Hi everyone, Gio here, and today we take a look back at the iPad Air 2.
The first way that I'd use to describe the iPad Air 2 is a gorgeous display attached
to a greatly built aluminum case, and it wouldn't be far from reality.
The 9.7" IPS display on front comes at a 2048-by-1536 resolution, at a pixel density of 264 ppi,
and it's simply incredible to look at. The laminated technology, the same found on
all of the latest iPhones, makes for a welcome sensation of pixels floating on top of the
display, with zero gap between your fingers and the content beneath them.
Like we always say for Apple products, this is not the greatest display around on paper:
it is not quite as sharp as the Nexus 9, and it doesn't offer the deep blacks of the AMOLED
panels, but it surely delivers top-of-the-line quality, and it has almost zero competition
in its size range.
So as I mentioned before, yes, the iPad Air 2 comes with the same build quality as any
other iPad: the whole tablet is surrounded by metal, and it's mostly curved and easy
on touch, apart from the chamfered edges that definitely help if you want to hold it with
one hand. Apart from that, everything has been shrunk with regards to previous generation
iPads, and it now comes at a ridiculous 0.96 pounds and just 6.1 millimeters in thickness.
It almost feels like holding just the screen itself from how light and how thin this is.
However, slimming comes to a cost, and in this case, there are two cuts Apple had to
make in order to keep it so ridiculously thin. One is the mute switch, the one that every
iPhone and iPad has had until now, that has been replaced by a software toggle, and the
other one is the battery. In fact, the iPad Air 2 battery is actually
15% smaller than the previous one, coming at 27.3 Watts-hour.
While the mute switch might be somewhat annoying for some, the battery cut is likely not to
be noticed at all: in fact the Air 2 delivers the usual solid stamina, and the same legendary
standby time that literally lasts days. Couldn't they just leave the old battery?
Probably, but we know what Apple does in the name of slimming.
However something that Apple didn't cut down on was computing power: this second iPad Air
is the most powerful iPad yet, with its A8X chip, and the first Apple mobile device ever
to sport 2 Gigs of RAM. Demanding tasks like gaming are handled just
as well as everyday activities, maintaining the iPad on its throne of best media consumption
tablet. And speaking of media consumption, yes, the
speaker is still side-facing, but it's really really loud, and you can get away with that
overall, it still is a good audio system for basic video watching and music listening.
However, if you again forget the specs, there is little difference to notice in terms of
performances between this and the first iPad Air.
With double the RAM you'll surely be able to keep more apps on the background, and it
will definitely help in stuff like web browsing, but the big news is that, due to its RAM,
the newly announced multi-windows mode in iOS 9 which be likely be an iPad Air 2 exclusive,
at least for a little while.
Something else that got upgraded from the previous iPad Air is the camera. The Air 2
sports an 8 megapixels sensor, which is not on par with the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus in terms
of picture quality, but if you're amongst those who badly want to take pictures with
their iPads, you'll hardly tell the difference. Oh and by the way, if you're an iPhone 6 owner
you'll be happy to know that this tablet also supports Touch ID, with the minor inconvenience
that you'll have to record all of the fingerprints from scratch, and you won't be simply able
to transfer them via iCloud.
So at the end of the day, should you still buy it?
If you are coming from the previous iPad Air, the answer is a clear no. You'll surely get
some more extended support in the future and possibly some extra feature with iOS 9, but
nothing worth the expense. On the other hand, if you're coming from previous
iPads or basically any Android tablet previous to 2014, this will be an excellent buy, delivering
top-of-the-line performances, great battery life, a gorgeous display and the usual solid
build quality Apple has accustomed us to.
So that was it for this quick video
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This was Gio from the Nerd Herd, and I'll see you guys, in the next one