Apple iPad 3 rumors raced across the Web after Daring Fireball's Dan Gruber posted a theory about Apple's iPad roadmap for 2011.
Apple's iPad 2? Never mind the lack of official unveiling-for much of the
blogosphere, it seems the company's next-generation tablet is already old news.
No, the new focus, however temporary, is on the iPad 3.
Many of the rumors swirling around the third-generation device seem to have
started with Daring Fireball's John Gruber,
who in
a Feb. 9 posting detailed what he called a "theory" about its
release.
Discussing the summer release of Hewlett-Packard's upcoming TouchPad tablet,
he wrote: "Summer feels like a long time away. If my theory is right, they're
not only going to be months behind the iPad 2, but if they slip until late
summer, they might bump up against the release of the iPad 3."
Later that day, Gruber clarified his pronouncement: "My gut feeling is
that Apple will move the iPad to a September release schedule, alongside the
iPods." In that spirit, his "guess" was that Apple would debut
the iPad 2 in March, for an early-April shipping window, and then ship the iPad
3 in September.
"How could Apple release a third-generation iPad just six months or so
after the second one?" he wrote. "Maybe it won't be an actual
next-generation model. Maybe it's more like an iPad 2.5, or iPad 2 Pro."
Guesswork or not, other publications seemed to take the ball and run with
it. By the morning of Feb. 10, the
Washington
Post's headline-"iPad 3 to have Fall 2011 launch? Some say it makes
sense"-was front-and-center on Google News, referencing Gruber's postings.
The iPad 3 theories contribute to what's already a white-hot furnace of
speculation over everything iPad-related. On Feb. 9, the
Wall Street Journal published a report suggesting that Apple had
already started production on its next-generation iPad.
The company's newest tablet will be "thinner and lighter than the first
model,"
unnamed
sources apparently told the Journal,
while suggesting that it would include a front-facing camera for video
conferencing, more memory, and a boosted graphics processor.
Other reports have suggested that the next iPad will lack a Retina Display
or similar high-resolution screen. "Our sources say Apple has requested
that manufacturers begin work on displays with that resolution for the iPad 3,"
IDC research manager Tom Mainelli told
PC World, after a DigiTimes report that
the next iPad would boast a resolution of 2048 x 1536.
Apple's lack of official word on its upcoming products has a habit of
driving bloggers and analysts into a frenzy. The original iPad attracted no end
of speculation in the weeks ahead of its initial release, and the next
version-whenever it comes out-seems to be mimicking that trend.
Editor's Note: Gruber's name was corrected from the original article.
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