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iPad Pro 1st Gen Touch ID. Why?

accentaudio

accentaudio

macrumors 6502
Original poster
Apr 4, 2012
359
110
Kansas City
Why in the world did Apple not put the much faster 2nd Gen Touch ID fingerprint scanner in the iPad Pro? Ridiculous.

I have gotten to love it on my 6s. What a cheap move on Apple's part. This may sound silly, but it is enough reason on principle alone for me to send it back.
 
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It's the same reason they included the baseband from the iPhone 6 rather than the 6S. iPad has always been a generation behind in design and components. Apple prioritizes the iPhone over the iPad as the former is more profitable and they can sell it for a comparatively higher price.
 
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accentaudio said:
It was cheap alright, cheap of Apple to do that.
Click to expand...

I'd guess that the screen is pretty expensive, as is the new tech that adjusts the screen refresh rate to 240z for the Pencil. Using a cheaper touch ID that in all honesty, most users won't really notice, or at least isn't a breaking point, is probably a way to maintain profit margins to a similar level as the other iPads.
 
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KPOM said:
It's the same reason they included the baseband from the iPhone 6 rather than the 6S. iPad has always been a generation behind in design and components. Apple prioritizes the iPhone over the iPad as the former is more profitable and they can sell it for a comparatively higher price.
Click to expand...

Agreed, the latest tech is always going to be harder and more expensive to produce. If your flagship product is the phone, you need to prioritise putting those parts in that device, especially if you're making a greater profit margin. Sometimes we lose sight of raw materials and manufacturing not being infinite, they have constraints like all other business, sometimes more so due to the scale they operate it.
 
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accentaudio said:
Why in the world did Apple not put the much faster 2nd Gen Touch ID fingerprint scanner in the iPad Pro? Ridiculous.
Click to expand...
Product pipeline....the pro has clearly been in development for years. When you've already sourced your components and have to move tens of millions of the new touch ID's (which are newly being manufactured) I personally think the TouchID2 manufacturing hasn't scaled up enough to supply both iPhones and iPads at the same time.

But you know, let's just boil it down to greed because components that no one else makes just rain from the sky in the hundreds of millions....
 
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Maybe the Gen 2 sensor was more important in an iPhone for mobile payments. For unlocking, it seems the iPad Pro is pretty close to the same speed as it also has more computing power.
 
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The 2nd generation is fast, but the 1st generation is hardly a slouch either. I've done iOS 9.2 beta videos and tested the unlock speed of my Air 2 and while its not instant like the 6s, it's within a second ... easily.
 
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accentaudio said:
I have gotten to love it on my 6s. What a cheap move on Apple's part. This may sound silly, but it is enough reason on principle alone for me to send it back.
Click to expand...

This way generation two has new features, 3D Touch and the enhanced and faster touch ID.
 
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Rogifan said:
Talk about first world problems. It takes all of 1-2 seconds for me to unlock my iPad Air 2. I've never had an issue with it not reading my fingerprint and I live in cold weather climate where my fingers can get quite dry and cracked.
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It's not about being able to use other methods. It's about once you've gotten used to TouchID you simply don't want to use any device that doesn't have it. It's that much less disruptive to the usage flow.
 
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QuarterSwede said:
It's not about being able to use other methods. It's about once you've gotten used to TouchID you simply don't want to use any device that doesn't have it. It's that much less disruptive to the usage flow.
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"less disruptive to the usage flow". cute. Can I use that. So buzzz wordy
 
RebornProphet said:
The 2nd generation is fast, but the 1st generation is hardly a slouch either. I've done iOS 9.2 beta videos and tested the unlock speed of my Air 2 and while its not instant like the 6s, it's within a second ... easily.
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It is "fast enough", but when switching between the two devices I end up missing on the pro because I am used to taking my finger off faster than it registers. Just kind of sucks for the top of the line iOS hardware.
 
QuarterSwede said:
It's not about being able to use other methods. It's about once you've gotten used to TouchID you simply don't want to use any device that doesn't have it. It's that much less disruptive to the usage flow.
Click to expand...
I'm not talking about having it vs not having it. I'm talking about the maybe half second longer it takes to unlock an iPad Air 2 vs an iPhone 6S. I can only shake my head if that is seriously disruptive to people.

Look I'm no fan of Phil Schiler's upsell obsession (I swear one day storage options will be 16 > 128 > 256) and I think some of their product lines are bloated because of needing certain price points/margins. But I don't think Apple intentionally leaves hardware out of a product so they can offer it to you the next year. Take 3D Touch. It's new technology. Maybe it wasn't ready for large iPad displays. Maybe the added weight was significant enough and Apple is trying to engineer a solution that doesn't add a lot of weight to the device. Maybe the Taptic Engine is supply constrained and they need everyone they're making for iPhones. Nobody knows.
 
Rogifan said:
Talk about first world problems. It takes all of 1-2 seconds for me to unlock my iPad Air 2. I've never had an issue with it not reading my fingerprint and I live in cold weather climate where my fingers can get quite dry and cracked.
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It's a legitimate question to ask why Apple's new flagship iPad -- the "Pro" model -- shares a sensor with the iPhone 5S rather than the newest iPhone 6S. It may be that the 1st get sensor is good, but it's not the most up-to-date technology, something Apple says the iPad Pro is, which is why it's, we'll, "Pro," with a price tag to match. Otherwise if it doesn't really matter why did Apple bother putting a 2nd gen sensor in the iPhone at all?
 
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Chupa Chupa said:
It's a legitimate question to ask why Apple's new flagship iPad -- the "Pro" model -- shares a sensor with the iPhone 5S rather than the newest iPhone 6S. It may be that the 1st get sensor is good, but it's not the most up-to-date technology, something Apple says the iPad Pro is, which is why it's, we'll, "Pro," with a price tag to match. Otherwise if it doesn't really matter why did Apple bother putting a 2nd gen sensor in the iPhone at all?
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How often has the iPad gotten something the iPhone didn't have first? Outside of the Pencil and the 3rd gen getting LTE first I can't really think of anything. Question it, fine. My issue is with the assumption it was deliberately left out to get you to buy a new iPP next year. Same thing is being said about 3D Touch. As if all the technology was ready to go, there's ample supply of displays and taptic engines but evil Apple marketing said 'nope keep it out this year so we have something to sell next year'.

ZBoater said:
What will they put in the iPad Pro 2 then?
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Yes because Apple couldn't possibly be working on stuff we don't know about. The only thing they have for iPP 2 is an updated Touch ID sensor.
 
Rogifan said:
How often has the iPad gotten something the iPhone didn't have first? Outside of the Pencil and the 3rd gen getting LTE first I can't really think of anything. Question it, fine. My issue is with the assumption it was deliberately left out to get you to buy a new iPP next year. Same thing is being said about 3D Touch. As if all the technology was ready to go, there's ample supply of displays and taptic engines but evil Apple marketing said 'nope keep it out this year so we have something to sell next year'.
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But this is not what you are describing -- Apple presumably saving a feature for the next model. This is Apple using an old part in a flagship model. It's not that Apple left out Touch ID it's that it used an older generation as-if the "Pro" was meant to be a lower cost budget model. Question is why did Apple do this. It may well be that the "Pro" was engineered with the 1st gen and dumping in the 2nd gen at the last moment would cause a delay. I doubt it has to do with supply though as the very nature of the "Pro" means sales will be infinitesimal compared to the iPhone 6s.
 
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