Apple launches new, bigger iPad, the iPad Pro, with fastest-ever A9x microprocessor

"If you see a stylus, they blew it," said Steve Jobs, except it isn't a stylus, it's "Apple Pencil"...

Apple has this evening launched the latest slew of new products, including updates to the Apple Watch, Apple TV and the much-anticipated iPad Pro, a 12.9-inch iPad intended to be the flagship of the iPad line.

While Apple senior vice president Phil Schiller emphasised the screen size for both watching films and playing games, it was the development of the Apple A9x microprocessor that stood out.

The 64-bit ARM-based chip that will power the iPad Pro, he asserted, provided "desktop-class performance", improving performance by 22 times compared to the original iPad, doubling graphics performance over the past 12 months and by eight-times since the first iPad.

"It's faster than 80 per cent of the portable PCs shipped in the last 12 months," he claimed.

It also has a 10-hour battery life. The variable refresh rate of the screen helping to save energy, despite its larger size. On top of that, it sports a four-speaker system that can shift according to the orientation of the device, and an eight mega-piit spxel camera.

Being 12.9-inches, it can also offer a genuine full-size keyboard, although the company also unveiled an after-market "woven fabric" keyboard that connects to the iPad via its new "smart connector" in a similar way in which keyboards connect to Microsoft's Surface series of hybrid tablets.

Finally, Apple has also added the Apple Pencil to the range of iPad products that will work with the iPad Pro, a development that necessitated the "re-engineering" of the touch display to take account of both pencil and finger. The Apple Pencil will enable more precise drawing and work on the device - including high-end CAD applications.

The Apple Pencil is battery powered and only rechargeable via Apple's proprietary Lightning connector.

The iPad Pro will retail for $799 in the US, with the keyboard weighing in at $168 and the Apple Pencil, $99. The iPad Pro should be available from November.

However, the words of Steve Jobs on the subject of the stylus will no doubt be widely quoted in the press tomorrow: "If you see a stylus or a task manager," Jobs said back in 2010, "they blew it."