It's been a long time since Apple did anything to its iPad mini line, and for a while it looked like the miniature tablet might vanish from the company's lineup entirely. Recently, however, reports suggested that a refresh may actually be on the way sometime this year.
Now, a new report from Japanese website Mac Otakara suggests that the device won't change a whole lot on the outside. It won't adopt Apple's Face ID, which falls in line with previous reports, and it also won't follow the iPad Pro with replacing the Lightning connector with USB Type-C. On the bright side, it'll apparently keep the headphone jack, which the company has been phasing out from a lot of its products. The only notable change on the outside is that the rear microphone might be moved to the top center.
On the inside, the iPad mini 5 will naturally get upgraded specs, which will be very welcome seeing as the iPad mini 4 is running Apple's A8 chipset that launched in 2014 with the iPhone 6. Unfortunately, it looks like Apple will keep in its tradition of using older chipsets for the iPad Mini, as it will reportedly opt for the A10 Fusion processor - launched with the iPhone 7 in 2016 - or the A10X variant, which powered the 2017 iPad Pro.
Lastly, it doesn't look like Apple is interested in adopting the latest Apple Pencil for this device either. The report suggests that it may support the original iteration of the digital pen, but the new magnetic model is out of the equation.
Apple is expected to unveil its iPad and iPod touch refreshes sometime this spring, but no official announcements have been made as of yet.
Source: Mac Otakara via MacRumors
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