With Apple’s October 16 event just around the corner, iPad rumors start to pile up.
Since 2012, the Cupertino company has gotten into a habit of releasing new additions to its tablet line in October, and judging by all the information being thrown up so far, Apple will likely release a successor to the iPad Air this year.
The iPad Air 2 has thus far been rumored to pack an anti-reflective screen, an A8 processor (similar to that in the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus), Touch ID, and come in iPhone 6 and iPhone 5S colors (Gold, Silver, Space Gray).
New rumors concerning the tablet’s chassis, display, and memory have surfaced.
Vietnamese blog Tinhte.vn recently released a number of convincingly looking photos of a silver colored iPad Air 2 (via 9to5Mac).
The iPad Air 2 model, which is suspected to be a good mock up or a prototype, is only 7mm thick. Like the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, the “leaked” model has recessed volume buttons. Unlike the new iPhones, however, it is missing the protruding camera and the mute switch.
Moving on, developer Hamza Sood has discovered some codes in the developer-only iOS 8.1 beta that point to the possibility of higher resolution displays in the new iPads.
Sood notes that a number of image files have “3x” in their names, which suggests a resolution that is three times that of the original iPad.
To put in perspective, the original iPad and iPad 2 have 1024 x 768 resolutions, while the iPad 3 to iPad Air have “2x” 2048 x 1536 resolutions.
A “3x” resolution could see the iPad Air 2 pack a whooping 3072 x 2304 display and about 395 pixels-per-inch, according to GottaBeMobile, and this definitely qualifies it to be considered as a “Retina HD” display quality.
Under the hood, the iPad Air 2 will use 2GB Elpida RAM chips, according to third-party Apple service provide GeekBar (MacRumors via Weibo).
This is means that the iPad Air 2 will have double the RAM of the iPad Air, which packs a 1GB Elpida DDR3 SDRAM chip.
If the GeekBar rumor hold through, this will be the first time Apple is increasing the memory on its regular size iPad line since the iPad 3 in 2012.
MacRumors suggests that the increase is RAM is necessary to bring out the “best performance on iOS 8,” and possibly to help the tablet accomplish rumored split-screen multitasking functions that Apple will introduce to iOS 8 in the future.
When it comes to storage, the iPad Air 2 should come in 32GB, 64GB, and 128GB options, according to The Michael Report. Apple should be removing the 16GB option, but it could still be available for the new iPad Mini.
Citing sources within Apple, The Michael Report also notes that the iPad Air 2 will feature a fully-laminated display (a manufacturing process where the cover glass and Retina LCD are made as a single unit), feature an 8 megapixel back camera and a FaceTime HD front camera, and come with NFC hardware that will allow it to fully utilize the upcoming Apple Pay app.
