Everything Apple and Microsoft Unveiled This Week
By: Apple announces the new iPad Mini starting at $329.Apple and Microsoft rolled out quite a few new products this week in a push to promote their latest devices before the holiday season swings into full gear.
Here's a quick recap of what the companies launched, how much each item costs and when the products will be available.
Apple
—iPad Mini
The long-awaited iPad mini was finally revealed on Tuesday at an event in San Jose, California. (Read More: Apple Sells Out of White iPad Minis During Pre-Orders)
The smaller iPad features a 7.9-inch display screen, forward-facing and backward-facing cameras, 10 hours of battery life and a dual-core A5 chip, which allows for a faster response time and a longer battery-life.
Like the full-size iPad, the iPad mini is available as Wi-Fi, or as both Wi-Fi and cellular enabled and is available in either black or white.
Prices start at $329 for a 16GB Wi-Fi enabled model and goes up to $529 for the 64GB Wi-Fi version.
For the iPad mini that is both Wi-Fi enabled and supports cellular data networks, prices range from $459 to $659.
The mobile device became available for pre-order early Friday morning and is scheduled to ship Nov. 2, although the ship date for the white Wi-Fi enabled models has been pushed back another week because the original supply sold out during pre-order.
—Fourth Generation iPad
Apple also released a newer version of its full size iPad on Tuesday. (Read More: Apple May Let You Swap iPad 3 for New Model)
Like the third generation iPad, which was released in March, the The fourth generation iPad features retina display and 10 hours of battery life. The company has discontinued the third generation iPad, however, and is only selling the iPad mini, the iPad 2, and the latest fourth generation model with Retina display.
The latest full-size version has an A6X chip, which provides double the processing power of the third generation iPad, and a FaceTime HD camera.
Pricing for the device ranges from $499 for a 16GB Wi-Fi enabled model to $699 for a 64GB Wi-Fi enabled model.
For the iPad that supports both Wi-Fi and cellular data networks, prices range from $629 to $829.
-13-Inch Macbook Pro with Retina Display
Tablets weren't the only products Apple showed off though Tuesday. The tech giant also introduced a smaller version of the MacBook Pro with Retina Display. (Read More:Enough iPad Mini, Apple's Macs Will Also Boost Revenue )
The new 13-inch model is 0.75 inches thin and weighs 3.57 lbs., making it 20 percent thinner and almost a pound lighter than the 13-inch model MacBook Pro without Retina display.
Among other features it has a FaceTime HD camera, dual microphones, improved speakers, Bluetooth 4.0 and two Thunderbolt and two USB 3.0 ports so that users can connect multiple devices and displays to the computer.
Inside the latest model are 2.5 GHz Intel Core i5 processors, 8GB of 1600 MHz memory, and up to 768GB of flash storage.
The device begins pricing at $1,699 for the model that has 128GB flash storage, and became available for purchase on Tuesday.
-iMac
