Quote:
Originally Posted by seajewel
I think it's quite interesting that Apple went with a 7.9inch screen significantly larger than the competition.. it's definitely nice for screen real estate but it makes it less portable (yes, it's very thin and light and very portable, BUT if the whole point of a 7" device is portability, well, some could view the screen size as a negative--and I've noticed people on other forums who do think that it is a negative in a device meant to be portable) and in some ways I think it makes cannibalization of the full-sized iPad even more likely.
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Yes, portability is both a matter of weight and size. And I think size trumps weight slightly. While the Mini is impressive in terms of weight, its footprint is significantly larger than the 7" tablets, making it less portable.
As for the 7.9" diagonal screen, what I gathered from this thread is that Apple was pretty much locked into something around that size,
unless they wanted to create an entirely new standard for their iOS tablets which would have necessitated every single tablet app to come out with a brand new version to accommodate it. So they were limited to either 1064 x 768 -OR- 2048 x 1536. The question then became what screen diagonal to use. If they made it 7" diagonal, they would have ended up with a tablet that was actually shorter in height than the 7" tablets, given their locked in 4:3 screen ratio. Not good from a marketing standpoint. The touch target also shrinks then, making it harder to navigate and making Jobs' concerns about the need for sandpaper somewhat valid. So once Apple decided to play in this market for smaller tablets, they didn't have much choice.
Android is a lot more flexible as it can scale the OS graphics according to display resolution.
--Pat