Much like how DC Comics relaunches its entire comic book universe every decade or so, a new rumor suggests that Apple plans to overhaul its entire product line up during 2012. Digitimes reports via unnamed sources that the company will give consumers all new designs for its iMac desktop, the MacBook Air notebook, the iPhone and the iPad tablet during the next 12 months or so.
The report hints that the first product to get the revamped treatment will be the iPad tablet. The current version outsells all other tablet devices by a wide margin. The story claims that Apple has been asking iPad supply manufacturers to create parts for not one but two iPad prototypes which supposedly have the code names of J1 and J2. If true that may mean that Apple is trying out two different iPad redesigns in order to pick one to go into mass production later.
The next version of the iPhone and iMac may not go on sale until the second half of 2012, according to the report. That would seem to track with Apple"s current schedule for releasing new versions of those products to the masses.
Of course, we don"t have any clear idea of what these new redesigns will be like. Will the iPad 3 have a higher resolution screen and a quad core processor? Will the iMac dump its big all-in-one monitor for a new approach? Will the MacBook Air become thinner and lighter than before? Most of all, will the next version of the iPhone have design and hardware features that won"t be slammed by reviewers like the iPhone 4S has been by some critics? Stay tuned.