I’ve
got three iPad pros with me here we've got the previous generation iPad pro 12.9
so that's the one powered by the A12 z chip and then the two-brand spanking new
ones with the m1 and we've got the iPad 11 inch and the iPad 12.9 inch so I’m
reviewing these I’ve got this for context because I want to figure out if this
really is much of an upgrade also which one of these should you buy?
does
the m1 chip make much of a difference is it worth paying the extra to get the
mini led screen so I’m going to run you through everything you need to know
hopefully answer some of the big questions and share my experiences
let's get into it so let's kick off
with a quick run through of what's new here I’m sure you guys already know
you've watched or read a bunch of reviews but the headline really is the fact
that these are powered by apple's m1 processor
that's the same chip you get in the latest iMac’s and MacBook’s although of course this one will be a slightly lower power version and that's paired with eight gigs of ram as standard two more than the previous pro and up to a whopping 16 gigs of the stuff if you go for the one or two terabyte storage option but there is a catch with this and I’ll come back to that in a second then there's this mini led screen aka the liquid resonant XDR if we're going to go by apple's own marketing spiel and this brighter and higher contrast screen is only on the new iPad 12.9 pro the 11 has the same IPS led screen as before I had kind of hoped that apple would move the front facetime camera from the top to the side which would make a lot more sense when you're using it in landscape mode like this with a keyboard so that it's central to your video calling apps but instead what they've done is give us.
an ultra-wide lens with a new center
stage feature and as it says on the tin this follows
and keeps you in the middle of the frame when you're on video and it works
really well with facetime zoom Webex teams and camera apps like filmic pro,
we're also getting a faster USB 4 port that supports thunderbolt 3 charging
time is the same unfortunately but now transferring files from storage drives
can be much faster and it also supports high resolution external screens so you
can even hook this up to the 6k apple display if you're Mr. moneybags speaking
of connectivity there's now optional 5g support rather than the old LTE which
makes this a much more future-proof travel companion although this will add an
extra 150 to the price plus of course the cost of the data for your sim card but
all that's kind of boring the big headline new feature you guys know what it is.
it's the new white keyboard it's um actually it's quite a lot nicer I put on twitter
and Instagram asking you guys which you prefer between the two setups and most
of you did say white and I think I do as well
especially if you pair it with the silver
iPad as opposed to the space gray which looks a bit better with the black one
although we'll see long term if this stays clean and doesn't end up like
everyone's fancy white tesla seat and looking all dark and green horrible but
off the bat I think i like the white keyboard more actually while we're talking about the keyboard, I’ve got the old model here and it does still work with it so even though this new iPad's actually about half a mil thicker than the old one and there is a new magic keyboard with this different color option and it's a little bit neater of a fit this does still work so if you've splashed on the old one you don't have to upgrade speaking of upgrading i think that was a pretty seamless segue right there but how about upgrading your wardrobe with thread i don't think I’ve bought any nice new clothes in the last year or so but then the lovely people over at thread.com asked if I’d try out their personalized online shop you just sign up for free there's no fee or subscription here take their quiz for the kind of styles you like or don't like and then it'll curate the store just for you and offer smart suggestions and there's no more filtering by size either then you just choose what you'd like to order and then after a couple of days you'll have your fancy new threads and if you change your mind or the fit isn't quite right then you just mark the items you want to send back box it up and then stick on the return label that comes with it so nice
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| Ipad pro 12 inch |
and easy feel free to disagree but I’m not exactly the most stylish person and most of the time i don't even know where to look or what brands to consider but with thread not only do they suggest outfits for you but it's a great way of just trying new brands and you can filter by price plus in the UK there's 20 off all orders over 75 pounds and for my American friends a discount of up to 30 dollars on all new user orders so why not give thread a try I’ll leave a link below because if you can't take fashion advice from a tech youtuber then well what is the world coming to so that's what's new but that's all on top of what was already I think at least i think most people would agree the best tablet you can buy and that's largely down to the app store and the quality of iPad optimized apps well except for Instagram for some reason but really this is what sets the iPad apart from android rivals but we're also getting a sleek aluminum design the smooth 120 hertz refresh rate screen punchy quad speakers best-in-class cameras and while it shares the same sensors and hardware as before the updated is in the m1 chip means we're getting a better white balance faster low light focusing and also a shorter focal length with these cameras so you can take some macro level shots and of course we still have the lidar
sensor which helps with augmented reality
although really only ever use it for measuring and then we've got the terrific
apple pencil 2 and the magic keyboard which while expensive I would highly
recommend especially if you do go with a pro or the air to be honest but either
way it makes it a lot more of a productivity tool having the magic keyboard so
the accessories really make this stand out as well but as you guys know none of
this comes cheap the 11 inch pro will set you back 750 pounds rising to a
thousand pounds for the 12.9 and then if you are planning to bump it up to 256
gigs of storage maybe add 5g and a magic keyboard then things get very pricey
very quickly what is interesting though is that the MacBook air costs the
same as the 12.9 they both cost a thousand pounds or a thousand dollars
although that's without the magic keyboard so tack that on it actually costs
more than this so I guess the big question for a different Post which i do plan
on doing when iOS 15 comes out so it's a bit more of a
laptop versus tablet comparison if you
had to pick one right now which would you go for let me know in the comments
below so far so good but let's answer some of the big questions and the first
one is does the mini led
screen in the 12.9 really make that
much of a difference and is it worth paying an extra 250 pounds?
over the standard 11 inch and to that
my answer would be kind of depends on what you're using it for if this is going
to be your main content device whether you're
editing videos or photos or you're watching
a ton of videos and movies then yes it is worth buying blacks are properly
black you can really see the difference in the contrast and HDR is a lot
brighter so with this we're getting 10 000 mini LEDs and about 2600 dimming
zones which means we're getting much higher contrast close to OLED levels
so the black bars around videos and
dark backgrounds appear properly black not just a washed out dark gray it's
also a lot brighter but only with HDR content otherwise for regular stuff like
you know web browsing and almost all the apps it's the same 600 nits as the 11
inch or last year's pro but when you are watching HDR it boosts the screen up
to a full screen 1000 nits with a 1600 nit peak in some areas and side by side
with the new 11 inch playing HDR video you can see
it's a good deal brighter and it looks a lot more vibrant the only downside to
the mini led is that we do get some blooming but that's kind of to be expected
i mean this is not an OLED screen and it's a fairly
common issue with mini LEDs with the trade-off
being higher brightness than your typical OLED it can
be subtle but there's no two ways about it you can see the blooming and it's
more obvious now because we have a darker properly black screen so the blooming
area stands out more than you'd see on the standard led iPad screen but to be
honest I haven't found the blooming to be much of a problem although what i
would say is that while the deeper blacks and higher HDR burners are nice and a
welcome upgrade it's not essential these screens are already very good so don't
feel like you're missing out too much if you prefer the cheaper and smaller 11
inch or just don't fancy an upgrade yet okay the next big question is how much of
a difference does the new m1 chip make to performance is it really that much of
an upgrade over the a12 Zen well the short answer
is yeah actually I think it does but there's
just so much untapped potential here that's the real issue although I guess
it's kind of a good problem to have but right now day to day while it does feel
a little bit nippier than last year's pro it's not to the extent that benchmarks
might suggest for example in geek bench 5 we're looking at a combined 53 boost
for the processor and a whopping 71 optic for the graphics over the previous iPad
pro and then in 3dmark wildlife extreme we go from 21.3 fps up to 30.1 that's a
41 boost in graphics and you just don't normally see these kind of numbers from
one generation to the next so the m1 is the headline really but as well as that
we're also getting more ram as i mentioned eight gigabytes is now standard up
from six but if you spec this with one or two terabyte storage option then that
goes up to 16 gigabytes of the stuff which is absolutely insane for an iPad and
actually means that it's the same spec as my MacBook pro now however there's a
catch because at the moment apps are limited to just five gigabytes of ram so
even though we've got 16 gigs in here it's not being utilized this is something
that I hope will change with iOS 15 but right now with iOS 14.6 which I’ve got
on these guys it doesn't really make much of a difference so really the extra performance
currently is all down to the m1 chip but hopefully soon that cap will be
unlocked and we'll actually see some benefit to the 16 gig model but right now it's
a bit of a waste of money so undoubtedly the software is holding back the
hardware at the moment but regardless that boost from the previous iPad pro is
incredibly impressive although in the real world the difference isn't quite as significant
if i load up one of the most graphically demanding games right now gentian
impact from home screen to gameplay it takes the m1 pro 29 seconds versus 37
seconds on the a12z pro so that's 22 percent faster but then my 10 minute 4k
project in premiere rush took 7 minutes and 10 seconds to render on the m1
versus 7 minutes 23 so that's just five percent faster and may actually be
limited by ram at the moment so yes it is faster and as you would expect this
thing doesn't skip a beat jumping between apps multitasking gaming editing
anything you throw at this thing it just breezes through and we really have to
get creative with how to actually demonstrate the power of it and of course any
app that uses machine learning you'll see a big boost thanks to the m1's neural
engine and then paired with the 120 hertz screen that we get on the pro models the
whole thing just feels incredibly slick and also if you are using the apple
pencil it makes doodling and drawing feel a lot more responsive but aside from
shaving off a few seconds here and there on an app launch or an edit you're not
going to notice that much difference between these two at least not yet and
that's the crux of the issue we'll have to see what iOS 15 brings it's annoying
that I’m making this review like a week or two before WWDC where it will get
announced and then generally the public will get it in September so not long to
wait but fingers crossed not only do they unlock that ram cap which currently
makes the 16 gigs a bit pointless but also fingers crossed that's not my fingers
that's my fists fingers crossed that we get some kind of pro desktop level apps
i mean iPads and macs have been on a collision course for years now i mean
these share the same chips as the MacBook’s and the iMac for goodness sake so
it can't be that much of a stretch for these to potentially one day run proper
desktop apps which would be incredible because right now the m1 while a bit
faster and very impressive in benchmarks it's just not really that utilized so I
think it's going to be a case of watch this space okay next question should you
buy the 11 or the 12.9 well to that I would say assuming this isn't going to be
your laptop replacement i would probably just go with the 11. it's cheaper it's
more portable and more comfortable to hold it's less obtrusive if you're using
out and about on a train or a coffee shop and i just think that all the attention
right now is on the big 12.9 with its fancy mini led screen but in reality the
base 11-inch iPad pro with the magic keyboard if you can afford it is
absolutely the way to go don't get me wrong mini led is clearly superior and i
also find the wider keyboard spacing on the 12.9 keyboard a little bit more
comfortable to type on but i don't think it's worth paying an extra 250 pounds
for unless it's a case of money's no object and maybe you're putting on the
business or if it's going to be a main rather than secondary device
in that case the 12.9 probably is worth
it and as i say if this is your main content device you're going to watch a ton
of stuff on here then yeah pay the extra get the mini led screen you will
appreciate those super deep blacks almost OLED level blacks with a little bit
of blooming as well but it is a lot nicer now i am actually working on a big iPad
buying guide with all the models and I’ll go through the pros and cons of each
so stay tuned for that but just to answer the question quickly of should you go
for the iPad air or the pro actually I think what i would do is go for the
standard pro because the problem with the air is that it costs 579 pounds which
is about 220 less than the 11 inch pro but you only get 64 gigs of storage with
that and if you actually go up to the next level which annoyingly is 256 gigs then
it's only 30 pounds less than this and you're not getting the m1 chip or the
120 hertz screen or the better cameras with the lidar so at that point
i think most people as I say would be best
off with an 11 with a magic keyboard and if that is too expensive and you don't
care about all those bells and whistles then just go for the standard iPad yes
it has chunky bezels and not as much storage but it runs all the same apps it's
fundamentally the same oh and if you're wondering why i didn't talk about
battery life at all well it's because it's exactly the same as before we're
still looking at about 10 hours of real world use they'll easily get you
through a full work day and if you're just using them casually then well i tend
to find them charging
them twice a week the only downside is
it's still a little bit slow to charge and we haven't got any improvement in
that area so that's something i would like to see for the next iteration so
let's wrap up and this is a pretty big refresh of the pros but if you already
have an iPad from the last couple of years i don't think it's worth an upgrade
at least not yet let's see if the m1 chip comes into its own and makes these genuinely
more of a pro device rather than just a souped up iPad air but if you've got
any questions at all let me know in the comments below I’ll do my best to
answer them I do read every single one of your comments thank you so much for
watching guys and I’ll see you next time right here on the tech chat
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