Apple CEO Tim Cook unveils the new iPad 3 in San Francisco on March 7, 2012 (Click Image To Enlarge)
Apple Chief Executive Tim Cook, presiding over his biggest product launch since 2011′s voice-enabled iPhone 4S, introduced the highly anticipated 3rd iteration of the iPad tablet, which is available for pre-orders from today and will hit store shelves March 16.
Tim Cook teased the audience, borrowing from Steve Jobs presentation style, saying,
“Everyone’s been wondering who will come out with a product that’s more amazing that the iPad 2. Stop wondering: we are.”
Tim Cook then said.
“It is amazing. We’ve taken it to a whole new level, and we are redefining the category that Apple created with the original iPad.”
Apple executives referred to the product as ‘the new iPad,’ without giving a more formal title. Names such as iPad 3 and iPad HD have been a focus of considerable speculation in advance of the announcement.
The device looks very similar to the iPad 2 but the new model is equipped with internal hardware including a high-resolution screen with a 264 ppi, and as Apple’s Phil Schiller notes, is good enough to call a retina screen.
Apple Senior Vice President Phil Schiller said.
“This is the best mobile display that has ever shipped and it's a real revolution. Your retina in your eye cannot discern those individual pixels. The images on it look stunning.”
But Apple doesn’t talk about just hardware. It’s all about the experience and a screen nearly twice as sharp is something Apple hopes will push the iPad into new markets and use cases.
Inside the new iPad is an A5X processor complete with quad-core graphics. Apple states that the A5 SoC is “twice as fast” as the Tegra 3 and the A5X offers “four times the performance.”
Software
Apple has optimized all the stock apps for the new screen like the company did for the iPhone 4. Several developers were given access to the new screen specs and have updated their apps to take advantage of the new pixels.
The new A5X chip gives developers new found freedom. Apple demonstrated on stage today several apps that take full advantage of the new processing power and high-resolution screen. Gaming and art apps have never looked better.
iWork is also all new and equipped with 3D animations and new transitions. Garageband now has smart strings, a note editor and, of course, syncs with iCloud. It also has a new feature called Jam Session in which 4 iOS devices running the app can play together over WiFi or Bluetooth.
Predictably, iMovie received a major update thanks to the new camera, high-res screen and processor. It features storyboards (!!!) and new editing tools.
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New with the new iPad is iPhoto. This marks the first time that Apple has ported its desktop photo program to the iPad. It features gestures, effects, multi-touch editing and, yep, you guessed it, iCloud syncing and what Apple calls, Photo Beaming. The cloud tools will allow the iPad to be a remote photo editing station of sorts. Photos can live on a desktop (or MacBook) but still be edited on the tablet. This could be big.
Camera
Holding up the iPad to take a picture is never the most pleasurable experience, which is likely why Apple kept the camera specs on the lower-end in the previous generation models. But with all the killer camera apps available on iOS and our general enthusiasm toward imagery, Apple knows it’s time to slap something better onto the iPad. That said, the next-gen iPad has been fitted with a 5MP shooter capable of recording video in 1080p.
The camera has the larger f/2.4 aperture to let in more light, and all the same software goodness that came with the iPhone 4S camera app — like swipe to preview, photo editing, and facial recognition — is along for the ride too.
The new iPad also comes equipped with a voice dictation tool that supports U.S. English, British, Australian, French, German, and Japanese. This positions the iPad for increased productivity tools — it’s a straight shot at other mobile workstation solutions.
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LTE
Apple has also equipped the new iPad with high speed networking. This model sports 21 Mbps HSPA+, 42Mbps DC-HSDPA and 73Mbps LTE. This is blazing fast data connectivity.
The new iPad can rock its LTE goods on Teslus, Rogers, Bell, Verizon, and AT&T (Verizon & AT&T in the states). It retains its 3G radio from before and is 3G world-ready.
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Battery
The new model is 9.4mm thin and weighs in at 1.4lbs. That’s slightly heavier than the iPad 2 but the additional weight allows for larger batteries that give the new iPad, complete with its new screen and LTE radio, the same 10 hour battery life found in the iPad 2 (9 hours on LTE.)
Price and Availability
Price points remain from previous models: the 16GB is $499, 32GB $599 and 64GB $699. Likewise, the LTE versions are $629, $729 and $829. The iPad 2 is also staying on the market and is now available for $399 and $529.
The new iPad ships on March 16th. Pre-orders are available today.
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COMMENTARY: I would've had this out earlier today, but I was out of town since midday and just got back, so I feel more or less obligated to fill you on "the new iPad." This is like having a baby and not giving it a name. Until Apple officially renames the damn thing the iPad 3, I am forced to call it "the new iPad." So when people ask me which iPad, I will tell them the one without a number after the word iPad. What kind of cockameme marketing idea was this?
The features of the new iPad are pretty much in line with what several Apple pundits had rumored and which I reported in my blog post dated March 6, 2012, so the excitement of the official unveiling of the new iPad is gone for me.
The new iPad will be nearly three times faster than the iPad 2 with LTE 4G. It's about time. The retina display is the biggest improvement. The images and games that were demo'd on the new iPad ran flawlessly, fast and without any buffering.
I had stuck my neck out and said that the price for the WIFI with 16GB memory would be $549, but I was wrong. It stayed at $499. I also thought Apple would add Siri, the voice command app to the new iPad. Wrong again.
I also thought that Apple would unveil a 7-inch tablet to challenge Amazon's Kindle Fire, but I still believe Apple will eventually introduce one. The low-end market has the potential to be huge.
Bottom line, the new iPad was worthy of true generation 3 status, so why the hell don't they just call the damn thing the iPad 3!! If you go to Apple's website, it's there in black and white: the new iPad.
In conclusion, the new iPad just raised the bar with its faster processor, retina display and support for LTE 4G. You can expect Samsung, Sony, Amazon and Google to introduce horsepower enhanced tablets of their own to match what Apple offers with the new iPad. Unfortunately with their lower scale, even if they add a retina display, I doubt they will be able to match the $499 price for the 16GB with WIFI version.
Courtesy of an article dated March 7, 2012 appearing in TechCrunch
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