We've covered the various iPad 2 rumors, leaks and predictions for months now, carefully gathering what seemed to be the best, most interesting and perhaps most convincing facts into one place for you. Now it's iPad 2 day, time for Apple's team (which may or may not include a "guest" appearance by Steve Jobs) to strut on stage and reveal all to the world.
So we've built a scorecard for you, summarizing before the event those rumors we think will turn up as fact. We'll update it later, checking off how accurate the predictions were.
Category Prediction True/False?
| Chassis: | Thinner, lighter, smaller, aluminum body | TRUE! |
| Shape: | Flatter than the iPad 1 | TRUE! |
| Colors: | White and black glass front options, aluminum back | TRUE! |
| Screen | 9.7-inch IPS unit, thinner, same 1024 by 768 pixels | TRUE! |
| Bezel | Narrower all around, to combat the critics | TRUE! |
| Chip: | ARM Cortex A9, Dual Core 1.2 GHz | Unclear, but 1GHz |
| Chip name: | A5 | TRUE! |
| Front camera: | 2-megapixel "HD" webcam, Photo Booth, FaceTime | False, it's VGA |
| Rear camera: | 3-megapixel (possibly 3.2) for imaging. No flash | Unclear. No flash |
| Video recording: | 720p HD resolution on rear cam | TRUE! |
| Speakers: | Enlarged speaker port, lower corner of chassis | TRUE! |
| Device storage: | Boosted to 512MB, to match iPhone 4 | Unknown |
| Internal storage: | User storage space stays at 16GB, 32GB, 64GB | TRUE! |
| SD card slot: | Nope! | TRUE! |
| 30-pin iPod socket: | Yes, as with every iDevice | TRUE! No microUSB here |
| Thunderbolt: | Yes: maximize the new protocol, connect to HDTVs | False, but HDMI-out |
| iOS5 previewed: | Yes, a small tease, due Summer | False, just iOS4.3 |
| Cloud MobileMe: | Yes, a big reveal, also has Mac powers | False, sadly |
| Arrival date: | Within March | TRUE! |
| Price: | This is the biggie… at or below existing (starting at $499) | TRUE! |
Apple's notoriously tricky to predict at the best of times—with the recent MacBook Pro refresh, which didn't live up to most people's expectations, as a classic example. How well do you think we'll do?
Update: The answer to that question is pretty well! We're sad about the lack of Thunderbolt, and the missing MobileMe update is a shame, but everything else we mis-guessed is pretty understandable.
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