9 
There’s something in the air this week. Maybe it’s that the holidays are coming, or that it’s getting colder, or that there’s not much actual news to be had three weeks before the Consumer Electronics Show. But for some reason, the dumb Apple rumours are piling up like so many discarded MobileMe accounts.
The latest offender? You’ve probably seen it already: Retina iPad mini. Here’s why it’s a total waste of everybody’s time.
Just to be clear, this isn’t the kind of rumour that’s dumb because it’s wrong. In fact, it’s the opposite: a rumour that’s based on something so inevitable, it has no merit as a rumour. It’s simply a statement of fact, one that’s been known since the day the first iPad mini came out. You might as well say that the next iPad mini will have a faster processor or a bigger battery or will run iOS 7. No. Kidding.
That makes all of this flocking toward Retina iPad mini bad enough, in its own way. But what makes it truly galling is that today’s burst of stories isn’t based on a component someone found, or anything concrete it all. It comes, instead, from DigiTimes. For those unfamiliar, DigiTimes is the single worst purveyor of rumour wrongness in the entirety of tech. Harry McCracken at Time did an excellent take-down earlier this year, if you’re looking for proof. It’s so bad, in fact, that most sites run every DigiTimes story with a throat-clearing caveat.
So when DigiTimes says the next iPad mini will have a retina display, what they’re really doing is taking the most obvious spec bump available to them, slapping some unnamed, probably nonexistent “sources” on it, and calling it a scoop.
Here’s the thing; everyone who covers technology knows all of this. They know that a retina iPad mini is a rumour in the same way that the Sun rising tomorrow is a rumour. They know that DigiTimes is a travesty. And yet:
So there you have it. Yet another in a long, venerable line of terrible Apple rumours this month, this year, always. We’re smarter than this, guys. Let’s start acting like it.
I’d be interested to see how they’ll do this without adding another screen scaling factor to the whole thing; At the moment they have iPhone(and iPod), Retina iPhone(and iPod), Stretched Retina iPhone(and iPod), iPad(and mini), Retina iPad, that’s 4 screen scaling factors developers have to design for.
The iPad mini will not fit the Retina iPad resolution; they will have to add a sixth scaling factor.
I know the argument could be made that in both cases, only 3 resolutions are current; Stretched Retina iPhone + iPod, Retina iPad, iPad mini. But still, the whole point about Apple is keeping the hardware in house. It’s worrying me that they can’t keep the focus that Jobs brought in.
Couple this with an out-dated (or, generously, a no-longer innovative) iOS, I think the whole portable line needs a reboot, with constant RAM, screen resolution, processor e.t.c, to help developers keep things simple.
K.I.S.S.
Sorry; corrections. I can’t count – 4 should be 5. Might I add a request to be a beta-tester for the edit button you editors have?
Edit button? You must be mistaken
Yeah, I must be
“The iPad mini will not fit the Retina iPad resolution;”
Why not?
Physical limitation – Hardware hasn’t yet been designed that is viable for the iPad full size in the iPad mini. Also, it would make the full iPad look shit – like a cheaper model.
Er, just to point out the bloody obvious, but Android gets along just fine with multiple resolutions because it was designed to handle it at an early stage, and the necessary tools were provided to developers.
However, that’s not how Apple roll, and that’s just fine. They prefer to keep consistency in their hardware, and fair enough, there’s benefits to doing that. I’m just saying, it wouldn’t mean the end of the planet if Apple decided to bring a few more resolutions into the mix.
Also, I would only count three resolutions here, as the retina devices are merely pixel-doubled versions of their predecessors. The devs just needed to up-res their bitmaps if they wanted to use the extra pixels, and that’s it. Hardly a challenge, and that’s exactly what Apple wanted.
So yeah, iPhone 4, iPhone 5 and iPad 3. Those are possibly the only resolutions worth caring about.
Also, I wouldn’t put it past Apple shoehorning a crazy 2048 x 1536 iPad 4 resolution display into the next iPad mini. They have a track record for being the first to bring new display technologies to mass market.
No, I understand all that, it’s just that Android software and libraries are completely designed to have quite literally any resolution – the UI elements are separated individually and scaled individually to get a consistent appearance, whereas when you use an iPhone app on the iPad, all they do is double the whole app, rather than scale the individual elements appropriately.
I’m not saying it’s the end of the world, but the reason iOS runs so smoothly is because there is such few hardware options. To remove this would be to kill its only advantage – to run well on weaker hardware.
See, I don’t think you can count double, because pixel-doubling means that for lower-res apps, you don’t get the benefit of the higher res screens, which would defy the point of having the higher res screen in the first place. So developers have to rewrite code (Which they don’t have to do in Android! – the font scales too in Android, which it doesn’t in iOS). Bitmaps really don’t work quite as well in iOS as they do in Android, not universally at least, BECAUSE iOS want them tailored for specific devices. It runs smoother if you tailor it.
Wait, what? iPhone 4? Who cares about that? Also, even in your 3-list device, you missed out the iPad mini.
And the resolution is too high to fit in a consumer device less than 8 inches. It’s a physical limitation at the moment – no screen has yet been designed to make it. That’s why I said it.
Why shouldn’t they be able to fit a 2x scaled high res display? Seeing as they can squeeze 1920×1080 into a 5 inch display, squeezing a few extra pixels into 8 inches should be pretty easy. The question is if they can do it for the same price.
Erm, 2048 x 1536 is not a few extra pixels. It’s a lot more extra pixels. Almost 2x the number of pixels as 1920 x 1080 in a screen that is only 3/5ths bigger.
And they only recently fitted 1080p in consumer tech because demand was there for it – 2048 x 1536 is an obscure screen size, I doubt the demand will be there. Of course, they could double it! But then the big 10 inch iPad looks a bit shit and cheap…
Do you mean that the smaller screen is 3/5ths the size of the larger one? Surely if it was 3/5ths bigger it’d actually be smaller?
Ah, I made a mistake with that
. Cheers! I don’t mean the smaller screen is 3/5ths the size of the larger one, I mean the larger one is 8/5ths – so it has an extra 3/5ths on top of the small one. Cheers!
“An awful rumour”. But it gave you something to write about eh?
As an iPad mini user (who has previously owned the iPad 1 & 2), I do not care for the massively overhyped Retina display but instead would like Apple to fix the iPads inexcusable lack of RAM and add cursor navigation controls to the keyboard. The former so ones browser tabbed pages don’t keep reloading and the latter so one don’t have to faff around with the magnified cursor everytime an edit need to be made! Cannot believe Apple have not sorted these issues 2 years in. Makes usability a nightmare.
I wouldn’t say Retina is overhyped. You can certainly see a difference. I can understand wanting more RAM for browser tabs, that is something Apple could easily upgrade with little fuss.
Personally, I think the best implementation of cursor navigation was a Jailbreak tweak that allowed you to swipe over the keyboard to move it.
Did Digi Times not correctly predict the iPad mini and iPad 4 release earlier this year? Credit where it’s due..
Two designs really, phones and tablets – responsive design can surely take care of the rest.
Hi
I am still happy with my ipad 1st generation 3G … its always with me in my van.
As i am London Base and i do Man and Van Removals Every days New client property or small stuff i have to move.. With Big Van Ipad is really good for me help a lot to see on Google map street and other details which some time i cant fine on my Sat nag.
I am waiting for ipad mini with Cellular which is small and really handy for me.
http://www.manwithvanhireremovals.co.uk