Apple iPad 3 to sport LTE '4G'

Quad-core CPU too

Apple's upcoming iPad 3 will incorporate LTE connectivity, it has been claimed.

If correct - and since it comes from news agency Bloomberg, quite possibly through a managed leak; common with large, influential US news outlets - it will mark a big step up in the tablet's ability to access data services on the move.

Bloomberg's sources - "three people familiar with the product", as it describes them - also confirm the presence of a 'retina' display "with more pixels on its screen than some HD televisions…[and] pixels small enough to make the images look like printed material".

And, yes, it'll have a quad-core CPU.

Presumably, Apple will continue to offer a Wi-Fi only iPad, so punters in countries where there is no LTE infrastructure - here, for example - can still get hold of the hi-res display and speedy CPU.

Production, claimed one mole, began at the start of January and will ramp up to a peak in February. The tablet will go on sale in March.

Separately, iLounge claims to have been shown an iPad 3 casing during last week's Consumer Electronics Show (CES). Powered down, it looks almost identical to the iPad 2. It's a millimetre thicker and the camera lens is slightly larger. Blink and you'd not be able to tell the two apart. ®