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Apple announces iPad Mini with a 7.9-inch, 1,024 x 768 display - $329
- jordn 14y agoI completely expect this to be the consumer favourite. Maybe outsell the original size by about 2:1. People love being able to easily hold stuff.
- cma 14y agoHis hand looked really stretched out
- phoobahr 14y agoMy girlfriend broke both her wrists a few years ago. Now they both give her troble and one thumb has nerve damage. She has travelled the world with her 1st gen ipad and never really thought about replacing it... But I bet she will now inside a month. She's also a physio who fits and customizes wheelchairs, powerchairs, scooters and the like. You would not believe how many of her clients carry an ipad, often in a custom mount, for all the regular uses plus assisted communication, home automation and the like. Give the size constraints I would not be surprised to see the ipad mini become an 'industry standard' there too.
- Permit 14y agoI'm pretty blown away they're already on a fourth generation of iPads. It seemed like they just released the last one not too long ago. Are people upset over how quickly it released or happy to have a potential upgrade?
- revscat 14y agoI have the current (err, previous!) gen iPad. I don't particularly care that there are new models. I'm still happy with mine, and don't have any plans on buying the new one. Why do you think this would make someone upset?
- Permit 14y agoI was watching a CNet livestream where the commentators were absolutely livid about the announcement. I don't have a tablet of any kind so don't feel strongly either way, I was just curious if their anger was felt by others. It doesn't seem that it is.
- arrrg 14y agoThat’s completely irrational. Being livid about something like that makes exactly zero rational sense. It would had Apple withheld stuff on previous models, but it doesn’t look like they did.
- KirinDave 14y agoThe 4th gen is just an incremental push on components the 3rd gen. It seems like Apple is staggering products with their processor releases to let them accelerate that tick-tock for phones and tablets.
- Steko 14y agoI think maybe they just wanted to turn the line over to the new dock faster so this year they went with 2 releases.
- wcarey 14y agoI suspect the driver for the new full-size iPad is the lightning connector. Now all of the iOS devices (except the iPad 2?) use it.
- nchlswu 14y agothat's my guess as well. I'm not sure how it aligns with previous launches, but I imagined they were going to discontinue the 2 as well.
- JoelSutherland 14y agoAdditionally the A5x was a really expensive chip to produce. It didn't have the graphics power to drive the retina screen so they just threw silicon at it. It had twice the die size as the Tegra 3: http://www.anandtech.com/show/5685/apple-a5x-die-size-measured-16294mm2-likely-still-45nm http://www.anandtech.com/show/5685/apple-a5x-die-size-measur...
- nicholassmith 14y agoMy money is on them shipping it pretty much for the Lightning connector and beefing the specs up to at least make it look like an upgrade.
- jonknee 14y agoIt was just a minor bump so they can speed along the painful transition to the Lightning connector ASAP. No one's going to sell their iPad 3rd gen and upgrade.
- sallen 14y agoI am going to upgrade my iPad 3. I mean you can sell it to Amazon for $400, and buy a new one for $500+tax. Doesn't seem like a bad deal to basically lease the iPad 3 for six months for about $120.
- jonknee 14y agoI guess, but the new one doesn't seem to have an advantage. At least not one worth the hassle of all that. I'll wait until a noticeable upgrade.
- engtech 14y agoI'm unhappy that my iPad 1 is essential on it's way to brickdom. I had bought it planning to pass it on to my toddlers as it reached about 4-5 years old. Unfortunately I don't think there will be any supported iOS 5 apps at that point. I may have to jailbreak it just to get a newer version of the OS on it at some point (assuming that someone gets the newer OS working on it).
- digisign 14y agoNever buy the first version of any new product.
- grecy 14y agoAre you upset when a car manufacturer releases a new model every year? I love that you can buy the 2013 model of a car in ~September 2012. Jeep are taking that to a new level.. In Jan 2013 they are going to begin selling the 2014 Grand Cherokee.. (I realize the gap from iPad3->iPad 4 was less than a year, but that happens in the car market too)
- kamaal 14y agoExcept that Jeep 2013 won't be totally useless by 2017.
- hfs 14y agoThe worst part is, even being $100 more than a Nexus 7 and with worse specs, people will buy this. I just don't get it.
- togasystems 14y agoConsumer choice - $209 Nexus Tablet from Google or $329 for the iPad Mini.... what do you think the public will choose?
- MrMember 14y agoYou're underestimating the pull Apple has on people. There are plenty who will pay an extra $120 just because it's Apple.
- phren0logy 14y agoIt could be "just because it's Apple," or it could be because they already own a lot of useful iOS software.
- engtech 14y agoFor $129 you could buy most of your frequently used apps on Android. But already being tied into iTunes is a huge momentum.
- rimantas 14y ago$129 can be a bit short for the stuff that does not exist at all.
- randomchars 14y agoWhat apps do you use on iOS that don't exist on Android? Genuinely curious.)
- randomchars 14y ago@rimantas What apps do you use on iOS that don't exist on Android? (Genuinely curious.)
- jug6ernaut 14y agoTrue but i would say these people would buy want to buy an iPad anyways, i don't think this is really expanding their user base. Maybe a little but not near as much a they could have with a lower price point that actually competes on price rather than just going of "we are apple" reasoning. People will buy it, but its not the homerun they were setup for, making it to 2nd base. Game is still on.
- gambiting 14y agoThe way they compared the new iPad Mini with the Nexus 7 was laughable at best. They complain about Nexus 7 being made of plastic and having broader basel, and completely forget that Nexus 7 has a higher resolution screen and most importantly is a $199 device while the new ipad is $329. What a joke.
- randomchars 14y agoMy favorite part was when they listed the bigger screen as an advantage.
- berberous 14y agoI sold the Nexus because it was too small to read a PDF. The iPad mini may also be too small, but if I can comfortably read PDFs on it, then that's a huge advantage to me.
- jug6ernaut 14y agoRemember it has a lower resolution than the Nexus 7. May still be more readable if the physical size was the issue, but chances are it's still too small. A larger, higher res solution would probably be what you need, i would wait for google upcoming announcement.
- nuclear_eclipse 14y agoAnecdotally, I stopped using my old 10" Android tablet in favor of my new Nexus 7 precisely because the screen resolution is just as high, but smaller and higher density, such that reading things is just as easy, but holding the device is now far easier than before. I've already used it many times for reading and even signing PDF's related to selling my old residence, and I haven't had any complaints about the process so far.
- berberous 14y agoReading and signing a short document might be okay, but I'm talking about reading a 40 page article or a full book. While it still might be doable, it's not comfortable like it is on a full-sized iPad. At least for me...maybe you have better eyes than I do. I know the Nexus has a higher-res screen than the iPad mini, but I suspect it will still be more comfortable to read PDFs on the mini due to the physically bigger screen size. On the other hand, text on the non-retina iPads look terrible to me now. I wonder if that's still the case on the mini, or if the reduced physical size will make the text rendering look passable.
- isaacwaller 14y agoWow, this is way more expensive than I predicted. I don't see how the iPad Mini can compete with a $199 Nexus 7.
- richbradshaw 14y agoI have a Nexus 7. Technically it's great, but in reality the screen creaks when you use it, it's pixelly (despite having 1.4 device pixel ratio), the headphone jack only works at a certain angle and most apps are awful (some exceptions, but most big brands have worse Android apps than iOS). It came with Google Play credit, but I can't find anything worth buying. I'm sure there are things, but I can't find them.
- randomchars 14y agoIf you find the Nexus 7 pixely than you should know that the iPad mini has a lower ppi. I agree about the apps though. But if you haven't already than get SwiftKey.
- runako 14y agoA few ways: 1) Brand that consumers associate with high-quality consumer goods. (Most Android devices carry the brand of their maker and not Google. Asus is not widely considered a high-quality brand.) 2) Channel availability. iPad Minis will be in the stores where consumers are shopping. Google has historically done a bad job here. For example: as of this writing, Target doesn't even carry the Nexus 7, but they do carry iPads. Wal-Mart bills the Nexus 7 as "The new $249 tablet from Google", effectively reducing the price differential at the largest U.S. retailer. 3) Apps, apps, apps. Note that Google Play isn't 100% available in many countries where the iTunes app store is available. In the end, both will likely sell tons of units. Note also that Apple is supply-constrained; they typically cannot make iPads fast enough to satisfy demand at their current price points. The corollary of this is that lowering the price would do nothing to increase actual sales, but would simply lead to them earning less money on each sale for no upside. Finally, if Apple follows the template they have been using since the launch of the iPod 11 years ago, the price of the iPad Mini will begin dropping right after the holiday quarter. This will likely coincide with them tightening up production and improving yields. It will also allow them to more effectively use the 100% of production capacity even after the holidays end. They've done this on pretty much every consumer product they've released for the last 10+ years, and I'd be surprised to see the iPad Mini selling for > $299 come March.
- mtrimpe 14y agoI absolutely love how they reframed the iPad mini from a "reduction" to a "concentration" of the iPad. I takes the most obvious quip to make about the new product and gives the Apple fan-base a ready-made, perfect, emotional yet simple retort. Brilliant marketing ...
- barista 14y agoThat has always been Apple forte. Create value by advertising
- rimantas 14y agoYeah. Because their products are crap, right? Apple has good marketing for good products. Some think they can skip the first part.
- mtrimpe 14y agoI'd say their excellent marketing provides them with the profit margins needed to afford development of several iterations of the products so that they can be as good as they are.
- marknutter 14y agoThis has always been every Apple detractor's assertion.
- monkeyfacebag 14y agoI don't know a lot about iPads, but that price is about $50 more than I would have naively guessed. Spec for spec, the Nexus 7 (disclosure: I own this) seems to offer more for less (yes, the screen is smaller, but the information quantity & density is actually greater). Sure, there is the value of Apple's ecosystem, but I imagine Android will catch up on this sooner or later.
- runjake 14y agoI'm guessing you didn't watch the keynote. Apple highlighted the fact that there is a severe lack of tabletized Android apps. So, an iPad app vs. what is essentially an Android phone app, the information density is actually much greater on the iPad because its app are actually designed to utilize the space. The materials are a lot better, as well. Aluminum vs. plastic (although I don't mind the N7's build at all). The iPad's screen is a much higher quality IPS display than the N7. Of course, I'm going to expect all of this in a tablet with a $70 higher price point, comparing 16GB vis a vis. I would have liked to see the price come in at $299, but $329 is perfectly reasonable and this will be a best seller for Apple. (I own and use both an iPad and a Nexus 7)
- w1ntermute 14y ago> Apple highlighted the fact that there is a severe lack of tabletized Android apps. There are two issues with this claim: 1. It's less relevant for smaller tablets like the Nexus 7 2. I haven't personally seen any lack of Android tablet apps. I have an Asus Transformer Prime, and I use a wide variety of tablet-optimized apps on a regular basis. Sure, some niche stuff is missing, but the big stuff is there already. Edit: another point to make is that unlike iOS app development, if you use the new Fragments paradigm introduced in HC, it's very easy to make a tablet version of an existing Android phone app. You don't need to have an entirely separate app.
- halostatue 14y ago1. It's not less relevant. I hate using a lot of the apps on my N7 because they are obviously phone apps stretched out—and there's no thought to the tablet interface. The only ones that are even remotely good (and barely, at that) are those that tend to replicate an iOS interface in Android. (And the gmail app on the N7 is complete crap. I can't read half of the emails that I get because its view pane is too small regardless of the orientation.) 2. There are, supposedly, a few thousand large tablet apps. I've been using the N7 since it was made available in Canada and have yet to see a good app that takes advantage of the N7's size advantage over phones, but recognizes the smaller area than larger tablets. The iPad mini will handle this much better. Your edit, BTW, is nonsense—you have always been able to make a Universal app for iOS. The layouts remain separate, but this is where Android gets it completely wrong: app makers should be taking advantage of the sizes available and stop pretending that automatic layout actually works (we learned that it doesn't with Swing; why the hell are Android developers having to learn it all over again?).
- brownBananas 14y agoI don't know how they are going to compete with Microsoft Surface(1366 x 768) with this Mini(1,024 x 768) without Retina Display. Edit: Price difference - I see.
- mikeevans 14y agoPrice, app ecosystem.
- lostlogin 14y agoIf those were equal, do you think Microfoft would catch up or overtake Apple?
- digisign 14y agoNo. With momentum as it is currently, MS would have to have a device 2x or better on every front.
- r00fus 14y agoAdd to your list: build quality, touch drivers, and (big differentiator) LTE - not available on Surface, Nexus or Kindle Fire 7".
- erikpukinskis 14y agoI'm pretty surprised by the price. It's more than twice as expensive than the entry-level Kindle Fire at $159. Now, it's obviously a much better product, but that's a big gap. Apple has maintained pretty aggressive pricing compared to the 10" Android tablets, but that's just not the case here. They're going to try competing on product quality, not price. It will be interesting to see how that pans out.
- fieldforceapp 14y agoDear Apple, thanks for keeping the same display dimensions as the iPad -- I was actually starting to sweat about the prospect of having to do more AutoLayout work!
- czr80 14y agoI find the pricing odd - is the 30 dollars really worth giving up the appeal of a 299 price point?
- arrrg 14y agoThe lesson to take away from this is that Apple does not compromise on price. If the iPad mini with a 30% or so margin has to be priced at $330 it will be priced at that.
- randomchars 14y agoThe fact that Android tablets apps of large corporations suck is more of a reflection on the companies themselves than on Android as a platform. How do the developers of the demoed apps feel? Basically they work was called a piece of shit.
- richbradshaw 14y agoCompared with what the iOS teams are doing, it is.
- king_jester 14y agoIt's not so much that the shown Android apps are pieces of shit, but they have a huge, glaring flaw if devs aren't willing to or can't get company support to get their app working well on as many devices as possible, which is Android's biggest strength in the first place.
- mladenkovacevic 14y agoToo expensive for me, but the tech uninformed have probably never heard of the Nexus 7 and will probably think this is a great deal. The bezel seems really thin too, how are you supposed to hold it?
- rimantas 14y agoSome well informed still think that it is a great deal.
- mason55 14y ago> The bezel seems really thin too, how are you supposed to hold it? In your palm. See here http://www.apple.com/ipad-mini/overview/ http://www.apple.com/ipad-mini/overview/
- mladenkovacevic 14y agoSo I guess I've been "holding it wrong" all this time then. On a serious note that grip looks very stress-inducing for any average sized hand. Try stretching your thumb and fingers out all the way out like that, then tilt your palm so that it faces you. Now hold that kung-fu grip for more than 15 minutes. I prefer to do the bezel thumb and index finger hold... and then switch hands every once in a while.
- KirinDave 14y agoOne thing I am really curious about is the bezel size for the iPad mini. Mathias Duarte gave a huge exposition about carefully laying out the bezels for lots of comfortable holding angles with the Nexus 7 in his interview, but the iPad Mini has only a fraction of those bezels. So one of the following is the case: 1. Mathias was BSing to make lemonaide from the lemons of the slightly odd looking screen form factor. The Nexus 7 could have been smaller or had a bigger screen. The iPad Mini is easy to hold. 2. Mathias was right, but only considering the weight of the Nexus 7. The reduced weight of the iPad Mini still makes it easy to hold. 3. Mathias was right, and the iPad Mini's design is more about photo ops than daily use, and users will tend to accidentally tap when they hold it. I'm really curious here, because device design is something of a mysterious art and I have enjoyed watching the different schools of design play out. UPDATE, "iPad mini intelligently recognizes whether your thumb is simply resting on the display or whether you’re intentionally interacting with it. It’s the kind of detail you’ll notice — by not noticing it." So, software. Which means that it'll be fine for reading, but probably not fine for gaming where there is a lot of input sensitivity required. That may explain why the bezels on the top ends (for holding it in portrait) are more conventionally sized.
- lukifer 14y agoI would've preferred a larger bezel. The new one looks a little off to me, and I'm guessing there will be lots of accidental touches on the edge. (Oh: software correction. Still, that'll misfire occasionally, and create a subconscious stress on the user for the simple act of picking the thing up and switching hands/grip.)
- kyriakos 14y agoN7's bezel is just about right. I have big hands i guess but if it was any less i would be touching the screen all the time.
- rg 14y agoApple had an insoluble problem, and they failed to fit the iPad Mini into a man's suit, sportcoat, or blazer inside chest pocket. Apple iPad Mini width (Apple specs): 134.7 mm Man's jacket inside pocket (size 41R): 124.0 mm Google Nexus 7 width (Google specs): 120.0 mm Result: the Nexus 7 with comfortable bezels fits very neatly in the pocket of any jacket I'm wearing (and I carry it there all the time invisibly); The iPad Mini with troublesome bezel will not fit into any of those same jacket pockets. Such a tiny difference, but it separates Nexus convenience from iPad Mini serious inconvenience (note that the thickness makes no difference here).
- samd 14y agoWhat I like most about the Nexus 7 is the soft rubberized backing. I'm not constantly worried about scratching it, I can toss it around more, but it doesn't require a bulky, obnoxious case. Have you seen those sci-fi movies where people just have tablets laying around everywhere, like people have documents and books laying around now. That's what the Nexus 7 feels like. Most every other computer, tablet, smartphone has to be managed. I have to worry about where I set it, where the case is, where it's plugged in, whether I'll drop it, etc. I don't feel that way about the Nexus 7. I'd rather have iOS and the iPad's battery life, but I don't want my tablet to feel precious.
- ricardobeat 14y agoThat's very subjective. When I first bought my iPad (1st gen) I treated it like a baby, but now it's just like a paperback book; I throw it on the couch, carelessly shove it in a bag, squeeze it among clothes in a backpack. It can handle that, and I bet the aluminium back will still look better than rubber after a year of heavy use.
- chucknelson 14y agoAgreed - don't these soft rubber coatings wear away after a while?
- ryanglasgow 14y agoApple doesn't seem to be pricing this against competitors, but rather themselves. A price point less than $300 would cannibalize their full-size iPad sales.