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Best iPad / Mac Combination?

A

Adelphos33

macrumors 68000
Original poster
Mar 13, 2012
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I work in an office with a Windows setup. Any "work" at home I do via remote login. I will occasionally use my laptop to take notes and do some work related research (mostly web) at home. When traveling I use my laptop to remote login as well as take notes and do some light word processing. Hobby wise I don't do much besides edit iPhone photos or movies, play music, keep records, etc.

I will go days without using my Macbook (2011 model Macbook Pro on 8 G RAM). I had an iPad but sold it a few years ago. I've been using my phone to do routine tasks at home and want to switch to an iPad for that.

My question is:

Should I get an iPad Pro plus a small Macbook like a Macbook Air or Retina Macbook?

Or get an iPad Air (3 assuming it is released soon) along with the updated 13" Macbook Pro?

Basically should I invest in the most computing power in the iPad or the Mac? Neither machine will be my main "work" machine (that's my desktop at work)
 
If you are currently not using your MacBook, why are you considering upgrading it? What are you hoping for from an upgrade of the MacBook to make it more useful for you?

If you are currently just using your iPhone at home, then why not just get an iPad -- Pro or Air -- and call it a day?
 
Night Spring said:
If you are currently not using your MacBook, why are you considering upgrading it? What are you hoping for from an upgrade of the MacBook to make it more useful for you?

If you are currently just using your iPhone at home, then why not just get an iPad -- Pro or Air -- and call it a day?
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My Macbook is 5 years old at this point. Though it performs well, it does crash on occasion and is running out of hard drive space. I have to have a laptop for my job to log in remotely at one and when traveling on occasion. Plus i use it for household tasks (tax filing, budgets, some word processing, etc). However, there are many days when I won't use a Macbook.
 
Hard to say. Why are you even thinking about a laptop at all? Why not do most of your remoting into a desktop with an iPad pro? Thats way the device you're remoting into isn't limited by size so it can be a more powerful machine to remote into. Mac mini with upgraded specs + iPad pro
 
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Adelphos33 said:
My Macbook is 5 years old at this point. Though it performs well, it does crash on occasion and is running out of hard drive space. I have to have a laptop for my job to log in remotely at one and when traveling on occasion. Plus i use it for household tasks (tax filing, budgets, some word processing, etc). However, there are many days when I won't use a Macbook.
Click to expand...

Get the laptop or a surface pro. See if it being new has you using it more. Wait on the ipad since there could be one coming out soon.
 
Ghost31 said:
Mac mini with upgraded specs + iPad pro
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That's what I'd say too. I have a Mac mini, iPad mini and a Chromebook running Linux full time. The mini is a great computer for desktop and server roles and I leave it running 24/7 at home and log in remotely as an when I need to.

On the mobile side, I'm seriously thinking ditching the iPad mini (my kids can have it) and replacing it and the Chromebook with an iPad air or Pro
 
Apple might announce the all new MacBook Pro on March 15 for mid or late year release. Should be a new design.

I'd wait till March 15 before pulling the trigger if I were you but that's just me.
 
Jeff R said:
Apple might announce the all new MacBook Pro on March 15 for mid or late year release. Should be a new design.

I'd wait till March 15 before pulling the trigger if I were you but that's just me.
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I'm due to upgrade my work Mac. Hoping there is an upgrade in the rMBP line, 15" in particular.
 
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I recently had to make a similar decision, which garnered the purchase of the iPad Pro, 128GB and LTE. From what you say you do, you can do it all on the iPad Pro faster, easier and more fun. Buy the pencil, maybe even the keyboard cover.

Unless your company is using some weird software, you can use Word, and the rest of the Office Suite as if it's on a PC.

Good Luck

DBK
 
I have recently sold my Macbook Pro, iPad Air 1, and Surface Pro 3 and purchased and iPad Pro 128 LTE and a 5k 27" iMac. I have the IPP keyboard and pencil. Thus far, I am loving this combination. I am surprised just how much work I can get done on the IPP and am now a believer that this type of mobile computing is the future (of mobile computing that is). At the moment, I foresee always having a desktop at home but using the IPP instead of a macbook when I am on the go has been a pretty big game changer for me in terms of enjoyment. As most know, there are certainly things an IPP can't do that a Macbook can but I have found that, in my profession (executive that uses email, excel, pdf review,word, etc), I wasn't using the Macbook nearly to its potential when away from my desk and, that the things I was doing, the IPP does so in a more enjoyable manner.
 
TL; DR. Too much analysis.

Your desktop computer display should be about 5x your phone display's inch measurement, and 2.5x your tablet's. Vis-à-vis, your tablet should be about twice the measurement of your phone's display.

Apple determines features by size, so you don't need to analyse this by any other measure, unless you really want to use Einstein's theory rather than Newton's law, which you might do when picking optional specs.
 
I don't know I've admitted here that I use a Hackintosh Pro. Faster and more u[gradable, and cheaper than the trash can. That's my base machine. 30 TB of storage, SSD for system drive and 32 GB of RAM

But I use iPad for everything that is not 4 K pro video editing.

DBK
 
The CameraGuy said:
I don't know I've admitted here that I use a Hackintosh Pro. Faster and more u[gradable, and cheaper than the trash can. That's my base machine. 30 TB of storage, SSD for system drive and 32 GB of RAM

But I use iPad for everything that is not 4 K pro video editing.

DBK
Click to expand...
30 TB of storage :eek:
 
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