Feeling Used by Apple

Yesterday at noon I had the newest iPad an hour later my iPad 3 was old and out if date. What happened in that hour is Apple announced a new iPad. Now I understand as an early adopter of Apple products that I am living on the bleeding edge and at times I will get burned. However this feels like someone handed me a wick for a candle and then lit it as I walked away. After all it hasn’t even been a year since the iPad 3 came out. The iPad is not cheap either, even the low-end one I purchased was over $500 if you include taxes and shipping. This is not a spur of the moment buy for most people.

What is the main differences between the iPad 3 and iPad 4? The iPad 3 uses a dual core A–5 processor, while the iPad 4 uses an A6x processor, which according to Apple is twice as fast. They also upgraded the front facing camera and changed the connection from the traditional 30 pin connector to the new 8 pin lightning adapter. iPad 4 with cellular capabilities comes LTE enabled while the iPad 3 does not. None of these are huge differences, certainly not something that would spur an upgrade under normal circumstances. So why did Apple make the announcement now? Initially I had two thoughts about this; the first is they are feeling the heat from Google’s Android line and the Kindle Fire, the second is they are feeling the heat from Wall Street. I quickly dismissed the first thought nothing I have read indicates that Apple is feeling pressure from either Google or Amazon when it comes to the tablet market. No, the pressure that Apple is feeling is coming from Wall Street. Wall Street is increasingly a what have you done for me lately entity, and by lately I mean since yesterday. This forces companies to do things that are against their long-term health, in order to satisfy Wall Street’s short term needs, unfortunately Apple maybe falling into this trap. I believe that a quicker upgrade cycle is bad for both the consumer and Apple in the long run. The bottom line is if you own a iPad 3 like I do, I don’t see any reason to upgrade at this time. The iPad 3 will do everything it did yesterday just fine.