TechRadar:

The iPad 3 could launch with a Samsung-made AMOLED screen, if rumours that Apple has been in talks on the matter with Samsung execs are true.

But wait! An iPad 3 to launch towards the end of this year? That’s a rumour we haven’t heard for a while, but it’s one that doesn’t seem to be going away – does that mean there’s some truth in it?

John Gruber kickstarted the ‘iPad 3 in late 2011 rumour’ in February, and I thought it was unlikely, in part on the basis of iPad 2 supply issues and slow international rollouts. Apple somewhat sorted the latter but not the former, and since February we’ve also had increasing rumours that the iPhone 5 might not show up until the autumn, or even until 2012.

Apple ditching the strict annual update routine makes sense—it keeps everyone on their toes and stops stagnating sales at the end of a cycle. However, I’m still not convinced we’ll see another iPad revision this year. It seems too soon, could alienate new Apple fans who’ve recently bought an iPad 2, and we’ve not seen an iPhone update since last year.

Of course, Apple’s hand might be forced, if a competitor rolls out a tablet with a Retina-style display, although most seem content of creating tablets thicker than the iPad that happen to run Flash and cost the same. Aside from that, I’d think it more likely we’ll see another iPhone later this year and the iPad 3 early in 2012.

Ian Betteridge offers a savvy take on modern computer purchase:

If there’s one thing that the huge demand for netbooks a few years ago proved, it’s that people buy because they can see how a computer can do something for them, not on megahertz.

In the case of netbooks, the “something” was being a machine they could carry everywhere, and do simple stuff on. In the case of Macs, it’s having access to easy to use, powerful software like iPhoto, iMovie, and so on – in a package that’s good looking, well designed, robust, and so on.

This continues through to tablets. There’s a lovely comment I recall reading from a teenager who said they wanted an iPad rather than a netbook, because you could “do more” with the iPad. Geeks would spit out their coffee at such a remark, reel off a tech-specs list, burble on about installing any app, ever (preferably on Linux) and get all huffy about someone buying a tablet, especially one from Apple and its walled garden.

The reality is most people really don’t give a crap about bullet-points. They just want to do things. With the iPad, they see all these adverts that show people making music, finger-painting, creating office documents, playing games, with hugely intuitive interfaces, on a device that’s sleek and shiny. Apple doesn’t need to bang on about the amount of RAM the iPad has, or the A4 chip’s speed—it’s all about what you can do, creatively, productively, or as a consumer. Until the competition figures that out, they’ll have a tough time catching Apple in the tablet space, and also a tricky time stopping Apple from nibbling away at marketshare for laptops and even desktop PCs.

Nicely spotted by Charles Arthur at The Guardian. Dell’s new XPS-15 marketing has caught the eye of a lot of websites, which have parroted Dell’s claim, without bothering to investigate it. That claim:

Finally, the power you crave in the thinnest 15″ PC on the planet*.

Charles Arthur:

Wow, the thinnest? But wait, what’s the asterisk?

Small print time: “Based on Dell internal analysis as at February 2011. Based on a thickness comparison (front and rear measurements) of other 15″ laptop PCs manufactured by HP, Acer, Toshiba, Asus, Lenovo, Samsung, Sony, MSI. No comparison made with Apple or other manufacturers not listed.”

Classy stuff, Dell. Still, as we all know, Michael Dell is the best CEO on the planet*

* Based on ignoring quite a few other CEOs who, quite clearly, are better than Dell, but, hey, is that really important anyway? Can’t we all just get along, even if companies are lying through their teeth in making misleading advertising claims that are objective and can therefore be checked against actual facts, rather than sensibly making more subjective statements? Actually, no, because Dell is a pillock.

Business Insider has a great interview with Apple’s first CEO, which offers this gem:

[W]hen IBM decided to get into the PC market they chop-shopped out the hardware to several different groups so you had a mess of hardware, and they’ve been trying to cobble the software on it ever since.

And you still see that in the phones and the iPad or the computers. You have to control both, or you end up with a mess. Android is a good example now, as Google’s learning, if you don’t have a level of discipline, you end up ruining the product.

For all the people complaining about Google increasingly locking things down, that will probably benefit the platform in the long run, because it will be able to control more of the experience. Whether Google has the design and UX know-how to really compete with Apple in this area (and its online apps suggest it doesn’t) remains to be seen. I’ll bet Amazon does though.

Touch Arcade just reviewed the iCade, and made a bunch of points I agree with, but some that I vehemently disagree with, notably

I found tearing through these classic games [in Atari’s Greatest Hits] on the iCade to be everything I’d hoped it to be. On the whole, it’s just an awesome experience

and

As far as I’m concerned, the iCade (along with Atari’s Greatest Hits) is an absolute must-have iPad accessory for the serious retro gamer.

But I’m getting ahead of myself, so QUICKFIRE HISTORY MODE!

In April 2010, wags at ThinkGeek announced the iCade, but, alas, it was April 1, stupid face! Duh! But heros in the distance emerged in the shape of ION Audio, who went “man, that’s a great idea”, licensed the design and made it a real boy.

I got to play with an iCade while working on issue 5 of Tap! magazine, and my review unit came pre-assembled, so I’ll have to take Touch Arcade’s word for how easy it is to put together. Touch Arcade’s bang-on about the unit itself, though:

• The iCade feels weighty and robust. It feels like it could stand up to a lot of fairly heavy gaming.
• The buttons have a great feel to them, and click in a very satisfying manner.
• The stick’s travel is too long (and my unit’s one ‘stuck’ in the left position quite a lot), but is nonetheless reminiscent of arcade sticks of old. (I always used to play games with a Competition Pro, which had a lower travel and was therefore more responsive.)
• The iPad sits very nicely within the unit in portrait mode, although you need to watch the surprisingly heavy lid doesn’t snap down on a finger, like it did on mine. (Ouch.)
• In landscape mode, the iPad perches a little precariously in a small ridge.
• Set-up/pairing with the iPad was reasonably simple, although in my case it took a few attempts.

The problem I have with the iCade as it currently stands is the games—well, app (singular) Currently, iCade only works with Atari’s Greatest Hits, which is a compilation I’d call middling if I was being charitable. The compilation includes a bunch of Atari 2600 games, which aren’t emulated correctly and only play in portrait (wasting loads of screen space), along with a selection of arcade hits, most of which were specifically designed by Atari to have unique control systems. You can see where this is going, can’t you?

In use, the iCade itself is actually pretty good, but the experience of the only compatible piece of software is not. Atari helpfully leave some of the interface behind, so you get to watch a giant pause button along with your game, but it helpfully removes the gigantic virtual joystick, leaving a huge blank space under the game. Had Atari enabled landscape mode for Atari 2600 games, I might have overlooked the shortcomings in emulation (major colour problems in some games, poorly emulated sound), but the entire thing felt more proof-of-concept than “an absolute must-have iPad accessory for the serious retro gamer”.

With arcade games, things weren’t much better. The games felt a bit like home conversions rather than the arcade originals: Tempest and Crystal Castles stripped of their spinner and trackball, respectively, and lumbered with joystick controls aren’t as satisfying nor as playable. However, ironically, because Atari’s Greatest Hits is so bad on the iPad, scaling up the iPhone mode’s virtual controls (meaning in Tempest that you need GIANT THUMBS to reach the superzapper button), iCade does actually make for a better experience—but that doesn’t mean it’s a good one. And again there’s the interface issue, with some games barely filling half the screen and many showing redundant controls.

Given that the iCade will cost 75 quid in the UK (it’s $99 in the US), I think you’d be bonkers to consider it, purely because of the lack of software. But if ION can get a lot of developers on board, and those developers actually take enough care when adding iCade support (minimum: full-screen games), the device would be a very different prospect. I know Manomio (the C64 emulator guys) are already working on support, and I sincerely hope others follow suit, including Taito, Namco and especially Capcom. Street Fighter games on iPad with the iCade would be fantastic, as would Namco’s Pac-Man: Championship Edition. But that’s currently a big ‘if’. For now, then, my opinion of the iCade is subtly different to what Touch Arcade wrote, but it’s an important difference: iCade could become an absolute must-have iPad accessory for the serious retro gamer—but it’s not there yet.