Tech Talk: Upgraded, after a fashion

IT’S nearly Christmas, and that means a slew of new Apple products on the shelves. It’s a ritual as traditional as yule logs and paper decorations, except those have longer shelf lives.

Apple has made a fortune by building in obsolescence to all of its devices. It does this not by making them badly but by rendering them quickly unfashionable. Haute couture has always operated in this way but for electronics it’s still a new phenomenon.

Don’t be swept up in the rush to upgrade, though; this year’s iPad and iPad Mini models are more evolutionary than revolutionary. All the same, their arrival will do much to accelerate the mass migration from laptops to tablets.

The new iPad Air is slimmer, lighter and more powerful than last year’s model. It feels more portable and zips from app to app faster than before. Its smaller sibling, the 7ins iPad Mini now sports an upgraded “retina screen”.

Neither is cheap – the iPad Air starts at just under £400 for a 16GB WiFi model and rises to £639 for 128GB. If you want mobile connectivity it’s another £100. Prices for the smaller model range from £319 to the thick end of £600.

But significantly, some older models will remain on sale. The two-and-a-half year old iPad 2 can now be had for £329 and the original iPad Mini for £249. They’re still consistently faster and more reliable than any Windows laptop.

That’s no coincidence because the laptop market is clearly where Apple is looking. It is giving away to new purchasers its suite of traditional office apps and emphasising the availability of third-party cordless keyboards which turn the iPad into a credible work tool.

Apple’s own MacBook portables are moving further into the top-end business market, as if to underline that the market for consumer laptops is all but dead.

If you already own an iPad 2 or newer, 
the benefits just don’t justify the 
outlay. But if you’ve been mulling the purchase of a tablet, the new iPad Mini offers perhaps the best balance between price and performance. And if fashion consciousness doesn’t worry you, look also at Google’s rival Nexus 7 tablet.