New Apple 2012 products categories with prospects and updates reivew

After a comparatively quiet iYear in 2011, Apple’s mobile products will necessarily see a slew of 2011 revamps from the headlining release dates for the iPhone 5 and iPad 3 to the lingering iPod touch 5 and Apple TV. This year saw the company’s mobile hardware releases skew less ambitious than usual: the original iPad was replaced by an evolutionary iPad 2 instead of the one people were hoping for. The iPhone 4 was replaced with an outwardly identical iPhone 4S instead of the redesigned iPhone 5 people were expecting. Apple’s MacBook lineup was split, with the Air seeing a major revamp and the Pro seeing nothing more than a speed bump. Other Apple iProducts were simply skipped over. How much this had to do with the challenging leadership transition from Steve Jobs to Tim Cook while Jobs was dying, and how much of it was a matter of the products merely not being ready yet, is something no one outside Cupertino can say for sure. But with 2012 around the corner, here’s a look at Apple product categories which will see updates this year, from the iPhone 5 to the iPad 3 and beyond, and the prospects for each…

Apple products 2012

iPhone 5:

Its release date is unpredictable at this point, thanks to Apple’s 2011 jockeying which saw the traditional summer iPhone launch timeframe shifted to October for the 4S. But the iPhone 5 (or whatever it ends up being called) carries much of the company’s 2012 hopes with it. The 4S was something of a punt, a way to roll out new technologies like Siri and the A5 processor and Sprint compatibility while buying time until the next generation iPhone body styling is ready. Look for the iPhone 5 to get faster and thinner while embracing new technologies like 4G LTE. If we had to guess, we’d say it’ll surface in the summer. But that’s just a guess.

iPad 3:

The whole world had this pegged for spring 2012, but now there’s buzz that it’ll be a fall 2012 product, with an iPad 2S arriving in the spring instead. Whenever it lands, the public will be looking for Apple’s tablet to take the next step toward becoming a full-on computer replacement, which was Jobs’ original stated vision for the product…

iPod touch 5:

Apple’s history suggests that the iPod touch 5 won’t be released until the iPhone 5 surfaces, and the new touch will offer a design which resembles the iPhone 5. In fact, the lack of a new iPod touch in 2011 is the strongest evidence that the company had plans to launch the iPhone 5 this year; if the iPhone 4S had been the plan all along, a suitably revamped iPod touch would have been released along with it. Instead, Apple apparently had plans to release an iPhone 5 and an iPod touch 5 this year, and when it turned out the former wasn’t yet ready, the latter couldn’t be launched either. Instead Apple added a white version of the existing iPod touch 4.

Apple TV:

Apple keeps making its set top box smaller, more powerful, and less expensive, and still no one cares. Is this the year Apple finally gets around to launching actual television sets with the “AppleTV” technology built into them?

MacBook Pro:

It’s not that there’s that much Apple can do to reduce the size of the MacBook Pro, as long as it continues to include bulky hardware features like an optical drive and a hard drive which the MacBook Air has left behind. It’s just that Apple hasn’t even tried to reduce the Pro, as it’s largely the same hardware body it was back when it was still known as the PowerBook G4. After a disappointing speed bump this month, expect the MacBook Pro to be finally renovated in 2012 with a new hardware design which is at least marginally more svelte.

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