Apple Event in October 2018 Around the Corner

October Apple iPad event: Everything we know [Video]

Video uploaded by CNET on October 18, 2018

Contents

1 October Apple iPad event: Everything we know [Video]
2 Apple Event in October 2018: New iPad Pro and Mac are Around the Corner!
3 Links

Apple Event in October 2018: New iPad Pro and Mac are Around the Corner!

Had a break after the iPhones and Apple Watch presentation in September? Time’s over! The new iPad Pro and Mac are around the corner. They will arrive on October 30, 2018, at 10 am, at the Brooklyn Academy of Music’s Howard Gilman Opera House in Brooklyn, New York.

Apple’s invitations tease, “There’s more in the making,” and the grand air of the coming event is highlighted by various logo designs–the signature apple is sliced, drawn in curved lines, or looks like a kid’s drawing–but the invitation designs are the last thing on our minds. The Apple users community is eagerly anticipating the premiere of the new iPad Pro X, iMac Pro, an entry-level MacBook, and probably an upgraded Mac Mini.

Apple’s October event has been scheduled for October 30 in New York. Source of image: Macworld.com.

iPad Pro X 2018

This next tablet in the Pro line-up is rumored to feature slimmer bezels, a USB-C port instead of Lightning, and a Face ID instead of fingerprint scanner. In other words, it is going to be an iPhone X on steroids, including the gesture interface. The 9.7-inch iPad is now dropped for larger 11-inch and 12.9-inch models.

The hardware specifications leak confirmed a A12X processor with A12X GPU. This iPad Pro will be able to output 4K HDR video to external displays via the USB-C cable.

The hardware specifications leak confirmed a A12X processor with A12X GPU. This iPad Pro will be able to output 4K HDR video to external displays via the USB-C cable. The video control panel will be available in Settings. To tell the truth, to me, it’s overkill; I just can’t come up with a scenario when I’d need to use my iPad Pro in this way.

The 2018 iPad Pro will feature a magnetic connector for the Smart Keyboard and other accessories. By the way, Apple engineers promise the new Apple Pencil will be connected by proximity, much like AirPods or HomePod: no more charging port for switching between devices!

iMac Pro 2018

The only upgrade we’re awaiting in iMacs is the upgrade to the 8th-generation Coffee Lake chips. Nothing exciting here.

MacBook Air 2018

Speculations about MacBook Air 2018 are even more vivid, mostly due to the fact that, according to famous analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, this Air will become the first entry-level MacBook. Although Apple has a very peculiar understanding of the “entry-level” term, the price is expected to be below $1000.

Speculations about MacBook Air 2018 are even more vivid, mostly due to the fact that, according to famous analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, this Air will become the first entry-level MacBook

We personally doubt that the upgraded MacBook Air will cost so low. For one thing, the laptop will have to feature a Retina display to run the Mojave OS, as it doesn’t work well with lesser resolution and pixel density. LG has allegedly started making 13.3 screens with a 2560 x 1600 pixel resolution. As you may well know, Retina displays never come cheap.

As for the hardware, there are no trustworthy leaks yet. Some experts claim there will be an Intel’s Kaby Lake inside, others venture a guess that it will be an Apple proprietary chip, or even an ARM SoC. Both parties agree on one thing: it won’t be the Intel’s Cannon Lake CPU, which is not expected until 2019.

The yet-to-come MacBook Air will have to pitch against Windows Ultrabooks with a jaw dropping set of features, including a fingerprint sensor and Windows Hello Face recognition. It would be lovely to have Face ID or Touch ID in a laptop from Apple, but I just can’t see them in a low-end model.

Mac Mini 2018

The Mac Mini was last updated back in 2014. Tim Cook assured the community that Apple is going to further support the small desktop, but we haven’t yet spotted any leak about the upgrade. The new Mac Mini does have a laptop-grade Celeron quad-core chip of the seventh generation, with integrated GPU, 6GB of RAM, and 512TB SSD storage. The problem is that such a Mac Mini could easily be replaced with an also expected MacBook Air. Sadly enough, with iPad Pro and MacBook Air around, there’s no place for the Mac Mini.

Rumors suggest that Apple will soon introduce a new entry-level MacBook, but could the company also be about to revamp the long-neglected Mac mini at its event on 30 October?

The bottom line: iPad Pro X will arrive for sure (and there’s going to be a lot of hype around its new artistic features and the Photoshop full version for iOS), MacBook Air will probably arrive, but I wouldn’t bet my money on Mac Mini.