When I write this the supposedly new iPad 3 might be released in about one day. In honour of that event I would like to share some pictures of another similar device.

Not an iPad 1

I do not buy pirated products, but occasionally I get to see what other people have found out there. This is one of those times. I recently got the opportunity to see a device that supposedly was an iPad 1 with 128 GB memory, a built in camera and what seems to be an SD card reader. “What the …” you say? Where might one find a device like that? Well, China seems to be a safe bet, and in this case it is the truth as well. In the sake of anonymity we will just say that the owner of this device visited China last year and found this device in a market in Beijing. From a distance and while turned off it looked like an iPad and it was cheap. It even was packed in something with a superficial resemblance to the real packaging. Now after the bargain had been struck and he arrived at the hotel to check it out he found a few strange things. It had a separate charger pin input. The regular iPad connector could be refitted with an adapter that made it possible for the device to connect to a regular network cable, an USB cable and (updated, see below) several other cable types. All in one adapter! That was kind of neat. Oh and it ran Android!

Not an iPad running Android version 2.2

Android? On an iPad?

Yes …. and no. This is of course no iPad. It might look like one but the there are several things that these images do not tell. Among else it is made of plastic, and feels cheap. Another tell was that it stopped working after a week. Now it only gives you the startup logo and then nothing happens.

But as a curiosity it may now live for a long time on the internet.

Not an iPad with more than one connector

Not an iPad with 128 GB memory

Not an iPad - backside

Not an iPad with a forward facing camera

Update 2012-02-06: I managed to take a few pictures of the included dongle as well. I remembered slightly wrong though, It only has two USB ports and one ethernet port available.

iPad dongle