Even though it looks like the enhanced iPad Pro with a Mini-LED screen has been bumped to next year due to the impact of COVID-19, we have fresh rumors of another new Apple tablet coming in 2021. There have already been rumblings about a new iPad Air coming in late Summer or Fall, but according to Ming-Chi Quo, we should also expect a new iPad in the second half of this year. Well, maybe.
While shipments of all tablets, including Apple’s iPads, were down over the first quarter of 2020, Digitimes Research is predicting a big rebound coming up. We should know more about the last three months after Apple announces its earnings later today, but what’s coming up sounds pretty exciting for iPad users and fans.
If you haven’t read Paris Martineau of Wired’s article iPads Are Crucial Health Care Tools in Combating Covid-19, then do yourself a favor and go take a look now. It’s a really insightful piece that shows the major impact that the iPad and other smart devices are having right now and in real-time across US hospitals and healthcare systems.
The iPad officially turned 10 years old yesterday! Hurray! A full decade has now passed and so much has changed with the hardware and software of the iPad and how I use them. It’s natural to look back after a milestone, so now is a good time to do just that. (You can see my previous strolls down memory lane here and here.)
Earlier today I read an article by Tom Warren at The Verge entitled Apple finally admits Microsoft was right about tablets. I wasn’t especially surprised considering that Warren has always been completely MS-centric. He’s a good writer and does his job well, but I he’s not the guy I look to for even-handed reporting.
As a full-time Windows user myself and someone who certainly doesn’t dislike the platform, I still heartily disagree with his take in this article.
9to5Mac has been a trusted source for Apple news for a long time. However, I didn’t really consider them to be quite on the level with Mark Gurman and Ming-Chi Kuo when it came to new device and iOS rumors. Gui Rambo has made quite an impact over the last couple of years revealing lots of information hidden inside of Apple’s various OS betas, but those details don’t start coming until after WWDC, when those of us with Apple Dev Accounts get our hands on the goodies.
I wrote about my first experience with the iPad back in January, right around the 10th anniversary of Steve Jobs announcing the device in 2010. As we close in on the 10th anniversary of the device’s release, I’ve been thinking a lot about where the iPad is today and the things I love about it, both new and old.
While I enjoyed using the original iPad and saw enormous potential in Apple’s tablet platform, it was the iPad 2 that really won me over. It was everything that was good about the iPad, just better all-around. It was thinner, lighter, faster and had better battery life. As big of a jump as we got from the original iPhone hardware to the iPhone 3G, this was even bigger. Add to that the fact that developers were fully onboard with making iPad-specific apps by this point thanks to the success of the first-gen device, and you had a really compelling package for the price.
Last Fall, Ming-Chi Kuo made a prediction that Apple was developing a new 16″ MacBook Pro and a new 12.9″ iPad Pro for release in the Fall of 2020. Now he is back (via MacRumors) with a new report that Apple will have four additional devices to go with these, including two additional iPad models.
Contrary to what you might think after reading that headline, I am not a hater. Not at all. I have actually been a fan of John Gruber’s writing and podcasting for several years and I typically agree with his point of view regarding Apple and the tech world, in general. However, I can’t say that’s the case when it comes to the iPad.
If you go back and re-trace the history of iOS over the last decade plus and think about its progression in context, then Apple offering users the ability to change default apps really would be a major shift for the operating system. Along with Springboard’s still static screens of app icons, this is one of the last foundational concepts of iOS that hasn’t shifted or changed to this point. That makes Apple even considering making a change a very important moment for iOS.
I wrote on the 10th anniversary of the iPad’s announcement a few days ago and I was far from the only one. Like mine, most of the articles that I read were largely positive and at least saw the potential for continued improvement, if not a bright future for Apple’s tablet platform.