iPad: The Third Generation

The god moment for Apple fans is a new product

launch. At 10 am in San Francisco (midnight, on the

eve of Holi in India), the wraps came off the new iPad-

New, not 3 or HD.

So iPad will now mean the new model. And iPad 2, the old

one that continues alongside until stocks last, and subsequently

only for the 16GB versions for up to a Rs 5k price

drop. That makes the iPad 2 a great entry into tablets at under

Rs 25k, making other tablet makers very nervous.

What's new? The brilliant Retina display, of course, with

four times the pixels of the iPad 2. Just a bit lower-res than on

the iPhone 4S, but really impressive on a full-size tablet (even

if, in a test by thenextweb.com, very few could pick new iPad

from old). To power the super-sharp display, there's a quadcore

graphics processor longside the dual-core A5X chip.

There's also a better camera now (no surprise, given how

terrible the iPad 2.s camera is). It doesn't go all the way to the

8-megapixel shooter on the iPhone 4S, but it does have a

“back-illuminated” sensor that's much better in low light. It

also does full HD 1080p video. The front-facer is still the old

0.3 MP VGA camera for video chats.

And there's 4G/LTE along with 3G, in the higher models.

3G and GPRS/Edge continue to be supported.

The 9-hr battery life claim with 4G/LTE (and 10 hours

without it), for a slim device with such high display resolution

and power, is amazing. I also like the built-in hot-spot feature

that supports up to five devices over Wi-Fi.

The third-generation iPad will likely hit Indian shelves in

April, as the iPad 2 did last year (see pkr.in/gadgets/ipad.html

for prices). The new iPad will start at Rs 29,500 for the base

(16 GB Wi-Fi model) in India.

Would I upgrade from my iPad2?

Not yet. There is nothing very different that I would see

with my current usage and apps. Except for 4G, but there's no

4G in India yet.

But let's wait to see the new apps that will take advantage

of the enhanced processor power, specs and super-display.

That could change the game.

And the hand-me-down route works well: I pass on my

iPad 2 to my wife, she passes on her iPad 1 to her sister, etc.

(In fact the oldest iPad is still a very usable device, and can do

much of what the newest one will.)

My only grouse with the new iPad is that

none of the whopping 70% bigger battery is

going toward increasing battery life from

iPad2 levels. Instead, it's being frittered

away on lighting up that Retina display, a

bigger processor/GPU, and 4G.

Now if there were an “aggressive powersave”

setting which gave me the option of 12

to 15 hours on a charge (sans 4G, and at

iPad2-level performance and resolution)...

And if I could switch back to power-guzzler settings when on

mains.

Even so. With the new version, Apple's tablet stays ahead

of competition. It's still the most compelling tablet for the

price, though the field is now crowded.

The biggest part of the Apple story, though, remains in the

half million apps on the Apple store, apps that transform a

thin slate into a magical device.