Renders reveal purported 2018 iPad Pro with near edge-to-edge display, iPhone-like antenna...

AppleInsider · September 3, 2018 9:54PM

Computer renders based on leaked CAD images could offer a first look at Apple's next-generation 12.9-inch iPad Pro, complete with slim-bezel display, iPhone-esque antenna "lines" and an angular chassis reminiscent of the iPhone 4 series.

Shared by OnLeaks' Steve Hemmerstoffer in a post to Twitter on Monday, the high-resolution renders, created in conjunction with tech blog MySmartPrice, claim to reveal a vastly redesigned iPad Pro model widely expected to debut this fall.

The images are polished versions of CAD schematics first aired by OnLeaks last week and show an iPad device that departs from Apple's current aesthetic. Gone are the soft edges of iPad's rounded chassis, replaced with an angular case design featuring chamfered edges and breaks along the circumference to accommodate radio-transparent material. A similar architecture defined the iPhone 4 in 2010.

As seen in a set of CAD images supposedly showing off an 11-inch iPad Pro last month, today's renders feature two rows of speaker vents flanking a centrally-located Lightning port at the bottom of the device, a design mirrored on the tablet's top edge. Two microphone ports are also in view up top, sitting above a TrueDepth camera system embedded in iPad's bezel.

Button positioning appears to remain unchanged from existing iPad models, though the familiar home button has been removed to make way for more screen real estate. Also deprecated is iPad's headphone jack, a modification that would bring the device family in line with iPhone.

More dubious is a repositioned Smart Connector that supposedly lives on the back of the tablet directly above its Lightning Connector. MySmartPrice believes the positioning is a concession for Face ID, incorrectly stating that Apple's facial recognition feature is unlikely to work while iPad is in landscape mode. Code discovered in past iOS 12 beta versions have revealed Face ID will indeed accommodate landscape operation in future devices, with iPad thought to be a prime candidate for inclusion.

Whether the renders, and indeed the CAD from which they are based, are legitimate is unknown. Hemmerstoffer himself hedges on the renders' veracity, saying in a tweet, "I can't confirm this one is 100% accurate."

Rumored for release this fall, Apple's next-generation iPad Pro models are speculated to boast a smaller footprint while retaining screen dimensions thanks to the deletion of Touch ID. According to analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, the shift to a button-free design will allow Apple to squeeze an 11-inch display into the existing form factor, initially designed to house a 10.5-inch screen. Apple is also anticipated to carry over the jumbo-size 12.9-inch model that ushered in "iPad Pro" branding in 2015.

Apple is scheduled to hold a special media event at its Apple Park headquarters on Sept. 12, where the company is widely expected to launch this year's iPhone lineup. Whether the smartphones will share stage time with a revamped iPad Pro is unclear.

coolfactor · September 3, 2018 9:57PM

I await the day when Apple loosens up on the industrial look of iPhones, iPads and Macs, and starts to have fun with the designs again. Remember the original iMacs? And the various designs of iPods? Then things became repetitive and boring,..

melgross · September 3, 2018 10:02PM

Edge to edge display? Has the definition of edge to edge been redefined to mean not edge to edge, but with smaller bezels?i also don’t the know if the one camera design is what we’ll be seeing. I expect the two camera module.

StrangeDays · September 3, 2018 10:04PM

coolfactor said:

I await the day when Apple loosens up on the industrial look of iPhones, iPads and Macs, and starts to have fun with the designs again. Remember the original iMacs? And the various designs of iPods? Then things became repetitive and boring,..

Not really. As the devices get smaller and smaller, there’s less room for superfluous elements. There’s only so much “fun” you can have with a very thin display slab. They don’t need to be tie dyed. It’s form following function, which is paradoxically what people love to complain that Apple doesn’t do enough of. Poor Apple, just can’t win.

eriamjh · September 3, 2018 10:10PM

I stilll sloppily tap and touch the edges on my iPad Pro 12.9. I cant imagine the, being any smaller. And I don’t even have big hands or fingers compared to most.

rogifan_new · September 3, 2018 10:12PM

So the new iPad will have an iPhone 5 style chassis with an iPhone 7 style antenna line? Not happening.

rogifan_new · September 3, 2018 10:15PM

coolfactor said:

I await the day when Apple loosens up on the industrial look of iPhones, iPads and Macs, and starts to have fun with the designs again. Remember the original iMacs? And the various designs of iPods? Then things became repetitive and boring,..

What more can you do besides offer different colors? Apple tried it with the iPhone 5c and everyone panned it. I do think the new 6.1” iPhone will come in different colors than silver or gold. This might be where Apple experiments with color again and if it’s popular maybe brings it to the $329 iPad.

PickUrPoison · September 3, 2018 10:24PM

melgross said:

Edge to edge display? Has the definition of edge to edge been redefined to mean not edge to edge, but with smaller bezels?i also don’t the know if the one camera design is what we’ll be seeing. I expect the two camera module.

If the measurements leaked from Mac Otakara are correct, the bezel is about 9mm all the way around; the notch is 8.93mm so it makes sense.

re: edge to edge, i have no idea why that description is used when the bezel is 9mm—actually growing a couple mm on the long edges for the smaller iPad Pro. It doesn’t even really make sense to call the iPhone edge to edge but it’s used often.

Again if the overall dims are correct, the 11.0” gets a new aspect ratio of 10:7, with about 15mm added to the (portrait) height while the width stays the same. The 12.9” keeps the original 4:3 aspect ratio and again the bezel is about 9mm all the way around.

re: the rear camera, there are no rumors of dual lenses so there’s no reason to expect that.

melgross · September 3, 2018 10:25PM

coolfactor said:

I await the day when Apple loosens up on the industrial look of iPhones, iPads and Macs, and starts to have fun with the designs again. Remember the original iMacs? And the various designs of iPods? Then things became repetitive and boring,..

Can you give an example of this whimsy?I don’t see what can be done on a modern phone or iPad that’s almost all screen.

anome · September 3, 2018 10:30PM

Renders really don't cut it. Most of these renders are just hopeful speculation by people who are hoping to get some attention by putting out their ideas.

I can't remember the last render (as opposed to actual photo) that was even close to the final product. I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong. (And possibly if I'm right, for that matter.)

As for this one, what no notch? All the stuff we've seen has suggested a notch, including internal graphics in iOS 12. Seems unlikely they would get all the other details right, but miss that.

ireland · September 3, 2018 10:42PM

Angular edges, therefore radically different to round edges. Give me a break. I think rounded edges are nicer, for the most part, but angled edges could be an attempt to further reduce device footprint. That said, in the grand scheme of things these difference won't have me call them radical.

ireland · September 3, 2018 10:44PM

melgross said:

coolfactor said:

I await the day when Apple loosens up on the industrial look of iPhones, iPads and Macs, and starts to have fun with the designs again. Remember the original iMacs? And the various designs of iPods? Then things became repetitive and boring,..

Can you give an example of this whimsy?I don’t see what can be done on a modern phone or iPad that’s almost all screen.

iPad invisiblo.

PickUrPoison · September 3, 2018 10:47PM

anome said:

Renders really don't cut it. Most of these renders are just hopeful speculation by people who are hoping to get some attention by putting out their ideas.
I can't remember the last render (as opposed to actual photo) that was even close to the final product. I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong. (And possibly if I'm right, for that matter.)
As for this one, what no notch? All the stuff we've seen has suggested a notch, including internal graphics in iOS 12. Seems unlikely they would get all the other details right, but miss that.

Aside from one of those speculative renders you mention—which had small, iPhone X-like bezels and a notch—no rumors ever suggested a notch on the iPad afaik. Instead Apple is camouflaging it by using a notch-sized bezel width (9mm) all the way around. The asset found in iOS 12 did not have a notch, rather it shows a pretty good sized bezel.

Soli · September 3, 2018 10:56PM

coolfactor said:

I await the day when Apple loosens up on the industrial look of iPhones, iPads and Macs, and starts to have fun with the designs again. Remember the original iMacs? And the various designs of iPods? Then things became repetitive and boring,..

Are you sure you want that? Those iMacs were a Hail Mary from Apple and it was really just colored plastic variances. I prefer the aluminium over the plastic and now they offer several metallic colors. Then you have the iPod Nanos which kept changing up the look and added lots of colors when that market segment starting to crumble, plus those not being devices developers could build apps for meant that Apple could be more radical with display sizes, aspect ratios, pixel density.

In regards to "repetitive and boring" here's a run on sentence of their iPhone history: they started with a single silver+black model, then had a black and white plastic models, and then back to black with a glass model, and eventually they had black and white glass, and then we moved onto aluminum again with space grey+black, silver+white, and the cheap 5c models with various colors (blue, green, pink, yellow, and white, but all with a black glass front) that apparently weren't successful enough to keep around, and then gold+white was added, and then with the iPhone 6 series the colors were dropped again with only silver aluminium for a year until the 6s series when game out with 4 anodized colors (silver, space grey, gold, and rose gold, then they added a glossy black finish, and with the 8 series they removed 2(?) colors.

What would you do different to increase Apple's sales that they haven't tried and scraped? What exactly are you expecting with this "fun" design?

Soli · September 3, 2018 11:01PM

Where would be the ideal place for Face ID on the iPad? Would top center in portrait mode still make sense, would this be best placed in the center in landscape mode (if that's the most used orientation), or would placing the sensors at or near a corner (as the engineering allows) help with making it work well in either orientation providing that you have the Face ID sensors switching from the top left and right, as opposed to the bottom left and right?

chasm · September 3, 2018 11:11PM

Because the iPad is so much bigger than a phone, the notch can be "hidden" in the bezel, and I expect that will be the case. I concur with the others that Mr. Campbell does not appear to know what "edge-to-edge" means, since he is using the term completely incorrectly.

I could see their being a "portrait" Smart Connector on the device IF there was one where it presently is as well, but the presence of that connector in the renders tells me that this design is based not on actual leaked Apple specs, but rather on the speculative case design we saw in an earlier story -- which had a cutout for something above the lightning port, but it coudn't be a smart connector because they are flush -- you can't have a case on an iPad that uses the Smart Connector, so that case design is likely false.

anome · September 3, 2018 11:55PM

PickUrPoison said:

anome said:

Renders really don't cut it. Most of these renders are just hopeful speculation by people who are hoping to get some attention by putting out their ideas.
I can't remember the last render (as opposed to actual photo) that was even close to the final product. I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong. (And possibly if I'm right, for that matter.)
As for this one, what no notch? All the stuff we've seen has suggested a notch, including internal graphics in iOS 12. Seems unlikely they would get all the other details right, but miss that.

Aside from one of those speculative renders you mention—which had small, iPhone X-like bezels and a notch—no rumors ever suggested a notch on the iPad afaik. Instead Apple is camouflaging it by using a notch-sized bezel width (9mm) all the way around. The asset found in iOS 12 did not have a notch, rather it shows a pretty good sized bezel.

My mistake, I thought it had. Probably just my faulty memory.

Still not convinced by this render, though.

canukstorm · September 4, 2018 12:13AM

rogifan_new said:

So the new iPad will have an iPhone 5 style chassis with an iPhone 7 style antenna line? Not happening.

Why not? Nothing unrealistic about this design.

Soli · September 4, 2018 12:25AM

canukstorm said:

rogifan_new said:

So the new iPad will have an iPhone 5 style chassis with an iPhone 7 style antenna line? Not happening.

Why not? Nothing unrealistic about this design.

I agree that it's not unrealistic if we're talking about from an engineering standpoint, but do you think it's a feasible design to have flat sides which means no beveled curves which is used to increase ridigty of the chassis with minimal material. I think that it would also feel clunkier and they seem to have reached a thickness point unless OLED or microLED is viable, but how much thickness would that save. There's a reason why Apple used a split frame for antenna bands in the iPhone 4 through 5s, and I don't see why the iPad would need to have such a large band with all the space it already has for antennas. Personally, I've found my Series 3 Watch to be more than adequate for cellular with the antennas hidden inside the rim of the of the display that I hope Apple will be able to save even more room by adopting something similar with the iPhone which may lead to more room for other improvements.

Now, if we're talking about the removal of the Home Button, reducing the bezel size, and, probably the biggest factor, adding all the Face ID HW into the bezel maybe they need to have the edge of the device thicker to house those components so for symmetry they're making it all the same thickness. So why didn't the iPhone X have to get that same treatment? In this hypothetical, the notch may allow them to get the components deeper into the device so that the rounded chassis can still exist.

fallenjt · September 4, 2018 12:38AM

coolfactor said:

I await the day when Apple loosens up on the industrial look of iPhones, iPads and Macs, and starts to have fun with the designs again. Remember the original iMacs? And the various designs of iPods? Then things became repetitive and boring,..

Did BMW or Mercedes do that: losen design to make the product look cheap and hideous?

anome · September 4, 2018 1:00AM

fallenjt said:

coolfactor said:

I await the day when Apple loosens up on the industrial look of iPhones, iPads and Macs, and starts to have fun with the designs again. Remember the original iMacs? And the various designs of iPods? Then things became repetitive and boring,..

Did BMW or Mercedes do that: losen design to make the product look cheap and hideous?

BMW has always looked cheap and ugly. IMHO, of course.

I'm not sure where design of these devices can go from here, anyway. Everything is some form of rectangle, the only differences is how big, and where the buttons are. While we're stuck with needing a big, flat piece of glass, everything will have to be built around it. When we get holographic projection screens that can put an interactive display up anywhere, we'll build everything around that.

Renders reveal purported 2018 iPad Pro with near edge-to-edge display, iPhone-like antenna...

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