Samsung Ativ Q

Apple is reportedly readying a 12.9” iPad – will it be a Macbook Air killer?

Apple’s new iPad design is brilliant – the 64-bit A7 processor and graphics chip is capable of scaling from the 4” 5S iPhone to – pretty well any size. The mini is 7.9”, the Air is 9.7”, and it is logical to produce a larger version.

It would be a niche product for sure – but given the iPad design, the finished product would still be smaller than an A4 writing pad. The increased size would allow for a larger battery and potentially a higher resolution screen – although the 2049x1536 Retina display would scale to this size nicely.

The question of a MacBook Air killer is not about war between OS X and iOS rather that iPad sales have cannibalised Mac sales as typical buyers realise that an iPad – now with Pages, Numbers, Keynote and more – can do 90% of what a Mac can do. Just add a Logitech Ultrathin Keyboard and you have a clamshell notebook – weighing and costing much less!

One thing is for sure – Samsung will not be far away with a Galaxy Note/Tab 12 or 13 – or both. It already has a Ativ Q – a 13” 3200x1800, Haswell i5, 14mm thick (with keyboard), dual boot Windows/Android hybrid, and rumours are a 13.3” ARM based Galaxy Note/Tab could be released as early as January 2014.

There also seems to be renewed interest in Windows 13” tablets with Wacom ready to release a Cintiq – with 2048 levels of pen pressure – Asus TX300 , Sony Vaio Tap 13 , HP Spectre, Toshiba Excite, and others all readying models in this ‘professional creative space’. The larger screen allows for a better thermal envelope accommodating fan-less Haswell i5 and i7 processors, more memory and up to 512GB SSD.