Considering tough competition in the global tablet market from Google and Microsoft devices, Apple is all set to launch its revolutionized iPad line at a special event to be held tomorrow.
Apple’s upcoming iPads will definitely stand out at the invitation-only event, which has been scheduled just before the holiday shopping season spree to be held at San Francisco, analysts claim.
Stephen Baker, an NPD analyst, told AFP that Apple has a dual-folded task at hand – first give something exciting to its 9.7-inch tablet fans and secondly with the iPad Mini 2 “catch up with what everybody else has done.” According to the analyst, the tablet devices are facing competition from Microsoft’s range of touch-screen notebook PCs available between $350 and $500.
With increasing popularity of premium high-quality screen tablets in the seven- to eight-inch range, Apple is under immense pressure to adapt to the customer requirements.
Amazon, one of the leading online retailers, has started shipping new seven-inch Kindle Fire HDX tablets starting just £199.
Google’s latest range of Nexus 7 Android powered tablets is a popular seller among the buyers at a similar tempting price.
The emailed invitations for Apple’s October 22nd event revealed information not only about the time and place of the event but also carried a message which read as “We still have a lot to cover.” The email bore Apple’s iconic logo in the shape of an iPad under a shower of colorful leaves.
Rumors suggest that Apple might unveil a completely new version of its full-size iPad in a “narrower, thinner, and lighter” avatar.
There were reports that Apple will fit in TouchID on both its new tablets and release them in a gold color, but Ming-Chi Kuo, KGI Securities analyst, is of the opinion that Apple ‘probably’ will not fit in the fingerprint sensor on the tablets because it doesn’t have enough resources to incorporate the TouchID into iPad 5 and iPad Mini 2 as the resources are busy trying to fulfill iPhone 5S demands.
Kuo does mention that Apple will power both iPad 5 and iPad Mini 2 with its latest 64-bit A7 processor and the M7 motion coprocessor. The analyst has also revealed that the new iPads will have upgraded 8-megapixel cameras on the rear.
