Saturday, January 12, 2013

Why is the iPad mini so @#$% expensive?

I thought I had already blogged about this months ago, but apparently, I haven't. And I've never yet heard nor read anyone say this anywhere on the interwebs.


I'll be talking here about the base models, which are Wifi-only with 16Gb memory, and screen sizes measured on the diagonal.

The regular iPad, with a ~9.7-inch screen, is $499.

Its screen has about 45 square inches in surface area.

The iPad mini, with a ~7.9-inch screen, is $329, or two-thirds the price of the regular iPad.

Its screen has about 30 square inches in surface area. TWO-THIRDS that of the regular iPad.

Does this make sense?

Well, the Nexus 7, with a 7-inch screen, was $250 (for the 16Gb model, okay!?) at the time when the iPad mini came out. Its screen has about 21 square inches in surface area. If the pricing of these smaller tablets relative to the regular iPad are the same percentages as the surface area of their screens, the Nexus 7 should technically be priced at $230.

So technically, when the iPad mini came out, it made sense that it was $329 and that the Nexus 7 was actually over-priced at $250. And considering that it has a plastic and not an aluminum shell and no back-facing camera. Of course, there's the pixel density issue; i.e. the iPad mini is not "Retina" quality, while the Nexus 7 might be. But true enough, sensing threat from the iPad mini, Google dropped the price of the 16Gb Nexus 7 to $200.

Is the Nexus 7 cheaper now at $200? Or does the iPad mini pricing now make sense at $330? Let me know what you think in the comments.

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