ipad 4

Apple's iPad, 3 years in: Magical? Some beg to differ

Apple released "the magical and revolutionary iPad" three years ago today.

So, what's trending on its anniversary? Well, there's the iPad Death Watch, which highlights what non-believers have said through the years.

Here are some of the comments:

Unnecessary: "It seems like a high priced, unnecessary trinket to me." Paul Thurrott, SuperSite for Windows, January 2010. (Note: this kind of comment wasn't that unusual in 2010. Though I quickly became a heavy user, I dismissed it initially as inadequate in some respects. And, even today, while some might consider excessive dumping on the … Read more

Microsoft Surface Pro shows off its inner ultrabook

Is the Surface Pro a tablet or a laptop? Well, let's put it this way: benchmarks put it squarely in the laptop category, leaving Apple and Android tablets in the dust.

Chip review site Anandtech ran benchmarks on the solid-state drive in Microsoft's new Surface Pro tablet, underscoring the performance gap with the flash drive in Apple's iPad 4.

It's a "full blown" SSD, wrote Anand Shimpi of Anandtech, referring to Micron Technology's C400 solid-state drive in the Surface that Anandtech tested.

The Micron SSD posted speeds of 400 megabytes-per-second when reading data … Read more

Dueling disks: Apple's 128GB response to Surface Pro

With the 128GB iPad, Apple is obviously trying to steal thunder from Microsoft's Saturday roll out of the Surface Pro. But that doesn't mean you can equate the iPad's disk performance with the Surface Pro's.

Apple's carefully-timed release of the 128GB iPad ostensibly puts the iPad's storage on par with Microsoft's 128GB Surface Pro, which will go on sale Saturday.

Well, not quite.

Apple is using a flash drive optimized for power efficiency, while Microsoft's solid-state drive favors speed -- the same kind of drive used in ultrabooks. (And Apple's MacBooks, … Read more

iPad Mini Retina Display may surpass iPad 4

The iPad Mini is ripe for a Retina display -- and it's already in the works, according to the latest Asia-based gossip.

The "iPad Mini 2" will have a Retina screen boasting 324 pixels per inch (PPI), according to a Chinese language report via BrightWire.

That's based on an 7.9-inch iPad Mini with 2,048x1,536 resolution display -- which simply doubles the resolution of the current iPad Mini's 1,024x768 screen.

And that's the same resolution of the current 9.7-inch Retina iPad.

But packing all of those pixels into the Mini'… Read more

Lenovo sees surge in tablet shipments

Lenovo saw tablet shipments spike in its most recent reported quarter, according to comments today from its top executive.

Along with reporting a record profit during its fiscal third quarter (the fourth calendar quarter of 2012), Lenovo said tablet shipments are on a tear.

The Chinese device maker shipped 800,000 tablets in the quarter ended December 31, "almost an 80 percent year-to-year" growth, said Yang Yuanqing, chairman and CEO, during the company's earnings conference call.

"We will continue to have hyper growth in smartphones and tablets," he said. Lenovo shipped 9.4 million phones … Read more

Eating your own, Microsoft style

Eat your own, or somebody else will. That's the new mantra in the device world.

Here's what Apple said this week on that topic.

In terms of cannibalization and how we think about this, I see cannibalization as a huge opportunity for us. One, our base philosophy is to never fear cannibalization. If we do, somebody else will just cannibalize it and so we never fear it. --Tim Cook.

This was said in response to an analyst's question during the company's first-quarter earnings conference call. Earlier in the call, Apple, in its prepared remarks, said that … Read more

Sony's new tablet is sliced thinner than the iPad Mini

Sony's new tablet is really thin. How thin? Thinner than the already-very-svelte iPad Mini.

The 10.1-inch Xperia Tablet Z measures 6.9mm or about 0.27 inches. The uber-thin Mini is 7.2mm and 0.28 inches, by comparison.

Thinness is important in tablets because it translates to very light, easy-to-hold designs. And here Sony delivers too: it weighs in at 485 grams or just over one pound.

That also beats the 10-inch class competition: Apple's iPad 4 is 1.44 pounds.

The 10.1-inch Xperia sports a 1,920x1,200 "Reality Display." That's not quite the pixel density of the iPad 4's Retina display but it's pretty close. The Xperia is about 224 pixels per inch (PPI), while the iPad's 9.7-inch display is 264 PPI.

But, to be fair, both fall short of Google's Nexus 10 with a PPI of 300. … Read more

Intel's bet on Windows 8 'convertibles' iffy, say analysts

Intel is betting a chunk of its PC future on so-called convertibles. So far, financial analysts aren't convinced these are designs that will win the day.

Newfangled laptops that perform mechanical acrobatics to convert to tablet mode, like Lenovo's Yoga convertible and Dell's XPS 12, aren't impressive enough yet to revive PC-market doldrums, according to a growing chorus of financial analysts who follow Intel.

On Thursday, Intel CEO Paul Otellini, speaking during an earnings conference call, tried to depict convertible PC designs as the best of both worlds: the laptop and the tablet. In essence, he … Read more

Google Nexus 7 tops iPad in Japan: Is this a trend?

Google's Nexus 7 is gaining market share in Japan and topped Apple's iPad in one survey.

Japanese digital device consumers are some of the savviest in the world. So, a report Thursday showing that the Nexus 7 has bested the iPad in market share is worthy of attention.

Based on a survey of 2,400 consumer electronics stores in Japan, Google's Nexus 7 tablet had 44.4 percent of the market versus the iPad's 40.1 percent, according to Nikkei, Japan's largest business daily. The survey was done by market research firm BCN in December. … Read more