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What the iPad 3 Looks Like
redletterdave writes "If you were expecting a radically different-looking tablet from the iPad 2, prepare for a minor letdown. In the same way Apple upgraded the iPhone 4 into the iPhone 4S, the exterior of the iPad 3 mirrors that of the iPad 2, despite completely renovated and upgraded innards. iLab Factory reportedly provided Sharp with the necessary parts to build the high-resolution iPad 3 display, and in a company blog post, various iPad 3 components are displayed alongside those of the iPad 2 for quick comparison. In addition to a new camera mount that will reportedly match or improve upon the 8-megapixel camera system in the iPhone 4S, the post also revealed that the iPad 3 will be approximately 1 mm thicker than its predecessor to house Apple's upgraded components, including a bigger battery, an improved camera, and a dual-LED lit system to make the 2048 x 1536 display even brighter."
Even though I have no need for it, I feel a strange compulsion to throw money at it.
SJW: Someone who has run out of real oppression, and has to fake it.
I seriously doubt they will shoot so low. At best I expect a price drop to $350 (but most likely $399) for the iPad 2 (and only available Wi-Fi 16 GB without cell data options.)
As for the PC market vs. Tablets... I got to ponder... Many people are defensive saying that tablets can't or should never take over and that PCs must live for us to keep our computing freedom... but what if we are looking at it wrong? What if we look at tablets not as downgraded computers but as the next evolutionary step for consoles and handheld entertainment units?
Will it be 4G or 3G?
3G = who cares.
4G = needs a nuclear reactor for 5 hours of battery life.
There is no clear win.
Anyone who has ever written iOS software knows that the UI scaling is done by float, and can easily take a value of 1.5.
It can technically be done, but results will look like crap, because scaling of bitmaps does not look well if you don't use an integer factor - either you get some pixels larger than other, or you need to use interpolation, resulting in an altogether blurry picture. There's a reason why Apple did 2x upscale with iPhone 4, rather than going for the then industry-standard-already 480x800.
Besides, from TFA, it looks like they have already identified the specific LCD screen that looks like it's tailor made for iPad 3 in dimensional terms - and it's 2048x1536.
Like it or not, Apple basically defined the tablet market, and their hardware + iOS ecosystem is incredibly profitable. Like it or not, Samsung is perceived as a major clone maker -- the 21st century equivalent of Compaq in the late 1980s.
That was once true, but desktop and laptop screens have regressed over the past few years towards 1080p (high-def TV) resolutions. There are only a few 2560x1600 desktop displays now - Apple for example no longer sells one. 1600x1200 screens were available on laptops for some time, too, but no longer.
With that resolution and dual backlights, I bet the new iPad screen will look fantastic. Now give me a 'retinal' 30" display for my desktop, please.
Fanboys. Anti-fanboys. Two sides of the same irrational coin if you ask me.
I'll tell you why. Because troll moderators have taken over the site and are trying to subvert it. Because the IT readership that used to visit Slashdot has been bleeding from the site in the last few years, leaving behind the more extremist posters. Because if you say something that those posters don't like, they abuse the moderation system to drive you off the site rather than reply and explain why you're wrong.
The latest thing is to accuse absolutely everyone of being a "shill" so that others will follow along and do their dirty work. My post didn't go down to -1 Flamebait until someone else accused me of being a shill and got modded +5 Insightful (!). Because of the default filters, +5 comments are automatically expanded while less than +2 is collapsed, so now every moderator reading the comments for the first time will see that post first and likely not even read what I wrote.
CmdrTaco promised a new moderation system for years, and it never arrived before he left the site. This limited moderation pool concept is terrible. It makes it so that a single point in either direction has a drastic effect on karma and effectively restricts people from posting something that's unpopular, even if it's legitimately true.
This is off-topic, and so I'd be justified in getting downmodded for this, but since my karma is getting completely destroyed right now anyway, I may as well post it before I'm limited to two posts a day. Thanks, Slashdot. Thanks, troll moderators.
"Sufferin' succotash."