iPad mini
apple.com
apple.com
Less conceptually fragile, less expensive, more portable, same software stack, same media stack, same OS, same UX, same premium experience, same monstrous manufacturing and distribution reach, same monstrous advertising and product awareness engine.
Every single one of the children you see in restaurants working an iPad so mommy and daddy can eat in peace will have one of these by January.
Schools will buy in by the hundreds of thousands, regardless of actual utility or how successful digital textbooks eventually become.
This is the new travel iPad. This is the status gift for the developing world. This is the throwaway iPad if you're rich or the first one you look at if you're less so.
It's priced to make Apple the margins they want while still inviting comparisons with less expensive and similarly sized tablets. It's going to suck the oxygen out of the $300-$500 price range for anything with a screen.
And it's cheap enough to substantially distinguish itself from the main iPad line, which is selling millions a week. That's all it had to do, pricing-wise.
I don't want or need this, and I don't think it was particularly necessary for the health of the iPad line, but they dotted all the Is and crossed all the Ts when designing this product.
I've been really critical of Apple lately, but I can't find any reason to get upset over this announcement. I find it funny how people are railing against this announcement just because its not useful to them. There are a million different needs and uses out there for different people.
A and B do not contradict. B does not invalidate A.
I can answer my own question: Apple doesn't want people to share these devices: fewer sales.
Not saying they won't look at it in the future but We have a family iPad and its no problem. My wife can see my email but she's my wife so I honestly don't care. Our neighbours have two between six of them and similarly have no issues.
People with a tech background worry about this more than most people but they also tend to be the sort of people who have their own devices. For normal families the current situation is a relatively minor problem - considerably less of an issue than both kids wanting it at once I suggest.
I also tend to enable Airplane mode by default when I hand my phone or iPad to my daughters.
Bingo.
Apple wants people to share iPads only to the extent that doing so gives other people a trial of the product, and ideally, a burning desire for it. Apple doesn't want the kids sharing Mom's iPad; Apple wants kids bugging Mom half to death for their own iPads.
Apple has trapped itself into a corner with the Apple ID. Apple puts on regular seminars for local school districts every 6 months or so in my area about how to integrate iPads for K12, and it is just brutal. At least 60% of the answers from the Apple rep is usually "you can't use it like that".
The hardships all come from the way that the Apple ID works. Apple wants the iPad to be a "personal device" for one person, but obviously in a school setting it doesn't work that way. The workarounds they have for school districts are laughable to the point that the Apple rep(s) always admit it to us when talking about manageability, security and tracking.
I love my iPad, but its just not enterprise/public school/multiuser friendly yet.
Which is very clever, they know their competitors are going for price, but now they've forced them to commit to seriously low margins. Always helpful to keep your competition struggling to make meaningful profit.
[edit: math (doh!)]
I honestly can't tell whether it's the 'new Apple product' shine, but I like the idea of a 7.9inch screen better than a 7inch.
That said, my Samsung Galaxy S III has 1280x720 resolution which makes it really nice for watching Netflix, TED videos, etc. And the Galaxy phone is very light weight.
I have decided to not buy anymore Apple gear, but if not for that, if I was in the market for an iPad, I would rather have this smaller one that is less than half the weight.
I see the mini competing more with 'super phones' like the Samsung Galaxy S III.
do the pixels weigh more? Seriously, would faster graphics weigh more? Or are you saying juicing the graphics would eat more battery, and therefore, it would weight more?
The backlight being the lion's share of the battery consumption, this requires a significantly larger battery.
(iPad 3 was launched with the retina screen a year after the iPad 2. And 2 years after the iPad 1)
There are plenty of great iPad specific apps.
Care to share?
Musical apps is something you won't get in the Android Eco-system basically because the OS itself sucks at it(although 4.1 seems to have improved a bit on that side).
With this in mind(musical apps), I will always favor the iPad (mini) over an Android tablet.
Been using them for lives & recording demos (iPad+MiC+Jam). the iPad never crashes(not like Android that freezes a lot).
Obviously you do no get a full pc stack and the quality is still not there so I resort to the Mac for more functionality/sound treatment but you can enjoy quite very much if you can't afford the thousands that cost Native Instruments softs or real hardware synths/drum machines.
Also (IMO) latest versions of Android wipe the floor with iOS when it comes to user experience and options. And N7 is quad core with Tegra, superb build quality and larger resolution for less money.
For this reason alone, I truly hope that digital textbooks become viable.
Should they use something new? I don't want governments to pay (even more?) bazillions to Apple or Samsung, but making their own will also come expensive.
Ideas?
Districts probably aren't going to care, as they are looking for a cheaper way to stay current. I recognize the prices are not as good as they should be, but realize the logistics are removed from the situation. The monster of having to manage all those books goes away with a keypress, but lands them squarely on a treadmill with the publishers controlling the dial.
Open school books? Maybe teachers will collaborate and make their own material? There's a lot of room in there...
Psychologically this is interesting because Apple is pulling at a lot of strings here. They want consumers to feel good about buying the product. Not resentful it's not the thing they really wanted but couldn't afford. Part of it is almost Pavlovian. The customer pays more but in the process is rewarded in different ways. For having the taste to pick the perceived superior brand for example. It's an item coveted by others, again if only because it's perceived to be superior, and it's an item that broadcasts it's premium price tag like a badge of honor with a striking design. The customer enjoys the experience of everyone swooning over their new purchase. They like the idea thousands of people are waiting in line to get this thing they are holding in their hands right now. This is even more important in the context of giving Apple products as gifts. Buying someone the cheap but acceptable option sends one message. Buying someone the expensive and also acceptable option sends a different message.
Basically Apple cracked the code of getting people to pay more and be pretty happy about it.
At 7.9 inches, it’s perfectly sized to deliver an experience every bit as big as iPad
What does that even mean? Either it's perfectly sized, and the iPad is the wrong size. Or it's not. There can surely only be one perfect size to deliver an iPad experience??? Either it's 10" or it's 7.9".
I think Apple's marketing has always been the same - it's just that for a while they were ahead of the curve and so their hyperbole was justified. The iPhone was amazing. The Macbook Air is still amazing. But there is absolutely FUCK ALL amazing about a smaller fucking iPad.
They said it about the iPod too- claiming that having less capacity than the creative nomad and no built in radio made it "lame" (CmdrTaco famously said this.)
They said it about the iMac as well, calling it a toy computer that looked like candy. Funny how in 2 years all the other manufacturers were making their computers colorful, and the bondi-blue design aesthetic was adopted by a wide variety of products around the world.
Now I'm sure somewhere there are people who were not even 10 years old when the iMac was being put down are saying the iPad mini is lame. For the same reasons.
Then when the product strikes a nerve with the public, and sells 100 million units, they decide that the people buying it must be stupid and persuaded by slick marketing, because obviously its "lame" or "doesn't have the specs" of the competition (though they never detail how it lacks specs and usually they're completely wrong and ignoring the terrible usability of the competition.)
It's the standard issue mythology of the apple hater:
Apple products are inferior (even when they aren't.) Apple products are more expensive (even though they aren't.) Apple buyers are stupid and easily persuaded by slick marketing (even though it should be obvious that people buy Apple products because they work better for them.)
Consequently, EVERY Apple product introduction is "underwhelming".
That said, Apple are inviting some of these comparisons. "More expensive", for example. The iPad Mini is more expensive than a Nexus 7, by a significant margin. Apple invited the comparison by comparing the two devices themselves on stage.
No amount of competitive marketing seems to have brought the two product families into competition beyond "well I heard the iPad has books too but my friend loves her Kindle".
The only reason the Galaxy Note gets a pass is because it's still mentally categorized as a big telephone.
I'm not sure why, given the sales of the "mini" form factor. I kind of suspect they're more concerned with positioning themselves against jumbo phones, which -are- selling in volume and have already invited a major design change in the iPhone line.
I don't know if this is necessarily the right conclusion.
For me what it comes down to in the end is the same, which is easier to hand off to a relative and not worry about.
Answer : the iPad.
I provided many family members with PCs over the years all the while using Apple products. Why? Because I knew they could just pop into a local store and buy software for it. Because I knew Windows was common and they most likely had it at work. Because I knew if their machine had an issue either I could solve it quickly or Dell's support would. Heck Dell even sent someone to my parents house to fix the unit!
Well something similar is happening here. I know if I give them an iPad they won't be lacking for software. It is a packaged experience with a dearth of support.
So, yeah they cost a bit more upfront, but for me the lack of having to "fix" something is worth the premium. It also means they know what it is and understand the intrinsic value. If I hand them a Google Nexus the first questions will be to compare it to an iPad... and well, why bother.
Neither is "better" than the other, it entirely depends on your circumstances- what you want your tablet to do, how much money you have, etc. etc.
Same for iMacs. Don't compare an iMac with a clone in a tower. Compare it to a similar form factor: all in one, quiet, low power consumption.
If you buy it over an Apple, you get what you deserve. The quality from Lenovo has been declining since they bought the brand from IBM. Thinkpad's are a SHADOW of their former glory, sadly.
Here's something people don't factor in when buying laptops: Your expensive MacBook Pro is having issues? Well, visit an Apple store and get it fixed!
Your expensive Lenovo is having issues? Well... mail it back...
But you still didn't make the comparison, you told other people to do it. Until you make the comparison, I'm still betting that the Lenovo cuts corners in a variety of ways to make the product cheaper, and as a consumer you have to accept those cost-cutting trade offs.
For example, while there are laptops much cheaper than the Air, the ultra books with similar specs, weight, battery life, and build quality aren't really cheaper. Another way to look at is that while Apple doesn't sell a $500 laptop, you don't get less in a $1,200 MBA than comparable $1,200 PC laptops.
Turns out it became the best selling iPod of all time.
While I agree some of the texts on the iPad mini page could have been better written, it's as usual just marketing speak designed to push interested customers that extra cm they need to do a purchase.
Like all tech companies, Apple needs to be able to do subtle iterations and improvements, and their marketing teams are left to try to add an "r" to every evolution.
Unless they are designed for different usage scenarios.
"At 7.9 inches, it’s perfectly sized to deliver an experience every bit as big as iPad"
It's "perfectly sized" for the role it's filling (one hand, more mobile, like a pulp novel, whatever), and iPad is "perfectly sized" for it's own role (around the house, larger games, magazine reading, whatever). They can both be "perfectly sized" in a marketing world, and I'm sure the design team fussed over the exact dimensions for a LONG time.
It's "an experience" "as big as the iPad" to emphasize that it will run all the existing apps, vs their comparisons to a "scaled up phone experience". The marketing here emphasizes that the compact experience is 'just as good'. I do wonder how well UI elements will scale down, but in a marketing world it makes a certain kind of sense to me.
Yes, these claims are a bit silly, especially in a literal sense, but recall that the original iPad was "magical". It's pretty typical marketing phrasing, especially for Apple.
That said, I frequently find the phrasing funny too.
"Nothing new, no one will buy it"
and
"It's too radical, no one will buy it"
With the iPad mini and the iPhone 5, have they completely forgotten how small thumbs are? It's marketing BS.
https://www.apple.com/ipad-mini/overview/#video-ipad-mini-fe...
This leaves irrelevance, perhaps, but given the context of this thread I'd argue it's not that either.
[citation needed]
* Lighter - that is correct, it is ~75g lighter than KF & N7
* Better battery life - citing the tech specs, it gets 10h browsing, surfing etc. the same as N7 and 1h less than KF's (these are all advertised)
* Bigger display - Yes it is bigger in inches, but it is lower resolution than both KF and N7 - meaning pictures are going to look worst. And the mini won't be able to do true 720p.
* Faster processor - Comparing apples and oranges here, provide a citation.
And I left out the cameras. The iPad Mini has (it appears) an actually good camera, whereas the Kindle Fire has none and the Nexus 7 (I think) only has a (poor) front camera -- never figured out how to use it if it's there.
But no LTE on a portable device is just ridiculous. I'm going to jump on the iPad mini as soon as it releases.
I'm not sure how representative of any market I am, but Google could have had me as a customer from day 1 if they had had LTE on the Nexus; instead, I'll be giving more money to Apple.
It's a couple of taps to tether to my phone. I'm already paying for a mobile connection and I can't use two accounts at once.
But truthfully, all the Nexus 7 really did was make me want an iPad mini, because the device itself is very frustrating. Reading a PDF? Half the screen is a garbly mess since only one page gets rendered nicely. Drives me nuts.
Even Chrome (which runs plenty fast) has a terrible time recognizing taps on links. I find myself tapping, and tapping, and tapping, and finally, it does something.
I'm ordering an iPad mini for personal usage, and expect it to sell crazy numbers of units, if my experience is at all typical. The size difference is so important that for a month now I've put up with crappy UX even as my larger iPad was in arm's reach.
Also, every iPad I've bought has had cellular; I'm surprised Google doesn't offer that for extra $$$ on the Nexus 7. The only place I do use my iPad now is in the car, and the iPad mini (with LTE) will replace both devices.
It's much nicer than accidently hitting a link, then have to hit back after a second or two.
What's annoying is when it doesn't pick up taps on links that stand alone, which is the case, on, e.g. HN. The tap "targeting" for Chrome seems particularly poor.
I'm probably still buying the mini. It may be boring, but its still the best of its competitors. Only microsoft's stuff might make me reconsider. I've been really impressed by the lumia phones, which have a better UX than the iphone in my opinion. I can imagine a tablet with windows rt being a joy to use as well.
Bigger phone, smaller tablet...yawn.
Do you have any suggestions for something better than the canonical icon grid?
(I'm only asking this because you wrote "... never before shown the slightest interest in an Apple offering.")
it is saying you are too cheap to buy an bigger iPad, so you should buy this instead.
The increase in width from the 7.9" screen is surely going to mean that this won't which is a pity.
(Totally agreed on the fits-in-pocket thing as a key value point, though!)
I also suspect that lots of doctors will buy these. I suspect this will fit very nicely into a lab coat, and the form factor will be a much better fit for doctors with easier one handed operation.
I, personally, would buy the Kindle Fire. Most people, however, will buy the iPad Mini. Bigger price and all.
Curiously enough, I think the iPad 2 has just become the most compelling tablet in the market in terms of price/specs/performance. I'm wondering if iPad 2 will eat into sells of the new iPads? And would Apple care?
Anyway, interesting times.
Also, bear in mind that the mini doesn't have to push around 4X pixels like the Retina iPads, so it can get by with less RAM and processor.
The inverse is not true. See the early reviews of the Kindle Fire HD, where the device is described as sluggish and laggy despite having better specs than the Nexus 7.
So the fact that something has faster hardware does not mean the one has a UX advantage over the other.
Of course, it's not like the two concepts UX and specs were independent; all of these things have an impact on the user experience, along with many others.
Everybody is going to buy this.[1]
[1]iPod mini
Can you enumerate these "worse specs?"
Like Bezos said recently, successful people change their mind, especially when confronted with great evidence like the Nexus 7.
Judging by the photos of the prototype iPad, I wonder if they ever made a prototype this size before deciding on the original iPad specs.
Anyway, I'm glad they didn't make it retina.
Why? Seems like a step backwards. iPhone, MacBook Pro, iPad... Apple pushes the need for Retina and then produces a new product that doesn't have it?
Since these devices are hand held, I prefer weight over screen res.
oops
so if you designed a button to be as small as a finger for the ipad, it's now too small.
The tap targets on an iPad mini are exactly the same size as they are on an iPhone or iPod touch (which also confirms that Apple is using the same equipment to produce the iPad mini screen panels as they used for the iPhone 3GS — they're just cutting the panels in a different size).
“I think there’s a method to Apple’s madness in recommending 44-point-or-larger tap targets for all iOS apps, both on the iPhone and iPad, despite the fact that on the iPad-as-we-know-it, each point is physically larger than a point on the iPhone or iPod Touch. (1 point maps directly to 1 pixel on iPad 1/2 and older iPhones; 1 point maps to a 4-pixel square on the iPad 3 and iPhone 4/4S.) A 44-point tap target on the rumored iPad Mini would be exactly the same physical size as a 44-point tap target on the iPhone.”
It's not like Apple even does either. The recent iOS 6 apps store on iPhone is a good example of something where they made the tap targets too small to expand app updates and it was very frustrating. They finally fixed that just recently so that the target was much larger.
I'm also wondering if they've made any iPad mini specific changes to OS elements to enhance the usability - namely if there's been any changes to touch targets
This could end up a huge mess.
Smaller ipad -> smaller icons -> harder to tap
I must say, I've consistently been impressed with Apple's copy writing.
I honestly was relieved whenever Phil Schiller came onto stage today.
Superlatives are annoying, yes, but at least in the passage I quoted, I appreciate the word play and efficiency of the phrasing.
Yeah.
Other folks have smaller form factor devices, the Dell 'Streak' [1] being an early example of an Android based device that started out at 5" and 'grew' to 7". 5" was not very successful and mocked as being an unwieldy phone, the larger size was better.
Laptops got 'huge' the 17" one being the pinnacle, and then 'small' again with the most popular models being 13 - 16"
Other tablets came out in 6, 7, 9, 10, 11" sizes at various levels of acceptance or not.
The Kindle was the first e-reader with a solid market foot print, it was 'small'. E-readers of 7" are common.
So dialing all of that together you end up with a bunch of different designers trying different ideas and some of them are successful and some aren't. The same designers look at the successful products and try to extract what aspects of the design were critical, which weren't? How did people use them, how did people think of them, what did people want that they didn't get.
So this market is evolving.
So the folks at Apple see these things and try to capture as much of the market as they can. They saw folks buying a bunch of Kindle fires and Nexus 7's and hey, they could do that.
I'm completely conflicted because I like the idea of an A6x iPad but I really like to 30 pin connector on my 3rd Gen iPad.
On the plus side for the N7, they screwed up on price though - for the ecosystem and build quality advantage may be a $50 premium would have been attractive esp for lesser screen resolution and older CPU/GPU. The N7 also feels like it should be more single hand friendly than the iPad mini.
In my experience, Android apps on tablets are horrible. Apple has the upper hand here in controlling the hardware, and releasing the iPad mini with the same resolution as the iPad 2 was a really smart move. Instant compatibility with all existing apps.
iOS apps are laid out in pixels, while Android apps are laid out with physical units (in, mm) or density-independent pixels, which means that a screen size change doesn't necessarily mean a usability change on Android. Two totally different layout mechanisms, and while this means that Android apps are less precise in their layouts, I'll argue that it improves usability across a range of devices.
Look at the top-selling Android tablets. Every single one has a different screen resolution/pixel density; Nexus 7 has 1280x800 (216 ppi), Kindle Fire HD has 1024x600 (169 ppi), Nook HD has 1440x900 (243 ppi), Galaxy Tab 7.7 has 1280x800 (197 ppi), etc.
It's an absolute nightmare for developers, and this is just tablets. The Android smartphone market is even more fragmented, and there is just as much variation in display specifications.
Hardware control has everything to do with it.
I don't really think hardware control is the issue here.
The fragmentation in smartphones is incomparably worse than the tablet market. But Android has nice ways of dealing with it in display-independent ways, and they work.
iPod + iPhone.. as far as I can tell are identical apart from the iPod cannot make calls.
iPad is a giant version of the iPod... which I really like to use to browse the web on the sofa.
We now have the iPad Mini which is that awkward size which is too big put in your pocket and yet you don't want to put it in your backpack as you could put your netbook / iPad / laptop in your bag.
I am sure they will sell plenty. I just don't really get it. Its like innovation has stalled at Apple. How many sizes can we make the iPhone?
Beyond this the iMac is incredibly disappointing. Its thin! Oh well. No SDD. No Retina Display. Probably has a little spec boost over last model. Its disappointing. Glad I didn't wait for it.
Neither does the iPod have a data modem. It's not an always-connected communicator like the iPhone. There's a big difference in utility between always-online and mostly-online.
The result is iPhone 5 with additional row of icons. And iPad Mini with disappointing ppi. This is classic technical debt.
And yes, it is this resolution solely to support legacy applications, possibly to reduce costs. But i can only speculate on the latter.
The original android g1 had greater PPI (180) than this thing.
The pixel density for the new iPad mini sits between the iPad 2 and iPad 3 with Retina display. As far as I'm aware, no one was complaining about the iPad 2 display.
In any case, I suspect the choice of resolution was driven more by compatibility concerns (i.e. it can run iPad 2 apps unscaled), and this paves the way for a 'Retina display' iPad mini at some point in the future.
Mainly, they are usually on the cutting edge of manufacturing technology for their parts. This year it is lamination, and there are only so many factories capable of doing this kind of lamination. I think doing the lamination for a retina display at this size would have restricted the manufacturing options and that capacity they'd rather put into the new iMac, Macbook Pros and retina iPad.
Secondly, cost. Retina is 4 times the pixels, and presumably significantly more expensive. A smaller display like this at the same resolution as the original iPad is going to be closer to retina than the original iPad.
Thirdly, it gives a nice upgrade for the future, to incentivize people to replace their device in a year or two. When the cost of the retina technology has dropped enough they can upgrade the mini to the same resolution as the iPad retina.
For new products, Apple tends to choose a mix of cutting edge and safe. The A5 is currently in volume production so it is a safe choice, where it was cutting edge last year, for instance.
Apple also has a food-chain. The newest processor goes to the newest product, and the secondary products (like the iPod touch and now iPad mini) which are in more price sensitive market positions (for instance the iPhone is subsidized by carriers but the iPod touch is not) tend to get the established one-generation-behind processors that are already cheaper to make. This way the A5 design lasts longer and the manufacturing capacity that is making it can keep making it.... while the A6 works on the lower feature size (requiring a more cutting edge fab).
For instance the A6 is, I believe 20 or 22 nonometeres, while the A5 was made on a 32 nanometer feature size.
Intel might be fabbing at 22nm, and probably some DRAM and NAND is on 22nm, but nobody is doing anything complex on 22nm right now. The rest of the ARM industry is on 28nm, and one of the things Apple gets by moving to TSMC is 28nm (TSMC are generally ahead of Samsung's fabs, but not by that much).
I also don't think they're withholding retina or cpus from anything so they can introduce that feature in coming years, this technology is moving crazy fast, it's already expected in higher end phones and tablets and after that it becomes normal.
Cost is the only reason they'd withhold anything, they target a market and what that market can pay and then they cram as much as they can into that price without sacrificing their enormous margins.
It's the old adage: buy on the rumor, sell on the news. I wouldn't read too much into it. The only time I really pay attention to what the street thinks about Apple is when earnings are announced.
However, you can be pretty sure what the price will do a couple of days before and the day of an announcement.
Absolutely. Apple could sell all their products for 20-50% off and still make a profit.
This is not the business Apple are in. They do not want to.
Seeings they are the biggest company in the world, I suspect their decision to not reduce margins is working.
2. Critics yawn, criticize etc.
3. AAPL goes down
4. Many speculate as to what Jobs would or would not have done, joke about rolling in grave, call for Tim Cook to be fired etc.
5. Apple makes a mint's worth of money, AAPL hits new high.
It's been happening for 5 years. It's not just unsurprising, it's predictable.
especially if the underside was also an eInk display
the 16GB Nexus 7 will drop to $200, with the 32GB release.
appears to already be sold out now
The other thing that iBooks is sorely missing is the ability to use two fingers to zoom in and out of a page. I really don't understand why we have to look at a page with a one inch white border all the way around the page on a digital device, which forces a smaller font to fit the same content.
I think that the iPad mini might just stress the need or a better user experience in software such as iBooks.
Personally, I'm grateful someone is sticking to the 4:3 aspect ratio. If that made a comeback on laptops and monitors, so much better.
Apple is now on the back foot and is heading towards market saturation and commoditisation via Android and intense foreign competition. Consequently I have held a large short position from 700 and will continue to do so following my sale of AAPL stock following the Samsung case - unless something changes.
You can only win in the brutal consumer electronics space by inventing the future. Otherwise you're just another commodity producer. You can't defeat the entire market by just doing more of the same.
Not impressed.
If it ran vanilla Android, it would have been a no-brainer for many of us.
Sure, with the 3g model you can still use iMessage, Whats App, Skype, etc- but you're missing out on regular voice calls and SMS.
From an engineering perspective- is it that difficult to add a sim card slot and the extra cell antennas?
I'm more excited about the new iMacs. They look great.
Resolution might be the same as iPad 2, but pixel density is different. Therefore an area that is clickable on iPad2 or iPad3 may become too small to click on the iPad mini.
So we had two platforms - iPad2/iPad3 with one tap area size, and iPhone 4/iPhone 5 with another, and now we have three.
I couldn't add a mouse or command-tab between programs. (without jailbreaking).
I'd pay for an update for these software features.
Why is it so hard to build an iPad or iPhone that speaks LTE on 800MHz?
That said, if you own an iPhone 3G, an iPhone 4, an iPod, an iPod Mini, an iPad, and then go and buy an iPad Mini, I am judging you.
The iPhone (original and 4S) were both great devices but too small. I could carry them everywhere, but the reading and browsing experience was cramped, by necessity of the small screen.
The iPad (original and Retina) are big, and lovely for reading and browsing, but too big to hold with one hand. This really is an issue for me, the way I sit when I'm reading... it ends up limiting my use of what otherwise would be a fantastic device.
So, the mini seems perfect. Light enough to hold, big enough to get a fantastic reading and browsing experience. I know it will be a little cramped compared to the iPad (well, expect it will be, but the same resolution original iPad was not cramped at all) but that's a fine tradeoff for being able to use it, literally, everywhere.
I like that they decided to start at $329 with 16GB, about perfect pricing for me. We spent over $650 on our retina iPad with LTE, and ended up not using the LTE much at all.
For our startup, which is heavily involved in iOS, and all of us have iOS devices, we will probably buy 2-3 of these minis.
In fact, I think I'm personally, done with the iPad and iPhone... I don't need the phone part (which is why I've mostly bought iPod touches) .... only went with it because the original iPad was not as portable as I'd like.
So, I'm totally stoked that this device is as it was rumored... I see no downsides to it at all.
Given that my primary use case will be reading, I now have to decide between a Kindle Paperwhite or the iPad Mini, with the one additional input that my kids would love to have another iPad in the house.
The only downside is PDF viewing, which you should still leave to device with more serious CPU and some auto-crop and fancy scrolling support (e.g., by quarter-pages).
Part of the good thing about the kindle is that I can just hold it still and keep reading, especially useful in bed.
I wonder how well PDFs render on it.
"Rethinking the screen meant we also had to rethink the software behind it. iPad mini intelligently recognizes whether your thumb is simply resting on the display or whether you’re intentionally interacting with it. It’s the kind of detail you’ll notice — by not noticing it."
Source: http://www.macstories.net/stories/ipad-mini-our-complete-ove...
I have an iPad 3. I found it too damn heavy for comfortable reading. So I bought a Google Nexus 7. Which is exactly the right size, and a delight ... except that most (not all) Android apps look like they were beaten with the ugly stick. The aesthetics are terrible. I read on the thing for 4-20 hours a week and it's just increasingly grating.
I'll be buying an iPad Mini. I won't be ditching the Nexus 7 -- if nothing else, there are some apps that, frustratingly, can't appear in the iOS Store -- but I expect to be doing 90% of my tablet use on the iPad Mini (and may well end up off-loading the iPad 3, aka not-so-new-any-more iPad).
((Stuff the Nexus is good for: (a) Firefox, (b) TextMaker, (c) being able to fire up a command line and run vim and busybox. No, seriously. I get antsy if I don't have a shell prompt to hand ...))
Still like the Nexus 7 price point too. At $200 I'm cool travelling with it and if it got away from me it wouldn't be the end of the world.
(just finished The Fuller Memorandum on it btw...)
It seems like the Chrome OS is geared towards media consumption and productivity, while Android is kind of the "low cost open source" solution.
I'd argue that Android is already far more capable than Chrome OS is- I'm not entirely sure where Google are going with it.