back to article CANNIBAL! Apple's 7.85in iPad will EAT 9.7in iPad sales

Apple's much-rumoured 'iPad Mini' will eat into sales of the larger model, but it's still going to lead to a massive increase in sales of the platform - if Apple releases such a gadget at all. So says Andy Hargreaves of Pacific Crest, a US stockbroker. Hargreaves this week said he reckons that for every buyer who opts for a 7. …

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  1. JDX Gold badge

    1024x768 as a "iPad2 mini" has to be the obvious route, allowing smaller price while remaining profitable and still a great display.

    1. big_D Silver badge
      Trollface

      1024x768

      That is so 1980s!

      I won't get out of bed for anything less than HD :-D

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      1024x768 - go for it apple!

      lower res than the nexus 7 and significantly higher price. Should be funny watching the iLemmings desperately trying to come up with excuses why its the best thing since bread!

    3. Geoff Campbell Silver badge
      Boffin

      I'm not so sure.

      Without doing anything so tedious as actual calculations or looking up information, it strikes me that 1024x768 will result in a wider, shorter unit than previous 7" tablets, especially if the screen is 7.85" rather than 7".

      Which means it probably won't have the one really useful attribute of the existing 7" tablets, the ability to slip into a jacket pocket. The existing 7" ones only just fit in most pockets I've tried, an extra half inch would stop that.

      That would certainly stop me buying one.

      Anyway, it's all bollocks until they are announced, so I guess we'll just have to wait and see.

      GJC

  2. Joerg
    FAIL

    It would be Tim Cook big second mistake at Apple...

    First Tim Cook big mistake was wasting Apple huge accumulated cash giving it to investors. He shouldn't have done that. He made Apple weaker and investors thieves ready to kill Apple at will.

    A Mini-iPad IS NOT NEEDED ! It would be a huge mistake.

    While maybe a 5" updated iPod with a pair of embedded analog sticks could make sense to completely annihilate expensive portable consoles. That would be a profitable product that Apple should pursue.

    Also Apple has still not opened the iPod Nano to developers, not even the latest revision. That is another bad Apple mistake. They should let developers make apps for iPod Nano. Giving customers thousands of new apps, customizable alarm clocks and so on.

    That is another area of improvement for Apple.

    BUT an iPad Mini is a terrible mistake. Microsoft and Google give no real competition on tablets at all. Their products just suck.

    Apple should just discount previous generation iPad more, like 40% less and that's it. No need for any iPad Mini. Who wants the latest model pays full price as always. Currently the iPad2 has been discounted only a few bucks by Apple. They should just discount it a lot more.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Thumb Up

      Re: It would be Tim Cook big second mistake at Apple...

      Wow, this is amazing analysis! They should hire you and get you advising the board ASAP!

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: It would be Tim Cook big second mistake at Apple...

        It's a better piece of analysis than the puff that prompted this article.

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: It would be Tim Cook big second mistake at Apple...

        "Wow, this is amazing analysis! They should hire you and get you advising the board ASAP!"

        My thoughts exactly. Forget about a 7" iPad and instead release an iPod with analogue sticks you say? Why hasn't Tim Cook hired this man already!? "lololol"

    2. Dave 126 Silver badge

      Re: It would be Tim Cook big second mistake at Apple...

      There is something to be said for a device that will fit in a jacket pocket, car glove box or normal-sized handbag- some devices will, existing iPads won't.

      Integrate joysticks? Why make the hardware bulkier for 80% users, just or the benefit of the rest who could use a Bluetooth HID option?

      iPod Nano development? Yeah, the geek in me would like to see it talking to other devices (and I own no Apple), just as using an iPad as HID for a Mac applications seems to me (a commentard) a good idea... We all have little wish-lists of fantasy gadgets, but we don't always claim to know more than the CEO who hasn't given them to us.

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: It would be Tim Cook big second mistake at Apple...

        'There is something to be said for a device that will fit in a jacket pocket, car glove box or normal-sized handbag- some devices will, existing iPads won't.'

        That'll be an iPhone then.

    3. Steve Davies 3 Silver badge
      Facepalm

      Re: It would be Tim Cook big second mistake at Apple...

      Cutting the price of the iPad 2 to the levels you are suggesting would immetiately bring a whole new slew of lawsuits and Government investigations.

      While the price is high there is room underneath for competitors. Ok, a good few of the maren't very good but there is still competition.

      Cut the price and almost all of the competition will bite the dust.

      Apple is very smart. By keeping their prices high they artificially restrict the size of their market. This keeps them under the Anti-Trust inquisitions radar.

      Destroy the competition and the wolves woll only be too ready to pounce.

      Doh! because this is only common sense.

      1. Andrew James

        Re: It would be Tim Cook big second mistake at Apple...

        You could argue the other way, and say that the low end of the market has no decent competition from a decent product. Just because £400 android tablets pitch in against the iPad price point and dont sell many doesnt make the competion commission step in ... so why should the £200 android tablet not selling as many as a similarly priced iPad make any difference at all?

    4. Kebablog

      Re: It would be Tim Cook big second mistake at Apple...

      "Also Apple has still not opened the iPod Nano to developers"

      Could it be that the iPod Nano doesn't run iOS - it runs an interface that looks like it.

    5. JDX Gold badge

      Re: It would be Tim Cook big second mistake at Apple...

      The quick straw-poll that is El Reg commentard voters, shows even radical anti-Apple people think aan iPad mini is a good idea.

    6. Steve Evans

      Re: It would be Tim Cook big second mistake at Apple...

      "While maybe a 5" updated iPod with a pair of embedded analog sticks could make sense to completely annihilate expensive portable consoles"...

      By replacing it with an even more expensive Apple branded console?

    7. Anonymous Coward
      FAIL

      Re: It would be Tim Cook big second mistake at Apple...

      Fixed it for ya

      " Microsoft and Google give no real competition on tablets at all. Apple told me that their products just suck."

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    i love it. So now we're getting sales predictions for items that do not, and may very well, never, exist.

    I'd like to meet the guy who said to Andy. "Hey, you know that thing that Apple don't make, yeah, well I want sales predictions for it."

    1. Pen-y-gors

      ...and stunningly precise predictions too

      not just ...oooh, call it around thirty million or so but 35.2 million. Not, 35.3 or 35.1, and definitely not 34.9 or 35.6 million, but 35.2 million, give or take 0.05 million. The guy is a genius - move over Mystic Meg.

      Can we please have a follow-up article in October 2013 and ask el Reg to interview him to see how accurate he was?

    2. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      The conversation would've been...

      "Andy, write something, I don't care what, and write it now. Or you're fired."

    3. Joe 35
      WTF?

      " thing that Apple don't make,"

      "Hey, you know that thing that Apple don't make, yeah, well I want sales predictions for it."

      So you don't think that before a company makes a new product they get sales predictions for it then?

      Your position would be, presumably, they make stuff at random, then see how its selling?

      I know Clive SInclair and Amstrad and lets face it even Apple (remember Lisa?) tried that in the early days, but they just don't do that kind of stuff any more as it didnt work (just like those products in fact )

  4. the-it-slayer
    Facepalm

    Stop it El Reg!

    Just type iPad mini into the El Reg search and you'll see a dedicated article every 1 in 3! Please, please, please. Let sites like MacRumors spil out the crap about the non-existant iPad mini. It's not going to happen and it will never happen. It won't ever be in Apple's interests to dilute their current iPad sales unless the Android bomb makes them desperate enough to chunk back some of the market. However, Jobs' declaration to not every produce a 7" tablet device will stand unless we all evolve with smaller hands.

    All this spin is not going to get Apple to ever speak to you as bum-buddies.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Trollface

      Re: Stop it El Reg!

      El Reg are rejection junkies - the more hate Apple give them, the more stories are printed.

      Page views and advertising revenue, you say? yes, that's probably the real reason.

      1. the-it-slayer
        Linux

        Re: Stop it El Reg!

        Maybe that's the real reason 1 in every 2 articles mentions the world Apple. Secret deal perhaps? The penguin knows.

    2. JDX Gold badge

      It's not going to happen and it will never happen

      You mean like an iPhone with a bigger screen won't happen?

      1. the-it-slayer

        Re: It's not going to happen and it will never happen

        Bigger screen will happen, but taller :). I'm just amazed how many fandroids have turned into the hulk.

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    On the other hand

    if Apple releases the rumoured iTV under the moniker iPad Maxi, then I estimate that 100% of those people who will buy it, will, and just about all of the people who won't, won't. I can categorically state that 100% of the don't-knows will or won't buy it, and 100% of the sales will be to purchasers. Many of the sales will be paid for with money, and most purchasers will receive the product in exchange. On the other, other hand, if Apple don't release the iPad Lord Humongous, none of the above will apply.

    I can haz high-paid analyst job?

    1. Kebablog

      Re: On the other hand

      Yes, you've achieved the right amount of 'Analyst Bollocks' in the post.

      1. Darryl

        Re: On the other hand

        That's almost as good as the BBC reporter (don't remember who) who claimed that most cars on UK roads only have one occupant, usually the driver.

  6. Jason Hindle

    Smaller iPad is entirely necessary.....

    At least if Apple is to realise its ambitions in the publishing market. The current iPad is not comfortable for reading a book.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Re: Smaller iPad is entirely necessary.....

      No but a kindle is, it has the special screen and everything.

      ipads are very comfortable for watching videos, browsing the internet and everything else they were designed for,

      1. This post has been deleted by its author

      2. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        Re: Smaller iPad is entirely necessary.....

        The iPad wasn't designed for watching videos. It has the wrong aspect ratio, and the resolution is currently way to high, requiring image manipulation to stop a 1920x1080 movie looking like a postcard.

      3. Jason Hindle

        Re: Smaller iPad is entirely necessary.....

        "No but a kindle is, it has the special screen and everything.

        ipads are very comfortable for watching videos, browsing the internet and everything else they were designed for,"

        Correct, but Apple also wants to sell lots of books so they will either bring out a dedicated ebook reader, just like a Kindle, or a smaller iPad. I'll leave you to guess which of those will happen.

  7. Bear Features

    Oh the amazing "Analyst" story. This rubbish is as bent as Apple's new IFone being magically left in a bar... by accident... *cough*

  8. KroSha

    Oh, look at the magic smoke, in the mirror!

    Load of crap. Please stop posting "analyst" "wave finger in air in hope of publicity".

    Turd icon needed.

  9. Tempest
    Unhappy

    Just Apple PR keeping the name in the Press

    I guess they can't make it a 7 incher otherwise it would prove Jobs was wrong.

    The question is whether even iPhans would get sucked into paying the premium for a product that is similar to a $200 pad from the rest.

  10. Jurassic
    Devil

    Aliens attack!

    "Apple's 7.85in iPad will EAT 9.7in iPad sales"

    Wow! A non-existent, fictitious Apple product will eat into sales of the hot-selling iPad. Who knew???

    Using the same lack of logic in forming an opinion: "Aliens will Attack New York City Tomorrow" (You heard it here first, folks. ;-))

  11. Scarborough Dave
    Pirate

    Fictitious or not!

    A smaller cheaper iPad would make a great kids handheld games console and business tool.

    Talking of business tools, often the iPad is too big and iPod too small, something I between would be just right for the service industry.

    Icon - well I always wanted to be a pirate!

    1. Cucumber C Face
      Joke

      Bring on the iSpanner set

      Tablets at one inch intervals between 3 and 80.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Stop

    Stockbroker?

    What does a stockbroker know? That's one level below the usual "analyst" who pulls figures out of his backside to seek headlines.

  13. homebase

    I wonder if the Ipod Touch 5 or Iphone 5 with a bigger screen should be enough to replace the Ipad 7 inch. A 7 inch Ipad with 8GB of memory space limit the amount of downloading high resolution content. But a 8GB of memory space for the Ipod Touch 5 can download more content at lower resolution. Plus it fit better in the pocket and should be less expensive than a Ipad 7 inch.

    I prefer a Ipod Touch 5 with a 5 inch screen then a Ipad 7 inch.

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