Teardown of Apple's iPad 2 Smart Cover uncovers 21 magnets
A total of 31 magnets are used to make the iPad 2 and its Apple-branded Smart Cover properly align, with 21 magnets found in the accessory and the remaining 10 in the iPad 2 itself.
A total of 31 magnets are used to make the iPad 2 and its Apple-branded Smart Cover properly align, with 21 magnets found in the accessory and the remaining 10 in the iPad 2 itself.
Components for the touch display on the new iPad 2 are estimated to cost Apple $127 for each device, an increase of more than $30 from the first-generation iPad.
A survey of customers buying the iPad 2 at launch has found that 70 percent of those customers are new to the platform and did not own Apple's original iPad.
The new A5 processor used by iPad 2 incorporates Samsung's new 46nm Low Power DDR2 memory, uses a variable clock speed and costs about $25, a significant premium over NVIDIA's competing Tegra 2.
The multiple core SGX graphics built into the iPad 2 A5 System on a Chip processor deliver benchmarks from 3 to 7 times faster than the original iPad, and smoke competing mobile chips such as Nvidia's Tegra 2.
Shipping times for new iPad orders continue to slip, with orders placed as of Saturday evening estimated to ship within 3 to 4 weeks.
Multiple reports of shipments of the first wave of iPad 2 orders has begun, with delivery estimates noting an expected delivery date of March 17.
An iPad 2 customer on AT&T notes his order shipped today with free two day delivery, with an estimated arrival date of Monday.
Many retail partners sold out their very limited iPad 2 inventories on launch day, but a variety of well stocked Apple Stores ran out of many or all models as well after a launch extravaganza that maintained hundreds of people in hours-long lines throughout the evening.
A small survey of customers waiting in line to buy the iPad 2 at the Apple Store in Palo Alto, Calif., on Friday revealed that 70 percent of those surveyed already own the first-generation iPad, while 20 percent of respondents planned to purchase the 3G model.
Piper Jaffray analyst Gene Munster increased his first day sales estimate for the iPad 2 to an upper range of 500,000 units after initial demand surpassed his expectations, with some Apple retail stores drawing 104 percent longer lines than last year's launch.
Immediately after Apple's release of the iPad 2 on Friday, iFixit began a teardown of Apple's iPad 2, discovering a slight increase in battery capacity compared to the original iPad and confirming that the tablet has 512MB of RAM.
Apple's flagship retail store in downtown San Francisco had already staged a line of more than 140 people before noon today, in anticipation of the iPad 2 launch beginning this evening at 5 PM.
On the heels of the release of iOS 4.3, Apple is expected to introduce an incremental update for its mobile devices, including the new iPad 2, to patch a newly discovered security hole in the Safari Web browser.
With expanded availability, two colors and a buzzworthy magnetic case, the iPad 2 could more than triple last year's sales debut and reach a million units over the weekend, one analyst believes.
Campers outside Apple's landmark Fifth Avenue store in New York City have weathered the elements waiting for the iPad 2 launch at 5 p.m. [updated with more pictures]. Also, some of the iPad's top-selling games have been updated to take advantage of the additional graphics horsepower in the iPad 2.
Of the 15 million iPads sold by Apple in 2010, between 15 and 20 percent of those early adopters will upgrade to the iPad 2, one analyst believes.
Apple on Friday began accepting orders online for the iPad 2, and the first buyers were told to expect the tablet to ship within two to three weeks [updated].
Analysts predict Apple could sell as many as 600,000 units of the iPad 2 during its debut weekend, a figure nearly twice the amount of the original iPad launch.
{{ summary }}