What Is the ‘iPad Pro,’ and Why Might Apple Make One?
This Thursday, Apple will hold yet another special event and announce yet another line of expensive metal rectangles. One mystery whose solution Apple will reveal: How big will the new iPads be?
The Apple rumor blogs, bless their obsessive souls, have floated the possibility of what’s been unofficially dubbed the “iPad Pro.” Essentially, this would be a larger iPad, with a screen size that might match that of your laptop computer.
Below is a brief summary of what Apple watchers think this iPad Pro might look like, and why Apple might want to make one.
I don’t get it. First they make an iPad mini. Now they’re making an iPad Plus?
Right? It’s like big then small then — make up your dang mind, Apple. It could’ve at least changed the shape into something more exciting than a rectangle (heart, star, peace sign).
Anyway, you’re not mistaken. Apple’s most recent iPad release did indeed include the iPad Air (9.7 inches), and the Retina iPad mini (7.9 inches). But that was then, this is now, and if the rumors are true, Apple is going BIG.
OK, sooo … how big?
In late August, Bloomberg reported that it’d be 12.9 inches, which coincidentally is also the size of Apple executive Craig Federighi’s hairdo. For an actual size comparison, 13 inches is probably around the size of your laptop’s display, give or take an inch or two. Just imagine that screen on an iPad, without the keyboard.
Is that all that’s different about it?
Well, no. It would likely include, as Taiwan’s TechNews reports, an A8X graphics chip. This would be a step up from the A8 processor that Apple debuted inside the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus. This chip would also make it easier to run high-resolution graphics on a larger screen, which would mean a better iPad gaming experience.
Since it’s bigger, it’ll probably also include more memory. Specifically 2 GB of RAM instead of just 1, according to the same site, which would help you run applications faster and perhaps also multitask.
That seems kind of boring. Anything else?
We’ve also heard murky stuff about the addition of a Touch ID fingerprint scanner for all new versions of the iPad. Plus, there’ve been videos floating around that hint at the ability to have more than one application open on a screen at once (which, we should note, would not be a new feature for tablets in general; check the Microsoft Surface and Samsung’s tablets for examples).
Nobody really knows which of those things apply to which iPad, of course.
So what’s the point of making them bigger?
For one, Apple’s iPad sales have been in a bit of a slump for the past couple of quarters, and it needs to do something new to get customers excited again.
Meanwhile, the size of the average smartphone has been growing — even, as we witnessed at the company’s special event in September, for Apple. So the logic might follow that tablets need to go big or become irrelevant.
Lots of blogs also suggest, with little evidence, that a larger screen could make the tablet attractive to businesses who may be looking to replace company personal computers and laptops with tablets but want something a little more powerful than what’s out there now.
It would also be a good way for Apple to push its iWork suite as a replacement for Microsoft Windows’ Word, PowerPoint, and Excel in large companies. In fact, Apple partnered with IBM in July to do just that.
So when should I expect to see this monster of a tablet?
All signs point to early 2015. It’s unlikely we’ll see the iPad Pro in real life until the new year. Perhaps we’ll know more about its estimated time of arrival after the company’s iPad-centric announcement on Thursday, at 1 p.m. Eastern.
Oh, and did we mention we’ll be there?
No.
We’re liveblogging it! Check back tomorrow for more!
Follow Alyssa Bereznak on Twitter or email her.
