Fans of Apple’s smaller iPad Mini caught a tough break last fall when the company unveiled its new tablets for the year. Although Tim Cook & co. lavished plenty of attention on the faster, slimmed-down iPad Air 2, the upgraded iPad Mini 3 was regarded as a mere afterthought. The list of changes was so short, in fact, that some of us wondered why Apple would introduce a performance gap between the Air and Mini lines. Still more people wondered when they’d get a Mini with enough power to match its larger sibling. Turns out, the answer was “a year later.” I’ve been testing the new iPad Mini 4 for over a week now and can say with confidence this is the Mini we should’ve gotten last year.Slideshow-323041