Apple expected to unveil new MacBooks and iPad Pros at launch event at the end of October

New MacBook Air expected - without the Air moniker - and upgraded MacBook Pros could also appear

Apple is expected to unveil new iPad Pros and MacBooks at an event on 30 October in New York.

While the invitation - "There's more in the making" - gives nothing away, rumours suggest that Apple's iPad Pro will be given an extensive makeover.

The upgraded tablet will reportedly be made available in 10.5-inch and 12.9-inch variants, both of which will boast slimmer bezels, and smaller dimensions compared to Apple's previous iPad Pros. They will also come with Apple's A11X Bionic CPU and a TrueDepth camera system that will enable Face ID for biometric authentication.

Bloomberg suggests that Apple will ditch fingerprint recognition entirely for Face ID with the new iPad Pros. The new iPads are also expected to shift from Apple's proprietary Lightning adapter to industry standard USB-C. However, the headphone jack is also expected to be ditched in favour of USB-C, too.

A long-awaited successor to the MacBook Air, Apple's entry-level MacBook, is also expected to be unveiled, with a starting price of $999 or less in the US. According to the rumours, the 'inexpensive' laptop will ditch the 'Air' moniker and will sport a 13-inch Retina display and Intel's 8th-gen Kaby Lake Refresh CPUs, rather than the much-delayed Cannon Lake.

And, if benchmarks that appeared on GeekBench over the summer are any guide, there could also be some MacBook Pros in the offing, too.

There could also be a new Mac Mini to replace the underpowered three-year old models currently available. In addition to offering outdated Intel CPUs, the 4GB or 8GB memory is also soldered on-board, making it impossible to perform even a basic memory upgrade.

In addition to upgrades to the CPU, memory and storage, the new Mac Mini is also expected to shift to USB-C. Apple's iMacs could also get some much needed attention in terms of minor upgrades.

Apple has been criticised in recent years for paying too little attention to its mainstream computing products, leading to claims not only that only are they over-priced, but also underpowered.

And this could be one of the last times that Apple unveils Intel-powered Macs and MacBooks, with the company strongly rumoured to be planning a shift to its own in-house designed ARM-based CPUs in 2020.

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