Everyone wanted a new iPad Mini Pro. After years of begging, Apple will release a low cost iPad Mini with yet another underpowered CPU/GPU. Why? Because they need them for the displays in the Apple Stores. The Minis take up less counter space. It has to update the Mini because it is going to drop iOS support for the old ones. Apple does not give a hoot what its customers want.
Eventually Apple will phase out the first Apple Pencil. I can’t see them continuing to carry two different pencils for that much longer. So that would mean future regular ipads and possibly ipad minis will adopt the flat edged ipad pro design most likely. Wether Apple does it with this next update remains to be seen. Hope i am wrong, but i have a feeling they will wait until the 20th anniversary of the regular ipad in 2020 for the redesign. I think the updates coming in March will be a modest speed bump.
But i would seriously love an ipad mini pro with a flat edged design, face id, apple pencil 2 support and thinner bezels. The question is, would Apple increase the screen size of the current 7.9” ipad mini to something like 8.5” but keep the same footprint? Or would they just shrink the size of the device but keep the current screen size? Hmmm. I think if they are increasing the regular ipad to 10.5” then they’d most likely increase the mini screen size to 8.5” but with slimmer bezels.
It's always seemed to me that Apple's lack of love for the iPad Mini reflects the same sentiment on the part of the buying public. How often does anyone see the iPad Mini out in the wild? The lower price and smaller size may make it nice for kids, but other than that...
I think the reason Apple has not updated the iPad mini is because it was waiting for introduction of true depth and Face ID, now that Apple is rolling this out across all its mobile lines. The iPad can get a true upgrade with bigger screen real estate in the same package. So there variations can go from 6”, 6.5” iPhones , 9 or 10” for the iPad mini to 11” iPad and iPad Pro and 13” for the iPad Pro. Restaurants and business like that, use the iPad mini size to conduct mobile orders. And so on.
I would be interested in buying an upgraded iPad mini but only with seriously upgraded specs, say an A11 or A11x chip (minimum), 3 or 4 GB RAM, laminated display, and 512 GB storage. Apple Pencil support, an upgraded camera (iPhone XR level, lets say), Smart Keyboard connectivity and USB-C connectivity would all be good also. My worry is that if Apple revives it, they will view it as a sort of kid’s tablet and move it too far downscale. We’ll have to see.
Lots of comments reflecting here on the stated “lower quality display.” Maybe I am just reading this differently, but I don’t see this as a literal down grading from current excellent laminated LCD display. The unanswered question is “less quality ...than what?” I read this not be mean lesser qualty than current Mini, but rather, lesser quality than the new standards used with iPad Pro models, with their OLED premium screen. Maybe these sources are essentially stating that we simply should not expect any Pro features, especially screen. If anyone has the exact wording that might provide better context, i would appreciate seeing it, but my guess is that the new Mini 5 will pretty much be the current Mini 4, but with newer chip.
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But i would seriously love an ipad mini pro with a flat edged design, face id, apple pencil 2 support and thinner bezels. The question is, would Apple increase the screen size of the current 7.9” ipad mini to something like 8.5” but keep the same footprint? Or would they just shrink the size of the device but keep the current screen size? Hmmm. I think if they are increasing the regular ipad to 10.5” then they’d most likely increase the mini screen size to 8.5” but with slimmer bezels.
Just guessing tho.