By all accounts, Apple is about to unveil its 2013 update to the iPad mini, often dubbed the iPad Mini 2, at a West Coast event on Oct. 22. This time around, though, the iPad mini has a lot more competition in the small tablet world.
The Nexus 7 2 and Microsoft Surface 2 only scratch the surface of the 7 to 8-inch Android and Windows 8.1 tablets flooding the market right now. Most feature, at the least, better performance and a better display than the 2012 iPad mini.
Android
On the Android side, the second-generation Google Nexus 7 probably leads the charge against iOS and the iPad mini, featuring a much better 1920 x 1200p Full HD resolution and a decent Snapdragon S4 Pro chip with 2GB of RAM. The Nexus 7 2 offers this in a thin, one-third-of-an-inch chassis, which is close to the iPad mini in size and weight, and at a very affordable minimum price of $229.
The Nexus 7 2 isn't the only cheap, hardware spec-stacked Android-based small tablet out there though.
Amazon has come through with a new impressive offering in the Kindle Fire HDX, which achieves the same resolution as the Nexus 7 2, but features a bleeding-edge quad-core Qualcomm Snapdragon 800 processor, clocked at 2.2GHz with 2GB of RAM and Amazon's MayDay live-chat customer support and concierge service 24/7 at the touch of a button. The Kindle Fire HDX is also retailing for a minimum of $229.
Other companies like LG are making upper-range small tablets that will add competition as well.
The iPad mini only has an A5 processor with half a gigabyte of RAM, and only offers a 1024 x 768p resolution - but that's one of the things that's expected to change come Oct. 22. Apple's heftier price is not.
Windows 8.1 Tablets
Despite Microsoft's interminable troubles with the latest incarnation of Windows RT, the company, and its surrounding manufacturers, will try to steal eyes (and wallets) away from Apple's latest mini offering as well. These include the improved Microsoft Surface 2 lineup, which offer as much storage as the top-of-the-line 128GB iPad mini at a lower cost through its microSD card slot, as well as a full HD 1920 x 1080p screen.
But other tablets are offering the full Windows 8.1 at the iPad mini's size, including a recently unveiled Lenovo Miix2 and Acer Iconia W4 - with many more to come.
These small tablets easily offer as much storage as the iPad mini, along with the latest Intel Bay Trail processors and screens with lower resolutions that still out-shine the iPad mini. While Windows 8.1 may seem like a barrier for entry to some, the free Office application suite that comes on many will certainly entice those who are tired of waiting for that long-fabled iPad-native Office app.
Apples and Others
This is not to say that Apple has an impossible - or even difficult - task ahead of itself. Apple tablets still dominate the relatively young tablet market, and Apple is still the first brand many average consumers associate with tablets - sometimes to the annoying Xerox/Band-Aid point where they call every tablet an iPad.
But Apple will have to do more than an incremental update to the iPad mini's specs - though they do need that update. Of course, Apple is rumored to be working on something special, in the form of a possible Bluetooth keyboard cover, as well as a 64-bit A7 processor for the iPad mini. And the Retina screen - they can't forget the Retina screen.
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