iPad mini 3 – Hardly any changes except for Touch ID

The iPad mini 3 was announced last night but it didn’t get as much attention as before. Like the incredibly thin iPad Air 2, it gets a new Gold colour, Touch ID and … that’s pretty much it.

The 7.9″ Retina Display that does 326ppi (pixels per inch) is still the same and it retains the same size and weight as the previous iPad mini with Retina Display, which is now known as the iPad mini 2. Don’t expect any performance improvements with this one as it is powered by the same A7 chip with a M7 motion co-processor like the previous iPad mini and iPad Air.

This is quite disappointing as we would expect them to upgrade it to the latest A8X like how the iPad Air and iPad mini 2 were on par when announced last year.

For taking pictures, it gets a 5MP iSight camera while the front gets a 1.2MP shooter for HD FaceTime. The connectivity features are still the same with WiFi 802.11n as opposed to faster 802.11ac on the new iPad Air 2. The LTE version covers the same number of bands which is more than enough to support our local 4G networks.

Overall, the iPad mini 3 is 7.5mm thick while it weighs 331 grams for the WiFi version and 341 grams for the WiFi + Cellular unit. Like the latest iPad Air, it will be available in 16GB, 64GB and 128GB storage capacities.

If you’re in the market for an iPad mini, you are better off buying the current iPad mini 2 which costs just RM969 for 16GB WiFi or RM1,399 for the 4G LTE unit. At time of launch, it costs RM1,279 and RM1,699 respectively, which is an indication of how much the iPad mini 3 would cost if it’s launched here.

For the extra price difference, you’re only paying for Touch ID which you can probably live without.