Apple Cuts Price Of iPad Air 2 By $100 Ahead Of iPad Pro Release

Apple announced the 9.7-inch iPad Pro tablet alongside the compact iPhone SE smartphone Monday. As expected, the price of the old iPad has been cut, since the new tablet will hit store shelves very soon.

Apple slashed the price of the well-received iPad Air 2, released in October 2014, by $100. It means that the tablet can be purchased at a starting price of $399 for the Wi-Fi-only model with 16GB of storage. The 64GB variant, on the other hand, can be bought for $499. Apple has apparently dropped the 128GB variant from the Air 2 lineup altogether.

As far as specifications go, the Apple iPad Air 2 features a 9.7-inch LED-backlit IPS LCD display, bundled with 1,536 x 2,048 pixels screen resolution, which translates to a pixel density of 264 ppi. The screen is protected by a scratch-resistant glass panel with oleophobic coating.

Speaking of design, similar to its predecessor, the iPad Air, this tablet also comes with the same aluminum chassis, giving it a premium look. Furthermore, at 6.1 mm, this Apple device is reportedly 18 percent slimmer when compared to the original iPad.

Under the hood, the iPad Air 2 comes powered by a triple-core (Apple A8X) processor and backed by 2GB of RAM. The slate runs on iOS 8.1, but can be upgraded to iOS 9.2.1.

Camera-wise, this slate sports an 8-megapixel rear-facing camera, in addition to a 1.2-megapixel front-facing shooter for selfies. Apart from the built-in storage options, there is no microSD card slot to facilitate expansion.

Apple has housed a non-removable Li-Po battery (27.3 Wh) on the Air 2, which reportedly provides up to 10 hours of battery life. Notably, this is the first iPad to carry a fingerprint scanner on the home button. And when it comes to colors, Apple offers three choices — Space Gray, Silver and Gold.