Predicting the “iPad Mini” internals | Hacker News Reader

Predicting the “iPad Mini” internals

marco.org

62 pointsBrajeshwar36 comments

> This is all speculation, of course, but I’m convinced: like the leaked Dock connector, this move is so ingenius that it’s most likely to be what Apple has really done.

Did I miss something? Why is the new Dock connector ingenius? It seems like a major pain in the ass (all new accessories, even really hard to change ones like those in cars).

This is where Marco talks about the new Dock connector: http://www.marco.org/2012/08/15/the-foolproof-dock-connector

Apple sure brings out weird feelings in people, it's like religion. I can't think of another company that would have people defending new proprietary connectors before any facts at all about it are released (or even if there will be a new connector at all!).

I agree with his hardware analysis, but IMO the big question is pricing.

If Apple prices an iPad Mini (wifi) at $299, there is still a reason for a person with no devices to consider a Nexus7 over an iPad Mini.

If the iPad Mini is $199 (or less), it probably kills the market for the Nexus 7 for device-naive users; Android people (or Apple haters) might still go with a Nexus 7, but in general the iTunes ecosystem is stronger, so it's better (on top of the hardware likely being better, if for no other reason than being newer rev -- and Apple Stores, better marketing, etc. would make it a slam dunk).

$249 iPad vs. $199 Nexus might be parity, but IMO it makes more sense for Apple to go $199 wifi and $249 and $299 products with more flash, 3G/LTE, etc.

The real risk is iPad Mini vs. iPad 3 sales cannibalization. I think there are enough women (who carry 7"-compatible purses) who would go for an iPad Mini at the same price as a regular iPad, so that would support pricing the iPad Mini at $299-399.

You might be right, we'll have to see. Apple's marketing is strong. But at the same price I personally would go with the 1280 x 800 Nexus over a 1024 × 768 iPad mini.

Here's a graphical illustration of why it'll probably be priced lower than $299, whether at $249 or $199:

http://www.iamconcise.com/main/the-reason-for-the-ipad-mini....

Apple has an excellent track record of not leaving price umbrellas under their products (even if it means releasing something super minimal, like a Mac Mini or iPod shuffle) nor do they usually create multiple products at the same price that cannibalize each other.

The second rule isn't as strong because it isn't nearly as big a problem as price umbrellas. They've often said (correctly) that if anyone's going to cannibalize their products it might as well be them, e.g. iPod sales declining because of the iPhone taking off.

I don't think this model applies to the whole product line. Obviously, different products have different price bottoms, and tablets won't go farther under $200 in the short term, so that end of the pyramid won't even be half-filled by an iPad mini. You can also see it this way: http://cl.ly/image/423I21222t0a

If the iPod line is any indicator (or some moves with the iPhone), then Apple is not really that concerned with sales cannibalization as long as you buy an Apple product. $249 would be interesting, but $199 would mimic the moves made in the iPod line. I would expect a $199 iPad mini ends the iPod touch line.

I think the 7" biggest potential is school age children. It is a good size and breaking the $200 barrier makes it particularly attractive to schools.

I finally got the Nexus 7, to get a picture of Jelly Bean and the Android ecosystem.

What the Nexus 7 lacks is a certain intuitiveness. I gave it to my almost 4 years old and she had to play along more with it, to grasp how to start up and use it. While using it, she accidentally accesses functions which distract her from using an app and I have to intervene. Which means the always on software buttons are no help.

Ok, you're talking of school children, but I think an iPad Mini with its better ecosystem for educational apps and general much stronger apps especially for kids is a better fit. Especially because when an app is opened, you are focused only on this app and no buttons to accidentally throw you out of it.

Also the homescreen of iOS is more intuitive, the homescreen plus separate app drawer cause confusion.

Maybe the Play Store can get better at educational apps. At least software wise, I don't feel it. It's more like a new form of PC instead of a tablet device.

But the PlayStation emulator I got is awesome :p

I would assume that school provided devices would include some kind of management system, locked down configuration, and apps, so there wouldn't be as much software difference between the two. iOS might be better out of the box, but Android is more customizable, so I could see an "Android for Classrooms" built which worked really well in that environment. That would only make sense in huge volumes, but the K-12 market is really big.

If you really want a kid's tablet, you should check out the Nabi 2:

http://www.nabitablet.com

It's been designed from the ground up for children ("kid mode" and "parent mode", an included rubber bumper and other attention paid to durability, kid-friendly launcher in kid mode, kid-focused app store with apps broken down by age, ...). The only big downside is that you can't get the Play Store on it (easily at least), though the Amazon Appstore isn't a problem (and most of the kid-focused apps seem to be in both).

My wife and I got one for our preschooler and she absolutely loves it.

To me, this is the future of kid's tablets (at least in the Android world) - targeted devices that fit into the larger ecosystem.

> The real risk is iPad Mini vs. iPad 3 sales cannibalization.

If there's a market for a 7" tablet that's a risk to iPad 3, then Apple would rather capture that market, even at the risk of cannibalization. They're the same company that cannibalized their own iPod line with iPhone.

Interesting. This is quite similar to another analysis I came across [1] of why the iPad Mini could be priced in a range from $249 to $299, by going into a breakdown of the BOM (Bill of Materials) [2]

[1] http://www.tech-thoughts.net/2012/08/ipad-mini-bom-299-price...

[2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_of_materials

Actually, Walter Isaacson spends a few paragraphs in the Steve Jobs biography describing how Apple, in contrast to most other companies, was never afraid of cannibalizing its own sales. He also speculates that this was one of the main driving forces behind their success.

I found a blog post describing these passages specifically: http://beta.fool.com/bamckenna/2012/07/13/apples-playbook-th...

It won't be $200. You can bet on it.

Android is the better OS. I sold my iPad 2 and bought the Nexus 7 on the same day and I regret nothing.

The iPad mini would only kill the nexus for the apple fanboys.

It's the better OS for you. It's subjective, massively.

It would be interesting to repeat the "Android vs. iOS" (device specific, I guess) experiment with device-naive users (kids or maybe old/poor/foreign people?) every few months.

Clearly the iOS/iPad/etc. was far superior at one point (especially when it was the only device!); it's likely it changes over time, but that for anyone familiar with one or the other, switching costs predominate.

Oddly enough personal experience within my family is they try Android to get their feet wet, find it overly frustrating and end up getting an iOS device. At least 3-4 family members I can think of, one being my girlfriend who hated everything but the ability to customise it. Different strokes for different folks.

Did they try stock Android, or devices with crap custom interfaces made by HTC and Samsung ? frankly, I wouldn't buy anything unless it has stock android, or let me root it and install stock android. I don't want TouchWiz or Sense. Having a bad experience with Android does not necessarily mean that someone hates android, it just means they hate that particular flavor of Android. Hardware manufacturers (Apple is the exception) tend to suck a LOT when it comes to writing software and it's a real pity that Google didn't chose to do the same thing as Microsoft and enforce their stock UI. Thank god for the Nexus line. Google has a really good OS but the worst strategy.

Android used to be inferior to iOS, but I feel that it has not only reached feature parity now, it has actually gotten much better. I used to feel the wow-factor a lot the first few times I handled my iPad, and none of the iOS update ever made me feel that again, on the other hand, Android Jelly Bean on the Nexus 7 has quite a few things that really surprised me, in a good way.

An example : when browsing places like Slashdot, I often had to zoom in to click comments and show those that are hidden because the links are often close together and too tiny to hit with the finger (which means that without zooming in I often hit the wrong one), and then zoom out to read the page at the correct size. It felt like a chore. But when I got my Nexus 7 and browsed places like Slashdot and Reddit (I don't use custom apps for websites), and tried to hit a link without zooming in, I had the pleasant surprise of seeing a zoom popping up with the cluster of links that were on the place where my finger hit, I tap the link I want in the pop up and it automatically disappear and I don't have to manually adjust the zoom of the page. It was the "Link Preview" feature of Google Chrome. Amazing. I will never be able to use another device again, if only because of that one feature, unless someone else copies it (the irony).

I haven't found a single thing I missed from iOS on the Nexus 7 - Jelly Bean, on the other hand, I discovered things I will miss if I were to leave Android (something that will probably never happen).

Feature wise, Android has left iOS in the dust. You may have a subjective preference to iOS's UI but there is no denying that iOS has less features than Android.

So here's how this goes: people buy an iPhone and get a clean experience out of the box, people buy a HTC or Samsung and deal with a crappy UX whilst respectable geeks tell them to root and flash it.

That's fine for you but not a non-geek no matter how easy it is. It doesn't matter if it's stock Android or not, their experience is tainted in a heartbeat. Having a bad experience with any form of Android will put someone off unless they know the difference, which most don't and don't care about.

I like how Marco spins this, how he's just casually reviewing his logs at the end of the day, sees a couple of numbers out of place, spins through a Sherlockian series of deductions and has a sudden moment of clarity about Apple's hardware plans. And he's right, of course.

Can we rename hackernews to marconews?

Marco views are insightful because he's the creator of 'Instapaper' ~ http://www.instapaper.com/ a pretty useful x-platform tool. Your comment is a bit snarky for a 1 submission, '140' day old account ~ http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=mmanfrin

Is my number of submissions really indicative of anything? My comment was made because this was the second marco.org post I've seen today, and at least the 5th overall. That's a lot.

In general, people who don't put effort into posting interesting submissions, don't usually have the standing to make dismissive claims about other people's submissions, particularly with backhanded snark.

I read that as snark about people upvoting the submission and as a consequence placing it on the front page, not the submitter.

Well, I take five Marco posts over Techcrunch. Maybe a possible explanation: I subscribe to his feed but he hasn't comments on his blog, so when I see a hackernews submissions of Marcos posts I always click into it to read the comments here.

If HN would just put those counts next to each username (perhaps denoted by decorative badges) it would naturally reinforce the hierarchy and save honorable members of the inner party from dirtying themselves with smacking down the masses.

Normally someone's length of exposure to HN isn't particularly relevant to their contribution, but when they are making a snarky claim as to what HN is, or isn't, it's relevant.

Marco's just made a few interesting posts recently - I noticed that the people who have submitted his posts rarely do, and, there has also been a diversity of posters as well. For example, of the 300 submissions that Brajeshwar has made in close to 3 years, this is the first time he has submitted one of marco's blog posts.

How does creating Instapaper make his views on a hypothetical device's internal hardware any more interesting than anyone else's?

As far as I can see, the only thing that came from Instapaper were the "2,5" and "2,6" strings - the rest of the analysis, while potentially insightful, is not related to Instapaper at all.

No, I do not find the article bad. It's a good one or maybe above that. And it's not even Brajeshwar's fault(submitter) to bring it on top, I am sure upvoters did that.

However, your comment is very stupid for a 'many submissions', '2017' days old account ~ http://news.ycombinator.com/user?id=bootload.

Because you implied two things:

  1. When Mozart farted it became a sonnet.

  2. People, who are new on HN, do not have to be sarcastic (while others can)

I see commenters here are misreading the word "Predicting" as "Announcing".

>>It’s a textbook Tim Cook supply-chain move: selling the last generation’s hardware at a lower price point to expand market share.

That's pretty brilliant, if true. If iPad Mini is indeed released this fall, it has the potential to sweep the floor with any other 7" tablet that has been released so far. It's going to be very interesting to watch.

"Predicting the “iPad Mini” internals" Why? you don't have any other work to do.

Kidding :D

But i'm sick of people going crazy after Rumors of any i<Whatever> device.

Predicting Apple gets pageviews, and getting pageviews is one of the author's jobs: http://www.marco.org/sponsorship

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