1. New iPads (notice the plural form)
Apple released two iPads on Tuesday, the highly anticipated 7.9-inch iPad mini and the surprise iPad 4. The brand new mini enters the market as one of the lightest and thinnest tablets that you can hold with one hand. The mini starts at $329 for 16GB.
The unexpected iPad 4 replaces the third-generation iPad by offering faster graphics, performance, and LTE. Prices start at $499 for 16GB. You can pre-order both devices this Friday, and they will be in stores on November 2.
2. “The Year of the Enterprise Tablet” is real
The new iPads are built to support fully-integrated business applications that serve diverse industries and business needs.
For this reason, corporations are rapidly adopting enterprise mobile applications to increase operating efficiency and engagement with customers. As a testament to this, 94% of Fortune 500 companies are testing or deploying iPads, according to Forbes.
Moreover, nearly 9 out of 10 small businesses report using smartphones and almost 2 out of 3 use tablets.
3. Apple Continues to Roll Out its Retina Displays
The 13-inch MacBook Pro finally receives the Retina treatment. Like its 15-inch sibling, the 13-inch model packs more pixels than any other competitive laptop and double that of HDTVs. How many pixels does it contain? Over 4 million.
4. Refresh of the Mac Lineup
Apple updated its Mac mini and iMac lineup with a plethora of new speed and performance upgrades, as well as the option of a new Fusion Drive—a hybrid of Flash storage and HDD.
The Mac mini is available now starting at $599 or an OS X Server starting at $999. The 21.5-inch iMac starts at $1299 (ships in November) and the 27-inch iMac starts at $1799 (ships in December).
5. Apps are the Future
With more than 35 billion apps downloaded to date, the market for app development will continue experiencing explosive growth as consumer and business demand increases.
A recent survey revealed that 50 percent of businesses that use mobile apps say they could not survive — or it would be a major challenge to survive — without them.