1. If you use a Retina display for even a week, the non-Retina display will look considerably worse when you switch back; you can't tell the difference until you actually use the device for an extended period.

2. I've heard from a few people that this is the case, but also that the iPad 4 charges faster, actually delivers on the 10-hour battery life claims and runs noticeably cooler.

Unrelated: I hate Gruber's pedantic style when it comes to Apple product names. Seriously, just write it the way Apple markets it.

> 1. If you use a Retina display for even a week, the non-Retina display will look considerably worse when you switch back; you can't tell the difference until you actually use the device for an extended period.

I agree to this. I have an iPhone 4S and an iPad2. Every time I use my iPad2 the pixels seem distorted.

Re: Naming Style - particularly odd given that just yesterday he wrote an article discussing the NeXT, NeXTStep.

I'll be interested in hearing why he's not calling it the iPad mini.

When the iPad 2 came out, I was really happy upgrading from my iPad. It felt slimmer and sleeker. I was not a fan of the iPad 3:

1. It was heavier. This is one of the few times this has happened with Apple products I think, and to me it was significantly heavier. The iPad 2 was already stretching it as a one-handed device, the extra weight on the 3 was the deal breaker and it wasn't that fun to have it for reading in bed anymore for example. The iPad 4 has not fixed this as it is even heavier than the 3. I used a hover bar ( http://twelvesouth.com/products/hoverbar/ ) and it could no longer support the weight too :/ (yes this is less of an issue but was still annoying and really highlighted the "trade-off" feeling of the iPad 3).

2. The performance sucked. The chip was just not ready to spit out retina-number of pixels. I prefer not losing frames to sharper text or whatever, and as much I'd like to, I really can't tell the difference that much when it comes to retina. I hear a lot of "if you use it for X amount of time you won't be able to go back". This doesn't seem like a great value proposition to me: "after X time this will seem normal (not exciting), and everything else will seem like shit!".

3. I could fit less stuff than before (unfortunately this is true no matter what given the silly way Apple handles "universal" retina/non-retina apps). I had a 64 GB iPad 2, and when moving to a 64GB iPad 3 and upgrading the apps they all increased in size by so much that I couldn't fit them all anymore (plus music, etc). This is particularly frustrating because it is 100% fixable by just having a system that distributes different binaries with different resources (with NO extra work to the developer).

I am incredibly excited about the iPad mini. I bought it at midnight when it went on sale and sold my iPad 3 without a second thought (which basically paid for the mini). As the article mentions, I always felt kind of silly taking a Macbook Air and iPad 3 with me, and after the Nexus 7 came out I would always really wonder which of the two to take (NOT a fan of the OS/feel, but couldn't beat the form factor). I now think this one tiny aspect of traveling will feel really good.

I agree that all three of your points are significant disadvantages, but I do think the retina display makes up for them. I upgraded from the iPad 2 and have no regrets (especially after selling the old model for $350). Even before there were rumors of a retina display iPad, I always thought the one flaw of the iPad 2 was the relatively ugly display.

On a related note, the added thickness and weight of the 3rd generation iPad does show Apple's prioritizing of battery life over portability. I actually have the opposite preference: I would love a retina iPad with the same size and weight of the iPad 2, even if it had half the battery life.

My eyesight isn't that great. My contacts don't completely fix my astigmatism. I can't tell the difference between the displays, just that the colors seem a bit brighter on one than the other. A retina display seems like a waste for me. I suspect a lot of people with poor eyesight feel the same way too.

> A retina display seems like a waste for me. I suspect a lot of people with poor eyesight feel the same way too.

I understand the emphasis is that it's a waste for you personally, but the statement above is analogous to a person with poor hearing saying they can't tell the difference between a cheap pair of earphones and a set of monitor headphones. To those with decent hearing, it's night and day, so it certainly has value in the market place.

The same applies with high DPI screens and eyesight - individuals with good vision will reap the rewards just as those with a keen sense of sound will appreciate high-fidelity audio equipment.

The real explanation is that some people think that iPad 2 is the next version of 'the new iPad'. I'm kidding of course.

iPad 4 is now called 'iPad with Retina display' which makes me believe that Apple might even continue upgrading iPad 2 with iPad name, similar to the other product lines with/without Retina.

Sorry I don't buy either of these reasons, I would chalk it up to the lower acquisition cost. It is still quite the 'luxury' good and there is a lot of market share in the margins as evidenced by relatively high resale value.

Huh, I’m getting the same 10h/8h (WiFi/3G) with my iPad 3 as I did with my iPad 2. And when I say that I mean it: I regularly use my iPad on long train rides (5–6h), so this isn’t some sort of extrapolation.

> most people can't tell the difference between retina and non-retina displays

That's ridiculous, unless you mean they physically can't tell the difference because they've never seen both products.

And the price, US$399.

I find (1) hard to swallow.

I took my 13" MacBook Air into the Apple store, and loaded some prime shots I had taken with a good lens into the Retina version of Aperture onto the MacBook Pro off a USB Key (I love how the Apple Staff who saw me doing this went and got a cloth to clean off all the smudges from both the screens so we could get the best possible comparison)

Long story short - the difference blew me away, and I fell in love with the Retina Display. The friend I was with swore he could not tell the difference between my 1440x900 2010 13" Macbook Air and the 2880x1800 15" Macbook Pro Retina - even with an App that had been optimized for Retina Display.

He just could see anything different on the screens. Some people just don't see the pixels.

I think most people can tell the difference, but I also think people don't care about the difference. Increased resolution on the iPad (which can only run one process at a time) really isn't that pressing of a concern.

It's the same reason many people find DVDs adequate for movies. It's good enough. Yes, blu-ray is higher quality, but you can only really "notice" when they're side by side and get used to the quality you're looking at.

I don't think "most", but I'd buy "many". But more so, a lot of people have never seen a high-DPI retina display and don't know what they're missing.

I have an iPad 3; girlfriend still has an iPad 1. Whenever she shows me something, it's painful, particularly text. Luckily she now gets the iPad 3 once my iPad 4 arrives...

You can pry the retina screen from my cold dead hands. I've been using an iPad 2 for the last week as I'm preparing to give it away on my trip. My god, the pixels cause my eyes to bleed! I never noticed before I had the iPad 3, but somehow it just causes your resolution expectations to increase drastically.

This is not the experience I've had with a retina MBP at all. While the increase in usable workspace is nice, I recently had to bring in it for service and go back to using my 2011-vintage "normal" MBP for a week - the only difference I noted was the lack of SSD. This is running the newer machine at 1920x1200 (or 3840x2400, I suppose) and the old at 1680x1050. My day-to-day work is all done in iTerm and VIM. Had I paid for the machine, I would've been sorely disappointed I think.

I think part of it might be working distance, and that the desktop OS still isn't really optimized for retina. The other problem I have with the rMBP is that it's glossy; I'm sticking with my 2010 17" Matte for now, and the slightly-less-glossy-than-Pro Air.

Fortunately 17" PVA and 24" IPS 1920x1200 and 13" PVA MBA 1400x990 are still basically ok. It will be exciting in 2013-2014 when High DPI desktop displays, iPad Mini Retina displays, etc. become commonplace. I wonder if it'll be 4K on the desktop, or some other standard.

Practically everyone I knew over 30 in the late 90s when DVD was becoming a thing told me they didn't see the difference compared to VHS, even on a 37" TV (big for back then).

Then I heard the same sort of things about HD a few years later.

Eventually I had to stop assuming that they were all lying to me... I don't know if people just figure their vision stabilized in the 20s and don't realize it's still getting worse cause they don't go to the eye doctor every year, or maybe they just don't pay as close attention as me, but I've heard that sort of thing too much to disbelieve.

At distance (> 5') there is no perceptible difference for HD vs SD video to me. If my life depended on it, I could not identify a show in SD vs a show in HD. Totally wasted on me.

And yes, you are write - a good pair of glasses would probably help.

30+ here, and SD vs HD for me is day and night. Though except for computer generated animation movies, I have a hard time spotting the difference between 720p and 1080p, especially since some movies have blur/grain filters...