In the grand, glorious world that we call ‘Apple Rumors’, we have become accustomed to certain rules. For example, when the Wall Street Journal reports something, it’s usually a little more credible and believable than your run-of-the-mill rumor.
So you’ll perhaps be pleased to learn that the WSJ is reporting the iPad 2 is in production, “according to people familiar with the matter” (ah, that old gem). The new iPad is said to be lighter, thinner, faster – but will have not, as many have reported, have the so-called ‘retina display’, an Apple marketing term for a screen on which the resolution is so high, you can’t distinguish individual pixels.
Of course, anyone ‘familiar’ with the matter would be aware that in order for Apple to provide a display with a higher-than-HD resolution, they’d not only have to produce an incredibly expensive screen, they’d also need some serious CPU/GPU power to drive it – and even the quad-core chips in Sony’s NGP aren’t powerful enough.
But given announcements like this one from Texas Instruments, it’s likely that by the time iPad 3 comes around, Apple would have access to the tech to build a tablet with a retina display.
So the big question for prospective iPad buyers is this: do you buy an iPad 2? Or do you wait for the high-res display you know is coming at some point?
