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After years of rumors Apple finally unveiled the generation one iPad on Wednesday 27 January, 2010. As we are moving close to the one year anniversary, the media is hot again with speculation about the second version. The holiday season and a new year are the most fertile times for the ontogeny of gadget rumors. But it’s virtually impossible to keep a track of them as new rumors are popping up every day. Here’s a summary of what the rumor mill believes the iPad 2 will consist of.
The first Apple iPad had a dream debut and according to a recent Fortune report, analysts have estimated that iPad sales for 2010 will top 14 million. Although the first generation has turned out to be a revenue machine for Apple, it does lack some features when you compare it to the modern breed of tablets set to come out in 2011 like the Samsung Galaxy Tab, Motorola Honeycomb prototype and RIM PlayBook. So what do we think we know that Apple will add?
The form factor, screen and resolution
Globally, the most popular rumor on web is that of a 5”, 6”, 7”or 8” iPad 2, but Jobs has already said that 7-inch is ‘dead on arrival’. Apple insider reported a new patent application filed by Apple of a lighter layered fiber-in-matrix material such as Carbon fiber-reinforced plastic (CFRP), which has fueled rumors of Apple shredding the aluminum back of the iPad for a lighter shell. It’s a fair bet that the iPad 2 will have a lighter and thinner shell. Apple might consider a flat aluminum back, which is not as radical as a complete change-over to a carbon fiber body and new size. Since the Consumer Electronics Show was filled with apparent iPad 2 cases that would fit a 10-inch device, it looks more likely that the size is staying put.
Another hyped up claim that is doing the rounds is that the iPad 2 will have a retina display. Although the iPad has an excellent resolution of 1024x768, there are bright chances of screen improvement. A retina display would take the iPad to a new industry standard, but is it feasible? According to Ryan Blocks, stuffing a retina display on a larger screen like 9.7-inch is not going to be easy, and possibly well beyond the capability of current mobile device technology. What’s more likely is a higher resolution, anti-reflective, and anti-smudge screen.
Camera
No points for guesswork, the new iPad will unquestionably have two cameras - probably a back 5MP and front VGA camera. There are a few strong reasons behind the claim. The absence of the camera in the first generation had been questioned by many and almost all the iPad contemporaries have launched models with dual cameras. As ‘the apparel oft proclaims the man’ it’s worth noting that in all the recent iPad 2 case leaks there are holes for a rear-facing camera in the upper left corner. Apple would like FaceTime to do well and the iPad 2 should naturally support it, with video calling based on email addresses already included in the latest iOS beta release.
Processor
The Motorola tablet and RIM PlayBook both have dual core processors and rumor has it that the next generation of iPad might have two cores of 1GHz ARM Cortex A9 processors to enable PC-like multitasking. This could be just a tall tale, but what we can expect positively in the iPad 2 is definitely an upgraded processor, maybe 1.2 or 1.5GHz.
RAM, SD card slot and expandable storage
The current iPad has only 256MB of RAM, which is half that of the iPhone 4 and one-fourth of the Samsung Galaxy Tab and RIM PlayBook. It would be a shame if Jobs doesn’t boost the iPad performance by upgrading the RAM in the second generation. The buzz is that Apple might double the maximum storage offered with the iPad to 128MB. Although a welcoming step, since the iPad is not a phone and the maximum storage for a computer shouldn’t be to a mere 64GB, it is hard to say if Apple will actually expand the storage.
The SD card slot is also courtesy of case leaks. Many snaps of iPad 2 cases are circulating the web with a big cutout near the speaker slot. But that is more unlikely to happen with Apple traditionally not being too generous when it comes to external storage.
Micro USB port and two dock connectors
The European Commission has been pushing companies like Apple for a long time to standardize power adapters, and there has been a fresh round of gossip that the iPad 2 will have a micro-USB port to create a uniform power adapter. It sounds great, but not doable for Apple, as this would kill royalties from its very own patented dock connector.
If not an additional micro USB port, Apple might add two dock connectors in the iPad as hyped by the case leaks. It is awkward to add an external keyboard in portrait mode and Apple might actually add another dock connector for landscape mode. Of course the two dock connectors could so much more simply be replaced by a USB port instead …?
Other possibilities
So, you’ve heard rumors of the iPad having better speakers and a gyroscope to enable powerful gaming. This could actually be true as gyroscopes or the orientation wheel to power tilt and spin based gaming, is a necessity for apps today, and better speakers will only add stars to iPad’s multimedia experience ratings.
The most recent of the rumors is that of three versions of the iPad—Wi-Fi, UMTS and CDMA. DigiTimes got the leak from the component makers and even dug up the shipping ratio to be 3:4:3 and CDMA locked with one of the carriers. This has less chance to be true, like the rumor of the iPad 2 set to support Flash, or the 7-inch version.
A sleek chassis, better power, double storage, dual camera, USB and SD card support, and many more exciting features! Whether or not these stories are true, they seem to be doing a big favor to Apple by keeping the iPad in the headlines.
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