Apple is expected to announce the iPad 3 on March 7th. That means we are a week and a half away. The following is a list of features that are rumored to be appearing in the new model:
- 2048 x 1536 Retina display (as opposed to 1024 x 768).
85 MP camera (as opposed to 1 MP)- Quad-Core A5X Processor (as opposed to Dual-Core A5)
- 4G LTE (as opposed to 3G)
- 1080p recording
- voice dictation (though not Siri)
- personal hotspot
I’m excited about seeing the updated resolution. I can tell a huge difference between the display on my iPhone 3gs and Amy’s iPhone 4, which is a Retina display. The sharpness just pulls you right in. This should also improve the airplay and video out capabilities. Will it now be able to play in HD to your HDTV?
I own the original iPad. As such I have no camera front or back, but I have heard people complain that their iPad 2 photos are grainy and this is a needed (and easy) upgrade to make the people happy. I can see using it to capture handwritten notes or handouts, importing them right into something like Evernote. Now that Amy and my mother have new Apple products, FaceTime is a feature I could see using in the future.
The processor bump is something that has been said to be necessitated by the updated display. My iPad, which is 16 months old uses the A4 processor and it is just as responsive as the day I brought it home. I will say that after having my iPhone 3gs for 32 months now (a dinosaur in tech-land) it is starting to show some lag in loading certain apps. . . come on iPhone 5!
My iphone is 3g, which seems to work fine. We get great 3g speeds where I live, but most of the time I’m using wi-fi. I can count just a few times where I had my iPad and wished I had purchased the 3G model. I don’t know that it’s really necessary, but if the iPad 3 has 4G LTE, then it would only give further credence that the iPhone 5 (of which I’m holding out for) will have 4G LTE as well. What will be really interesting is if there will be only one model that you can connect to either Verizon or AT&T.
It also remains to be seen what the pricing strategy will be, if the early success of the Amazon Kindle Fire will cause Apple to adjust their prices. My prediction is that the iPad 3 prices will remain in line with the current pricing structure and the iPad 2 will be offered as a discount model to better compete with the Fire.