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New iPad Air, powered by M4

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171–180 of 693 posts

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#171
post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I know it's semantics, but Apple has never actually marketed their Air products as lighter than their Pro counterparts. The 11" variant is ~460g.

What are you talking about? Air literally always meant thin and light. Now they're treating it a premium product between normal and pro instead (see iPhone Air too)

Yeah they should never have tried to copy "Air" from MacBooks, precisely where it meant thinnest/lightest, to the iPad/iPhone line where the products are already thin and light. That has always seemed like a bizarre branding move to me.

If they need a mid-tier brand between entry-level and Pro, just call it Plus. The iPad Plus would make a lot more sense.

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#172
post #18

I'm about to head to the gym with my 12.9-inch 2017 vintage iPad Pro, which is still going strong. I prop it up on the elliptical trainer every other day or so for entertaining me while I grind out an hour of cardio. I use it for reading, watching YouTube, listening to music, audiobooks, etc. It's been my regular gym buddy for years, and is showing no signs of needing to be replaced. It's stuck on iPadOS 17.7.10, whi…

I have an iPad 9th generation here, from 2021, and it appears to be at the end of its life. I expected it to last a little longer, despite the cheap price of around $350 in 2022. After the Liquid Glass update it became so sluggish that I had to turn off animations in the Accessibility settings. And it still is not enjoyable.

iPad Pro (4th generation) 2020 here. Life was good then updated OS with liquid glass. Big mistake.

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#173
post #160

Can you connect it to USB-C/Thunderbolt monitor/dock and use it with keyboard and mouse?

yes. Has been possible since at least M1.

Buy M-based iPad, nice monitor, keyboard and mouse. Connect mouse and keyboard to monitor via USB. Then iPad via USB-C/Thunderbolt to monitor. Everything "just works" and you can handle surprisingly high amount of work this way

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#174
post #117

To what end? I genuinely don’t get the purpose of these high end processors in a tablet. Like more power is nice but what would I do on it that needs it? Serious gamers mostly steer clear of Apple. Video editors presumably use desktops/laptops. Browsing doesn’t need power. Video watching doesn’t need it. Programming on iPads is cumbersome. Who is the target audience that gains from this?

You'd be surprised by the horsepower some games require, my wife plays Love and Deep Space and she recently just bought a new iPad because the game requires some good specs and a LOT of storage space. She's not a "serious gamer" as your parlance.

But the iPad is not a console … it doesn’t even do Steam. All that horsepower to play … a couple of forever titles and that’s it. I have the M1 iPad Air and it has never used that processor to its fullest. I think iPad is just an odd device for most people

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#175
post #18

I'm about to head to the gym with my 12.9-inch 2017 vintage iPad Pro, which is still going strong. I prop it up on the elliptical trainer every other day or so for entertaining me while I grind out an hour of cardio. I use it for reading, watching YouTube, listening to music, audiobooks, etc. It's been my regular gym buddy for years, and is showing no signs of needing to be replaced. It's stuck on iPadOS 17.7.10, whi…

I have the 2g iPad pro (I think I bought it in 2020 before the pandemic?). I keep looking for an excuse to replace it but it just works so well there isn't much to get from a new one.

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#176

My current iPad is the iPad Air 3 (the one with the backlight issue that's never been acknowledged, to my understanding.) Can someone explain to me why an iPad at all, let alone an iPad Air, needs as powerful a processor as a M4? That's stronger than my laptop (a M2) where I run multiple VMs and more.

I have an iPad Pro (2018) with A12X processor which at one point was a "holy crap this this is incredibly fast for how thin it is" device. 8 years later the local apps still run fast, but it struggles with web browsing. Which is to say, you need a fast processor or web developers will out-bloat your device capabilities in a few years.

Yeah, devs using top of the line MBPs and taking a “works on my machine” attitude keeps web bloat on a constant incline.

I sometimes wish it were an industry norm for devs (a group of which I am a member) to be required to use a $300 Walmart special laptop for a week every two months.

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#177
post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'd be surprised by the horsepower some games require, my wife plays Love and Deep Space and she recently just bought a new iPad because the game requires some good specs and a LOT of storage space. She's not a "serious gamer" as your parlance.

But the iPad is not a console … it doesn’t even do Steam. All that horsepower to play … a couple of forever titles and that’s it. I have the M1 iPad Air and it has never used that processor to its fullest. I think iPad is just an odd device for most people

Yeah, maybe I'm too much of a "real gamer" but my iPad sits unused. The quality (and greediness!) of games on the iOS App Store is often worse than the direct-download console slop.

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#178
post #160

Can you connect it to USB-C/Thunderbolt monitor/dock and use it with keyboard and mouse?

yes. Has been possible since at least M1. Buy M-based iPad, nice monitor, keyboard and mouse. Connect mouse and keyboard to monitor via USB. Then iPad via USB-C/Thunderbolt to monitor. Everything "just works" and you can handle surprisingly high amount of work this way

Can you share more about this experience please? To me, you're still left with apps that are designed for a touchscreen and consumption.

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#179

This is an incredible piece of hardware, I just don't know what to do with it how is music production on it these days?

I really like this setup:

iPad + Korg microKEY-37 + KORG Gadget 3 + all a bunch of KORG apps

No subscriptions. Keyboard is wireless but no noticeable latency. In my workflow I pretty much never need more keys but if I do I just use a MIDI adapter and plug a larger keyboard.

KORG apps go on 50% sale several times every year.

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#180
post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You'd be surprised by the horsepower some games require, my wife plays Love and Deep Space and she recently just bought a new iPad because the game requires some good specs and a LOT of storage space. She's not a "serious gamer" as your parlance.

But the iPad is not a console … it doesn’t even do Steam. All that horsepower to play … a couple of forever titles and that’s it. I have the M1 iPad Air and it has never used that processor to its fullest. I think iPad is just an odd device for most people

I do wonder about this too… I'm cutting 4K video and doing SwiftUI development on an M1 MacBook Air. My current plan is to upgrade next year, but only if they upgrade the screen. An M4 seems like a dramatic over-spec for a tablet.
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