It might be best to have your salt shaker handy, as you’ll likely want a couple of grains to take along with this latest rumour. If a new report is to be believed, a completely redesigned iPad 5 is due out this October.

The source for this rumour is Jeremy Horwitz, the editor-in-chief over at iLounge. Horwitz reportedly inspected a fifth-generation iPad shortly after the holidays but did not want to divulge too much about it as it “didn’t seem to be finished yet.”

Now Horwitz has come forward with his information, and it looks like our suspicion was correct: the iPad 5, if it follows the prototype, will be thinner and smaller than it is now, taking a good many cues from the iPad Mini.

Now, to make the one on the right look more like the one on the left…

Interestingly, Horwitz notes that the 5^th Gen iPad will sport much thinner bezels around the entire device. There are “virtually no” left and right bezels, while the top and bottom bezels have been reduced dramatically but still sport the familiar camera aperture and home button.

As for the overall feel of the design, Horwitz once again confirms our suspicions when he noted that “calling it a ‘stretched iPad mini’ is very close to entirely accurate”.

We’ll be curious to see how Apple manages this feat, and when it will unveil it to the public. Given the case redesign, October seems like a much more solid bet than March but we’ll just have to wait and see.