Apple launches new iPad Air2 and iPad Mini 3
APPLE has launched two new tablet computers that are thinner, faster, and offer a better camera and more features than their predecessors.
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APPLE this morning launched a bid to revive iPad fever, revealing two new tablet computers that are thinner, faster, and offer a better camera and more features than their predecessors.
The technology giant unveiled the iPad Air 2 and iPad Mini 3 at an event on its Cupertino campus just one month after its successful iPhone 6 launch, and amid pressure to turn around tablet sales as consumers fail to upgrade their devices.
Apple also revealed a revamped iMac desktop computer with a high-resolution, 5K screen, featuring 14.7 million pixels, as widely tipped before the event.
iPad Air 2 and iPad Mini 3
Apple worldwide marketing senior vice president Phil Schiller, who introduced features from both new iPads, said the upcoming iPad Air 2 was just 6.1mm thin, shaving almost a full millimetre from the original Air launched last year, itself as thick as a pencil.
“It is the thinnest iPad we have ever made,” Mr Schiller said. “That’s 18 per cent thinner than the iPad Air, which was already 20 per cent thinner than the iPad before it.”
The iPad Air 2 adds an 8-megapixel camera, a TouchID fingerprint scanner for security, as seen on the last three iPhones, an anti-reflective coating on its 9.7-inch screen, and a body redesigned to be thinner than the first Air.
A faster A8X chip also promises 12 times the processing speed for the second iPad Air.
The company’s iPad Mini also received an upgrade, with a fingerprint scanner as well as a gold version, though the announcement was almost glossed over at the Town Hall event.
Both will be available for pre-order on Saturday, with prices starting from $619 for the Air 2, and $499 for the Mini 3.
The iPad Air 2 is getting all the attention in Apple's press room. Poor Mini. pic.twitter.com/89sIkRuTG1
— Jen Dudley-Nicholson (@jendudley) October 16, 2014iMac
Apple’s new 27-inch iMac, designed to accommodate high-resolution video, also features a body that is just 5mm thin, and a 3.5GHz Intel chip.
The iMac will cost $2999 in Australia.
OS X Yosemite
As predicted, Apple also used the event to launch its new Mac operating system, OS X Yosemite, available immediately, in addition to new iWork programs.
The free download delivers new features letting Mac users take calls and send text messages from their computer, via a connected iPhone, as well as a new Today notifications tab, a redesign for its Safari web browser, and a look more akin to iPhone software.
The OS/X Yosemite upgrade link is already available, but unfortunately not working :-( http://t.co/vcrswMzI85
— Arik Fraimovich (@arikfr) October 16, 2014“OS X Yosemite ushers in the future of computing, where your Apple devices all work together seamlessly and magically,” Apple software engineering senior vice-president Craig Federighi said.
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Tablet sales
Software aside, Apple’s new hardware may go help address the company’s falling tablet sales, with iPad sales recently hitting their lowest point since early 2012.
Apple tablet sales were down nine per cent in the third quarter of the year to 13.28 million, compared to 14.62 million at the same time last year.
Apple’s new iPads will be a hard sell. Some analysts say the new tablets don’t have the “wow†factor http://t.co/atE0skNX6C
— Quentin Fottrell (@Quantanamo) October 16, 2014But it is not a problem confined to Apple, with Gartner forecasting tablet sales to grow by just 11 per cent this year, down from 55 per cent in 2013, as consumers hold on to their tablets longer or opt for PCs instead.
“Some tablet users are not replacing a tablet with a tablet,” Gartner research director Ranjit Atwal said, “they are favouring hybrid or two-in-one devices, increasing its share of the ultra-mobile premium market to 22 per cent in 2014, and 32 per cent by 2018.”
It is a trend also in play in Australia, with Telsyte managing director Foad Fadaghi saying the most popular Apple tablet remained the iPad 2.
“There was a flood of those devices sold in Australia and it remains the number one used iPad in Australia and, if I’m not mistaken, the world,” Mr Fadaghi said.
“It is a challenge to get people to upgrade and I think Apple has been quite upfront about building devices that don’t need to be upgraded as often as in the past.”
Despite tough conditions, Telsyte predicted Apple would reclaim the top tablet seller title from Google Android in Australia during the second half of the year, with Australians tipped to buy more than 2.1 million tablet computers.
Jennifer Dudley-Nicholson travelled to Cupertino, California, as a guest of Apple.
Follow @jendudley on Twitter.
Originally published as Apple launches new iPad Air2 and iPad Mini 3
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