The rumor mill kicks into high gear the week before CES
Next week is the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) that is held annually in Las Vegas. A lot of major manufacturers use this show as a platform to announce their next new devices. So of course in the weeks leading up to CES the rumor mill kicks into high gear. Here’s a few of the rumors floating around this week:
Apple will be launching the “iPad 3” in March, and the much improved “iPad 4” in October. Digitimes reports that when the iPad 3 is launched, Apple will lower the price of the iPad 2 to $399. This would help Apple by having a tablet in the middle tier of pricing.
Google is working on a 7-inch tablet that will rival the Kindle Fire. The rumor actually says that the tablet will be priced cheaper than the Kindle Fire. It will be interesting to see what Google can do with a tablet for less than $200.
RIM will demo Playbook 2.0, the next version of it’s tablet OS. As part of the update Playbook users are supposed to be able to install the Android Market, even though some clever people already show you how to do that. This update has actually been expected for many months, and the most recent release date is February 2012, so hopefully RIM will have something solid to show off at CES.
Pantech will release a waterproof tablet for AT&T. When I think of Pantech, I think of cheap $60 tablets sold at your nearest pharmacy, so it will be interesting to see what they do with a mid-level tablet. A waterproof tablet will allow you to read those ebooks at the beach and not worry about ruining your tablet!
Velocity Micro to release two Ice Cream Sandwich tablets. They supposedly have a 7-inch and 9.7-inch tablet ready to be announced for $150 and $250 respectively.
Reading through all the rumors about possible upcoming devices is fun as long as you take what you read with a grain of salt. Not all the rumors are true, despite being reported as being from trustworthy sources. Which rumor do you hope to see as a reality in the coming weeks?
