The iPad Pro 2021. Powered by Apple's own M1 processor. The M stands for Mind-boggling.
This is the fastest tablet in the market.
And yet...It's mind-boggling that we can't fully take advantage of the power it offers.
But I have a feeling that we're just getting started. The processor architecture, the huge
amount of memory and GPU cores is head and shoulders above the competition.
But all of this feels pointless as the hardware specs seem to be ahead of what is possible
with the software.
Thin, very light, the design whilst not new, is a work of art.
But something as basic in functionality as connecting to an external display is still
not possible.
The display for me is the crown jewel of this device. It's the beautiful Liquid Retina XDR.
With technology stolen from Apple's own top tier professional display. This thing really
is beautiful to watch.
With true-to-life detail, 120Hz refresh rate (ProMotion) and great contrast ratio, it makes
content watching, photo or video editing an absolute pleasure.
And I don't have a counter for this one. This one is...legit.
But should YOU buy one?
Two months now. So the honeymoon period is definitely over.
Am I still as impressed with this machine as I was when I first unboxed it?
Would I recommend this iPad Pro? Yes and No.
Let's have a chat. I am Alex and I do down to earth tech reviews. I am here at least
once a week. Though this week I uploaded 4 videos!
I need some sleep!
The iPad Pro 2021 is an incredible tablet. As you've seen in the intro, the specs from
a hardware perspective are very impressive.
At first my thought was that these amazing specs were kind of irrelevant when you look
at what is possible on the software side of things.
But the more I used it and the more I discovered in terms of possibilities, the more I realised
that yes, there is a lot of room for improvement I shouldn't complain too much.
There's nothing else out there able to deliver more than what this can.
But let me clear about something. I still think Apple over promised in April and under
delivered. In my opinion they were deliberately misselling the iPad Pro under the premise
that this is you next computer.
It isn't. As far as Apple sales is concerned, they still want you to buy their computers.
But at some point in the near future I think they will have to make a decision.
You can't have a Macbook line that doesn't have a touchscreen like every other laptop
on the planet.
And really you shouldn't be asking people to drop $2,000 dollars on a tablet and not
offer them more capabilities.
In my opinion, they are deliberately not giving iPad users more power, to avoid losing Macbook
sales.
Because in all honesty they know that people dropping so much cash on a tablet are likely
to drop cash on a laptop as well.
It forces a large portion of the market to pick one or the other, but in all honesty
I think they know that a lot of their customer have the acquisition power to get both.
So yes, how long can you go on selling tablets with so much power and not deliver on software?
And I've heard the counter argument... Oh if you want a laptop, buy a laptop. Or the
iPad is fine as it is, Apple didn't promise pro apps.
And yes, they didn't promise pro apps. But they promised a pro experience.
How the hell is it that we can't get the iPad plugged into an external monitor and just
work?
Why do we have to put up with these black bars?
Oh Alex, that's not how you use an iPad. Oh it was never meant to be used like that.
I'm sorry! It's a $2,000 dollar machine. I think plugging to an external monitor is a
bear minimum requirement!
Bit of a rant there but, hopefully you see where I am coming from.
Now... Let's talk about the things that I've enjoyed the most so far.
And we can't ignore this beautiful display. Gaming on it or watching my favourite shows
has been an absolute delight.
In any condition, during the day, outdoors or in the evenings.
The games on the iPad look amazing! We still don't get the haptics that we were promised
but man, is it nice to play games on this! It would be great to get some big names developing
more for the iPad but with what we have right now, it's pretty good.
As I said, I'd love to get haptics feedback.
Speakers Listening to music or watching content is
great and most of the time I don't even need to wear my headphones, the speakers on the
iPad have really impressed me!
I thought initially it was just me but I heard from other creators and some of the comments
in my previous videos that the speakers on this iPad are really impressive.
I won't be able to make justice here on YouTube but I will play a few seconds on it in comparison
with an older iPad just so you get an idea. This is not meant to be a fair comparison,
just a guideline of how impressive this is.
Before we talk about the Thunderbolt performance, quick reminder guys I have done over 100 videos
on this channel. Some are of questionable quality, I will give you that - I am still
learning. But some are pretty pretty good.
So if you like my stuff, it would be awesome if you subscribed to my channel.
Oh yeah, and don't forget the bell. See, we have an actual bell here. You don't see that
every day!
Right. Thunderbolt. Pretty much the theme of this video. Initially I hated how slow
it was. But now, with iPadOS15 (albeit the beta version)
we are finally getting much more decent speeds when it comes to file transfer.
So... loving that! Getting about 500 MB/s using my Sandisk SSD connected directly which
is not blazingly fast but much better than the 30 MB/s I was getting before on iOS 14.6.
Interestingly it was a bit faster transferring from the iPad to the SSD, I was getting about
650 MB/s directly.
From an overall improvement perspective, this is consistent when using a Thunderbolt 4 hub
like this one here from OWC. I was able to get between 450 and 530MB/s again, much better
than previous 30MB/s
But that my friends is where the good news stop for me on the Thunderbolt.
I won't go on much further but I really wish we had proper external display support. We
still get the BBOD (The Black Bars of Doom). In windows we have (Blue Screen of Death,
in iPadOS we get the Black Bars of Doom)
I will leave it there.
Now what really makes the iPad experience more enjoyable and arguably more complete,
are the accessories. The Magic keyboard is probably the most expensive keyboard you will
ever buy.
But it is pretty special. I love my mechanical keyboard, but there's something really pleasing
about typing on this keyboard. And if you're used to typing on a Macbook laptop, the transition
here is pretty seamless.
You got the pen of course, which is very responsive. It's such an underrated accessory!
But what about accessories outside of the Apple world. Well, there's so much to talk
about and I've already done a few videos on iPad Accessories that you can check out on
the playlist I will leave at the end.
But just a special mention to this beautiful stand from Satechi and this super capable
Thunderbolt 4 hub from OWC. I am really happy with the performance on this hub, how compact
it is... So it won't clutter your setup.
Talking about that, I didn't want to clutter this video with lots of products so I did
a few videos on accessories to keep your setup as clean as possible.
So in the last two months of daily usage, it's been very much a love and hate relationship
so far. On balance though, if I am really honest with myself. I just bought the wrong
spec.
16GB RAM is so far been absolutely useless. 8GB would have been plenty for me.
I am still hoping that Apple will prove me wrong and allow developers to take advantage
of the resources...
And that apps like Procreate, Lumafusion, Lightroom will continue to be developed to
take advantage of all this power.
Before I forget, I also covered a lot more details on things like battery performance
and other aspects in my 1 month review.
Would I recommend this device to you? Absolutely. But, make sure you select the right spec.
And if you are not interested in the new display or Thunderbolt capability, then you may as
well go with the 2020 iPad Pro which is still an absolute beast.
And if you don't care for Apple at all, then take a look at the Samsung tablets.
The Tab S7+ is an impressive tablet, with some limitations on software and apps but
it could suit some people.
I will see you and your smiling faces. On the next one.