This is a marketing and psychology. In the same way they are going stop selling iPhone 11 Pro just after iPhone 12 keynote. The best smartphone on Earth will not be the best smartphone anymore. Most of iPhone 11 Pro buyers need to feel disappointment and worse because it will push them to buy a new iPhone 12 and give a false feeling that you again on the top of pyramid. In the same way other companies wants you to buy a new car, TV and other things.
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Apple Introduces Redesigned 10.9-Inch iPad Air With A14 Chip, All-Screen Design, Touch ID in Power Button, and USB-C
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Nothing common about Apple 😉
I’d love a higher end mini but I don’t think there’s enough demand 🙁
I retract that statement now I’ve seen the pricing.
The new Air wifi only at the lowest practical storage level (256GB) is only €50/£40 cheaper than the equivalent 2020 Pro (128GB).
So for that small extra, you get ProMotion, Face ID, better camera array with LIDAR scanner, and a slightly slower A12X chip on the Pro.
So all in all very little for the average Joe.
At least not very much that would be tangible or immediately obvious (and make them pay 33% more).
Apple's offering of - an unprecedented - five colours indicates that this is the target group to whom they want to position it as the new middle-of-the-road model.
I see this more as a "Pro Light" model:
Make it look and feel light the Pro. Cut a few corners to offer a lower-priced version.
The Pro was probably due for a price cut - I doubt that many people were buying it.
Good lineup names indeed. Would make more sense. I also hope Apple doesn’t leave the best stuff only for the 12.9
Of course, Apple raises the price by $100 and keeps storage at an abysmal 64gb.
I am thinking about finding an iPad Pro 2018 with 256 GB, which will probably less than $749 (+tax).
Assuming same price and brand new for the base 64GB model, what do you guys reckon is the better buy between the 2018 11" iPad Pro and this iPad Air 4?
Yes and it makes me questioning me about getting a new iPad Pro 12.9". The performance seems pretty much the same, it has Pencil 2 support which is nice too and what I need.
Really impressive update. The 11” Pro is still clearly a more powerful more featured device, but that user that needs the extra of the Pro is not that big. The 11” Air is a killer tablet. Love Touch/ID integrated into the button. Would love this solution on iPhone and future iPad Pros. Crazy that the A14 is in the Air and the Pros are using the A12 with an extra GPU core vs what was available in 2018. Wonder how the performance stacks up. If I Remember correctly the A12X/A12Z are still quite bit faster/more powerful than the A13 was But the A14 is on 5nm.
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No, quite the contrary. It is a watered down (design-wise) of the last gen Pro - just that they haven't stopped selling the last gen 11 Pro.
While 128GB might be the lowest practical storage for you, that's (according to my experience) not true people.
It's as if many people would be recording as much video with them as with iPhones - let alone do editing with it.
iPads are still largely used as a consumption device (reading web sites and books, video streaming, photos) by many.
Seriously...I bought a Pro last year and now this Air has the new design with better colors and a better processor. Apple thinks they're gonna upcharge $300 for LiDAR and ProMotion? And FaceID on the iPad Pro kinda sucks, tbh.
Yeah, october.. october when, what? October buy, preorder?? Nothing like being vague...
As someone who recently ordered a 2020 iPad Pro and still haven't received it, I'm eager to find out how A12Z compares against A14.
Since there's no benchmark on A14 yet, I did some calculations on existing benchmarks and Apple's spec.
A14 consists of a 6-core CPU and a 4-core GPU, and A12Z is 8-core + 8-core.
Apple says that A14 is 40% faster than A12 in terms of CPU, and 30% faster in terms of GPU. In comparison, according to Geekbench, A12Z (iPad Pro 11 2nd gen) is about 60% faster on CPU multi-core performance and 120% faster on GPU performance (Metal) comparing to A12 (iPad Air 3rd gen).
The caveat is CPU single-core performance, assuming what Apple says about A14's CPU is multi-core, then A14's single-core performance is (1.4/6)/(1.6/8)-1 = 16.67% faster than A12Z, but in the meantime, A13 (iPhone 11 Pro)'s single-core performance is about 18.69% faster than A12Z, it would be odd if A14's single-core performance wasn't better than A13, let alone slower. So in the other case where what Apple meant was actually single-core performance, A14's multi-core performance would be 1.4*6/(1*8) - 1 = 5% faster than A12Z, (A12Z's single-core performance is nearly identical to A12), which makes a little bit more sense IMO.
When we talk about GPU performance we generally don't care about that of a single CU, so I think the "30% faster than A12" is the combined GPU performance.
In conclusion, my (very rough) estimation is:
Since there's no benchmark on A14 yet, I did some calculations on existing benchmarks and Apple's spec.
A14 consists of a 6-core CPU and a 4-core GPU, and A12Z is 8-core + 8-core.
Apple says that A14 is 40% faster than A12 in terms of CPU, and 30% faster in terms of GPU. In comparison, according to Geekbench, A12Z (iPad Pro 11 2nd gen) is about 60% faster on CPU multi-core performance and 120% faster on GPU performance (Metal) comparing to A12 (iPad Air 3rd gen).
The caveat is CPU single-core performance, assuming what Apple says about A14's CPU is multi-core, then A14's single-core performance is (1.4/6)/(1.6/8)-1 = 16.67% faster than A12Z, but in the meantime, A13 (iPhone 11 Pro)'s single-core performance is about 18.69% faster than A12Z, it would be odd if A14's single-core performance wasn't better than A13, let alone slower. So in the other case where what Apple meant was actually single-core performance, A14's multi-core performance would be 1.4*6/(1*8) - 1 = 5% faster than A12Z, (A12Z's single-core performance is nearly identical to A12), which makes a little bit more sense IMO.
When we talk about GPU performance we generally don't care about that of a single CU, so I think the "30% faster than A12" is the combined GPU performance.
In conclusion, my (very rough) estimation is:
- A14 GPU is about 40% slower than A12Z.
- A14 CPU single-core performance is 40% faster than A12Z, and multi-core performance is 5% faster.
or
- A14 CPU single-core performance is 17% faster than A12Z, and multi-core performance is 12.5% slower.
It's great on the iPhone 11 Pro, not so much on the iPad Pro. Seems to have much less range and it's constantly blocked by my hand when I'm holding it.
True, not a lot for average Joe. Btw Air 4 has 4 speakers too.
Why does Apple keep the lighting for the iPad, annoying. Nevertheless A new 20W USB C charger is included for even the basic iPad..
Hm either the Air is too expensive or the air too cheap. The pro still has a fair bit extra it seems over the air including that seeet spot 128GB storage (I would have to pay ££150 extra for the 256GB on the air too). My feeling is the pro is going to go waaaay up when it gets the A14X or whatever they call it. There also seems to be a missing spot below the air and above the ipad. Well it’s iphone year for me this year but next year...