On this episode of 6 months later
we'll be taking a look at Apple's iPad Pro.
Is it worth upgrading your old iPad to?
And what features set it apart to
make it an entirely different iPad experience?
Now, sit back, relax,
and enjoy some theme music
If you're like me and originally bought
one of Apple's first generations of
iPads you probably loved it for the
first year or two, but after a while you
noticed the OS started becoming sluggish
apps were working as well as they used
to and you started forgetting your iPad
around the house and not really caring
where you put it.
In the pre-iPad pro era, iPads were really good at one thing and
mainly one thing only, and that was consumption.
They were great for watching Netflix, browsing the internet,
checking Facebook and for casual gaming but
overall they weren't that great for
productivity, actually producing content.
The first keyboard accessories that came out
for the iPad were clunky, they required batteries and
overall, they weren't that great.
and the styluses that came out for the iPad really sucked you
really couldn't draw on the iPads at all.
Nevertheless, all of these shortcomings
the iPad still cemented itself in
consumer tech, creating an entirely new
category of devices that it is still the
king of today.
With its bigger screen, the iPad was better for consumption than
your smartphone, but it still wouldn't
replace your laptop because the laptop
was still king for productivity.
After years of declining iPad sales and in
the era where smartphones started
getting bigger screens and getting
better at consumption, Apple decided to
release the iPad Pro, the next iteration of the iPad.
Now when the iPad Pro first
came out, I really didn't give it that much thought.
It came out with a 12.5 inch display that was
that was ginormous and it really didn't make me
feel like 'yes I need to have this Apple product'
like Apple products usually do.
Now, when Apple released the 9.7 inch
variant of the iPad Pro, again, I didn't
get the feeling like 'oh yeah I really need this, I need to buy this Apple product.'
However, once Black Friday
started kicking into gear last year and
all the sales started coming out, I saw
the iPad pro was going to get some
pretty heavy discounts from a lot of
retailers like Target, Best Buy, etc, so I
started to take a closer look.
Now I know that my previous iPad was just
collecting dust under my nightstand,
I hadn't used it
probably for six months but could I really
let 2016 be the first year since high school
I didn't buy an Apple product?
Heck no!
So what was the killer feature that drove
me to purchase the iPad Pro?
Well, besides just my obsession for Apple products the
feature that really drove me to purchase
the iPad Pro was note-taking.
Now, when the iPad pro first came out, again I
wasn't that impressed with it, but the
one thing I was impressed with was the
Apple pencil.
Now what the Apple pencilis is, is it's a stylus made for the iPad Pro.
What the Apple pencil does is it
allows you to write extremely naturally
on the iPad pro with almost no lag and
your handwriting actually looks like
your handwriting when you write on this thing.
It's unbelievable. It's one of
those moments when you use an Apple
product that just works it almost feels
like magic.
And, that is really hard to do and it blew me away when I tried it out
in the Apple store, so I thought to
myself, you know this thing could really
replace my notepad I use at work.
And after six months of using it I can say
for a fact that it indeed has replaced my notepad.
The Apple pencil plus the
iPad Pro, plus an app from the App Store
called Good Notes, all combined make a
note-taking experience better in every way possible
As opposed to just using a pen and paper.
Now if you're not familiar with the app Good Notes,
what Good Notes allows you to do is to
write in a digital notebook.
It backs up all of your notes through a variety of
cloud storage services such as Google Drive,
Dropbox and it'll even search
keywords in your notes so it will
actually search your handwriting and it
will highlight the text to show you what
it found.
The search paired with the ability to drag and select text,
write notes on a PDF presentation, and
digitally highlight, all of this adds up
to functionality that just completely
surpasses old pen and paper in every way possible.
Except you're writing on a screen, not on a piece of paper.
I guess some people like that.
Now, another feature I've really come to love
after using my iPad Pro for the past six
months is the Smart Keyboard made by Apple.
Now, I should mention before I get
onto reviewing the Smart Keyboard that
both the Apple pencil and the Smart
Keyboard cost extra and are not included
with the iPad Pro. Now the main reason I
ended up getting the Smart Keyboard was
mainly from reviews I've read about how
good it was, it was lightweight, and most
importantly, it did not require batteries
because I do not need one more device in
my life that I need to worry about
whether or not the battery is going to run out.
Now, I should mention the reason
the Smart Keyboard doesn't require
batteries is because it's powered
directly by the iPad Pro through the
smart pin connector Apple design
specifically for the iPad pro line.
Overall, I haven't used the Smart
Keyboard as much as I've used the Apple
Pencil, but when I do use the keyboard I
absolutely love it.
Everything feels really comfortable, I can type
surprisingly accurately and pretty fast
and the key travel on the keyboard feels
really really good. It's not as much key
travel as you may be used to if you're
coming from a classic MacBook Pro but
it's way more key travel than the
current generation of MacBooks.
Now, the keyboard is also covered in this durable
canvas material which makes cleaning the
keyboard really easy and makes
everything feel durable and very safe if
you spill anything on it.
Now I will say the Smart Keyboard does take some
getting used to there's some origami
going on with this thing trying to get
it into different configurations whether
or not you want it propped up so you're
typing on it, or you want it sort of
slanted up for drawing on it.
It takes a couple days to get used to but overall
it's not really bad. It's maybe not the best
design Apple's done with the case but
nevertheless it still gets the job done.
Another shortcoming I've found with my
iPad Pro set up after about six months
is really with the Apple Pencil the way
you charge the Apple Pencil is just kind
of stupid.
So, you take the cap off andyou just plug the pencil into the iPad Pro
and it looks pretty ridiculous like
I'm pretty sure
Apple had some sort of more elegant
solution for charging this Apple Pencil
but I would assume they just had to go
with this for some reason design, cost, or whatever.
You really have to be carefulwhere you charge your Apple Pencil
because if this thing is just sticking off
the edge of the table someone walks by
could break the pencil it could damage
your iPad Pro so just be aware of that.
Another thing I've noticed after six
months of using the Apple pencil is the
stainless steel ring around the top
where the Apple pencil logo is embossed
into the stainless steel, that is easy to scratch.
Don't be alarmed after six
months if you look at your Apple Pencil
and you see all these little hairline
scratches in the stainless steel.
All in all, after six months of use, I'm really
happy with the iPad Pro, the Apple Pencil,
and the Smart Keyboard. All three combined
I use this device way more than I ever
used my previous iPad and I really like
the direction Apple is starting to take
the iPad line in general. The iPad Pro
can do so much more than the first
generations iPads ever could I think if
you're the type of person that surfs the
web, does casual gaming, checks Facebook
maybe wants to handwrite notes, or type
an email, or type a letter, or something like that...
The iPad Pro may be the device
you're looking for. It's way more
portable and more user-friendly than a
typical laptop, and it may solve most of your needs.
Now, while Apple did make the
iPad Pro for people who want to create
content, they also improve the iPad Pro
for consuming it. Through the true tone
display, they increased the color gamut,
they increased the brightness and
contrast of the display, as well as
adding four-speaker audio, it just makes
for a really great content consumption experience.
Now currently the iPad Pro
9.7 inch variant starts at $599, the
Apple pencil costs $99 and the Smart Keyboard
sells for $149.
Now at that price point this
iPad and this solution is not going to
be for everyone, but if you want to
replace your physical notebook, get the
iPad with the best display, get the iPad
with the best graphics and chip performance,
then you're definitely
going to want to look at the iPad Pro.
For 6 Months Later, I'm Josh Teder