I remember several times a year that I have an iPad Pro. I’ll use it for about 40 minutes and put it back in the dock until the next major iPadOS update.
It is difficult to convey in a nutshell the disappointment that this line of devices causes. Only powerful hardware disappears for 5 years in a row, like the device itself.
Recently there was a rumor that the next generation iPad Pro will have an M4 processor. For the first time, the iPad will receive the latest chip before the Mac. This is a marketing classic, but it won’t save you. Absolutely no one has asked or expects a new processor in it.
At all Nothing will not save this device, except for one step that Apple fundamentally does not take. Perhaps he never will. Then why is it needed at all?
What’s wrong with the iPad Pro of the last 6 years
This is a device whose unique capabilities are requested by buyers of a microscopic layer, just like the iPhone mini. At a much higher price than other Apple tablets, the iPad Pro offers the minimum useful to its owner beyond what iPads can do that are two or more times cheaper.
I have a 2020 iPad Air with an A14 processor and my son gets it. I regularly pick up the device and find that it does absolutely everything I do on the iPad Pro without any problems. Even a drop in performance cannot hide the facts of the ridiculousness of the lines and the stagnation of flagship models.
Many people use a tablet for very basic tasks: Internet, video, toys. At these boundaries there is very little difference between all iPad types. And the one that exists is no longer conditioned by anything other than marketing.
Even buying an iPad Pro was a shame. The expectations of iPad Pro owners for some kind of functional development for 6 years already, embedded in 99% of all reviews and reviews of these devices, remain only expectations. For a long time it was not clear why this was happening. As soon as Vision Pro was released, everything fell into place, only these places are clearly unfaithful.
iPad Pro tested technologies and software for Vision Pro, but everyone was hoping for something else
Since the introduction of LiDAR in the iPad Pro, Apple has been committed to using this device as a springboard for testing technology and software for the Vision Pro helmet. This strategy has caused the device to stagnate for the last 5 years. Its customers bought the device in the hope that it would get better in the future, but that was the last thing Apple wanted.
As everyone knows, the Vision Pro interface is a continuation of the ideas of iPadOS, only in augmented reality. The applications have been redesigned almost one to one, some completely outright. The principles of multi-windowing are very similar. Restrictions too, places to the point of absurdity.
LiDAR in a tablet came first, and it was needed by Apple engineers, not users. Just like the strange implementation of Stage Manager (“Stage Manager” in Russian localization) in iPadOS was a beta test of the company with the goal of creating a multi-eye interface for the helmet.
I’m sure even the decision to price the iPad Pro’s bezels with iPadOS was a common support for Vision Pro at launch. If a couple of years ago this line of tablets had received support for macOS as a second, or even more so, alternative OS, 90% of its users would have practically forgotten about the existence of anything else on the device. And developers’ interest in serious software for iPadOS waned almost instantly.
It’s the iPadOS apps that allow the Vision Pro to hit the market, albeit with some App Store visibility. This moment was already a failure, but it could have been much more serious: instead of the quickly transferred software for iPads, several additional programs would have been available on the Vision Pro, and that’s all.
And here we are. The differences between the 2018 iPad Pro and the current model fit into a microscopic list. More memory, better display, more powerful processor. Not only the four-year-old iPad Air or iPad Pro, but even the basic iPad has 95% more features than the two expensive models, because Cupertino threw that one under the Vision Pro train. You also have to push the train itself, it doesn’t move.
iPad Air is almost no different from iPad Pro
The modern iPad Air can do almost everything that the modern iPad Pro can do. Its capabilities are limited only by the upper level of the flagship strip, which is stagnating. There is the same Pencil and the same applications. And the Air model on the M2 chip copes perfectly with any tasks, and no firmware is required.
But it is precisely because of the iPad Pro that modern Air suffers from a pitiful 60-Hz IPS display, when cheap Android tablets have long had both 90- and 120-Hz OLED screens. And let’s take 64 gigabytes of memory in 2024, when cheap Android smartphones for the price of one and a half Apple styluses will have 256 GB of memory on a USB drive.
Just think: Apple’s desire to somehow save the position of the iPad Pro on the shelf with other branded tablets will force the company to order the production of M1 and M2 chips with unique properties for many years. small 64 GB of internal memory, which has never been on a Mac! The whole production was raised to make the spare part worse for the sake of marketing.
Plus, nothing prevents the company from releasing a larger version of the iPad Air, filling the same micro-need of a micro-share of users who ask the company to make a tablet with an even larger display. I don’t need an iPad Pro, just a big Apple tablet. There is nothing stopping Apple from removing completely archaic restrictions on display quality and memory capacity in the Air.
The iPad Air can and, in a normal situation, should have been completely replaced by the iPad Pro long ago. But so far nothing has changed on the latest macOS.
iPad Pro needs macOS, or iPad Pro isn’t needed at all
I’ve noticed that skepticism of Apple’s policies and restrictions has become a trend over the past few years. The aggression of Apple fans towards those who want to push and weaken the boundaries of their “garden”, especially in the Western segment of the Internet, has intensified. I don’t remember such angry, borderline absurd comments in support of any apparent anti-consumer action by the company during the fight between Samsung and Apple 13 years ago.
Established norms lead to movement, and this movement begins to move the foundations of Apple.
The pandemic, the global situation, complex problems and the completion of moves and smartphones into household appliances, underwhelming and progressive gadgets have opened the eyes of many to the fact that the absolute majority of tablets are limited by “Apple” technology – completely fictitious and unnecessary. Other manufacturers absolutely easily and naturally do without ancient displays, pitiful amounts of RAM and storage, and archaic restrictions on the freedom of their owners.
Therefore, the iPad Pro that will receive the M4 in a week will not be a better buy than the iPad Pro on the M1. It will still be an iPad Pro on iPadOS, which is stuck in development and limits the capabilities of the long-standing top-end hardware.
I’m sure his sales will be appropriate. Like the reviews in which everyone says: “great, but why.” Expectations that people will go to the store en masse for a new chip are as groundless and pointless as buying a Vision Pro in the spring of 2024.
Conversely, the appearance of macOS in the iPad Pro form factor allowed the company to finally bring order to its line of tablets. A hybrid device tailored to accommodate Mac users, with improved cooling and a more sophisticated Magic Keyboard, will free up a niche for a long-overdue upgrade of the iPad Air in accordance with the requirements of 2024 technology. Air can continue to remain within the boundaries of iPadOS and be the best in them, side by side with the basic iPad, which is already logically limited in hardware.
Personally, I no longer expect anything from Apple in this direction. If I ever have to buy an iPad, it definitely won’t be the flagship Pro. It’s better to spend this money on something else with much greater benefits. Or I don’t take the iPad at all. Investing money in a device that the manufacturer has given up on ideologically is no longer interesting.
The iPad Pro may be 25 times more powerful than any computer on the planet, but it has two options, and only one of them will save it. In the meantime, Apple doesn’t want to follow it – well, what can you do, you’ll have to quietly admit that revenue in this category is falling by 25% every year.
Source: Iphones RU
I am a professional journalist and content creator with extensive experience writing for news websites. I currently work as an author at Gadget Onus, where I specialize in covering hot news topics. My written pieces have been published on some of the biggest media outlets around the world, including The Guardian and BBC News.
