Tonight Apple held a media event at one of it’s campus lecture theatres, while not quite the showcase of the iPhone 6 launch, the more ‘intimate’ setting made for more personal event, and the event live streaming was flawless this it time.
In fact the whole show went without a hitch with impressive demonstrations, incredible sales figures and the Apple guys even took the opportunity to poke fun at themselves.
Perhaps of most interest though was the annual update to the iPad range of devices starting with the iPad Air 2.
Tim Cook introduces the iPad Air 2
At only 6.1mm thick Apple described the Air 2 as the thinnest tablet in the world, yet it manages to fit in some reasonable hardware upgrades.
Featuring the 64 bit A8 processor and M8 co-processor the iPad Air 2 has a 40% more powerful processor then its predecessor and also boasts a 2.5x faster GPU for improved graphical performance.
The Camera functionality on the iPad Air2 has also been enhanced by including an 8MP iSight camera capable of 1080p video, burst photography, auto HDR & Panoramic photography.
The iPad Air 2 also includes Touch ID for convenient security.
The American Pricing was announced at $499 for the 16GB version, $599 for the 64GB version and $699 for the 128GB version. The cellular version of the devices will cost $130 extra.
Impressive Performance
The accompanying iPad Mini 3 announcement was surprisingly brief, perhaps reflecting the disappointing lack of hardware improvement over the mini 2.
Still running on the A7 processor of its predecessor and also featuring the same 5MP camera, the only real difference is addition of Touch ID.
The American pricing of the iPad mini 3 was announced at:
$399 for the 16GB version, $499 for the 64GB version & $599 for the 128GB version. The cellular version of the devices will cost $130 extra.
Apple also confirmed the continuation of both the iPad Mini 1 and Mini 2 albeit with a lower price tag.
The iPad Family