Let's say Apple did stick a retina screen on the iPad mini, the same resolution as the iPad 3rd Gen.
To run at that resolution well you would have needed an A5X chip at least, so for the sake of argument, lets say they stick in an A5X chip.
The same A5X chip that makes the iPad run fairly warm, warm enough for a lot of people on the internet to moan about anyway.
So now you have a retina screen and an A5X chip, but to get that 10 hour battery life we will need that 42.5 Wh battery.
Let's forget cost for a moment.
This 42.5 Wh battery is the same battery that made the 9.7" 3rd gen iPad heavier and thicker than the iPad 2.
Imagine fitting that into a 7.9" tablet?
You thought people moaned about the weight and heat of the iPad 3rd gen... imagine if Apple put all that into an iPad Mini.
Coming back to cost.
Clearly what we have in this scenario is a 7.9" version of the 3rd gen iPad in every way, same screen, processor, battery, camera's etc.
This product, apart from being thicker than a 3rd Gen iPad (that battery has to go somewhere), would be just as heavy, probably even hotter, and would be even more expensive. Miniaturisation costs a lot of money, and although Apple do a pretty good job of constantly making things smaller it still costs money.
For example, to get the device thinner, speakers must be smaller, but to not sacrifice on sound quality, you need much better quality smaller speakers.
If this was the real iPad mini it would be far more expensive than the 3rd/4th Gen iPads.
But even then, forgetting about cost of parts, the impossible engineering feat to get it into a smaller device, the weight issues and the heat issues that everybody is already complaining about, even if they released the product described above, you lot would still be crying that it didnt get the A6X chip.
To run at that resolution well you would have needed an A5X chip at least, so for the sake of argument, lets say they stick in an A5X chip.
The same A5X chip that makes the iPad run fairly warm, warm enough for a lot of people on the internet to moan about anyway.
So now you have a retina screen and an A5X chip, but to get that 10 hour battery life we will need that 42.5 Wh battery.
Let's forget cost for a moment.
This 42.5 Wh battery is the same battery that made the 9.7" 3rd gen iPad heavier and thicker than the iPad 2.
Imagine fitting that into a 7.9" tablet?
You thought people moaned about the weight and heat of the iPad 3rd gen... imagine if Apple put all that into an iPad Mini.
Coming back to cost.
Clearly what we have in this scenario is a 7.9" version of the 3rd gen iPad in every way, same screen, processor, battery, camera's etc.
This product, apart from being thicker than a 3rd Gen iPad (that battery has to go somewhere), would be just as heavy, probably even hotter, and would be even more expensive. Miniaturisation costs a lot of money, and although Apple do a pretty good job of constantly making things smaller it still costs money.
For example, to get the device thinner, speakers must be smaller, but to not sacrifice on sound quality, you need much better quality smaller speakers.
If this was the real iPad mini it would be far more expensive than the 3rd/4th Gen iPads.
But even then, forgetting about cost of parts, the impossible engineering feat to get it into a smaller device, the weight issues and the heat issues that everybody is already complaining about, even if they released the product described above, you lot would still be crying that it didnt get the A6X chip.
