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New iPad Air, powered by M4

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Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#601

Post by asimovDev »

MattGrommes wrote: post #334
upmind wrote: post #244

I owned a few iPads as a kid but as I get older I see less and less reason to buy one. It kinda sits in the middle of usefulness of a phone and laptop for me. Larger screen than phone yes, but can't run any of the applications I need from a laptop. If it had MacOS, I'd be much more inclined to buy it.

Mine is 98% for reading comics and 2% learning to draw on Procreate. Most everything else I find awkward to do on it.

same here. Drawing on my 13in M3 Air is a delight with the pencil. I sometimes try to do productivity stuff on it like sitting in zoom calls while multitasking on an external monitor, but it's not a very good experience on iOS 18.6

Haven't tried 26 yet, maybe it will be better

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#602

Post by gentleman11 »

spudlyo wrote: 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…

The newer have worse ergonomics than the old ones. I used to use my previous ipads all the time for reading, but now I find them all fairly uncomfortable for reading and end up not using them. Slightly tempted to sell them and get older models tbh

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#603

Post by robotpepi »

gehsty wrote: post #412
Havoc wrote: 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?

Better chip = better performance per watt = longer batteries for similar levels of performance, running cooler. Also it never hurts the smoothness of the interface. It just ultimately makes it a nicer device to use.

But it's such an overkill. In any case, the question was a bit rhetorical, and highly subjective.

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#604

Post by tonyedgecombe »

2OEH8eoCRo0 wrote: post #5
joezydeco wrote: post #2

The word "value" appears four times in that press release. I sense a theme in the marketing this week.

If they wanted to provide value they'd add MacOS to their tablets.

I hope they never do that. It would compromise macOS too much.

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#605

Post by robotpepi »

malshe wrote: post #326
bottlepalm wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

iPad is the most absurd device ever. It is fully capable of running a full blown general purpose OS, but artificially restricted to be a YouTube machine. Something you give kids in a restaurant to be quiet. Putting an M4 in it is like Apple rubbing our faces in it. Look at this device that could do everything, but can't do anything.

Comments like yours just go on to show how narrow the worldview of many HN users is. Just because you don't know how people are using their iPads doesn't mean iPads "can't do anything". It defies common sense, too. If iPads couldn't do anything, why would people buy them consistently? I can imagine people buying them once because they don't know any better. But iPad is more than 15 years old now.

> If iPads couldn't do anything, why would people buy them consistently?

It seems you're way overestimating how logical people's choices are.

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#606

Post by cachius »

alwillis wrote: post #591
tomaskafka wrote: post #234

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tim Cook's fear of people not buying a full set of Apple devices for each person is the driving force behind not just the lack of multiuser support, but also the overall nerfing of iPadOS. For the past 5+ years it's been, "This will be the year of real work on the iPad," but they keep circling around it, trying not to make iPads accidentally powerful enough for someone to skip buying a MacBook.

> trying not to make iPads accidentally powerful enough for someone to skip buying a MacBook. This clearly isn’t the case—the iPad Pro got the M4 processor in May 2024; the Mac didn’t get the M4 until October. So for a few months, Apple’s most powerful chip was only available for the iPad Pro. And while the M5 MacBook Pro and the M5 iPad Pro were announced together in October 2025, none of the other Mac models have b…

> iPads powerful enough to skip a MacBook

This is about software

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#607

Post by cachius »

sroussey wrote: post #570
janderson215 wrote: post #454

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m pretty sure iPadOS supports multiple profiles on Classroom[0] devices. [0]: https://www.apple.com/education/k12/teaching-tools/

Yeah, it’s like TVOS. One main account determines apps installed etc (WiFi settings, etc). Then local docs switches per user. Honestly that good enough for home use.

You must be a school or business with DUNS number and rigorous, manual verification through Apple to set up shared iPads with managed Apple IDs in the School or Business Manager Portal.

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#608

Post by nasretdinov »

MetalSnake wrote: post #600
alwillis wrote: post #595

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The huge advantage for some people: you can get a cellular data connection for an iPad. If you need internet connectivity on the road regardless if Wi-Fi is available, only the iPad has that option. Yes, you can use a Mac laptop with your phone acting as a hotspot but unless you have unlimited data, that gets expensive real fast. Now that Apple makes their own cellular modems, it should be feasible to add them to Mac…

Why is it getting expensive when using the phone as a hotspot, but not when using the iPad or MacBook directly with cellular data?

I think some (most?) carriers in the US charge for hotspot traffic separately from direct access from the phone (by looking at packet's TTL, it's lower by 1)

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#609

Post by mort96 »

musictubes wrote: post #520
mort96 wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's great, sure. But why release an M4 iPad Pro when essentially no software can make use of the processor power improvements since 2018?

No software? DaVinci Resolve? Affinity Designer? Final Cut, Procreate, AUM, Logic Pro etc etc etc. As the processors get more powerful more demanding software can be made for it. Running multiple physical modeling AUVs along with FX loops eat up clock cycles. Final Cut Camera on iPhones along with Final Cut on an iPad allow for full multi camera controls and recording from 4 different iPhones with ProRes and log shoo…

Are serious people actually using the gimped iPad versions of those pieces of software? I can't really imagine doing serious video editing on an iPad.

Re: New iPad Air, powered by M4

#610

Post by pjmlp »

NetMageSCW wrote: post #435
wffurr wrote: post #360

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1 car for our family of four seems to work fine for us in the city. Hard to imagine people with different living situations. I held off a while on giving my youngest child his own iPad because he and his brother were playing nicely together on one more often than not. It turned iPad time into social play-together time.

Wait until your kids are older.

If they are European, they learn to get by with public transport, bikes and such.

I was already on my thirties when I got my first car.

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