科技資訊:蘋果的全新iPad 六大新特性

APPLE used to be coy about its upcoming products. The press invitation unveiling of its latest iPad tablet computer depicted a finger pressing a high-resolution touch-screen with the label: "We have something you really have to see. And touch." In the event, perhaps the biggest surprise to come out of the presentation by Apple's boss, Tim Cook, was that the company is calling the device just "iPad" and not, as had been expected "iPad 3".

蘋果總愛對自己的新產品嚴格保密。在新iPad平板電腦發佈會上，有一隻手指按在一塊高分辨率的觸摸屏上，旁邊還註明着這樣一段話：“我們要讓你真正去看，去摸”。或許後來真正讓人驚訝的是蘋果CEO蒂姆•庫克僅僅把新產品稱爲“ipad”，而不是人們預期的“iPad3”。

To be sure, the svelte gizmo sports a plethora of improvements over its numbered predecessor, the iPad 2. Its new "Retina Display" boasts four times as many pixels, close to the limit of human perception, and its four-core graphics processor makes the experience of what was already the smoothest tablet smoother still. Lower-resolution apps, such as those developed for earlier iPads, still look sharp on the new device (each old pixel is translated into four new ones), something rival Android devices, which come in a variety of shapes and sizes, struggle with. It also has a better, 5-megapixel camera. But these changes had been much anticipated in the blogosphere's techier quarters.

的確，這個纖薄的小玩意比起前輩iPad2有着大量的改進。比如它的“視網膜屏幕”，聲稱其像素是以往的4倍，已接近人類視覺極限，而四核圖形處理器將爲平板帶來最流暢的操作體驗。即使是爲前代ipad設計的那些低分辨應用程序在新產品上畫質表現依舊細膩（每個像素被轉換成四個），這對於各式各樣的安卓設備來說這是一大優勢，此外，新iPad還採用了更強大的500萬像素攝像頭。但是，這些改進早已被博客世界的技術板塊預測到了。

There was a bit more uncertainty about fourth-generation (4G) mobile connectivity. Here, Apple seems to have dealt with several bugbears of Long Term Evolution (LTE), an increasingly ubiquitous 4G standard capable of faster download rates and more consistent reception. LTE smartphones are often ungainly due to the hefty electronics needed to support it. Apple, famous for its sleek design, could have none of that. The iPad's already ample battery has been tweaked so that it matches the ten hours in 3G mode of older models, and lasts fully nine hours with LTE on, while feeding a power-hungrier display. That marks a significant improvement over the smaller LTE devices currently on the market, some of which last only a few hours.

有一點不確定就是新iPad在4G移動數據的連通能力上，蘋果似乎在LTE（Long Term Evolution長期演進）上遇到了一點小麻煩，LTE作爲4G標準已經初具規模並且在上傳和下載速度上都有着良好的表現。但由於LTE芯片比較龐大，所以LTE智能手機常常顯得很笨拙，但這當然不會出現在以時尚設計著稱的蘋果身上。新iPad還配備了一塊強勁的電池，這不僅使它在滿足更加耗電的屏幕同時，還能在3G模式下堅持使用10小時（達到了前代的標準），即使在4G模式下也能堅持9小時。這在當前LTE設備市場算得上一個重大的突破，因爲同類產品只能使用很短時間。

Apple used its buying power and dominant position in the tablet market to hit competitors like Microsoft, whose partners are preparing to launch an array of Windows 8 Metro slates later this year. The new iPad prices haven't budged. They start at $499 for a 16-gigabyte Wi-Fi only unit and finish at $829 for a 4G tablet with 64 gigabytes of flash storage. At the same time, Apple is keeping the older iPad 2 on the market for $399 with Wi-Fi and $529 with 3G.

蘋果利用其粉絲的購買力和其在平板市場的主導地位給了競爭對手強力一擊，比如微軟，後者準備在年底與合作伙伴推出一系列預裝Windows 8 Metro界面的平板電腦。此外，新iPad的價格並沒有超過上一代，最低是16G的 Wifi版，499美元起，最高的是64G的4G版，829美元。同時蘋果還調低了iPad2的價格，Wifi版399美元，3G版529美元。

Other firms had already been hard-pressed to meet Apple's price, battery life and hardware features, let alone its swish operating system, copious media catalogues and the internet's biggest app store. With an upgrade at the top of the line and a drop in price for the current bestselling model, the iPad is unlikely to be dethroned any time soon. Apple has every reason to blow its own trumpet.

蘋果產品的價格、電池續航時間還有硬件，更不用說其華麗的操作系統、豐富的多媒體資料和最大的網上應用商店，這些都給了其他公司很大的壓力。在升級高端產品線的同時調低暢銷產品的價格，新iPad在很長一段時間內都不會過時，蘋果的確有他驕傲的資本。