iPad Pro Expected At Apple's Sept. 9 Event
Unless you've been blissfully spending the last week of summer on a deserted island (not a bad proposition) you've heard that Apple is planning a major media event on Sept. 9 where the company will likely take the wraps off of the hotly-anticipated iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus.
In addition to the focus on the company's latest iteration of its ubiquitous smartphone, the rumor mill is indicating that Apple is going to debut a larger version of its tablet called the iPad Pro, which would feature a 12.9-inch screen.
Further separating it from its iPad and iPad mini cousins are features like differentiated software, an improved keyboard, and split-screen multitasking to make it a better daily workhorse for mobile professionals.
Projections by KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, first sourced in MacRumors, suggested the device would be ready to hit stores in October or November. According to them, it will feature a stylus with Apple's Force Touch technology, which allows users to use different levels of pressure on the display to deploy applications or execute other types of commands.
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Force Touch, already available on the Apple Watch and newest MacBook, is expected to be the hallmark feature of the updated iPhone 6s, and Kuo believes that the technology will eventually be integrated across Apple's entire product line.
Apple's not the only player rumored for the monster tablet market. Archrival Samsung is purportedly planning a massive 18.4-inch tablet that will run Goolge's Android operating system.
Samsung and Apple are each looking to breathe new life into the ailing tablet market, as large-screen smartphones and phablets -- smartphones that are essentially small tablets that make phone calls -- eat into sales.
A July report from IT research firm IDC found the worldwide tablet market declined 7% year-over-year in the second quarter of 2015. The period was marked by little hardware innovation and limited vendor portfolio updates.
This could change if the tablet rumors surrounding Apple and Samsung become reality.
Apple maintained its lead in the worldwide tablet market in the second quarter of the year, shipping 10.9 million units in the second quarter -- good for nearly a quarter of the market -- while Samsung followed with 7.6 million units shipped and 17% marketshare.
Among other Apple rumors surrounding the media event in San Francisco next week, 9to5Mac quoted unnamed "reliable sources" saying the company would release a new version of its iMac all-in-one desktop computer with a 21.5-inch 4K ultra-high-definition display.
The display will boast a resolution of 4096 x 2304, up from the current model's resolution of 1920 x 1080.
While that level of resolution is no doubt impressive, Apple currently makes a Retina 5K display, which has four times as many pixels as the standard 27-inch iMac display and runs $1,999