Can someone tell me outside of some niche use cases where somebody needs a 13" touchscreen canvas, what is the point of the iPad Pro? I don't see what the point of owning one would be for an average consumer. It will probably be too big to hold in your hands comfortably for long periods of time and iOS will never come close to replacing a desktop operating system due to its inherent disadvantages. So it just makes more sense to have a regular iPad for consumption and a MacBook for more productive work. I think the iPad Pro will sell in much fewer quantities than the regular-sized Pad Air.
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iPad 12.9" iPad Pro: what is the point of this device?
- Thread starter saintforlife
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It always amazes me when someone comments on a product, that at this point isn't even being acknowledged by the company making it. I realize this is a rumor site, but how can one comment on the usefulness of a product when we do not even know one thing about the product, except it's supposed size.
You ask about the usefulness of a 13" touchscreen, yet Windows has even bigger touch screens in their latest computers and laptops. Of course, one is stuck having to use the disastrous Windows 8. Which has not made those products any more useful.
Now many people infer that the ipad and other tablets are not for productive work, and yet, in my business, I find the ipad very productive.
I have sales people which use their ipad to sell and take and enter orders.
I have secretaries who use their ipads for all sorts of communications, including email, and Warehousing staff which use ipads for pulling and shipping orders. So, if you would like to continue to stick with those cliche's because it makes you more comfortable, feel free. But for me, using ipads have been very profitable.
The only thing I use my macbook pro for anymore is to house my itunes library.
If they make the ipad pro more powerful, with a strong feature set, I envision that there will be lines out the door, and people camping out, prior to their release.
You sound defensive. The iPad is a great product. I'm just questioning the utility of a 13" iPad Pro.
Please go ask you sales people, your secretaries and your warehousing staff if they'd want to lug around a 13" iPad all day at work everyday. I'm gonna venture a guess and say most of them will say no. Which goes back to my original point - What exactly is the problem that the iPad Pro is trying to solve?
I think legions of professional users would love a letter-sized iPad. Just to see a document at actual size would be great.
For me, personally I am depending on my iPad4 more and more for sheet music, but the screen is just a little too small for it to be completely effortless. A 13" iPad would be just perfect for that. And I'd assume it eould come with even better battery life.
For me, personally I am depending on my iPad4 more and more for sheet music, but the screen is just a little too small for it to be completely effortless. A 13" iPad would be just perfect for that. And I'd assume it eould come with even better battery life.
My guess is that the largest group of people that would use it is designers, think it can be very useful for them.
For a lot of home users I can a Pro version seeming a bit overkill when the current iPad is plenty large enough for gaming, movie watching, web browsing etc.
I work in a law firm and considering a lot of the partners are of a non techy generation, a lot of them use iPads.
We now support them and have apps they access work through. They would jump at the chance to have a bigger iPad. No doubt other sectors would be the same.
For me as a home user, a Pro doesn't interest me but I can see I having a place in the market even if it's less domestic.
I work in a law firm and considering a lot of the partners are of a non techy generation, a lot of them use iPads.
We now support them and have apps they access work through. They would jump at the chance to have a bigger iPad. No doubt other sectors would be the same.
For me as a home user, a Pro doesn't interest me but I can see I having a place in the market even if it's less domestic.
why would warehousing staff use an iPad at all? For somethings yes, but most will use iPod/iPhones for scan and pack, inventory check, etc etc.
Sales people would just use iPads and iPad minis, as well as an iPhone/iPod.
iPad pros will be more of a stationary device, at the office, trade shows, stores, etc etc.
but 13" iPads aren't going to be that hard to carry around since 13" usually is the minimum for most laptops (i don't know how people use an 11" MBA), but they obviously not going to be used for mobile purposes.
The fact is, Apple is heading strong with B2B apps and want to iOS to be what microsoft's windows is to the business industry, owning more then 95% of the market.
which is why i don't see iPod Touches getting retired any time soon and the emergence of the iPad Pro being a sure thing.
It's a great question, actually. Sure, guys on construction sites and some designers might appreciate the larger screen but at that point a good laptop will be roughly the same weight and have more powerful hardware to match it.
I can't see people that now are carrying around an iPad Air being willing to switch to a device with such heftier dimensions and likely weight. Any tablet that size is basically just lugging around a small LCD screen which IMO would have to get tiring after a while. And, like we said, why not just have a MacBook Air or other capable laptop instead? The cost different cant be that much.
We shall see how they sell. I'm curious.
The first thought that comes to mind is anyone in the creative field. The current iPad is just a bit cramped for working on. Artists will surely appreciate the extra space, especially if Apple adds digitizer of some sort. An iPad makes a great tool for showing off proofs for photographers, but a larger canvas would again be better in many situations.
And it's not like a 13" iPad would be huge. It'd probably be about the size of the back half of an 11" MacBook Air (which has giant bezels). Hardly a burden for professionals who have probably carried a 13"-15" laptop for many years.
Try to be a bit more imaginative with what people do for work and play. Not everyone needs a keyboard and mouse to edit spreadsheets, documents or code all day. I've already thought that much of my own field work is close to being capable of done on an iPad, a larger one would just make that all the more possible. I can think of half a dozen other places in our engineering business alone that these could be useful.
And it's not like a 13" iPad would be huge. It'd probably be about the size of the back half of an 11" MacBook Air (which has giant bezels). Hardly a burden for professionals who have probably carried a 13"-15" laptop for many years.
Try to be a bit more imaginative with what people do for work and play. Not everyone needs a keyboard and mouse to edit spreadsheets, documents or code all day. I've already thought that much of my own field work is close to being capable of done on an iPad, a larger one would just make that all the more possible. I can think of half a dozen other places in our engineering business alone that these could be useful.
The ipad is great and all but I need the functionality of a laptop.
Touch screens on a PC laptop is functional, however in my opinion the Surface or Yoga really take advantage of the touch screen and full computing experience.
I don't see a larger ipad in my future unless it has a full blown operating system such as OSx
It's simple really! How about people that want a 12" touch screen experience on an Apple OS!? On top of a larger media experience! YouTube and Netflix alone on this screen size would be lovely for home users!
A 12" tablet would Not be uncomfortable to hold
It would still be lighter than a 3rd gen iPad and people used those just fine (I still am). And the extra size wouldn't be that much more than a 3rd gen iPad either! I held a very large Samsung tablet the other day and thanks to the nature of how lightweight the tablet was, it wasn't uncomfortable to hold at all!
Tablets are the future
You can walk around with them, sit down with them comfortably getting real up close and personal with your media, and be seriously productive with the addition of an Apple Bluetooth Keyboard! All that diversity in a very lightweight device topped with near desktop class performance, architecture and a laptop challenging screen size will within a year or two (when it also carries a more powerful OS) completely replace laptops! Apple likes to deny this fact to protect their current laptop sales but secretly they know this to be true!
It comes back to the trucks and cars metaphor Steve Jobs used
Or more importantly the part of the metaphor he missed! What about vans? Trucks are used for serious work loads, cars are pleasure vehicles primarily for personal and light use, but what about the in between? A carpenter or plasterer can not use a car but they don't need a truck either, they need a van! There's SO many people that buy a laptop purely because they need slightly more power than a tablet but don't use a laptop to its full potential, in fact far from it! How many people do you think own a laptop just for iTunes, downloading, media storage and light productive use? Well news flash, you don't need a laptop for these things as a tablet is potentially perfectly capable of doing them with out you having to purchase an expensive laptop just to under use it...
2015 Tablets will seriously challenge laptops
Higher res oled screens, a faster chip than the A8X with upwards of 4gb ram, quad core CPUs, 16 core PVR 7XT GPUs, 256gb or more flash storage, usb 3.0 connectivity and maybe some kind of magnetic lightning connector! Chuck that all together at 7mm thin with a sturdy chassis, all day battery life, front facing stereo speakers, keyboard attachments similar to the Surface Pro and a more powerful Apple OS that uses a full iTunes experience with the inclusion of Finder and more powerful apps... and we can start watching laptop sales plummet!
A 12" tablet would Not be uncomfortable to hold
It would still be lighter than a 3rd gen iPad and people used those just fine (I still am). And the extra size wouldn't be that much more than a 3rd gen iPad either! I held a very large Samsung tablet the other day and thanks to the nature of how lightweight the tablet was, it wasn't uncomfortable to hold at all!
Tablets are the future
You can walk around with them, sit down with them comfortably getting real up close and personal with your media, and be seriously productive with the addition of an Apple Bluetooth Keyboard! All that diversity in a very lightweight device topped with near desktop class performance, architecture and a laptop challenging screen size will within a year or two (when it also carries a more powerful OS) completely replace laptops! Apple likes to deny this fact to protect their current laptop sales but secretly they know this to be true!
It comes back to the trucks and cars metaphor Steve Jobs used
Or more importantly the part of the metaphor he missed! What about vans? Trucks are used for serious work loads, cars are pleasure vehicles primarily for personal and light use, but what about the in between? A carpenter or plasterer can not use a car but they don't need a truck either, they need a van! There's SO many people that buy a laptop purely because they need slightly more power than a tablet but don't use a laptop to its full potential, in fact far from it! How many people do you think own a laptop just for iTunes, downloading, media storage and light productive use? Well news flash, you don't need a laptop for these things as a tablet is potentially perfectly capable of doing them with out you having to purchase an expensive laptop just to under use it...
2015 Tablets will seriously challenge laptops
Higher res oled screens, a faster chip than the A8X with upwards of 4gb ram, quad core CPUs, 16 core PVR 7XT GPUs, 256gb or more flash storage, usb 3.0 connectivity and maybe some kind of magnetic lightning connector! Chuck that all together at 7mm thin with a sturdy chassis, all day battery life, front facing stereo speakers, keyboard attachments similar to the Surface Pro and a more powerful Apple OS that uses a full iTunes experience with the inclusion of Finder and more powerful apps... and we can start watching laptop sales plummet!
1) It doesn't exist yet
2) Apple hasn't told us
3) Choice
MacBook Air
"An ultra thin notebook for that only has 128GB storage? No businessman or student would carry that around so nice try Apple but you got this wrong!"
iMac
"An all-in-one computer that costs twice as much as a standard Mac? When the computer dies you are supposed to just throw away your monitor?!? Good luck selling that disposable mess Apple!"
iPhone
"A 6 hundred dollar phone with Internet? Whatever. I already have internet on my $100 startac and I NEVER use it. Nobody needs to be online ALL the time, nobody wants to carry a 3" shard of glass in their pocket and touch screens can't replace real buttons. Apple needs to focus on things that will actually sell."
Ipad
"Seriously Apple? You just invented a giant iPhone but without the phone! If you want to watch a movie then you have a TV. If you want to read email then you have a a phone. If youre some sort of deviant who reads in bed then turn your laptop sideways. I guarantee you that NOBODY wants to use those gigantic apps so why the heck is Apple wasting their time on this?"
Historically then the "condescending Internet commentor" has been wrong more than they've been right because they're setting limitations on something they haven't even used yet. So, rather than saying "never" and trying to disprove the existence of something that doesn't exist then why not wait and see?
(Personally, the 6+ has changed everything. It's big enough that my iPad usage has dropped considerably and I no longer carry a tablet. But that doesn't mean I don't want one. So the idea of a 12" isn't crazy at all. If it mainly lives at home Then that's fine. But if I need to take it out then 12" isn't nearly as awkward or unwieldy as you make it out to be. Especially since an iPad Pro will likely be more than a "bigger iPad" and probably will be Apples first step in reinventing the iPad with many new features and ideas. A "biggest" size iPad may not exist yet but I'm already sold on it.)
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It has the same point as the Surface Pro 3, Galaxy Tab Pro 12.2 and Galaxy Note Pro 12.2. I'm not sure how big the sales are for these devices, but Samsung and Microsoft has determined enough of a market exists are those sizes
I dont know, what features does it have?
We cant know what it's for until its released...
Will it runn iOS or OSX? Who knows?
All I know is that the piano on garageband will be a pleasure to use on the 13" screen.
We cant know what it's for until its released...
Will it runn iOS or OSX? Who knows?
All I know is that the piano on garageband will be a pleasure to use on the 13" screen.
Exactly!
Haven't you guys grasped that a device as productive if not enabling more channels of productivity compared to current paradigms that DOES NOT require 40 different configurations of physical keyboard hardware is the end of the past and the beginning of the future?
The Jetsons didn't use keyboards and 2-button mice did they? I think they used just their voices and digits.
the 12.9'' has much sense as much as the people saying they prefer the Air2 over the mini ( '' because of the larger estate '' they say )
don't worry
it will sell nicely
and i can tell you, within 20-40 years, all the people with good money will own something bigger, a lot bigger, than the 12.9''
a mix of TV - Desktop - Laptop - Large Tablets
something to use at home.
The only way I would even consider it is with split screen multitasking on iOS, full OSX also available on demand, 4Gb+ ram, and 500Gb storage so I could realistically replace my MBA otherwise its a nonstarter. Actually the cost of all that would make it a nonstarter anyways. 
I have no complaints with my current setup bringing and iPad Air 2 and MBA with me to work.
I have no complaints with my current setup bringing and iPad Air 2 and MBA with me to work.