The Apple event of the year has passed and with it came the announcements for their new lines of products.  One such product has yet to step out of rumors and be confirmed by Apple: the iPad Mini.

The new highly anticipated iPad Mini is expected to be released later this October. Analysts are estimating the device to be available before the upcoming holiday season along with the iPhone 5.

Tim Cook, CEO of Apple, spoke during the press conference for iPhone 5, saying "the iPad is driving the post-PC revolution at a breathtaking pace."

Some of the specifications yet to be confirmed are a two model option between a seven and nine inch screens. The iPad Mini will also include a stylus and an 8-megapixel camera. The device will operate on Apple's new iOS 6 operating system which the company debuted along with their announcement of the iPhone 5 on Wednesday in San Francisco.

In October 2010, the late Steve Jobs commented on mid-sized tablets saying:

"The 10in screen size is the minimum size required to create great tablet apps. 7in tablets are tweeners: too big to compete with a Smartphone, and too small to compete with an iPad."

The price tag is rumored to be priced around $250 to $300 per respective screen sizes.

Some of Apple's current competition for the tablet market includes devices such as the Kindle Fire HD and Google's Nexus 7. Many of these devices are inexpensively priced around $150 to $250.

The iPad Mini is likely to use its lower price to attract buyers on a budget. They will also likely use the access to thousands of iPad specific apps as a factor to encourage sales against their competitors.

The ten inch iPad has currently sold over 84 million devices and Apple is expecting greater numbers for their next quarter.