Hot on the heels of a quarter in which the iPad 2 outsold every major PC with 15.4 million units, Apple CEO Tim Cook showed off the new tablet in his first product announcement other than the iPhone 4S since the passing of Steve Jobs.

While the exterior of the new iPad doesn’t look dramatically different from the iPad 2, it does offer numerous improvements both under the hood and in terms of display capabilities. As expected, the new iPad has a super-sharp Retina Display, with an astounding resolution of 2048×1536, or a total of 3.1 million pixels at a density of 264 pixels per inch.

Take that, 1080p! This means that you’ll no longer be able to distinguish pixels on screen as you can with the iPad and iPad 2. The display also claims to offer 44% better color saturation than the iPad 2′s already high quality screen.

Existing applications will automatically be upscaled to take advantage of the higher resolution, and obviously text, video and photos will look way better right away. But I’m really looking forward to games and creative applications which take advantage of the sharper screen details. Just think about the fact that this thing can push more pixels than an Xbox 360 or a PS3!

It’s all powered by a new chip called the A5X, a quad-core CPU/GPU to help push all those pretty pixels to the display. However, the CPU side still runs at 1GHz – only they GPU has seen a speed bump.

The iPad’s main camera has also gotten a much-needed upgrade, now offering 5 megapixel resolution, backside illumination and a hybrid IR filter, just like the stellar camera in the iPhone 4S. It also supports auto-focus, auto-white-balance and face detection. Video can be shot at up to 1080p resolution, with software based image stabilization. It doesn’t sound like the user-facing camera has changed, though.

Apple has also added a new feature to the iPad – voice dictation. There’s a handy new button on the bottom of the keyboard which looks like a microphone. Tapping this engages the voice dictation capability (which appears to be a stripped-down Siri), and transcribes text to typing in US English, British, Australian, French, German and Japanese.

The iPad HD also is the first Apple device to support 4G LTE – which means super-fast network speeds wherever you go (in covered areas, that is.) Top speed of the LTE modem is 73MBps, which is nearly double the absolute top speed of 3G HSPA or EV-DO. Apple showed off the 4G LTE running on both AT&T and Verizon networks, so you have a choice right away, though it will require different versions of the tablet. Internationally, Apple has partnered with Rogers, Bell and Telus as well. One other bonus feature is that the iPad will also support tethering, so it can act as a mobile hot-spot.

Apple is claiming the same battery life as the iPad 2, with 10 hours for Wi-Fi and 9 hours on 4G LTE. At  9.4mm thick and 1.4 pounds, it does weigh a tiny bit more than the iPad 2, so they must have had to put a bigger battery in there. (UPDATE: The iPad 2 has a 25 watt-hour battery, and the new iPad has a 42.5 watt-hour battery, so it’s much bigger.)

Prices remain unchanged from the iPad 2, with the Wi-Fi version selling for $499, $599 and $699 (USD) for 16GB, 32GB and 64GB models, respectively, and the 4G LTE models going for $629, $729 and $829 in the same memory configurations.

Pre-orders start later today over at the Apple Store, and the new iPad ships on March 16th to the US, Canada, UK, France, Germany, Switzerland, Hong Kong, Australia, Singapore and Japan. Much of the rest of Europe, along with New Zealand get the new iPad on March 23rd.

While the new iPad may be more of an evolutionary step than a revolutionary one, the new iPad still looks mighty impressive. If you don’t own an iPad yet, you’ve got more than enough reasons to buy this one. If you own an iPad or iPad 2, the new display, faster CPU, 4G LTE and improved camera might convince you to upgrade later this month.

Apple also confirmed that they will continue to produce the iPad 2 for at least some period of time, with prices dropping by $100 for each of the older models. You can find more details on the new iPad over at Apple’s website, and you can view the complete announcement here.

[Image Credit: Engadget] 

For starters, the iPhone 4S will come pre-loaded with the hundreds of new software improvements in the already announced iOS5 and free iCloud storage.  It sports a speedy dual-core A5 CPU, which runs about 2x as fast as the old A4 in the current-gen iPhone 4, as well as 7x faster graphics. From what I can tell, these are the same specs you’ll find on the iPad 2, but in a pocket-sized device. Of course, it still has the same sharp 960×640 Retina display found in the iPhone 4. But it offers other under-the-hood improvements including increased battery life (up to 8 hours talk time), improved call quality and antenna redesign, and data download speeds of up to 14.4Mbps on HSDPA connections. Apple claims this is just as fast as most “4G” phones, but I think it truly depends on the quality of your carrier. Speaking of carriers, the iPhone 4S is a single worldwide handset, supporting both CDMA and GSM networks, and will be released on AT&T, Verizon, and… drumroll please… Sprint when it hits stores later this month.

Perhaps the biggest improvement in the iPhone 4S over the iPhone 4 is the rear camera. As Apple is taking aim at upending the point-and-shoot camera market, they upgraded the built-in camera to 8 megapixels (from 5mp.) But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. The new camera supports true 1080p HD video (at 30fps), and even has real-time image stabilization and temporal noise reduction for improving video quality. In addition, the camera incorporates a new, wider f/2.4 lens, an improved sensor with better light sensitivity and faster startup time. You’ll be able to start shooting your first image after 1.1 second, and subsequent images can be shot in 0.5 seconds. The camera also incorporates face detection and automatic white balance. If you care to see just how impressive the photos are from the iPhone 4S, be sure to check out Apple’s image gallery, which offers full resolution sample downloads.

Last, but not least, the iPhone 4S is the first phone to incorporate Siri – Apple’s “intelligent assistant”. This app lets you ask your iPhone questions and to perform tasks verbally, and Siri takes care of them. For instance, you can ask Siri “How is the weather today in Chicago?,” “Read me my new notifications,” or “Remind me to call mom on her birthday” and it’ll take care of the rest. Siri can also provide restaurant recommendations, and do instant searches of Wikipedia and Wolfram Alpha simply by asking it a question. One of the coolest features of Siri is the voice-to-text dictation. Just speak at your normal pace, and Siri can transcribe it into text without a keyboard. Day one, Siri will ship with English, French and German support, but will eventually offer more languages. While I thought Siri might be available for all iOS devices with the release of iOS5, it’s an iPhone 4S-only feature for now. Perhaps we’ll see it on the iPad 2 at some point because it has the same chipset and performance.

Check out the iPhone 4S in action in Apple’s official launch video below:

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

Pricing for the iPhone 4S is as follows: 16GB $199, 32GB $299, 64GB $399 – with a 2 year phone contract – and it’ll be available in both black and white versions just like the iPhone 4 used to (other than the new 64GB model, of course.)  Apple will start taking pre-orders on October 7th, and the iPhone 4S will ship on October 14th. Full specs for the iPhone 4S can be found here. For those of you wondering when iOS5 will be available for your existing iOS devices, I’d keep an eye out on iTunes sometime late next week.

The new PS3 Slim console sports a compact new form-factor, and a lower price to go with it. Priced at $299.99 (USD), €299, and ¥29,980, the PS3 Slim is $100 bucks cheaper than the previous model.

The PS3 Slim will ship with a spacious 120GB hard drive, and is 32% smaller than the previous models. As an added bonus, it consumes 34% less power too. And while the box shot below was leaked a long time ago, it looks like it was the real deal:

I’m none to thrilled with the cheaper looking case design, but if that’s what it takes to get the size and price down to size, I suppose it’s worth it. And I won’t miss the fingerprints.

In addition, Sony also announced the impending release of the their new v3.0 firmware for all PlayStation 3 models. Here’s a sneak preview of what’s new in the 3.0 firmware for those of you who care:

No word yet on a release date for the v3.0 firmware, but Sony says that it should be released “soon”.

You can now pre-order the PS3 Slim over on Amazon for $299.99 (USD).

[image credits: PlayStation Blog and GameSpot]

The new model, currently known as the Series 3 “Lite” (model #TCD652160) will retail for about $299, and packs in a pretty nice feature list for the price. It’s got dual MPEG-2 and MPEG-4 decoders, so it should be able to handle any signal you throw at it. Storage is limited to a 160GB hard drive, but that still should record around 180 hours of SD, or 20 hours of HD programming if I’m doing my math right.

With the removal of the schmancy OLED screen and no THX certification, the new model doesn’t offer some of the bells and whistles of the original Series 3. However, for $299, I think they’ll sell like hot cakes. Now all they need to do is get these to work with DirecTV and I’ll be happy.

[via Engadget HD]