said to belong to the iPad mini, with the label rating it at 16.7Whr and 3.72V...
As Apple gets to show us "a little more" next Tuesday, and taking into account that Microsoft's Surface tablet will hit store shelves next Friday, watchers have been wondering whether the iPad mini will be immediately available following the introduction, on the Friday following the event or the following week. The iPhone 5, for example, was unveiled on Wednesday, September 12 and hit store shelves the following week on Friday, September 21. According to a new report citing a source close to a major UK retailer, the iPad mini will hit retail stores on November 2 (that's a Friday)...
Rumors that Apple had plans for a smaller version of its popular iPad tablet go back at least two years. Our earliest report on the topic dates all the way back to August 2010.
But the gossip has gotten a lot more serious over the past 9 months or so, and the iPad mini is widely expected to debut at Apple's recently announced October 23 event.
It's actually been interesting to watch this story unfold this year. And if you missed any of it, never fear, the folks over at GimmeTech put together this infographic timeline...
With Apple and Microsoft both teasing their upcoming tablet launches earlier this morning and Microsoft finally announcing price points for its iPad contender, we are beginning to wonder just how competitive price-wise the iPad mini is going to be against other products, seven-inchers in particular.
Apple has economies of scale playing to its favor which it readily exploited to deliver the original iPad, billing it as a "magical and revolutionary device at an unbelievable price" at then unheard-of $499. A lot has changed since 2010.
Nowadays, for half the price one can get a perfectly capable seven-inch Nexus 7 tablet from Google with sixteen gigabytes of storage ($199 for the eight gig version). It doesn't run your App Store apps, lacks the iPad's build quality and skimps on certain hardware features, but otherwise is a pretty decent tablet. And with Android Jelly Bean running on Nvidia's quad-core Tegra 3 processor, Google's tablet certainly is no slouch.
There's also the new Kindle Fire tablet from Amazon (it sells at cost). With those inexpensive devices rapidly picking up steam and catching up on the iPad, no wonder Apple had to respond. Now, the third-generation 9.7-inch iPad begins at $499 and goes all the way up to $839 for the flagship 64GB model with 4G LTE networking.
The company also kept the previous-generation iPad 2 with 16 gigabytes of storage and WiFi-only networking at a reduced price of $399, a hundred bucks cheaper than before. Which brings us to today's poll: where should a small-factor iPad start at?
Forbes called for an October 10 iPad mini media event and missed, forcing author Philip Elmer-DeWitt to apologize, writing "I don't know what I was doing in the rumor business in the first place". Then, John Paczkowski of the Wall Street Journal-owned AllThingsD blog set another date for the elusive iPad mini announcement.
Paczkowski, who is rarely wrong about these things, said Apple would hold a media event to announce the smaller iPad at an intimate Cupertino Town Hall presser next Tuesday, October 23 (and Reuters concurs). Spoiling Microsoft's Surface party, Apple just issued invites to select members of the press.
A departure from past events, this one will be held next Tuesday, October 23 in San Jose's California Theatre rather than San Francisco or at Apple's Cupertino campus. The event is scheduled to take place at 10am Pacific and iDownloadBlog will provide around the clock coverage to keep you updated with everything related to Apple's announcements.
The invitation graphics leaves little room for doubt: Apple is about to unveil a smaller, inexpensive iPad, as suggested by its tagline which reads "We've got a little more to show you". If I wanted to be cynical, I'd say that a product everyone has virtually known about for months ends up being the biggest tech story of the day. Hey, this is Apple...
iDB yesterday informed you about possible price points for the iPad mini discovered in the system of a German retailer. Today, we bring you a full list of alleged iPad mini part numbers, showing 24 different models based on price, color and storage capacity. Most telling of all, it appears Apple will offer the device in WiFi, 3G and 4G LTE configurations...
Having solved yield issues, Taiwan’s maker of flat panel displays AU Optronics (AUO) is said to be boosting its output of displays for the iPad mini, with Apple being so confident in AUO's ability to deliver that it upped orders by 50 percent to three million panels (Apple's striving to produce ten million iPad minis).
The screens should trickle down to assembly factories later this month, giving hope that Apple will have ample supply of parts at its disposal to manufacture enough iPad minis for the rumored October 23 introduction. If history is an indication, the iPad mini should be available either right after the keynote or a week or two following the presser...