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Would you pay more for retina option?

  • Yes, I would pay $100 to $200 more

    Votes: 36 51.4%
  • No, I don't want retina that much

    Votes: 34 48.6%

  • Total voters
    70

sebastian...

macrumors regular
Original poster
Sep 11, 2011
247
16
People seems so excited about an ipad 3 with retina screen. You can read everywhere statements like :
"if it doesn't have a retina I'm not buying"

Some rumors says Apple might plan to release a "special" ipad for professionals, which will include a retina screen. That could mean that "professional" ipad could cost more because - retina screen, 4x hardware power/memory and so on.
So we would pay more, just like we pay more for a 3G model.

Are you willing to pay 100 or 200 $ more for an Ipad Retina edition ? And it will have the same power/performance as an ipad 3 without retina.

What about an ipad 3 with a retina screen, but with a half performance speed and half the battery time compared to a non retina ipad 3 ?

I know people want retina in ipad, but how much they want that ?
 
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I wouldn't spend $200 just to get a retina screen on my iPad. Sure, it's nice - but it wouldn't be worth the extra price to me. This won't apply to everyone though.

About your second question, Apple wouldn't make the "higher end" retina iPad slower than the cheaper "standard" iPad.
 
"Retina" is a vague marketing term. Without a specific resolution tied to it, I can't put a price on it.

But, no, I will not upgrade until they improve the resolution over existing models, and yes, I'd pay a premium to get a higher resolution model sooner rather than later. How much of a premium depends on how much improvement they can produce.

And there's no point in making it slower or worse on battery life to save money. People willing to pay an additional amount for higher resolution aren't going to do so at a cost of those functions--it's often those looking to use the display for professional needs who want and are willing to pay for even incremental improvements. Sacrificing performance below current levels is just a dumb idea all around.
 
A higher resolution display would be nice, but not for that price. Not unless this "professional" model also included some kind of digitizer pen support. Then I would pay, since it would make the ultimate lightweight digital drawing tablet!
 
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"Retina" is a vague marketing term. Without a specific resolution tied to it, I can't put a price on it.

I think we can be pretty sure Apple will double the linear resolution, which means it'll be QXGA (2048×1536). The iPad 2 was a quantum leap in terms of graphics power so I'd think the iPad 3 should be fast enough to handle the extra pixels.

I probably will be tempted to pay extra, but I really hope Apple brings the new display to every model.
 
Some further explanations.
No doubt Apple is considering the 2048×1536 resolution and trying to manufacture it in the ipad 3 model. However they are likely to encounter obstacles.
For example buyers for sure would expect maybe again an increase in computing power and graphics performance for the next ipad model. Maybe again a 9x increase and at least the same battery time. But at the same time increasing the resolution to a higher numbers than even the most powerful laptops today is a considerable challenge.
So what to do ? Especially since this is one the most expected feature of ipad 3. So a solution would be this "professional" ipad version dedicated for "professionals" and a regular 500 $ with 9x improvements with a regular screen resolution. This way Apple can offer the cake and you can eat it too.

If the ipad 3 won't have retina there will be countless number of people saying : "What ? No retina ? It's 2012 already and still no retina ?" "I expected more from Apple, the pioneers ..." .. and so on.

By offering a specialized ipad 3 with a retina, no matter how difficult would be, or how expensive - the Apple can save face and say : Hey, for the first time on a tablet we are offering the marvelous retina ..etc
And you can also choose an ipad starting from 499$ , 599$ with the 3G and only 699$ with the special brilliant retina display *wifi only .

Another explanations for calling the retina ipad - for "professionals" only, would be to offer that screen on a regular ipad 3 hardware. That would be simpler for Apple. No two sets of hardware. And the new hardware of ipad 3 would be powerful enough to drive that screen. But of course and ipad 3 with a regular resolution would be much faster. So the ipad 3 retina version would be suitable for photographers and others who desire retina and don't play 3d games and so on.
 
Be honest, iPad2 does not have 9x faster graphics performance that iPad a had.

It's certainly not been shown to be this much faster in software, and even single benchmarks I don't believe have shown this either.

Irrespective of that point, remember one very important thing. A computer can change screen res irrespective of the physical screen itself.

There is no reason why you can't have a 2048x1536 screen and run it at 1024x768 for fast moving things when needed.

You do not have to run in native resolution all the time, and this might be what they are doing.
 
I thought about this too. Running home screen background with some icons couldn't be that demanding. Again true for mail, web browser, word processors.
The problems would be for games and VERY high res video playback. But in those circumstances they could just use an upscaled regular res.

But it's kind of annoying seeing people everywhere commenting : Could you believe how amazing will be having this 3d game in 2048 resolution on ipad ? It would look AMAZING. And all for only 499 $ ...I can't wait...

edit : I don't have the poll option. Probably because I just registered
 
A retina screen for the iPad (and by that I mean something similar to the iPhone where pixels cannot be seen) would be a HUGE GIGANTIC improvement IMO. I am not sure I would pay MORE for an iPad 3 with retina, though, since it would be enough for me that I had to buy a new device.
Also, a retina screen is about the only improvement I need, so if iPad 3 does not have that, I am not buying it...
 
I thought about this too. Running home screen background with some icons couldn't be that demanding. Again true for mail, web browser, word processors.
The problems would be for games and VERY high res video playback. But in those circumstances they could just use an upscaled regular res.

But it's kind of annoying seeing people everywhere commenting : Could you believe how amazing will be having this 3d game in 2048 resolution on ipad ? It would look AMAZING. And all for only 499 $ ...I can't wait...

edit : I don't have the poll option. Probably because I just registered

Agreed.

I am only guessing, but this may well be the technical way out of the problem.
As you say reading a book, a web site, or something else with fine detail it could drive the screen in full res, but when something fast needs to move it could seamlessly flip into old res (in effect pixel doubling)
This would have to be done very well as chip level so it happens instantly without being too obvious.

They don't HAVE to do it this way of course, but it would certainly get them over the hurdle of how do you drive that many pixels super fast with a low power mobile CPU chipset.

Until of course such silicon can drive 4x the current pixels at super high speed all the time.

It will be interesting to see how they do it.
 
Also, a retina screen is about the only improvement I need, so if iPad 3 does not have that, I am not buying it...

Would you still choose a retina option, with the same price, knowing you could have the ipad 3 without retina but faster processing ? Fortunately for some that faster processing won't be noticeable in photo browsing, book reading and emails. But will be noticeable in apps.

The problem is, no matter how well the ipad 3 could power that retina, an ipad 3 without retina would be faster. That's only logical.

If there are two categories of people, ones desiring retina and others desiring faster processing, a solution for apple would be to offer retina as an option.

but when something fast needs to move it could seamlessly flip into old res (in effect pixel doubling)

They could do upscaling with far better quality than pixel doubling. Just simple doubling looks very bad, there are fast and cheap scale algorithms today that can be used by the GPU
 
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Would you still choose a retina option, with the same price, knowing you could have the ipad 3 without retina but faster processing ? Fortunately for some that faster processing won't be noticeable in photo browsing, book reading and emails. But will be noticeable in apps.

I would DEFINITELY prefer a slower iPad WITH retina than a faster without it. I only use the iPad for reading and not for gaming and for that purpose the retina display trumphs any other realistic improvement I can think of.

By the way, I generally find the iPad quite unsuited for anything but the most silly mini-games. I think gaming on an iPad is a HUGE step back from gaming on the PC or consoles. The only way that iPad gaming can ever be good is if the screen can actually change shape so that you can actually feel the buttons or something like that.
 
A higher resolution display would be nice, but not for that price. Not unless this "professional" model also some kind of digitizer pen support. Then I would pay, since it would make the ultimate lightweight digital drawing tablet.

Oh, how I would love the digitizer support.:)
 
I'd love a better digitizer/screen. Not sure I need more pixels though. Processors improve each year so I don't doubt Apple could 4x the pixels and still make it smooth. On a related note, I have the Acer A500 and the Acer A100. The only real difference between them is the screen size and resolution. Both running Tegra2s at 1gHz and android 3.2. 10.1 showing 1280 x 800, and 7 showing 1024 x 600. Side by side the 7" A100 really shows off the advantage of pushing few pixels as it is quicker at nearly every graphic trick compared to doing the same thing on the A500.
 
People are buying the iPad 2 in droves without a retina display. If you have an iPhone 4, you probably notice the difference in screen quality. If you don't, you probably don't care. And whether or not the iPad 3 has a retina display, it will sell like hot cakes, and the only people who will care are the nerds. A small vocal microcosm of tech news followers.

I currently own an iPhone 4 and an iPad 2, and while the iPhone 4 has an amazing screen, I am still sometimes also blown away by what the iPad 2 screen can do. HD video looks pretty awesome on it, and so do games.
 
I'd love a better digitizer/screen. Not sure I need more pixels though. Processors improve each year so I don't doubt Apple could 4x the pixels and still make it smooth.

it isn't merely the processor that needs to be upgraded, it's the other constraints that have to be factored in which makes this challenging. upgrading the cpu/gpu to handle the increased resolution will almost certainly impact:

1) battery life
2) weight & form factor
3) heat

i would not be interested in a higher resolution if battery life drops from 10+ hrs to 6-8 hrs. if they stick a larger battery in there to give it the same runtime as an ipad2, you're possibly going to have a heaver/thicker tablet. i'm not too concerned about thickness, but more weight would be a deal-breaker for me since i use it a lot as an ereader.
 
Nope. I think retina or whatever marketing hoopla term Apple wants to use, should be standard in the iPad 3. The price point should not suffer.
 
I don't plan on buying an iPad 3 either way; I probably won't br upgrading til 4 or possibly 5. Whenever I do upgrade, I wouldn't pay more for a retina display if there's a cheaper option without it. The iPad 2 display is plenty good enough for me, upgrading that is not a priority. My main priorities would be processor power/memory to keep up with newer apps and switching from my current wifi to 3G (or whatever the equivalent is at that time).
 
Retina retina retina

I have hated the term "retina display" ever since the (brilliant) Apple marketing machine first added it to everyone's vocabulary.

Steve told us that a retina must have 300ppi or greater? By that logic, an iPhone matching PPI on an iPad would be 2530x1897.... not likely!!
As you have discussed here, the likely new iPad would be a doubling of the existing resultion - a ppi of 264 by the way.

I guarantee Apple will call iPad 3 "retina equipped". But of course they will back-pedal and say that the term "retina" is dependent on the viewing distance (which it is). Hell, even my work Blackberry has retina when viewed from 2 feet!


oh, but to answer your original question, YES. I never got an iPad 2 because of the crappy resolution (this is 2011 not 2006!!) but I would definitely consider an iPad 3 with 2048x1536.

And while you're at it Apple - now that Steve is no longer steering the ship - can you give your loyal users the CHOICE to run flash content please???
 
You want flash? Please, this is 2011 not 2006.
;)

the rhetoric sounds cute, but the truth of the matter is that flash is still being used and it's still relevant whether you like flash or not.

i was checking out some sites over the weekend for backup generators and the view picture function requires flash. the machine i was using had a fresh windows install (the hd had crashed) and i hadn't gotten around to installing flash on it at the time.
 
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