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Apple to Launch Trio of iPad Pros in Spring 2017, Including 7.9-Inch Mini Model

bdkennedy1 said:
And I have to disagree. A fragmented product line is what got Apple into trouble in the first place.
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otoh the iPhone SE is why I'm not using some cheap flip phone since didn't want the larger iPhones.

The customer is not always right but enough customers wanting something not broken to be restored --like the 4" phone option-- can be a phenomenon worth exploring. Nothing ventured, nothing gained. If it didn't pan out as Apple wanted, they don't have to update it again. Something as basic as size of the device can't be resolved by just putting an adapter in the box to satisfy customers who liked some feature of a previous rollout, so it probably took Apple awile to research how seriously to take complaints of customers who still wanted a 4" screen on their iPhone. The SE seems to have sold pretty well. Sure it fragments the product line. So what. They met a demand, they used 5S tech that provided an upgrade for people coming from their old 4S or 5C, and they put in touch ID albeit not the 6 version. It sold like hotcakes over the size feature and kept their production costs low for the effort. What's not to like when they can work out something like that.
 
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manu chao said:
Have you ever wondered why Apple is keeping the previous model around in their iOS lineup but not in their Mac lineup?
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They kept the old HDD MB in their line up for years after new models were introduced. The same with the MBA which hasn't had a serious update for years. You can even still buy the 11" MBA in official Apple resellers.

I think their current product strategy is totally confusing with far too many models. Tim Cook has been banging on again about how Steve Jobs is still in Apple's DNA and always will be. If I remember rightly Steve hated over complication. He wanted to keep things simple with a streamlined product lineup. To me all this complication is a sign of a serious lack of leadership.
 
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What I don't understand is, by the time you add the smart cover to the iPad Pro, the size, price and the weight becomes equal to the 12" MB. One is a full macOS / Windows running computer, the other is a crippled IOS running wanna be a computer. Aside from the Apple Pencil for the artists, I see no advantage to go for the iPad Pro.
 
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Aatma-Studio-iPad-3-concept.jpg


ipadpro_bonus_3.jpg
 
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Agree with the observation about relative sizes!

The iPhone Plus models are about 19 sq. inches whereas the iPad Minis are about 42 sq. inches- well over TWICE as large!

Lots of people abandoned their Minis when they got their Plusses, but I cannot see them substituting!

The news about the Minis is great! Finally having a flash and getting an advanced camera will be fantastic! The Mini has been our favorite i-device for taking and showing photographs; the size is just right (the Air is unwieldy and the iPhone too small).
 
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This is why I bought an iPad 2:

s!AgyCO4Xuw4oAgdQjTO6eeJlZs2mbYg


And this is why I bought an iPad Air later:
  1. I wanted to experience the retina display.
  2. Radically thinner and lighter.
  3. Apple made older iPads it too slow with newer versions of iOS.

And this is why I would buy an iPad again:
  1. If I´m not able to do what I do now with the iPad Air anymore.
  2. If Apple makes an interest keynote ever again about why an iPad a not because new colors, or health or watch integration or Apple Pay or Apple Music or name change but a real compelling keynote on why getting a new iPad is relevant.
 
gpat said:
This has become an huge farce. The iPads sales right now are equal to the 2011 ones when only the iPad 2 was sold. Just drop the "Pro" moniker, keep 3 models, one for each form factor, and charge down-to-earth prices. Also USB-C with host functionality.
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The sales are low because we are all waiting for the new models.
We are waiting for the new models because the new CPU will be constructed on TSMC's 10nm process (and by naive scaling should be something astonishing, 3.4GHz in frequency, equivalent to Intel at over 4GHz).

The delays aren't just happening because Apple has dropped the ball; there is a schedule here that is that way for a reason.

(And, I suspect, the same is pretty much true for the Macs. TSMC at 10nm gets close to Intel's best DESKTOP single threaded performance. The A11X, shipping on TSMC 7nm in early 2018 should get past Intel's best DESKTOP single threaded performance, at which point everything is lined up for the ARM Mac...
It doesn't help Intel's case that their chips over the past few years have been so interchangeable. I mean, seriously, whether your Mac has a Broadwell or a Skylake or a Koby Lake in it, can you even really tell?)
 
gpat said:
This has become an huge farce. The iPads sales right now are equal to the 2011 ones when only the iPad 2 was sold. Just drop the "Pro" moniker, keep 3 models, one for each form factor, and charge down-to-earth prices. Also USB-C with host functionality.
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That would entail a bought of common sense. Something that appears to be in short supply at Apple these days.
 
Saturn007 said:
Agree with the observation about relative sizes!

The iPhone Plus models are about 19 sq. inches whereas the iPad Minis are about 42 sq. inches- well over TWICE as large!

Lots of people abandoned their Minis when they got their Plusses, but I cannot see them substituting!

The news about the Minis is great! Finally having a flash and getting an advanced camera will be fantastic! The Mini has been our favorite i-device for taking and showing photographs; the size is just right (the Air is unwieldy and the iPhone too small).
Click to expand...

I don't see how people think the iPhone Plus is a viable replacement for the iPad mini. It's twice the price and requires a mobile phone contract/plan to make it work. The whole point of the iPad mini was to introduce a low cost option to the line-up. The iPhone 7 Plus is not a low cost option.
 
LONG LIVE iPAD MINI!!!!!!!!!!!! I will buy this as soon as its available. If true. I don't care what the specs are I've been wanting an iPad mini forever. But been holding out for the this one. Oh yeah! Mini is back!
 
ChrisCW11 said:
Well, this shows Apple has no understanding about the professional device market because NO professional will opt to use a 7.9" screen all day long. Something is pro because it becomes a tool that a professional can't live without. Not seeing a lot of people dumping their PC workstations or laptops for an iPad Pro.

iPad Pro in any size is still not something people will use exclusively for their job, and this is why they are not "Pro" products at all. Compared to something like the Surface Pro, which people use as their only device, most people have an iPad Pro sitting on their desk and used occasionally, they are still "casual" use products by and far.

Give me the ability to connect external monitors (and not just mirror to an external display with AirPlay), support a mouse, and maybe even allow to install VM to drive other OS or OS X applications seamlessly, you know, like a freakin Surface Pro, and maybe Apple will finally offer a real professional tool. But then Apple does not want their iPad Pro to be TOO professional because that will kill their MacBook Pro sales.

Ultimately, iPad Pro can't be called professional until it can be used to develop iPad apps on it. Hell, I can even develop iOS apps on a Surface Pro.
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I have heard music PROFESSIONALS use an iPhone before. The iPad Pro Mini might be a good option for them.
 
Zorn said:
Really though, you don't? There's nothing convoluted to you about having:

iPad 2
iPad Air 2
iPad Mini 2
iPad Mini 4
iPad Pro 9.7
iPad Pro 12.9

Have ever you tried to explain to someone non-technical which iPad they should buy? If you list all that and try to explain the differences, their eyes will glaze over. If anything, they greatly simplified the Apple Watch lineup, at least now you don't have 3 lines with different names, it's just Apple Watch and you choose which case material and your band. Done. If you want to go premium, you pick Hermes or Edition.
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The product lines aren't sprawling, I agree, just the Apple Watch website looked a little complicated to me. :)
 
bingeciren said:
Close?? It is about twice as big is the iPhone Plus. I can never substitute an iPhone plus for my Mini.
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I was only saying that's the argument many make. But I went on to say that the size diff is big enough for me to make the iPad mini worth it for me. There are things I do on my iPad mini that I wouldn't do on my iPhone plus. It's a much more productive tool for me because of its larger screen.
 
For those who didn't figure it out yet:

A 10.5" iPad pro would likely have the same 2732x2048 pixel resolution as the 12.9" iPad, but at ~326 PPI instead of 264 PPI.

It would essentially have the same relation as the 9.7" iPad vs. the 7.9" iPad mini.

You'd get the same UI screen estate as the big iPad pro, but in a package closer to the 9.7".

I've heard some people loving the extended screen estate of the 12.9" but thought it was too bulky and went back to the 9.7" pro because it's lighter, smaller and more portable. The 10.5" iPad pro would be perfect for these people.
 
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Shaun said:
They kept the old HDD MB in their line up for years after new models were introduced.
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A single exception rather proves the rule. You have a few exceptions on the iOS side as well, foremost the original iPhone and iPad models were not kept around as their successors were launched.
The same with the MBA which hasn't had a serious update for years. You can even still buy the 11" MBA in official Apple resellers.
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The MBA had the same updates as the (retina) MBP line over the last couple of years (in fact they got their last update on exactly the same day as the 13" MBP and got a similar set of updates: next Intel processor generation, faster SSDs, longer battery life; they also gained TB 2 which the MBP already had but did not get the Force Touch trackpad the MBP got).

You have either forgotten this or are confusing case redesigns which happen maybe every four to five years and annual updates. Unless you are also shocked that you can even still buy the 13 & 15" MBP in official Apple resellers.
 
Guys, just because you can't edit 4K video on something, or you can't run 30 virtual machines, doesn't mean it is not a pro device. I know lots of professionals that use Garageband, and now the new devices can use a pencil for artists.
 
name99 said:
The sales are low because we are all waiting for the new models.
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The sales are also low because nearly every household has more than one iPad already. My first generation is running as a slide display on a table, iPad2 has gone to my son, iPad retina went to my daughter, gave my iPad Mini 1 as a present, my wife's iPad retina went to our grandson, I now have a Mini 4 and my wife has an Air2. So, unless Apple comes up with something radically tempting and worthwhile to upgrade, we will be happy and content with our iPads for quite sometime.
 
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Zorn said:
Really though, you don't? There's nothing convoluted to you about having:

iPad 2
iPad Air 2
iPad Mini 2
iPad Mini 4
iPad Pro 9.7
iPad Pro 12.9

Have ever you tried to explain to someone non-technical which iPad they should buy? If you list all that and try to explain the differences, their eyes will glaze over. If anything, they greatly simplified the Apple Watch lineup, at least now you don't have 3 lines with different names, it's just Apple Watch and you choose which case material and your band. Done. If you want to go premium, you pick Hermes or Edition.
Click to expand...

Hmm. I don't see the iPad 2 on apples website.

I see:

Mini | Air | Pro - Then within these, you can either pick by size, or get an older version for a cheaper price. That is not a lot of choices.

Now, this rumor suggest you would simply see:

Pro - Then simply choose a size.
 
MacDarcy said:
I was only saying that's the argument many make. But I went on to say that the size diff is big enough for me to make the iPad mini worth it for me. There are things I do on my iPad mini that I wouldn't do on my iPhone plus. It's a much more productive tool for me because of its larger screen.
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I agree and feel the same way.
 
Sweet! We have two Mini Retina's ("Mini 2's") in the family that are still great iPad's but the users long for touch ID. I've been putting off replacing them until the Pro features come to the mini, specifically for the Apple Pencil capabilities.
 
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