Edible Apple

All Things D reports that Apple plans to unveil the highly anticipated iPad Mini at a special event scheduled for October 23. It was initially believed that Apple would introduce the iPad Mini either in September or earlier in October, but recent reports suggest that a last minute design change may have forced Apple to delay things a bit.

That’s a Tuesday, not a Wednesday, so this is a bit of a break with recent tradition. It also happens to be just three days prior to the street date for Microsoft’s new Surface tablet.

Sources declined to specify where the event is to be held, and I’ve not been able to confirm a location.

But it’s likely to be at Apple’s Town Hall Auditorium. The company has debuted a number of important products there in the past — OS X Lion, a next-generation MacBook Air and the iPhone 4S — so there’s plenty of precedent.

We’ve also seen reports that Apple has put in component orders large enough to manufacture 10 million units for the upcoming holiday quarter. If true, Apple has high aspirations for its upcoming iPad Mini tablet, especially when measured against the reported 5 million unit order Amazon put in for the Kindle Fire for same quarter.

As has previously been reported, the iPad Mini will sport a 7.85-inch screen but will not necessarily house a larger form factor that smaller devices like the Kindle Fire and the Google Nexus 7. Recent reports have indicated that the device will feature Apple’s new lightning connector and we should also point out that the device will likely not come with a Retina Display as Apple is looking to keep costs down in order to compete with cheaper tablet devices out on the market.