Apple releases Ipad 3

http://www.apple.com/ipad/?r=3

by craigbellot • 14 years ago

290 326 14 years ago

tvon2• 14 years ago

I'm still somewhat amazed they haven't found a better way to handle updating the store. I understand that there is a marketing aspect to taking it offline, but it should be back online and updated immediately after the event is over.

dabeeeenster• 14 years ago

I think it IS all just marketing...Im sure a company that size can update a product on a website without going offline if they really wanted to

tvon2• 14 years ago

I think that's reading a bit too much into it. The product has been announced, having the store down now does nothing to promote it (as having it down during the announcement might), it only prevents people from buying it.

PawelDecowski• 14 years ago

It was briefly online after the event, but it was hammered with requests, so they've shut it down again. Maybe they're just throttling the traffic so not anyone can get it, or maybe they took it down completely to do some magic to better handle all the traffic.

SeoxyS• 14 years ago

I'm not so sure it's all marketing. Apple is the most inflexible, arcane company imaginable when it comes to web software. They're still using a legacy technology (WebObjects w/ Java) that died many years ago, and everything I've heard about their web team make it sound like their're stuck in technological legacy handcuffs.

Xuzz• 14 years ago

Although the HN title (currently) says "Ipad 3", Apple seems to actually be calling it the new "iPad" (edit: "new iPad", not "New iPad"). It's a bit confusing: next year, is it then the "old iPad"?

But, we don't really have that issue with many other Apple products (iPod nano, all Macs, etc) that use the same naming scheme. So we'll see how bad it actually ends up.

WiseWeasel4• 14 years ago

It looks like they're just calling it "iPad" now on their website. It's an interesting idea; maybe they plan on always calling the current one "iPad", and renaming the old model something like "iPad 2012" once the 2013 "iPad" is released.

count• 14 years ago

They don't say 'MacBook Air 4', just 'MacBook Air'. I think this is to unify that naming scheme.

celoyd• 14 years ago

As people have pointed out, this is essentially how things like MacBooks work. I happen to know I have a “mid-2010” MacBook, but that isn’t printed on it anywhere and the average user would never know. It’s not a MacBook 7S or whatever.

moe• 14 years ago

The lack of a numbering scheme is a royal pain in the ass when googling bugs or trying to find pretty much any information about a specific model.

Although admittedly we already have that with most of their other devices ("do i have an early 2011 MB or was it the mid-2010?") and it's not like other vendors are much better in this regard.

losvedir• 14 years ago

It's what they've always done. The "iPad 2" was always officially just called the "iPad" as well. My friend won one in a raffle, and we scoured the box looking at whether it was the new "iPad 2" or not. It never mentioned the "2" anywhere, but we eventually realized from the device's shape that it was the 2.

ugh7• 14 years ago

I bet they were pissed after people were disappointed that they only got an iPhone 4S and no iPhone 5. Plus at some point you have to stop numbering. iPhone 23 doesn’t sound very appealing.

wmf3• 14 years ago

I wonder if this will reduce complaints about "planned obsolescence".

runako• 14 years ago

I think this is one way Apple brings their marketing in line with how average consumers think. Most non-gadget people don't know the difference between the iPhone 4, 4S, and 3GS , other than price. They assume the more expensive one is better and does more stuff. But model numbers (even if it's just a single number) are not the way most consumers think.

Similarly, the iPhone 4S simply says "iPhone" on the back and is not easily differentiated from the original iPhone 4.

jiggy20116• 14 years ago

I'm not sure , sticking numbers after something is a fairly universal thing. Movies, video games and most software has been doing this for a while.

joejohnson3• 14 years ago

I think it's just called the iPad. Right now it's new, so they're referring to it as the "new iPad".

This naming convention is simpler that appending a hardware version number to the name at each refresh. Also, it's what Apple currently does with most of their other product lines. It's the MacBook Pro, not the MacBook Pro 3. The iPods were always called just that, an iPod. People referred to them as the nth generation iPod, but Apple labeled them iPods. Easy.

I wouldn't be surprised if this naming convention spreads the iPhone.

Confusion2• 14 years ago

Macbooks are versioned. The versions people refer to are 'mid 2007', 'late 2008', etc.

iPods are also versioned. People refer to their '4G iPod shuffle' or their '2G iPod touch'

jaredsohn• 14 years ago

>I wouldn't be surprised if this naming convention spreads the iPhone.

This naming convention would be especially convenient for the iPhone. The next one would be the sixth generation but it could confuse people if they call it 'iPhone 6' since there was never an iPhone with a '5' in its name.

For reference, here are the previous iPhone names:

1. iPhone

2. iPhone 3G

3. iPhone 3GS

4. iPhone 4

5. iPhone 4S

warmfuzzykitten4• 14 years ago

When you check out, it's referred to as iPad (3rd generation).

warmfuzzykitten4• 14 years ago

When you check out, it's labeled "iPad (3d generation)".

Steko2• 14 years ago

Apparently it's just "iPad". Not 3, not HD. Maybe people will always call it the iPad 3 or maybe we'll end up calling it the 2012 iPad or the 3rd gen or something.

high5ths• 14 years ago

In one of the videos they mentioned it as the "third generation." Seems like they're just asking for confusion though.

Steko2• 14 years ago

Seems to have worked ok with the iPod ("generation") and their PC line (generally referenced by year of refresh). A bit confusing now when they're doing the transition from "2" to numberless which the first one was but in the long run it will pay off. I suppose they'll just keep calling it "new" to differentiate.

jaems33• 14 years ago

Makes sense. It's not like we call the Macbook, Macbook Pro, or iPod by version numbers. Instead, at least browsing on Craiglist, it's usually by years (for laptops) and generations (for iPods)

_djo_• 14 years ago

It's 'the new iPad', not the iPad 3. Apple is evidently going to follow the same pattern as it does with its computers and is doing away with a sequential numbering system.

So the next iPad will also just be 'the new iPad' the same way that every year we see 'the new MacBook Pro'. The iPhone will probably follow suit.

thought_alarm• 14 years ago

Apple is following the pattern that begun with the failure of the Apple III computer, which is to not name any more products "3". There was no Mac 3, iPod 3, or iPhone 3.

MatthewPhillips2• 14 years ago

Does this not include an update to iOS?

richbradshaw• 14 years ago

Yep, iOS 5.1 is out today as well.

spicyj• 14 years ago

It does; iOS 5.1 comes out today.

MatthewPhillips2• 14 years ago

Link? Update to Safari (IndexedDB please)?

Aloisius• 14 years ago

It should be noted that the limited data plans for both AT&T and Verizon mean that at the max 4G speed of 73 Mbps, you could use all your bandwidth for the entire month in less than three and a half minutes (2 GB plan).

The overages of $10/GB per month on both services mean once you go over your plan, you'll be looking at a little over $5/minute in new charges.

It is possible (though highly unlikely) to rack up over $200K/month in bandwidth charges if you managed to find an empty 4G cell for a month.

Sadly Sprint, which has unlimited 4G last i checked, was absent from the release of the new iPad.

kacy• 14 years ago

Well, you could legitimately use 2GB by simply purchasing a movie that they discussed in the presentation. A 720p version of "Drive" on iTunes is 3.17GB. Soon it will be upgraded to 1080p, which would be at /least/ 5GB. That's at least $50 in data for one movie, assuming the data plans stay the same.

samstave4• 14 years ago

Someone needs to do exactly this, then sue the balls off these carriers for such draconian plans and rates.

AntiRush• 14 years ago

Apple doesn't let you download anything (apps, movies) bigger than 50mb over a cellular connection.

ronnier• 14 years ago

Right. These two companies have somewhat destroyed mobile innovation by being the largest providers of mobile internet and neutering their services to be almost useless outside of checking email and web browsing. Comcast is doing their bit with their monthly limits also. I say this with an "unlimited" AT&T plan where I've reached my monthly limit. Hitting my limit slows my connection down to a crawl (it's almost unusable, the connection says edge).

gbog• 14 years ago

The largest In The USA. Maybe you are aware that other countries do actually exist?

twiceaday• 14 years ago

The is a rumor that big telcos are going to offer companies to pay for their users bandwidth. I hope this never happens. That is not how you fix this issue.

tomkinstinch5• 14 years ago

While bandwidth does have physical limits, we can all agree the prices currently being charged are excessive.

The proper way to fix this is to have very local cells (or wifi). I would like to see cell networks pay individuals to connect mini cells to their home connections, and then allow any phone to connect to the cells. Wireless users get connectivity everywhere, mini cell operators have financial incentive to exist, and carriers reduce demand on their macro-scale network. If the telcos could agree on reasonably low prices (cost plus?), I would even agree to usage-based billing.

The wireless carriers would become dumb pipes (as they really are to begin with). Their new role would be to coordinate distribution of mini cells.

This system also creates incentive for wire line ISPs to increase their transfer rates to customers, and perhaps get into the mini cell game themselves.

cjensen• 14 years ago

The iPad does not have overage charges.

If you use up your data, you have to manually sign up for more data. If you sign up for more, it's like starting the month over from the time you sign up. You're also given the opportunity to switch to a plan with a different data size.

trotsky3• 14 years ago

you can put anyone's sim in this one

talmand• 14 years ago

That's what I think every time I see a 4G ad, "awesome! I can reach my data cap that much faster!"

samstave4• 14 years ago

This is exactly what happened to me after I bought a MyTouch 4G which allowed wifi hotspotting for my laptop.

While I was not charged overage fees, my data rate was crippled to 57Kbps.

The thing sits in the drawer and I NEVER use it because its useless.

I am paying $100 a month for it. They want $400!!! to cancel it.

Fuck these carriers.

cwe• 14 years ago

If you have more than 4 months left on your contract, it will be cheaper to cancel it now.

ugh7• 14 years ago

I’m not really sure why you are angry at the carriers. Knowing about the limits and how much you need is kinda your job. I know that I need at least half a terabyte per month when I’m using my laptop and I know to always check how much bandwidth I can get from the carriers.

Your responsibility.

Gabler2• 14 years ago

When I see people complaining about being capped at 50kb/s speeds it makes me sad to live in New Zealand where our capped speeds are about 15kb/s at best.

usaar333• 14 years ago

They want $400 because if you cancel your contract, you get to keep the phone. You can sell it on ebay for $200.

jiggy20116• 14 years ago

I wonder if the next step for Apple is to use their cash reserves to buy a carrier then of course all of their devices will be restricted to it.

k-mcgrady• 14 years ago

Not really possible. If they were going to restrict their devices to their own carrier they would need a presence in most countries in the world. For Apple to buy a big carrier in every country they operate would be costly and stupid (it would be difficult to manage carriers all over the world when they just want to produce hardware and software).

guyzero• 14 years ago

Let's not be silly. Existing LTE phones on Verizon get a real-world top performance in the 20Mbps range. Now, that's great and all, but no one will ever get even 50% of what's basically the signaling rate of 73Mbps.

Also, your download patterns are unlikely to change a lot. It'll still be email, web surfing and some youtube. LTE makes netflix possible while not on wifi, but that's about the most data-hungry thing an average user is going to do. For the most part the only thing this changes is that things like installing apps when off wifi are much faster.

lepht• 14 years ago

Sooo... 25 minutes of watching Netflix then?

lukeschlather• 14 years ago

Also, 4G is too unreliable, at least on my Verizon Samsung Stratosphere. It works great in some locations, but when I'm in transit (the main times I could risk running up a tab) it drops out pretty regularly.

msh2• 14 years ago

I am not in the US but with my MiFi cabled to a computer I get around 40-60 mbit (a bit less when using wifi to share the connection).

donniezazen• 14 years ago

I get 5-6 Mbps on Sprint. I don't think most people even on Verizon get 73Mbps.

bhousel• 14 years ago

>Sadly Sprint, which has unlimited 4G last i checked, was absent from the release of the new iPad.

I think Sprint is excluded because their 4G service is based on WiWax for now, although they are switching to LTE later this year and continuing into 2013.

tybris• 14 years ago

Apple should really use their vast piles of cash to buy one of the major carriers.

tomflack3• 14 years ago

It's a nice dream, but would it actually make sense? Spend a lot of money to get an expensive capital-intensive business that is very different to any other business units in Apple and operates in only one of the countries Apple has a market presence.

gurkendoktor• 14 years ago

Google and Amazon are the companies that aim for the US first every single time. At least it would be unusual if Apple did the same here.

mark_l_watson• 14 years ago

Don't most people, really, use iPads over wifi? Or am I just one of the cheapskates who bought one without 3G or 4G support?

I bought an iPad 2 last year and I didn't even consider buying one with a data plan. I am near wifi about 99% of the time, discounting driving, hiking, and airplane time. In a pinch, I can check email on my Droid.

Eventually 4G will become inexpensive, but it isn't right now.

rjurney• 14 years ago

I rely on the 'always on' internet connection that 3G provides me. When I need to look something up, I don't even think about wifi. I just look it up. There is value in that.

rdl6• 14 years ago

I sometimes trust 3G (and now 4G) more than I trust the available wifi, even over a VPN. Admittedly it's not that hard to put up a fake base station, but it's basically unlikely. Sometimes wifi at events is just badly run or overloaded, too.

There are also sites with rules about what's allowed to be on the network or not. Often a consultant or guest can't put his device on the network, at least without a lot of work (BYOD isn't done on many networks), but having network access is useful. There are also sometimes IP considerations (using an iPad or 4G hotspot during a break from a day job is less likely to be "using employer resources" to manage your startup if you're moonlighting than if you use their wifi...).

For +$130, it's worth it to me to have the capability. It also makes GPS more accurate, and maps is a really cool thing. I only replace my iPad every second generation, though.

waitwhat• 14 years ago

I really don't want or need all my devices to have seperate data contracts -- one contract (for the phone) and hotspot capability is just fine.

r00fus• 14 years ago

I used to know someone who worked at a facility where he didn't trust the wifi (perhaps he thought they were running bluecoat or something). He just used an iPad 3G for all his personal stuff. He was pretty well regarded, so no issues on productivity/etc.

hrktb• 14 years ago

Same here.

Still, I bought a 3G ipad only because of the GPS chip in it. Even without the data plan it's quite valuable if you hook your ipad to your phone's hotspot or another wi-fi network.

ctdonath• 14 years ago

"Don't most people, really, use iPads over wifi?"

No. I don't use the work wifi because it is severely limited (paranoid IT guy) and my iPad may access material I'd rather they not sniff (just NOYB stuff). I use it on the road for mapping, impromptu parking-lot Grouponing, whatever far from wifi. Open routers still often have some irritant signin or blacklists. Even at home my iPad often gets 3G better than wifi.

Don't underestimate the value of "always connected". A legacy unlimited plan multiplies it.

michaelbuckbee• 14 years ago

Inelegant, but you could get a Sprint Mobile hotspot and use it (and 4 other devices) with their 4G unlimited plan.

mason55• 14 years ago

That's like how Verizon was selling iPads with MiFi's attached via a case.

noonespecial2• 14 years ago

While this particular example seems extra silly, it does fit the long tradition of carriers advertising amazing new features that are technically true but always hampered in some minor way as to make them functionally useless.

I explain it to laypeople in one simple sentence: "You can't really watch the game on your phone."

robomartin2• 14 years ago

If you have two or more iPads, why do they make you pay multiple monthly fixed-price amounts for connectivity? This is even more ridiculous when you consider that most devices are probably on WiFi most of the time. So, you are paying $mm per month times N devices for, well, nothing.

It's time for these contracts to become more reasonable. Right now they border on being nothing more than theft. Imagine this: You pay AT&T for your DSL line and you also pay them for wireless access for your iPad. You are paying them twice but only using one of the pipes at any given time.

mdonahoe• 14 years ago

The contracts are for the devices, not you. It is possible to use them both at the same time, so ATT wants your money.

I definitely agree that they should do it your way though. Pricing is part of the product, and simple-to-understand pricing schemes will sell.

In the meantime, you might be able to get creative with swapping SIM cards around.

cletus• 14 years ago

I'm disappointed the "top" comment on this announcement is nothing more than a sideways swipe at an unrelated topic from someone who clearly has an axe to grind.

In Australia, the ACCC banned the use of the word "unlimited" (with respect to Internet access, wireless or fixed-line) unless it truly was unlimited. No shaping, hard or soft quotas, excess usage charges and vague "fair use" provisions. The result? You get what you pay for and you pay for what you get. If you pay for 1TB/month on an ADSL line you're absolutely going to get it.

The real problem here is a combination of false advertising and people with completely unrealistic expectations. Not everyone can use 73Mbps all the time. There simply isn't the bandwidth for it. If you want to download 100GB+/month you should absolutely be paying more than someone who only downloads 2GB/month.

Back to the "new iPad" (why not iPad 3? Seriously!), i'm excited about it. Having it be able to do 1080p is great, although I think it's high time they up the flash storage at this point. 64GB doesn't go that far at Full HD.

The RAM, CPU and memory upgrades make this a pretty serious device now. The release of iPhoto is probably going to be unfortunately for many photo app makers (and hopefully it'll mean an end to Photoshop Touch's ridiculous 1600x1600 limit).

Apple just continues to cement their complete dominance against, well, everyone in the tablet space.

sneak4• 14 years ago

"why not iPad 3? Seriously!"

The video shown at the end of the announcement event has an Apple employee referring to it as "the third-generation iPad".

This seems very strange to me, considering how on-message Apple has ALWAYS been in the past. It's just... sloppy.

I wonder if Apple has a future beyond its current momentum. I'll be convinced otherwise ifwhen they release another world-changing product that wasn't invented by Steve.

potatolicious• 14 years ago

> "Having it be able to do 1080p is great"

The resolution is kind of awkward for moving watching no? There's no 1:1 mapping of source pixel to hardware pixel, so you're going to get some filtering regardless. But, a step up regardless. The current iPad screen is downright painful to look at once you've been spoiled by high-DPI screens.

> "although I think it's high time they up the flash storage at this point. 64GB doesn't go that far at Full HD."

I actually don't think this is a big issue. It would seem to me that Apple is moving slowly towards the Amazon model - cloud-based content provision of everything. It used to be that you'd have to download giant files to a "mothership" computer, then pipe it over USB to your mobile device, but with iCloud and now downloading your movies over the air, this seems positively archaic.

msh2• 14 years ago

Well I have no problem with them having a 2GB plan for people with only a smaller need to surf and check email but want good speed.

They do lack a plan with a decent cap, I can live without unlimited but the cap should be decent.

On my non-us LTE plan they reserve the right to throttle it if I use more than 30 GB a month. I think thats a decent cap (the price is approx. 52 USD a month including 25% VAT, cheaper plans with less data is available).

thematt• 14 years ago

Nothing mentioned about Siri. That is surprising, because I thought that inclusion would be a slam-dunk.

ary• 14 years ago

Not exactly true. It supports dictation just like the iPhone 4s.

kyberias• 14 years ago

They certainly mentioned Siri in the keynote.

icki2• 14 years ago

I believe they started the keynote with Siri. iOS 5.1 is bringing Siri to Japan.

jws• 14 years ago

Looks like no Siri. No mention of it in the iPad pages on the main web site.

jevinskie4• 14 years ago

No mention of bumping the RAM from 512 MB to 1 GB. Even my TF101 Tegra 2 tablet has 1 GB of RAM. I wonder how much the 4x larger retina display assets will increase RAM usage.

Edit: I guess it does have 1 GB of RAM. http://chronicwire.com/the-ipad-3-has-1gb-of-ram

mbreese• 14 years ago

Apple doesn't release how much memory their iOS devices have as a tech spec. The best we can do is find out by debug messages (like you just linked) or physically examining the device (ifixit).

Apple would say it has "enough" RAM. I thought that one of the game demos mentioned that it had more resources than an Xbox 360 or PS3, but I don't think they were talking about RAM.

kenrikm9• 14 years ago

IIRC the PS3 has 256mb of ram.

kenrikm9• 14 years ago

I did a test a 1024x768 PNG vs the Same PNG at 2048x1536. 299k vs 664k. So for raster images it more than doubles the footprint, however if you use vector assets there should be little impact.

jevinskie4• 14 years ago

But you don't store compressed PNGs in RAM for display by the GPU. Does the GPU even support lossless texture compression? I would imagine it supports lossy texture compression.

Edit: It is also interesting to see that the ~ 2x increase in the size of the PNG can be explained by PNG's run length encoding. When you double the pixels in each direction, RLE should readily compress the horizontal pixel replication but not the vertical pixel replication.

ryanpetrich• 14 years ago

After decompression into memory, that 2048x1536 image will take exactly four times the memory as a 1024x768 image.

woobar2• 14 years ago

The comparison to the amount of RAM in TF101 doesn't make any sense. It runs different software.

megablast3• 14 years ago

It all runs different software, but games are generally going to use the same amount of data.

tomkinstinch5• 14 years ago

The 264dpi screen is a big deal. I was at a workshop with Edward Tufte this week. He extoled the virtures of using paper for information-rich data transfer. Having paper-like screen resolution is an obvious advantage for disseminating information.

I'd like to see a startup take on PowerPoint by releasing software to compose iPad-friendly presentations. Think one-pagers full of text, graphs, and figures. On an iPad they could be interactive, annotated, and linked together. Every iPad-toting meeting goer could scan a QR code on the way in to get on the same page, and then sit and discuss the content. Gone will be the days of presenters doling out bullet points at excruciatingly slow pace.

Having read Isaacson's biography of Jobs, it seems that Apple may be gunning to disrupt the textbook market. Having paper-like resolution is a great step in that direction.

WiseWeasel4• 14 years ago

Apple sells their Keynote presentation software for the iPad.

tomkinstinch5• 14 years ago

Keynote is great, but it's still slideware. People need to think about the iPad as a printer for dynamic content. It's smart paper.

Edit: Thanks to gte910h for pointing out iBooks Author. I wasn't aware of it!

http://www.apple.com/ibooks-author/

th0ma5• 14 years ago

When I was at Eyeo Casey Reas stated that print is like using a static version of a dynamic display from the future (or something to that effect) ... This talk about retina perception of pixels is indeed compelling and true, but 1200dpi is still "nicer" in many ways that I wouldn't want to try and prove on HN :P

nextparadigms3• 14 years ago

Won't this make it hard for developers to develop apps on Macs that still have only 1920x1080 displays?

tomkinstinch5• 14 years ago

As mentioned elsewhere, Macs may see similar resolution bumps soon, along with resolution independent UI.

aaronblohowiak• 14 years ago

the simulator already offers multiple levels of zoom

rhplus• 14 years ago

Huh, what about the meeting goers who aren't toting iPads? Couldn't your interactive presentations be achieved with content built to web standards?

tomkinstinch5• 14 years ago

Sure, maybe the output of the composer app is a web document. The point is that it should think like a book in terms of composition and layout, and less like a website.

baconner• 14 years ago

There are quite a few bi tools that do pretty much what you're describing on the ipad and other mobile devices now. Share a link, pulls up an interactive dashboard for everyone that they can play with and discuss in the meeting. Many also let you build a slide deck in PowerPoint with interactive dashboards on each slide.

Now if you could have the ppt (or whatever) allow attendees to collaboratively interact with the current dashboard slide then you'd really have something.

Maybe I should get to work on that!

afterburner3• 14 years ago

It's 10% heavier:

http://www.engadget.com/2012/03/07/new-ipad-vs-ipad-2/

Yes, I know why, but I was hoping against hope it would get a little lighter. But I didn't think it would. Maybe next year, when there's no reason to up the resolution.

lukifer2• 14 years ago

It's still slightly lighter than the first iPad, so for those of us who didn't upgrade, it'll be an improvement. :)

afterburner3• 14 years ago

Heh, yes, by 5%. :)

I think a nice weight would be about 400g. The Kindles are 200-300g, except the DX-2 which is 540g.

lunarscape• 14 years ago

I guess we're left waiting for a big breakthrough in battery technology to see a decrease in the weight of these types of devices.

afterburner3• 14 years ago

The new model has almost twice the battery capacity, and the battery probably accounts for almost all the weight, so it looks like there is a decent amount of yearly improvement.

cheald• 14 years ago

Pushing 4x as many pixels doesn't come cheap. You have to add bigger batteries.

I'm really curious to see what the battery is like when playing games. Quadrupling the effective required fill rate is gonna have that GPU working overtime.

jonhendry• 14 years ago

I think I would have been satisfied with a 4.5 hour battery life claim, if it was lighter than the iPad 2.

funkah• 14 years ago

That's too bad. I held off on the original iPad because it felt too bulky and heavy. The second one was significantly thinner and lighter, so I bought one and have been using the hell out of it for the past year.

ugh7• 14 years ago

I’m extremely happy that Apple is picking battery life over thickness and weight. It shows that they have their priorities straight: battery life is by far the best features of the iPad’s hardware. As long as the weight and size don’t get too crazy (and they are still doing better than the first iPad) picking battery life is always the right choice.

icki2• 14 years ago

I'm excited that they're addressing user complaints about 'content creation'. iPhoto looks particularly impressive; it looks like people will be using their tablet devices for more than just content consumption now.

YooLi• 14 years ago

"...it looks like people will be using their tablet devices for more than just content consumption now."

They have been for a while...

rbarooah5• 14 years ago

What user complaints? The only people saying that the iPad can't be used for content creation are blogosphere commentators arguing that it can't replace a laptop yet.

julianb• 14 years ago

Looks like the iPad2 is available for $399 now.

kenrikm9• 14 years ago

The Apple Store was live for about two minutes but a DDOS from everyone trying to pre-order brought it down and they went back to "We'll be back soon"

I would love to see how many hits they are getting.

munchor2• 14 years ago

I hate it that I can't watch the videos on Apple's website, and to me, this is just a reminder of that, oh why?

munchor2• 14 years ago

Also, I do know why, but Linux user over here :P

Osiris3• 14 years ago

Yeah I can't event watch them in Chrome on a Macbook Pro, I have to use Safari.

ot• 14 years ago

Pre-ordering will be a lottery. I've been trying to get to the online Store for more than half an hour and I get either server error, "we'll be back soon" or incredibly slow connection (which then fails). I managed to get once to iPad page but clicking on any link brought me back to server error.

jevinskie4• 14 years ago

The store went down just as the checkout page (page after the smart cover upsell page) was loading. I auto refreshed on that URL and was able to place my preorder a few minutes ago.

warmfuzzykitten4• 14 years ago

I stopped counting, but I must have started over a dozen times before I was finally able to check out. What I didn't know was that each walk through the iPad page was ordering another iPad, so my cart wound up with five of them (!) but thankfully removing the extra three didn't make me start over.

[Aside: The new Apple TV is impossible to order from the website because the page has no continue or buy button! Maybe they'll notice when first day sales are zero. You can add one to your cart from the Apple Store iPhone app, but so far I have been unable to check out. Apple seriously underestimated the order volume for these products!]

Fizzer• 14 years ago

Does anyone know if OpenGL's 1024x1024 image size restriction is being raised as well? Seems pretty limiting to not even be able to make an image that's as big as the screen without tiling four of them together.

huggyface4• 14 years ago

Does anyone know if OpenGL's 1024x1024 image size restriction is being raised as well?

Referring to the maximum texture size, I assume? Don't current iOS / PowerVR implementations have a max texture size of 2048x2048? It isn't intrinsic to OpenGL but is implementation specific -- for instance the Mali-400 (GS II) and Tegra 2/3 is 4096x4096.

toadkick2• 14 years ago

The max texture size has been 2048x2048 since the 3GS

toadkick2• 14 years ago

Sounds like on the new iPad the max has further increased to 4096x4096

abruzzi• 14 years ago

I'm glad they didn't call it "iPad HD". Call me pedantic, but HD should be limited to ITU 'HDTV' broadcast spec, and the iPad 3's resolution doesn't fit. Instead it just confuses things with imprecise language.

guelo• 14 years ago

The world of LCD panels baffles me. For some reason Apple can sell an iPad with a 2048x1536 IPS screen for $500 but your average $1,000 laptop comes with a crappy 1366x768 TFT screen or maybe 1920x1080 if you're lucky.

wmf3• 14 years ago

Screen area costs money. Also, economy of scale; the iPad outsells any laptop model by a wide margin.

kenrikm9• 14 years ago

Exactly, Apple sells around 2mil+ Macs/Qtr most of which are laptops however they sell 15+mil iPads. It's easier to get volume deals on 15 million displays then it is 1-2mil.

berntb• 14 years ago

Apple could release a 9.7" Air and use the same IPS screen as the iPad. (Even better would be a 13" Air/13" iPad with the same screen. I'd buy both.)

tomkarlo3• 14 years ago

I believe folks have already seen evidence in OSX that Apple will be doing "retina" displays for laptops and desktops. Continued movement towards a resolution-independent OS.

schiffern3• 14 years ago

Actually, I see this as the abandonment of resolution independence. Apple has always been about pixel-perfect graphics, and that's quite hard to do with vector assets. Fonts have to have all sorts of hinting to get single-pixel risers and joins to look decent. That's one of the reasons that fonts are so costly – now imagine that all your graphics require that level of care. Making pixel-perfect "@2x" graphics is much easier.

Then again, maybe those hints are only necessary because of the limitations of low resolution displays. If each pixel is barely large enough to be discerned by the naked eye, single-pixel accuracy may not matter so much. Clearly resolution independence is still desirable for accessibility reasons, even at the end of the pixel density road.

dangrossman5• 14 years ago

It's mindblowing. When my last laptop broke, I had to turn to eBay to get a PC laptop with a decent screen... HP briefly sold a 1600x900 14" screen in the Envy line then discontinued it, so I found a used one and paid a premium for it. Everything in every retail store was 1366x768, washed out and dim.

joejohnson3• 14 years ago

Using Apple's definition of a retina display, the MacBook Pros are already very close: http://www.tuaw.com/2012/03/01/retina-display-macs-ipads-and...

You hold your laptop significantly farther from your face than an iPad, thus a lower PPI is sufficient. However, a 9.7" display with the iPad's PPI is getting close to acceptable sizes for small laptops, like the 13" MacBook Pros.

ugh7• 14 years ago

But the other thing is quality. Viewing angles and color gamut tends to be horrible on laptops. Not so on the iPad.

goldins• 14 years ago

I think the change is due to cheap and plentiful on-board graphics that limits the screen resolution but provides a longer battery life. Since most users don't need a powerful gaming laptop, manufacturers use the cheap, efficient, but limited on-board graphics processors.

gnaffle2• 14 years ago

I think the biggest issue is simply thet desktop operating systems doesn't have good resolution independence. So for most people, a laptop display with more than 1920x1080 will make icons and buttons very small by default. And of course, most people (and businesses) don't care either way and don't want to pay for the price difference.

justincormack• 14 years ago

True. Not even the ones made by Apple. Even after 10 years of shrinking desktop feature sizes. Clearly there is much more money to be made in tablets and mobile than laptops...

pkamb• 14 years ago

The 4:3 aspect ratio is the big thing. Impossible to buy a laptop with that spec any more. A new ThinkPad X series with the iPad's display would be amazing.

samstave4• 14 years ago

I would think that this is largely due to the fact that Apple uses its massive cash reserves to effectively lock-in parts exclusively for their products.

Its not like that part is a COTS part that is available to all OEMs.

xavi• 14 years ago

With the Retina display, using the new iPad as a second display for the Mac (using the Air Display app) becomes more interesting.

philwelch• 14 years ago

Apple can commit to shipping millions of iPads and makes procurement decisions based on that fact. You're talking about the company that buys a significant proportion of the world's NAND flash production preordered a year ahead of time. iPad has enough economy of scale that as soon as Apple found a display manufacturer able and willing to manufacture the screen they wanted, they immediately promised a large enough preorder to make it cost-effective. Remember, Apple ships more iPads than any PC manufacturer ships total units, and all those iPads use the same parts.

So in case you were wondering why Apple keeps obscene piles of cash around, that's why.

hinathan• 14 years ago

Apple has effectively paid for some of its suppliers factories to ensure parts availability. Good position to be in. http://www.asymco.com/2011/01/23/the-bank-of-apple-using-cap...

megablast3• 14 years ago

Not anymore, they seem to be selling the new iPads and the old iPads, which will mean two display sizes. Still, your point holds.

The other issue is that Apple has enough money to invest in factories, not that it owns them, but it can put money up front to encourage building them. I would not be surprised if they had a 1 year hold on screens of this size, just as they did for the iphone 4 (although even today noone is using the same screens as the 4).

hef198982• 14 years ago

If it's true that apple preorders one year in advance, it really gives them a big advantage in terms of procurement. And here I'm talking about better prices, prefered customer status and guaranteed material availability. Add to that the huge quantities, and you get a really nice position for Apple. What really impresses me, beyond the near-perfect marketing they have, is the way they clearly are managing their supply chain, down to the very end-costumer. For, Apple may easily become the SCM benchmark Toyota used to be a decade ago.

mrspandex• 14 years ago

Someone should sell a conversion kit to make it a monitor. I'd drop $100 for that.

TheFuture• 14 years ago

I thought the same thing. It was one of the reasons I didn't think they'd be able to do a retina iPad, it would just be too expensive.

Look at the prices of your average 47" LCD HDTV sets, way over $500. And they're probably making less money per unit than the iPad. I don't know how Apple is doing it.

huggyface4• 14 years ago

I have four Android smartphones and two tablets, but this is the first Apple product that has really opened my wallet. Literally, my wallet is sitting open.

But their store keeps crashing and going back to the offline state. Called their phone sales and they couldn't help me because they use the online system to enter orders. :-)

Ah well, I'll get one soon enough.

nextparadigms3• 14 years ago

What is it about it that made you want it so much? There will be Android tablets with just as high or higher resolution very soon, and with stronger CPU's than the still dual core Cortex A9 chip in the iPad 3.

bryanlarsen3• 14 years ago

I'm thinking the same thing. The ASUS infinity's 1920x1200 screen is probably high enough to qualify as "retina" for my eyes at normal viewing distances, and the dual-S4 appears to be at least twice as fast as a dual core A9. The WIFI model isn't quite as exciting because it only uses quad core A9.

huggyface4• 14 years ago

I had always considered getting one simply to be able to test personal web projects on it. This -- being the latest tech at the same price -- presents good timing to do so.

I'm an Android believer from a philosophical and practical perspective, however I have to credit Apple: they don't talk about an HD display and then bring it out six months later, but instead talk about it when the shipments are loading on the trucks. Further the empirical strength of the A5X, thus far unproven, may not always top artificial benchmarks, but they seem to get a heck of a lot more out of it.

pilsetnieks• 14 years ago

It's like the megahertz war from way back when - you might have a CPU with 100% more megahertz but you're still using windows.

ben1040• 14 years ago

I preordered an iPad 3 and plan to sell my Galaxy Tab 10.1 as soon as the iPad shows up.

The integration with Google Talk and Gmail is a plus for Android, but Android on a tablet seems to still suck for usability otherwise. Additionally battery life sucks (some random app would occasionally just grab a wakelock and suck down battery to zero), and so does media management.

And after having an Android tablet for 10 months now, I still have yet to see apps for it that are as compelling as I've seen from day one on the iPad. Aside from Google's own apps, Android apps that actually take advantage of the tablet form factor (as opposed to just being smartphone apps that get stretched awkwardly to the giant screen) are few and far between.

Osiris3• 14 years ago

I think Apple is doing a great thing by pushing up display resolutions. I can't believe that PC manufacturers still REFUSE to produce laptops (at least consumer grade) with any resolutions higher than 1366x768.

I've been watching consumer laptop sales for a year and the only one I've seen with a higher resolutions is a 17" beast. Luckily I got a 15" Macbook Pro from work with a 1680x1050.

Everyone's known since the iPhone 4 that Apple would do a hi-res Tablet display, but PC manufacturers still refuse to innovate and put in hi-res displays in their laptops.

I refuse to try to write code with only 768 vertical lines.

jonnycowboy• 14 years ago

My year-old Dell XPS-15 has a 1920x1080 display (15") and is fairly "consumer grade". Granted it was an option, but still. Actually I have a problem with this screen - the font is too small (windows doesn't rescale automatically).

Osiris3• 14 years ago

That's interesting to know. Still, considering the hundreds of models of laptops available, it's a very very small percentage that offer anything other than 1366x768. The Macbook's minimum resolutions is 1440x900 and they offer 1680x1050 as an option.

tikhonj• 14 years ago

I think the opposite is true--Apple's laptops actually have much lower resolutions than some other options. The 13" laptop I'm currently using (which is even lighter than an Air) has a 1600x900 resolution; if I had been willing to order online they would have upgraded it to 1920x1080 for free (but I am not a patient man and at 13" that's a bit of overkill).

If Apple releases a retina screen Air, I would seriously consider getting it. If they make one about as heavy with a high resolution and a 15" screen, I'm definitely getting one unless it has a slow SSD or is really incompatible with Linux.

jiggy20116• 14 years ago

Personally, I would prefer to be able to still buy laptops (or any monitor for that matter) with a more "square" ratio.

I have a new laptop with a 1366x768 resolution but my older P4 laptop with 1280x1024 (or thereabouts) is much more pleasant to write code (or write anything) on. Those extra 266 vertical pixels just make all the difference especially when you have so many toolbars etc.

I don't understand why everything has to be widescreen now, it may be preferable for movies but that's surely not the main use case for a computer. That's what a TV is for.

bugsbunnyak• 14 years ago

ASUS n55sf is <$1k from some vendors with 1920x1080 (plus quad core i7, 2 gb nvidia 555m, 8 gb ram)

MatthewB• 14 years ago

I'm wondering if my grandfathered unlimited plan with AT&T can be applied to the iPad?

FaceKicker• 14 years ago

Is it just me or do the comparison pics of the old iPad screen vs. new retina display on this page look exactly the same? http://www.apple.com/ipad/features/

Edit: never mind, there's a zoom widget I didn't notice.

InclinedPlane• 14 years ago

Talk to your optometrist.

brianwillis• 14 years ago

Is the loupe showing up for you? It didn't for me the first time I loaded the page, and I thought the same thing you did.

It should look like this: http://i.imgur.com/WUQ7n.jpg

trotsky3• 14 years ago

They looked exactly the same to me as well the first time I looked. When I just clicked again a magnifying glass widget appeared over them that wasn't there the first time (even though I spent quite a while staring and scratching my head). It's obvious when that pops up.

wmf3• 14 years ago

"Quad-core graphics" seems like misleading marketing to trick people into thinking A5X is equivalent to Tegra 3; this seems like a shame since Apple could presumably win without it.

nextparadigms3• 14 years ago

Since the pixels are multiplied by 4, and the GPU only by 2, does this means the real world performance (in games) of the iPad 3 GPU should be half the performance of iPad 2?

ericd3• 14 years ago

That sort of depends on where the bottlenecks are, and what multiplying the GPU by 2 means. Basically, there's not enough info to say, and it'll probably require some benchmarking to tell.

kenrikm9• 14 years ago

I doubt they are using the same GPU that's in the iPad 2,I suspect that they went with a higher end GPU and made it Quad. We will have to wait for a teardown to know with 100% certainty though.

bryanlarsen3• 14 years ago

A teardown won't tell you anything: it'll tell you that the GPU is in a chip called the A5X. You might be able to get a little more by pulling out an electron microscope, but iFixit doesn't go that far, yet. :)

It'll be the people doing software sleuthing that'll get you the answer.

However we are fairly confident that Apple didn't build their own GPU -- they would have bragged about it if they did. There are a limited number of GPUs IP blocks available for licensing, so that does mean that speculation can be relatively accurate. Their use of the term "quad-core" makes it highly likely they're using the SGX543MP4, twice what is in the iPad 2 (although perhaps higher clocked or with better memory bandwidth). That's also the GPU in the playstation vita.

halayli• 14 years ago

Why are you assuming it's linear?

pfraze• 14 years ago

The two aren't directly related. More pixels means more information to store and process, but that's just one component of rendering.

kenrikm9• 14 years ago

Ouch, Just ordered 32gb 4g (AT&T) $780 with tax. If I were not using it for development it would hurt a lot more however it still is about double what I would be comfortable with for my own use.

ericd3• 14 years ago

I'm always kind of surprised that the online store doesn't update instantly. I have to imagine that their "We'll be back soon" splash page kills a lot of potential impulse purchases.

It seems to be back now, but the iPhone is showing "From $0", and clicking on the iPad gives an "Oops" error page. Couldn't this all be worked out in staging?

allwein• 14 years ago

> It seems to be back now, but the iPhone is showing "From $0"

This is actually the correct pricing for the iPhone, since the 3GS is available free when signing up for a 2-year plan from AT&T.

ericd3• 14 years ago

Ah interesting, thanks for the correction, it's been too long since I've bought one of those. I didn't realize that they were even supporting the 3GS anymore, let alone selling it.

awfabian22• 14 years ago

I doubt anything technical prevents instant updating. Showmanship is a big part of the corporate DNA.

awfabian22• 14 years ago

I doubt the reason is technical. Showmanship is a big part of Apple's corporate DNA.

juiceandjuice• 14 years ago

I think this link is titled wrong.

Nowhere is it referred to as iPad 3, iPad HD or anything like that. It's just "The new iPad"

incanus77• 14 years ago

It's spelled "iPad" and it's not the 3.

Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to get back to my Desk 4 and have some Breakfast 2.

demallien2• 14 years ago

I don't think he knows about second breakfast Pip

lelf• 14 years ago

Is me the only one was secretly hoping for tactile feedback?

phn• 14 years ago

You were not :) I was really hoping for it. All in all I think it was a very "play it safe" upgrade.

xpose2000• 14 years ago

During iPhone 4S release, who cares about 4G. iPad HD, all hail 4G!

cicloid• 14 years ago

Isn't the LTE migration in part a cost saving measure for carriers and later on the final user?

From what I remember, LTE does pump more data in a more cheap way; and the infrastructure for it is more cheap also.

leeoniya2• 14 years ago

so Apple ditches Flash for HTML5, but requires Quicktime to play the Retina tech video?

http://www.apple.com/ipad/features/

leeoniya2• 14 years ago

yo dawg! we used quicktime to showcase your iPad3 so you can use apple proprietary tech while you watch apple proprietary tech.

jiggy20116• 14 years ago

I wonder what the implications of this will be for web design?

A website built with a fixed with 1000 pixel design is suddenly going to look pretty silly on a new ipad.

Of course if you design around large resolutions you will marginalize those with standard displays.

kyleslattery• 14 years ago

It will work exactly like it does on the iPhone—if you specify 1000 pixels, it will be 1000 pixels wide on the non-retina iPads, and 2000 pixels on the new iPad.

scrame• 14 years ago

Hooray! Another iteration of an expensive toy for tech managers trying to justify their jobs and people who think that money buys taste!

tlb• 14 years ago

Resolutionary. What a godawful marketing department word. The first thing you see. I miss Steve.

kaiwetzel• 14 years ago

The equivalent on the German Apple page seems to be "Sehvolutionär", literally "see-volutionary". (In case you thought it couldn't be worse.) Though I actually think it's a fun idea.

macrael• 14 years ago

It's not unprecedented. The Macbook Air was marketed with "Thinovation"

weiran• 14 years ago

There was also the funnest iPod.

benwerd• 14 years ago

I'm pretty psyched about the 1080p video. We just released our iPad app, which compresses video and shares it with people / teams, and my hope is that this will drive further adoption. Also, I want one, and I want to be able to share the video I take with it.

I do resent how poorly my iPad 1 performs now though. I only bought it 18 months ago!

warmfuzzykitten4• 14 years ago

Apple can't keep the Apple store up. Why are they surprised by the load?

robomartin2• 14 years ago

Why I will not be buying an iPad 3:

- Resolution: Who cares. - Camera: Who cares. - 4GLTE with a ridiculous price and cap. No thanks

I don't think there's anything really compelling about the iPad 3 for the masses. Sure, they'll sell a bunch of them, mainly because, well, that's what they are selling now.

Being on WiFi most of the time I don't see any motivation to get an iPad 3 over my iPad 2. Most of the time the iPad 2 is used to casually browse the web on the couch, play chess and mess around with other games. In none of these use cases has the iPad 2 screen resolution proven to be an issue at all.

Once usage becomes more serious iPad 2 goes on the shelf and I/we switch to computers. All of our home computers are equipped with a minimum of two 24inch 1920 x 1200 pixel screens. There is no way the iPad 2 or 3 experience can compete with this at any level.

I think Apple needs to fix the issue of carriers gouging customers for connectivity. We have four iPhones and two iPads. Why are we paying six fixed-cost, limited usage data plans when the devices are on WiFi most of the time? Why is it that we can't buy a "family" plan, if you will, and pay one fee for connectivity. That's what you do with DSL: You pay one amount for a data rate and it doesn't matter if you have one or fifteen computers attached to the service.

The next revolution in mobile might not come until the recurring costs involved in using these devices come under control.

jcfrei2• 14 years ago

I feel like apple is already slipping without steve jobs. calling the new ipad "the new ipad" certainly doesnt seem like a smart move (same goes with the iphone 4s - wouldnt you rather have an iphone 5?). and furthermore, there's again very little innovation in the device, the outside hasnt changed at all, albeit being a little thicker. just improving display resolution seems like a change most ipad2 users won't appreciate enough. I just feel like that apple is now just draining every penny from it's customers with small innovations and a huge brand - while still being unable to decide what to do with it's stockpiles of money.

lukev• 14 years ago

I actually agree with you to a large extent (especially on the iPhone 4s), but a vastly improved resolution + substantially better hardware do constitute a legitimate incremental release.

You can't really expect them to do a full redesign with every product iteration, especially when they've obviously already landed on a local maxima of aesthetics and usability.

jcfrei2• 14 years ago

yes but it still feels like those are rather intangible improvements to the average consumer. will he care so much about improved resolutions and processor speed? speaking of aesthetics, I would love to see a screen without bezel on the side (like the galaxy s3).

eternalmatt• 14 years ago

It sincerely bothers me that no where no the apple.com site, has Apple referred to his as the iPad 3. The closest thing to a new name that they've given is "The new iPad".

Please everyone stop calling this the iPad 3.

cageface2• 14 years ago

It says a lot that the longest thread thread here is about data plans. I guess this is a logical iteration of the iPad 2 but they really seem to have left the door open for an Android manufacturer to leap ahead here. Both this and the 4S feel like Apple on autopilot.

rbarooah5• 14 years ago

What would suggest they should have done to stay ahead?

cageface2• 14 years ago

If I could answer that question I'd be Steve Jobs.

dlsym• 14 years ago

Apple releases Ipad 3 - and no one cares.

shad0wfax2• 14 years ago

Wonder how many are willing to upgrade from Ipad 2? I have an Ipad 2, I don't see a need to upgrade.

I am sure the tablet devices will follow a similar cycle as iPhone. Upgrade once in 2 years. I am beginning to wonder, the only aspects that might make me want to upgrade to IPad 4 next year, could be faster processor and more memory, thus making the overall experience better. I am sure Apple will have some exclusive software that will run only on their latest device (ex: Siri), that might force me to upgrade. Given how I use the Ipad right now - Videos, Netflix and eBooks (very limited browsing), I am ok with what I have now.

Will be good to know some statistics on how many upgraded to Ipad 2 from Ipad 1.

bstar772• 14 years ago

Most of us moving up from the iPad2 already sold our iPads.

shad0wfax2• 14 years ago

Agree, that is an option to make it easier to decide to upgrade. The question is are you (and the others who sold their iPad2) gadget freaks that lust for new stuff, or do you really see a value in the upgrade.

What I am trying to figure out is, what keeps you(/me) wanting to upgrade to new tablets frequently, where as we are perfectly ok, running our 3+ year old Mac. Maybe the price point makes it more affordable to upgrade frequently.

mikemoka• 14 years ago

Everyone is speaking about bandwidth speed, but what about the first major product launch of the post-Steve era? What was your impression about it? A little bit of something clearly wasn't there if you ask me

demallien2• 14 years ago

I don't know. It was better than the last announcement, the day before Steve died. But then, I suspect that none of them were at their best that day. At any rate Tim seemed much more relaxed this time round. There were moments where he really did seem to be enjoying himself - the big thumbs up after the Siri Japan demonstration springs to mind, but there were a couple of other moments too.

marze• 14 years ago

In the presentation, Cook refers to the "new iPad" with no "3". Inside Apple, they probably have viewed what we call the iPad 1 and iPad 2 as the prequel 1 and prequel 2 to the actual iPad, which is only now finished.

joshAg• 14 years ago

Welp, this does it for me. As soon as i can get a completely carrier unlocked iPad in the bay area, I'm going to switch from my laptop (x61t) to this new iPad plus a dock and a BT keyboard and mouse. All I really need is an ssh/X-window server app, and I can run all my programs on my server or desktop.

jorisw• 14 years ago

1) It's spelled iPad. 2) It's not officially called iPad 3, just 'the new iPad'.

Apple releases Ipad 3

Related Stories