by Jason Snell
Reports: iPads might be announced next week
At 9to5 Mac, Mark Gurman just posted an article headlined “iPad Pro planned for Sept. 9 debut with iPad mini 4; October pre-orders, November launch.” Big news for those of us who assumed the iPad (and some new Macs) would be the subject of an event in October, rather than being jammed into the big Sept. 9 event.
But keep in mind, the headline says “planned,” and plans change. As Gurman writes:
While whispers within Apple point to the MacBook-sized tablet making its debut on next week’s stage, it is possible that Apple could still hold back the larger iPad for an early October event given the currently planned November ship date.
Gurman’s sources are very good, but in this instance he’s referring to them as “whispers within Apple” before immediately saying that Apple could still not include the new iPad Pro at the Sept. 9 event. Apple’s been known to make changes to its keynote lineup at the last minute, so even if the whispers say one thing today, things could be completely different a week from now.
Then here’s the similarly well-sourced John Paczkowski at BuzzFeed:
Sources say Apple executives are likely to show off the company’s latest iPads at this event as well, though that 12.9-inch “iPad Pro” seems to be a wildcard, still.
Paczkowski rates the appearance of iPads as “likely”—a bit stronger language, I’d say—but calls the iPad Pro a “wildcard.”
Who knows? Maybe not even Apple, for sure. But at this point it seems to be more about when, not if.