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iPad Mini 3: Most Underwhelming Apple Update Ever?

The iPad Mini 3 is being touted as, at best, a very anti-climactic update, and at worst, a brutal evisceration of the iPad Mini line. The iPad Mini 3 was doomed to struggle in the shadows of the new i...
iPad Mini 3: Most Underwhelming Apple Update Ever?
Written by Lacy Langley
  • The iPad Mini 3 is being touted as, at best, a very anti-climactic update, and at worst, a brutal evisceration of the iPad Mini line.

    The iPad Mini 3 was doomed to struggle in the shadows of the new iPad Air 2 and the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus, but its cool reception has some wondering just how long Apple can keep the iPad Mini line afloat.

    “I think Apple is either being very lazy, or it’s throwing the iPad Mini under the bus,” Sebastian Anthony, senior editor of ExtremeTech, told Foxnews.com.

    He added, “The most likely reason is…[it’s] trying to create a bit of a gap between the products. There’s now a clearer [separation] between the iPad Air 2, iPad Mini 3, and iPhone 6 Plus,” he said.

    It’s quite possible that Apple is ready to follow Steve Jobs’ sense of direction and go ahead with letting the iPad Mini 3 lead the way to making the iPad Mini obsolete.

    Jobs said back in 2010, “The 7-inch tablets are tweeners, too big to compete with a smartphone and too small to compete with an iPad.”

    He just might be on to something. The new iPhone 6 Plus, with its 5.5-inch screen, kind of does away with the need for the iPad Mini 3. The iPhone 6 and 6 Plus belong essentially to that ever-growing category of “phablet”, after all.

    Bob O’Donnell, Chief Analyst of Technalysis Research marketing research firm in California, explained, “The Mini 3 is a very modest update because Apple recognizes that larger smartphones like the iPhone 6 Plus are likely to cannibalize the iPad Mini.”

    Besides, as far as budget-conscious consumers are concerned, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to spring for the new iPad Mini 3, at around $400, when you can now get the iPad Mini 2, which is entirely adequate, for around $300. The new iPad Mini 3 has a gold trim option and Touch ID, but beyond that, no stellar improvements over the iPad Mini 2.

    What do you think? Is the iPad Mini 3 worth spending the extra money on?

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