According to AllThingsD’s John Paczkowski, Apple will announce its new, smaller, iPad at an event in October.

AllThingsD has a solid record of confirming the dates for Apple product launches and rumors concerning unannounced products, making today’s news quite credible.

The new iPad is said to have a display of 8-inches or less and will be shown off at its own special event in October, the report adds.

Daring Fireball’s John Gruber, prior to today’s news, opined on the iPad Mini launch in a Thursday post on Thursday, suggesting that Apple won’t launch the new iPad next to the new iPhone at the same event for a variety of reasons. Apple launching a new product alongside its flagship device, the iPhone, does seem a bit farfetched.

The iPad Mini would likely be a “one more thing” scenario were to be released next to the iPhone, which could end up hurting sales of the device.

With a smaller iPad, Apple could take a commanding lead in the tablet market. Already a dominating in the larger tablet market, the smaller tablet market is ripe for the taking no one company controlling sales of sub 8-inch screen tablets.

Many feel smaller tablets are perfect for portability and even better for long travel. Android-based tablets, while getting better, still are not up-to-par with Apple’s iOS.

Certainly the release of the iPhone 5 and iPad Mini remain speculative until Apple makes a formal event announcement, but AllThingsD’s sources, as stated, have been solid in the past and there’s no reason to believe they won’t be this time.

What do you think? Do you want to see a smaller iPad?

---