So when Apple announced their latest products. A new, extremely thin iMac, a 13" Retina Macbook Pro, and, perhaps the most interesting; the iPad Mini. You might be thinking the same thing I was. An iPad Mini? Isn't that just an iPod? Well, you might be right...
In true Apple fashion, the details that were released were mostly marketing guff. It looks like it's literally just a smaller iPad.
The new iPad Mini is intended to compete with the wide range of ultra-cheap android tablets. The iPad is a fairly high end device in relation to the rest of the tablet market, but you are getting what you pay for. The iPad is, without discrepancy, the best option in the tablet market. Although android is developing, it still cannot compete with the simplicity and power of iOS.
The problem with making something cheaper is, you often have to sacrifice the amount of hardware in a device, or the quality of the hardware. This is something which Apple has been meticulous about in the past: quality. So, we can assume that if the iPad Mini really is as cheap or cheaper than some of it's competitors in the Android market, it will either be lacking performance, or quality. A bad quality Apple product...?
So, a smaller, cheaper iPad; an ultra thin iMac, and a 13'' Retina Macbook. Nothing much on the innovation side of things. We could be seeing the beginning of the end for the (current) largest company in the world. The only thing it seems like they're doing is making things smaller and lighter.
Things can only get so small and so light. Only Time Will Tell !
