MacNotes is reporting that they have heard from one manufacturer of iPad accessories “Apple is planning on holding an event next week.” The website further adds that at this event, which will be for iOS 4.3 launch Apple will announce the iPad 2 as a “One more thing”. The specifications of iPad 2 provided by MacNotes are same as other rumors with A5 processor, iPod touch like design and an additional mini DisplayPort for direct video output.

Also developer Chris Galzerano posted on his blog:

The first thing I noticed was in the sounds folder in the system folder. In the sounds folder, there are multiple camera related caf files for recording video and taking pictures. Also, in USBDeviceConfiguration.plist, there are entries for all of the regular devices like the iPad (iPad1,1) and the iPhone 4 (iPhone4,1), but there are 3 more entries for the iPad starting with 2: iPad2,1, iPad2,2, iPad2,3. This means that there will probably be three different versions of the iPad 2: a Wifi model, a GSM model, and a CDMA model. Strangely, there’s an iFPGA string in the plist file. Could Apple Possibly be working on a Field-Programmable Gate Array chip to put in their iDevices?
I looked in the SpringBoard.app package and found a surprise. There was a file called K48AP.plist. It showed capabilities of the iPad 2. All of the values were checked. Some of the important ones were: 720p (meaning the iPad would either play or record 720p video), magnetometer (meaning that the ipad 2 would have a compass like the iPhone 3GS, and displayport (Meaning the iPad 2 would have a displayport to connect external monitors and TVs). There were some smaller software features like “gas-gauge battery and multitasking-gestures.” There’s also a plugin for a gas-gaugeHID.

Our sources still maintain that Apple will introduce the next generation iPad within 3-4 weeks, but they are not sure if it will be next week. It can happen and Apple could take away all the thunder from Dell’s and HP’s tablet announcement. Also we don’t think Apple will host an event for iOS 4.3 update, it’s a small incremental update with just one imported feature – WiFi Hotspot. If the event will be there it will be about iPad, Apple might say that the next generation iPad will come with iOS 4.3, which it will.

In other iPad related news, 9to5mac has posted images showing the iPad 2 screens. The old part number of iPad LCD is LP097X02-SLA3 and the new LCD screen has part number LP097X02-SLN1. The display is manufactured by LG Phillips and has 1024 x 768 resolution. The LCD type is H-IPS, which should result in better image reproduction than most tablets on the market, even better than current iPad model. The darker screen color suggests that the new display will have better contrast ratio and darker black level.

It looks like Apple will be maintaining the current iPad screen resolution, but will be improving on already excellent screen on current iPad model.