Apple unveils iPad 2, will hit stores on March 25
Posted March 2, 2011 1:31 pm.
This article is more than 5 years old.
TORONTO, Ont. – Apple CEO Steve Jobs has unveiled a new version of its tablet device, the iPad 2, and techies only have to wait another three weeks to get their hands on it.
Despite recent reports of being ill in health, a frail-looking Jobs made an appearance on stage in jeans and a black turtleneck, explaining the updated version of the popular device is a third thinner, and is much faster and lighter than its predecessor, and comes in two colours (black and white).
It connects to a television via HDMI with an adapter, which is sold separately.
At the Apple store in the Eaton Centre, technology buffs were already getting excited about its debut, causing shopper Richard to say, “It’s not kind of crazy. It’s like absolutely out there crazy.”
He told 680News the upgrade will be worth the money, and it’s the FaceTime application that has him most excited.
“Definitely having a face to face conversation with someone without having to turn your device around is definitely going to be a huge selling point. That was personally a huge selling feature for myself as to why I bought the iPhone 4.”
“I just upgraded from an iPhone 3G […] the performance improvements over that much of a generation gap were definitely noticeable for me. Apple always has the interest and they are always on the cutting edge of technology being released.”
Armond says he is most excited by the CPU, which is said to be twice as fast, while graphics are expected to be nine times faster.
“It would have to be the Internet. [The best is] when you have a bunch of applications open, how fast they run, because multitasking is good.”
The weight of the new tablet has gone down from 1.5 pounds to 1.3 pounds.
Apple has sold nearly 15 million iPads in the nine months since it introduced the device, and is hoping to remain on top with the new version.
While the iPad had the tablet market largely to itself last year, Apple will face increasing competition this year from Dell, Research in Motion, Hewlett-Packard, Samsung and others.
The iPad 2 will arrive in Canada on March 25 at the price of $499 US, right on par with the original device. It will be available in the US starting March 11.
