iPad 3 with LTE, Quad-Core Processor and Retina Display Set for March Launch

[chrmjenkins]

AnandTech has a good article about what to expect from the A6 processor.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/4971/apple-iphone-4s-review-att-verizon/7 (note: numbers in this article are for the iPhone's A5 processor - the A5 processor in the iPad has higher clockspeeds).

It's really about expected that the A6 processor will be produced at a 28nm/32nm line (because Samsung and others are dumping the 45 nm line). This would allow a thinner, smaller processor which generates less heat and uses less energy. If Apple goes for a quad-core processor, it is very well possible it might use less energy than the current A5 processor.

What do you mean by thinner? Height? Likely the same and negligible in this case for any actual affects on product dimensions.

If we look at the architecture, really anything is possible. Apple has never stuck on the same architecture for more than two generations, but it's too soon to get a good pattern. It will be either the Cortex A9 architecture or the Cortex A15 architecture.

CPU clock? No one really knows right now. If the A6 processor indeed turns out to be a quad-core processor, than it's likely it's clocked at 1 GHz for iPad 3 and 800 MHz for iPhone 6. If the A6 processor turns out to be, for example, a dual core cortex A15-processor, than it could stay clocked at 1 GHz (A15 architecture is faster than the A9 architecture at the same clock speed) or it could be higher.

There are really lots of possibilities for the A6 processor. Apple could, however, play it very aggressively. Most companies try to avoid to move to a new process (like from 45 nm to 32 nm) ánd architecture at the same time. Apple, however, has already done so in the past: with the iPhone 3GS they moved from a 90nm process to 65nm process and they went from the ARM11 architecture to the Cortex A8 architecture.

It is different for licensed architectures. ARM targeted 28/32 nm processes with the A15 design. It would actually be a greater risk for someone to try the design on 40nm, and I don't think you'll see any. On the other hand, there's no reason to believe exynos 5250, omap 5, novathor 9600 etc. will debut on anything other than 28nm/32nm processes. If apple came out with that now, it would be a risky time to market because of the youth of the design and the process, not the simple combination of them.

Even if the next iPad had 512mb of ram, you wouldn't really notice because of the A6 (quad-core?).

RAM doesn't handle graphics, the graphics card does.

Graphics depend on RAM too. SoCs traditionally have shared architectures when it comes to memory. Hopefully it will have LPDDR3 like the tegra 3.

 

[nuckinfutz]

Press Release - Nov 15

http://www.qualcomm.com/media/relea...-availability-gobi-4000-platform-4g-lte-conne

November 15, 2011 – Qualcomm Incorporated (NASDAQ: QCOM) today announced availability of Gobi™ 4000, its latest addition to the Gobi family of embedded data connectivity platforms. Based on Qualcomm’s leading multimode 3G/4G wireless modems, the MDM9600™ and MDM9200™, and a common software interface (Gobi API) for connection management development, the Gobi 4000 platform allows customers to offer both LTE/HSPA+ and LTE/EV-DO designs to meet the growing demand for embedded 3G/4G connectivity in mobile devices worldwide.

Seriously people. 2012 is about LTE and it doesn't take difficult searching to find out the nextgen chips that will fuel this years products

 

[SandynJosh]

LTE is useless. Who actually brings their iPad outside to use where there are no wifi networks?

Umm...a polar explorer??

 

[stagmeister]

It needs to have at least 1 GiB of RAM.

Yes -- it really does. BUT what I realized after they made the iPad 2 with only 512 MB of ram, is that the real problem is physical space. Since the iPad is basically a big battery with some chips strapped on, any additional space taken up by the RAM chips will reduce battery life substantially. There are two ways to go from 512 MB -> 1 GB of ram. Either you just double the number of RAM chips (which in most environments would be fine) or you have more RAM in the same amount of space. As far as I know, 1GB chips at the same size as 512MB chips are much more expensive than just getting more 512MB chips. So this is probably the real dilemma with regards to increasing RAM -- either you increase ram and decrease battery, or you increase ram and you increase price.

 

[B.A.T]

A retina display needs an iPad version of iPhoto and/or Aperture.

 

[cvaldes]

LTE is useless. Who actually brings their iPad outside to use where there are no wifi networks?

No WiFi on Caltrain. No WiFi on MUNI. No WiFi on BART (except two or three stations in downtown SF and that's just a pilot program).

No free WiFi at SFO, although that may finally be changing.

Some of San Francisco's coffee shop owners are proudly declaring "No WiFi" at their establishments.

 

[iSayuSay]

Whoa Quad Core? Likely
LTE .. meh .. Apple won't do it, not this year I think.
Retina Display .. hell yes
Improved camera .. well it's a welcome addition.

But if next iPad indeed come with quad core and retina display, it surely competes tightly with PS Vita. Apple wants to kill Sony now?

Granted, iPad interface is terrible game controller, plus you can't play Uncharted on iPad (unless Sony commits suicide and license Uncharted series to Apple). But this is a great value indeed, like it or not, iOS devices is a decent mobile gaming platform.

 

[thenerdal]

No WiFi on BART

 

[chrmjenkins]

Yes -- it really does. BUT what I realized after they made the iPad 2 with only 512 MB of ram, is that the real problem is physical space. Since the iPad is basically a big battery with some chips strapped on, any additional space taken up by the RAM chips will reduce battery life substantially. There are two ways to go from 512 MB -> 1 GB of ram. Either you just double the number of RAM chips (which in most environments would be fine) or you have more RAM in the same amount of space. As far as I know, 1GB chips at the same size as 512MB chips are much more expensive than just getting more 512MB chips. So this is probably the real dilemma with regards to increasing RAM -- either you increase ram and decrease battery, or you increase ram and you increase price.

The increase in power usage by more RAM is nominal. Moreover, the RAM in these packages is typically stacked on the SoC in a single package, so more board space isn't a concern. The same isn't true for NAND, which eats board space and was the reason 32 GB was the max while iPod touch and iPad had 64GB up until the 4S.

 

[sineplex]

Bloomberg's last rumors about iphone 5 were all wrong.
I don't trust them and tommorrow and the day after the rumors will change.
I'll wait fir official announcement thanks.

 

[fertilized-egg]

Bloomberg's last rumors about iphone 5 were all wrong.
I don't trust them and tommorrow and the day after the rumors will change.
I'll wait fir official announcement thanks.

I do hope the quad core part is wrong. I'd rather see the new chip with A15 dual core, which should be blazing fast. It'll especially help with web loading speed and javascript performance, bringing the experience closer to PCs.

 

[yeah]

Processing power and RAM are unrelated. RAM is needed to store the data and the processor (CPU / GPU) are used to process the data.

More RAM is useful for lots of things. You can multi-task between more jobs without the OS having to kill and restart them. More tabs can be open in the browser without having to be reloaded.

Most importantly, more RAM also is better for future proofing devices. My original iPad worked fine until the iOS5 update. The reason it is sluggish now is mostly because iOS5 uses a lot more memory (about 200 of the 256MB are used by the RAM which only leaves a sliver for the applications). Often, old computers can have their life extended by simply adding more memory.

Higher resolution graphics do demand more RAM as well as the graphics need to be stored in memory (both the screen graphics by the OS as well as images that are being manipulated by the apps).

Well said, but as many members on this site tells us, more ram will decrease battery life.

 

[rtabdo]

iPad 3 with a retina makes complete sense too with the whole concept of Apple bringing textbooks to the iPad as pointed out by these guys: http://www.thetechblock.com/articles/2012/ipad-3-in-production-with-high-resolution-display-and-lte/

 

[Jake99]

4G is a no brainer. For new iPad and new iPhone. Apple falls too obviously behind without it. Plus Verizon just said that they will not support new products that are NOT 4G, going forward. The speculation about 4G is finally going to end.

 

[cvaldes]

Well said, but as many members on this site tells us, more ram will decrease battery life.

The iOS devices use special low-power RAM, not the standard DRAM in personal computers.

The display's backlight draws the most power which is why there are user-configurable options on how quickly to dim the display. Another notorious power hogs are the cellular baseband chip and the wireless chip.

I do hope the quad core part is wrong. I'd rather see the new chip with A15 dual core, which should be blazing fast. It'll especially help with web loading speed and javascript performance, bringing the experience closer to PCs.

The timing is wrong for A15 chips. It's not expected for any A15-based chips to reach production until early 2013.

More likely would be a quad-core ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore CPU (the A5 is a dual-core) in the next generation Apple SoC (A6?). Four cores is what the Cortex-A9 is designed to handle.

 

[Can't Stop]

4G is a no brainer. For new iPad and new iPhone. Apple falls too obviously behind without it. Plus Verizon just said that they will not support new products that are NOT 4G, going forward. The speculation about 4G is finally going to end.

Behind with what? Useless tech sheets?

 

[bmwhd]

LTE sounds nice.... but I'm kinda doubting it

Especially since the iPhone 4S didn't have it. Why put LTE in an iPad (which practically owns the tablet market) but not put it into an iPhone (whose market is considerablly more competitive)?

LTE is coming, at least to one carrier. The reasons for it coming to iPad first are battery capacity and lack of voice requirement. Voice fallback from LTE is still being ironed out.

LTE iPads are in the hands of network testers now. The only thing I can't confirm is if these represent then next iPad being released or the one after.

 

[cvaldes]

LTE is coming, at least to one carrier.

Yes, TeliaSonera, for sure. After all, why not go with the guys who have the most experience in running LTE networks?

 

[iPadIndo]

Sound good, I'm waiting ...

 

[Rumple]

Ok if it's lighter I'm in!

 

[chrmjenkins]

The iOS devices use special low-power RAM, not the standard DRAM in personal computers.

The display's backlight draws the most power which is why there are user-configurable options on how quickly to dim the display. Another notorious power hogs are the cellular baseband chip and the wireless chip.


The timing is wrong for A15 chips. It's not expected for any A15-based chips to reach production until early 2013.

More likely would be a quad-core ARM Cortex-A9 MPCore CPU (the A5 is a dual-core) in the next generation Apple SoC (A6?). Four cores is what the Cortex-A9 is designed to handle.

Samsung's Exynos 5250 will hit production Q2 2012 http://www.theverge.com/2011/11/30/...s-5250-is-first-soc-with-super-fast-dual-core

If apple continues to use samsung's fabs, there's a slim chance they could do A15, though their quantities makes it even less likelier. Everyone else except Samsung would be comparatively underpowered through 2013. Depends how quick Nvidia can get Wayne out.

 

[maxfromdenmark]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_0_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.1 Mobile/9A405 Safari/7534.48.3)

iPad 2S LTE first comes to next iphone

 

[sparky52t]

That's all well and good.

But has it been beefed up enough to run Flash?

 

[Michael Scrip]

I'm really curious how the Retina Display would work with websites or anything not optimised to this resolution?

Websites will be stretched to fill the width of the screen.

Text will scale nicely... and will look amazingly sharp on a high-rez iPad screen.

Graphics, however, will also have to be scaled... and will be a little pixelated.

But it's a trade-off I could live with!

 

[henrikrox]

Whoa Quad Core? Likely
LTE .. meh .. Apple won't do it, not this year I think.
Retina Display .. hell yes
Improved camera .. well it's a welcome addition.

But if next iPad indeed come with quad core and retina display, it surely competes tightly with PS Vita. Apple wants to kill Sony now?

Granted, iPad interface is terrible game controller, plus you can't play Uncharted on iPad (unless Sony commits suicide and license Uncharted series to Apple). But this is a great value indeed, like it or not, iOS devices is a decent mobile gaming platform.

sony is very desperate. they are loosing money like crazy

----------

Samsung's Exynos 5250 will hit production Q2 2012 http://www.theverge.com/2011/11/30/...s-5250-is-first-soc-with-super-fast-dual-core

If apple continues to use samsung's fabs, there's a slim chance they could do A15, though their quantities makes it even less likelier. Everyone else except Samsung would be comparatively underpowered through 2013. Depends how quick Nvidia can get Wayne out.

trust me, if the march/april timeframe is right, they cant for a soc that comes in march/april, they have probably have started/or are starting production already