I see the surprise bump to fourth gen iPad as an admission of two things:
1. Apple really wishes that it had the A6 ready for the third gen iPad, but they didn't, so they designed the A5X as a stopgap until they could design an SoC that would drive four times the pixels with the same performance as the A5 drives 1024 x 768. Now the iPad can run games at full rez without dropping frames or effects (though God I wish developers would let it scale if their game already has a choppy framerate) compared to iPad 2.
2. It's going to be at least nine more months until IGZO displays will be ready and suitable for the iPad, which is the only way the size and weight of the device is going to substantially change.
The competition? I expect Amazon and Google will keep burning cash in the hope that it will turn into profit somewhere down the line, while I think MS may succeed in satisfying the most demanding users. I suspect the users Microsoft attracts with Windows on tablets will be somewhat smaller than the users it will lose to the competition, though.
"The worst part about these reviews is they are [subjective]--and their scores often depend on how drunk you got the media at a Street Fighter event." — Mona Hamilton, Capcom Senior VP of Marketing
*Image indefinitely borrowed from BrainBoxLtd without his consent.
