iPad 2 announcement is on for March 2

Stephen Withers
Thursday, 24 February 2011 07:37

Your IT - Mobility

Apple has issued invitations to a US media event on March 2, apparently to introduce the iPad 2.

Yesterday, rumours were swirling concerning the imminent or delayed iPad 2. One camp was putting its money on a March 2 debut, another reckoned production delays meant we wouldn't see Apple's revised tablet for another couple of months.

iTWire observed "We should find out very soon if ATD's version [All Things Digital presented the March 2 launch as fact] is correct, as invitations to the asserted March 2 event would need to be issued in the next couple of days."

And so it came to pass. Various media outlets in the US have received an invitation from Apple to an event at the Yerba Buena Center for the Arts on March 2. As usual, the invitation doesn't explicitly mention what's being announced, but the artwork does include the top right corner of an iPad, plus the tagline "Come see what 2011 will be the year of."

Whether Apple uses the 'iPad 2' moniker that most of us have been bandying around remains to be seen. After all, successive versions of the iMac have simply been called 'iMac', with designations such as 'mid 2010' added only when necessary to distinguish one historical model from another.

Apart from the exact specifications, the big question for next Wednesday will be how soon after the announcement the new iPad will be available. Will it ship (almost) immediately, or will previous suggestions of April delivery prove correct?