Yep, welcome to the wonderful world of IOS devices. Every year there is a substantial upgrade on the horizon. I sort of wish they would freeze the specs for a three year period like consoles do.
As it it, I already feel that the iDevices are not advancing fast enough. Witness the requests for longer battery life, more RAM, faster CPU and more storage. If iDevice specs had been frozen, just look at any of those orphaned Android tablets which can't be upgraded. Just pass off your no longer latest and greatest devices to your parents, wife, or children. They do not need such cutting edge specs for Facebook and Youtube... iPadisStillWaitingForRetinaMini...
The problem with advancing technology quickly is that there's also a need to make money. It's a balance that Apple has mostly been on the leading edge of. The need for such advancements are weighed against the profitability and competition of those advancements. Unfortunately, it's a rule of tech. Nobody is going to take a giant leap forward without milking the potential of earlier steps before it.
I think the problem is that software isn't catching up with the hardware. Most App developers target the iPad 2 as the reference design system. There is little benefit to truly optimize an App for an iPad 5 'Air' hardware. There's a big a risk of receiving a bunch of poor reviews for Apps that don't run well on older hardware. I fully agree smaller and lighter is always better. I think I just figured out what Apple's strategy is with the iPad 5. I'm going to weigh in and say I really like what Apple did with the iPad Air. More ram would have been nice and Apple is still stingy with the storage. But the overall design of the system is truly outstanding and nobody can touch it. Of course things are 10x worse on the Androids side of the fence regarding application optimization.
But if developers did not support the iPad 2, then I would not be able to buy their games... Other than Candy Crush Saga, I do not play on my iPhone anymore.
Exactly, that's why I didn't understand your "you will wait" statement due to the revisions, my point was generally you don't lose out because as time goes by things are typically streamlined because goal is to cut costs. Also in relation to the large hard drives worrying you, seems minimum installs are going to be pretty large so a 500GB will be gobbled up in no time. Killzone 45GB, Call of Duty 49GB and Knack 38GB, I'd hate to know what the digital downloaded versions would take up.
Digital downloads you say... I heard battlefield 4 has two separate downloads... One single player.. And the other multiplayer.. Must be huge GB.
A GB (never referred to as Gb, as Gb is the standard term for Gigabit) or Gigabyte, cannot change size, ie cannot be small, large or huge. 1GB is 1024MB and will never change.
Personally I'm waiting for the iPad Air S which will have an upgraded A9 processor, 2 GB of ram, touch ID and will come in the Kardashian gold color. On second thought I better hold off for the iPad Air 2 which will include an A10 processor, IZGO display, and a redesigned chassis which will weight in at .80 pounds. In fact scratch all that and forget the iPad all together. I'm going to buy a PS4, a 60' LCD TV, a bunch of batteries and a really big roll of duct tape. Beat that combination!
I guess I'll be alone in this but you know what really irks me about Apple? You blow the best part of £500 on an ipad (more than I personally have to live on in a month!) and they have the gall to sell you a Smart Cover for another £30-40. Come on Apple, you tightwads, include the damn cover.. Jeez.
Well, I just got back from a week-long whirlwind tour of the States for work, finalising a couple of advertising deals on both coasts and getting my cultural excavations sorted somewhere in-between. One of the major highlights during the course of that was that I got to spend just under an hour using both an iPad Air and a Retina-based iPad mini, and came away pretty impressed with both. As far as the current devices go, the 4th-gen iPad is superior in most every respect in terms of both performance and content creation and consumption, with the first-gen mini filling a spot for people who can't afford (or justify paying for) the bigger device, or have a wardrobe full of clothes with convenient iPad mini-sized pockets. With the two new devices, it really all does come down to these two factors more than ever. Both the Air and new mini are the same thickness, have the same hardware powering them, and have the same resolution screen. Both are closer in size than ever and are about as small as it is reasonable to get without the entire upper surface forming the screen (which wouldn't be a plus). While the Air is obviously still heavier than the mini, it's not by much at all; the weight difference between the two devices is really pretty negligible at this point. As it stands, the two devices are basically the same in every respect, with the only differences being that one is slightly bigger and more expensive, and the other smaller and cheaper. While the new mini is vastly superior to the existing one, I found that I personally still prefer the bigger device for work and play, as the mini just doesn't have the screen real estate required and, while the screen is naturally far clearer than that of the original mini, its smaller size still largely renders illegible finer details that are small enough already on the bigger device, in both publications and games. In general, though, there's no weighing up pros and cons to the extent required with the existing devices: now it all really just comes down to the individual preference of screen size and whether or not you want to spend the extra cash, rather than including weight, processor speeds, Retina versus non-Retina screens, or any other considerations currently involved with the 4th-gen iPad and original mini.
Yup. And smart covers are crap. Mine's frayed all over the place and been pathed up with glue. Hopefully the next iPad model will be the same form factor so I can just pick up a cheaper better cover made by somone else. (And as far as I can tell, the cheapest iPad Air case is £65!!!!)
Thank you very much for the mini review. I'm still slightly leaning towards the iPad Air but this is a tough decision. I want your job.
My leather ipad 2 smart cover is a little worse for the wear but hasn't needed patching. I do have an issue where the iPad 2 is a bit finickier about how you close it, as far as whether or not it is going to go to sleep. Sometimes I close it and it doesn't go to sleep. I don't know if it's the smart cover or the iPad, though.
The iPad 2 works perfectly well without the Smart Cover. Mine is still lying in the corner collecting dust asnI found a folio case, with its additional angles for propping my iPad up, more useful. Part of the fun of having iDevices is in buying the optimal cases for them. I bought four cases before selecting my current case for long term use... It is probably an issue with your Smart Cover's magnets. Although it would be a good excuse to justify a new iPad to the significant other...
