More iPad 2 Retina Display evidence and recap of rumors

Lot’s of rumors floating around on the iPad 2, the successor to the very popular iPad lunched last April by the Cupertino Folks. Wow so where should we start? Let’s start with the screen. Over the weekend various blogs were reporting that that the screen size on the iPad 2 would double based on some findings in some iOS Apps that doubled the resolution for some existing icons. So the “Super High Resolution” display, also known as the Retina Display will pack a huge 2048 x 1536. Then today, our good friends at GlobalDirectParts, (remember them from the iPhone 5 leaked video?) they re back and now they are shedding some light on the screen for the iPad 2 by publishing the “OEM Apple iPad 2 LCD screen” at a cost of $218.19 which is up sharply from it’s predecessors replacement screen cost of $144.99. This is all but confirms that we can expect BIG (2048 x 1536 big) things from the iPad 2’s screen size!

From the same leaked source above comes word that the “OEM Apple iPad vibrating motor” is also listed for sale at a price of $9.99. This is a new add to the Apple iPad 2 that the original iPad did not have. This is a great add for the gaming folks that use the iPad.

[Via Mac Rumors via BGR]

Now, some other items of interest, this time coming from Engadget that state that the iPad 2 will begin to feature a “dual GSM / CDMA chipset produced by Qualcomm”. Not sure how excited I am to hear Apple move away from Infineon for the likes of Qualcomm, but this is very interesting none the less. Also stated with the Qualcomm chipset is that it would support CDMA / GSM / UMTS basebands but no word was given about LTE. Sorry Verizon 4G.

Engadget is also stating from their leak that the iPad 2 would feature a SD Card Slot, something that has not been mentioned in any leaks so far. In the picture below, it definitely looks to be the future home of a SD card slot, which could have been confused in earlier rumors to be the USB port that many had doubted.

And now coming full circle back to BGR, who got an exclusive from an Apple source that the new iPAd 2 and iPhone 5 would no longer have a home button. Stripping off the home button would not have happened if it were not for the multi-touch gesture support that leaked out in iOS 4.3 beta. It is with the new multi-touch gestures that you will navigate to the home screen and also to the launch app switcher.

Older rumors that we think will still make the cut is the front facing camera on the iPad 2. This is pretty much a no brainer and I would be shocked not to see included. As we near the one year mark of the iPad launch, it is safe to say that we can expect Apple to maintain the one year distance between device launches. Look for an announcement and launch of the iPad 2 in April.

Some very interesting news floating around on the iPad 2. Keep in mind none of this is confirmed, and that rumor is still the status we should file this under. But with the amount of support each rumor is getting, resisting to believe in the a Retina Screen for the iPad is getting hard and harder to to do! Stay tuned and will continue to keep you updated .