iPad 3 features enquiry - 4G and making normal phone calls via iPad without a phone

[timlonngson]

The new iPad 3 sounds very impressive, but it will DEFINITELY need support for 2 key technologies which its predecessors do not support if it is to justify upgrading to it:

1. It will need to support the new 4G which is coming out in the next year or two, which will allow roaming internet access of upto 100Mbp / second.

2. It will need to allow regular phone calls to be made directly - iPad can already fit Simm cards, but the iPads 1 and 2 will not allow you to make phone calls (the closest you can get is with skype). What we really want is an all in one unit to be able to do everything - if the software for voice recognition on the iPhone 4s is put on the iPad 3, then with a simple earpiece or headset, people could make calls from their iPad 3, and not need to carry around any other separate gadgets like separate mobile phones.

So long as it DEFINITELY supports those 2 technologies, I will get one - can anyone please confirm if this is the case?

Kind regards

Tim

p.s.
Support for passive 3d (polarized passive glasses rather than active shutter) would also be a huge attraction, but not so much a deal break as the above 2

 

[gerabbi]

There is a hack (jailbroken) that allows for calls and texts on iPad 1 with 3G. "PhoneitiPad" it works very well. It doesn't work with iPad 2 yet mainly I think because the jailbreak has not been released, but I don't know that for a fact.

 

[AQ_OC]

I don't think iPad 3 needs to be a phone. Skype calling is fine on iPad and there is facetime too. It's just too big to be trying to be a phone. And why would apple do something that's going to eat into its phone sales? It would be nutty.

It does need to support 4G, though, and it needs a higher resolution screen and beefier cpu/gpu to support that resolution while not killing battery life and adding too much weight or thickness.