Apple’s new iPad 2 Pro is an expansive 12.9 inches

We were expecting new iPhones today, and we were even expecting Apple TV announcements, but whether Apple would update its iPad line was more difficult to say. It seems Apple is bucking its own announce-new-iPads-in-October trend, however, because the company just added a 12.9" iPad to its lineup.

Taking the stage at Apple's launch event in San Francisco on Wednesday, Apple's Senior Vice President of Marketing Phil Schiller explained the design choice. "Let's start with the display: Why make a bigger one?," he said. "You can touch your documents, touch your books, interact with everything. It does things an iPhone can't do since it doesn't have to be pocketable, does things a notebook can't do because it's holdable.

Apple confirmed that the iPad Pro's screen has a 2732×2048 resolution, as had been rumored in the weeks leading up to this event, with 5.6 million pixels.