iPad mini - page 21

With the absence of Steve Jobs looming in the background, Tim Cook and his team faced a mountain of questions as they marched into 2012. Who would be the visionary now? Would the iPhone continue to be successful? What’s going to happen to the Mac now that the iPad has become a beast of its own?

The most important question Apple faced going into 2012 was whether they could maintain their supremacy. With competitors closing the gap, Apple doesn’t have Steve Jobs’s vision, charisma, or negotiating prowess anymore, and 2012 has been the year to prove that Apple can endure. The challenges and adversaries Apple is facing in 2012 has made this single year the most important one ever for Apple, and yet they’ve been able to come through in the clutch and blow us away with an army of incredible products and strategic moves.

It is becoming clear that some case styles are better suited to the iPad Mini than others. And it seems that Pad&Quill’s bookbindery cases are clearly way more appropriate for the little mini than they ever were for the bigger iPad.

Not that the regular-sized cases aren’t great — they are. But the whole bundle always seemed a little big. Now, though, the match looks to be ideal.

Oh man. I’m trying so hard not to buy an iPad Mini, and this new Skech case isn;t helping any. It’s a variation on one of my favorite iPad cases ever, and now it has been made tinier and cuter.

It’s called the SkechBook, and it looks good enough to make me buy a new iPad.

I have a feeling that there are going to be many, many misguided attempts at making iPad Mini cases. Exhibit A: The Rubata Mini case from Padacs, a cheap and extraordinarily ugly keyboard case which turns the little iPad into a tiny laptop.

Where am I going with this? One word: netbooks.

Despite launching the fastest-selling iPhone to date just over a month ago, in addition to a new iPad mini that’s sure to be a big hit this Christmas, Apple is suffering from a surprising yet swift decline in stock value. Just weeks after reaching a $705 high, it now sits at its lowest price in over five months.

Many will dismiss the decline as a rare dip, confident that Apple will bounce back bigger and stronger than before. But others are questioning its ability to do so with ever increasing competition from its rivals. ABC Nightline asks whether Apple has “lost its shine.”

The iPad mini is rather perfectly sized for an e-reader: light, easy to hold, super thin. What better way to show off your reading street cred with a set of luxuriously tasty book-themed images? They’re perfectly sized for the iPad mini, with higher resolution options for its larger, more Retina-enabled bigger brothers, too.

Oregon-based case and accessory maker Grove has announced its new wool sleeve for Apple’s smaller tablet. Wool padding protects the mini inside a protective, bamboo exterior. Grove has designed its sleeve to fit an iPad mini with or without Apple’s Smart Cover.

The FlexiShield Skin from MobileFun is a translucent silicone case for iPad mini that’s designed to offer long-lasting protection, extra grip, and a slender profile that “highlights the form of your iPad mini” rather than spoiling it.

It provides impact and scratch protection to the back of your device, while still allowing you to access all of its buttons, ports, and switches. It costs $16.49, and it’s available in white, purple, and black.

The iPad mini is an incredible tablet, and I haven’t been able to put mine down since it was delivered last Friday. I love how thin and light it is, and that it will run all of my existing iPad apps right out of the box. There’s no ignoring the fact that it doesn’t have a Retina display, however.

The iPad mini’s low-resolution display sticks out like a sore thumb the second it lights up. It’s not awful — it’s still better than the iPad 2’s display, and after a few days you stop worrying about it. But it’s noticeably worse than the Retina iPad’s display.

If this has been stopping you from picking up the iPad mini, then you might want to hold onto your cash until its successor arrives next year. According to sources in Apple’s supply chain, the Cupertino company is already working on its 2048 x 1536 Retina display.

On of my favorite case makers, Mujjo, has announced its new iPad mini sleeve. Like Mujjo’s MacBook and iPhone sleeves, this new iPad mini holder is handcrafted with wool felt and quality leather. You’ll turn heads with this thing.

Mujjo’s design taste is very minimalist and swanky, and this new sleeve for Apple’s latest tablet looks like no exception.

Geeze, I use an iPad every day and still I’m learning new things to show you in these tips. Today, I found out about Multitasking Gestures–a feature that’s been around since iOS 5, but really hasn’t been well-publicized, in my opinion. Multitasking Gestures allow you to manage your new iPad mini (or other flavor of choice, from the iPad 2 to the iPad 4) without resorting to the Home button to manage multitasking.

Here’s how to enable, and to use, Multitasking Gestures on your iPad.

Think your new iPad mini’s the perfect tablet for gaming on the go? Well it may have some stiff competition ahead. Microsoft is said to be secretly planning a 7-inch “Xbox Surface” tablet that will be developed specifically for touch-based gaming. The slate is expected to make its debut before Microsoft announces the Xbox 720.

Well, that was fast. The Apple online store has already caught up with the pre-order demand of the fourth-generation iPad, and it’s now saying the device is “in stock.” That means customers will no longer face a shipping delay when placing their order for the new device online.

Although the iPad mini is well-reviewed and seems to be something of a hint with early adopters, there is at least one complaint: the display isn’t Retina. In fact, not only is it not Retina, it’s actually decidedly lower resolution than even competing 7-inch tablets like the Nexus 7 and Kindle Fire HD 7.

How does the display of the iPad mini stack up against the Nexus 7 and Kindle Fire HD in objective terms, though? Not well, although there’s something Apple could do to make things better.

Belkin has become the first accessory maker to get authorization from Apple to build third-party accessories for the Cupertino company’s new Lightning connector. It just announced a new lineup of Lightning accessories, which are compatible with Apple’s latest lineup of iOS devices, including the iPhone 5, the new iPod touch and iPod nano, the fourth-generation iPad, and the iPad mini.

Apple’s much-anticipated iPad mini went on sale last Friday alongside the new fourth-generation iPad, and the Cupertino company just announced 3 million units were sold during the launch weekend alone — breaking its previous iPad launch record.

The iPad mini is Apple’s answer to smaller Android tablets from the likes of Amazon and Google. But there’s a good reason why it doesn’t come with the same $200 price tag. A teardown has revealed that the new iOS device costs at least $188 to build, and that price rises when you add bigger storage options and 4G connectivity.

Steve Jobs said that touchscreen desktops just don’t work, pretty much ruling out the possibility of a touchscreen iMac in the future. But he also said that tablets under ten inches don’t work, and his company is now selling the awesome iPad mini. There’s every chance, then, that we’ll see an ‘iMac touch’ someday, and it’ll fit in perfectly alongside Apple’s iOS devices — as this awesome concept commercial demonstrates.

If you frequently buy brand new Apple products, you know the cycle: initial pre-order stock sells out quickly, launch day stock goes fast, and then Apple starts offering next-day reservations for in-store pickup. The iPad mini has reached the last stage in the cycle.

Apple retail stores get a limited supply of new products (in this case, the iPad mini) each night. If you’re having trouble getting your hands on an iPad mini, your best bet is to order one through Apple’s online store and see if you can walk in and pick it up in person the next day at your local Apple Store. 

We’ve got some great new apps in this week’s must-have roundup, including Path, which finally makes its debut on the iPad; a nifty utility for monitoring the data consumed by your iPhone apps; plus a great new cooking magazine that every foodie should have installed on their iPad.

Gorgeous body; super slim profile; al-lu-minium backside; yes, we’ve been fondling Apple’s new iPad mini for hours and hours now, and on our just-recorded special edition CultCast, we report what we like, what we don’t, and our overall first impressions of Apple’s brand new much-hyped tiny tab.

But we also had to ask the question: without a retina display, is the iPad mini a worthy replacement for its larger, retina-pixeled brother?

We cover all that and more this special edition CultCast! Subscribe now on iTunes, or easily stream new and previous episodes via Apple’s free Podcasts App.

I just got an iPad mini a couple of hours ago from the UPS guy. I took it to lunch and we’ve been playing around with it here in the office.

Couple of observations:

The screen is not great: John is absolutely right about the quality of the screen. It is manifestly lower resolution than newer Retina Displays.

A lot of discussion is raging around the iPad mini display, with pundits and tech-savvy consumers alike taking to Twitter, Facebook, and gadget review sites to villify the iPad mini display screen.

With a pixel density of *only* 163 pixels per inch, the iPad mini looks to be, on numbers alone, far lower in resolution than, say, an iPad 4. Which is the truth. But how does that stand up under the microscope? And, since tons of folks are saying the iPad mini is a shrunken-down iPad 2, how do the two screens compare when looked at as closely as possible?

The fine researchers at the Repair Labs blog decided to find out, placing all the currently released iPads, from the first generation to the mini, under the scrutiny of a microscope. What they found may surprise you.

The iPad mini already seems to be a huge hit with buyers, with Apple’s diminutive little tablet already selling out at the 5th Avenue Apple Store. You know, the one in New York City, a town ravaged by Hurricane Sandy that it is still half-flooded and half without power? Even a natural disaster can’t seem to keep people away.

By now you’ve had enough time to run to your Apple Store, buy an iPad mini and bring it back to your house in a loving embrace. If not, well you’ll get one later today, or whenever the delivery man finally makes his way to your house. We just posted our thoughts on the iPad mini, but we’d love to hear from you guys about what you think.

What are your first impressions of the iPad mini? Is it worth the price? Is the display really as bad as some people are saying? Does portability make a huge difference for a tablet? Come over to the forums and let us know what you think are the most important aspects of the iPad mini.

Click here to go to the Cult of Mac Forums and share your first impressions of the iPad mini with us