iPad Pro - Buyer's Remorse Anyone?

[kingtj]

Ghost, lots of truth in what you're saying here, in general. My experience as a kid was similar to yours. (My parents used an old tube type console Magnavox TV set as our primary TV from before I was born until the time I was at least 13 or 14. They would have kept it longer except the TV repair guy had replaced practically every tube in it by then, during one service call or another, and finally declared it impossible to get parts for anymore!)

But at the same time, computers and technology are my core interests. (For my parents, not so much... My dad was into math and astronomy and my mom into nursing.) So comparing my tech purchasing habits with theirs is probably not realistic either.

As I commented in a previous post, too, I typically resell my electronics and computer stuff when I upgrade it. That recoups a good 50% of the cost (if not more) of the upgrade, in most cases. Yeah, it takes a little extra effort and patience to make a decent eBay listing and deal with the deadbeats who bid but don't pay and all that. But you really can get good money out of anything "name brand" like an Apple product on there.

By contrast, I think anything my parents bought wound up in the trash when they were done with it. Nothing they kept as long as they did had any resale value when they were ready to replace it.

So marketing aside? I think there are justifications for constantly upgrading the things you're most interested in using on a daily basis.

It's just kind of odd. Saying you didn't know if you needed to upgrade because "well true tone is nice and it has nice speakers, but I don't know!" Well...those were the upgrades. If you didn't think those features among the other new ones were worth it, why did you get it ya know?

There's a lot of psychology that goes on with purchases. Especially these days when you have the media and giant multi billion dollar companies telling you what to buy. Back when I was a kid, people didn't really buy things unless they had a strong need. "Back in my day" (when saying that, I get to feel old) you kept your tv until it died. Same with phones and everything else. Now people are spending hundreds of dollars on a product for a couple minor features they don't even know they need. And despite how fast tech seems to be moving, there aren't any quantum leaps in technology. Especially when you already have a product that just a month ago was the newest most current one. That's why on all these sites they ask this very question. "If I have an iPad Air 2, should I get the new iPad Pro?" And it's pretty much a consensus that unless you're dying for an updated speaker set up or a better camera, your iPad Air 2 is just fine. It's like if someone warns you not to put your hand in fire then you do it anyway, then you make a thread about it saying "damnnnn that was hot! I probably shouldn't have done that!" Then people look at you like dude. You were warned. How can you be that shocked? You should have thought this through. Are the people that tell him to be more careful in the future just a bunch of jerks?

I don't know. Maybe I bring too much of my own perspective with my comments sometimes and it can be jarring to some people. I can be a little too blunt sometimes.

 

[rui no onna]

Watching all those gifs made me dizzy! Does that mean they were playing at normal speed?

Or to put it another way, I didn't notice any difference between my iPad Pro and Air2 in how the gifs played.

Seems like the Air 2 is fast enough then. Now I just have to decide between 64GB and 128GB. Ah, the paradox of choice. The choice would've been much easier when the 64GB LTE Space Gray was out of stock. Scratch that. Looks like 64GB Space Gray is out of stock again. 128GB it is.

 

[yegon]

The speakers made it all worthwhile for me. I listen to a tonne of podcasts and they really do make a difference - I can now hear it when I'm taking a shower. Yeah yeah, Bluetooth speakers blah blah. True, I have a couple of decent ones for various purposes, but when I'm moving around the house it's impractical to carry the speaker, or suffer the hassle of resyncing to a different one. I did investigate Sonos for this very purpose and would have kitted the whole house out with them, but podcast support is poor to non existent. Dunno if it works with the stock podcast player these days, I'm out of the loop, but I've no desire to use the stock Podcast player so it's irrelevant.

The surprise bonus is the Smart Keyboard. Not really an iPad keyboard user historically, far prefer laptops for lengthy typing, but the Smart Keyboard is quite svelte and pretty handy for light usage. Also, minimum of fuss, no syncing via BT or another thing to charge.

Tried the 12.9" upon release, can see the attraction for some people, but waaaay too big and cumbersome for my usage as a supplementary/on the go entertainment device.

 

[Cheffy Dave]

Got mine Friday morning after a lot of back and forth in my mind. I upgraded from an Air 2. Even on the way to Best Buy to pick it up I was having remorse. After getting home and playing with it, I was happy with it. Love TrueTone, screen attracts almost no fingerprints, nice speakers.

Here's my issue. As I sit using it I don't feel anything is really different from my Air 2 aside from the screen feeling smooth and not attracting fingerprints. It seems snappy but not so much that I feel a difference from my Air 2.

So, I am left feeling "Did I really need this upgrade?" and am pondering returning.

Anyone else in the same boat?

No, I have the iPad Air 2, just bought My Wife the 9.7 Pro, finally pried it out of her hands for a test run.
Screen is EXCELLENT, True Tone is amazing, it is FAST,FAST ,FAST! We have 350 MPS in our home, and this iPad can handle ALL of it, OOKLA Test gave me 368 MPS, on an iPad!!
Face Time with the Granddaughters , is so much better with the 5 MP Camera, I bought each their own 9.7.She has a lot of video's/Pix, so I got her the 256 MB SSD. The Sound from the 4 speakers makes a BIG difference. This chipset on this baby is a screamer, The APPLE Pen, is perfect, she uses it without a Keyboard, it is a VERY worthy upgrade from the iPad Air 2, in fact, I just ordered mine
[doublepost=1460566157][/doublepost]

It was not an upgrade from your Air 2. It is an Air 2 with a True Tone gimmick and the ability to use a stylus.

poor choice of words, it's not a gimmick, but a major step up for Photographers

 

[NT1440]

The speakers made it all worthwhile for me. I listen to a tonne of podcasts and they really do make a difference - I can now hear it when I'm taking a shower.

One of my main use cases at home. The phone just isn't loud enough, and I don't want to buy another bluetooth speaker until I buy one worth spending money on.

 

[aberrero]

No, I have the iPad Air 2, just bought My Wife the 9.7 Pro, finally pried it out of her hands for a test run.
Screen is EXCELLENT, True Tone is amazing, it is FAST,FAST ,FAST! We have 350 MPS in our home, and this iPad can handle ALL of it, OOKLA Test gave me 368 MPS, on an iPad!!
Face Time with the Granddaughters , is so much better with the 5 MP Camera, I bought each their own 9.7.She has a lot of video's/Pix, so I got her the 256 MB SSD. The Sound from the 4 speakers makes a BIG difference. This chipset on this baby is a screamer, The APPLE Pen, is perfect, she uses it without a Keyboard, it is a VERY worthy upgrade from the iPad Air 2, in fact, I just ordered mine
[doublepost=1460566157][/doublepost]
poor choice of words, it's not a gimmick, but a major step up for Photographers

True tone is terrible for photographers. If you do any graphics work on an iPad, you must turn true tone and night shift off.

 

[yegon]

One of my main use cases at home. The phone just isn't loud enough, and I don't want to buy another bluetooth speaker until I buy one worth spending money on.

Yeah, I use it for podcasts so much, Overcast is always high up in my battery usage stats, invariably below Safari and Infuse (video). Given how little battery Overcast actually uses, it's a testament to how much I have it running.

O/T, but Smart Speed in Overcast has now saved me a whopping 120 hours. That's a LOT of incidences of mere milliseconds worth of skipped, silent audio combined!

 

[NT1440]

Yeah, I use it for podcasts so much, Overcast is always high up in my battery usage stats, invariably below Safari and Infuse (video). Given how little battery Overcast actually uses, it's a testament to how much I have it running.

O/T, but Smart Speed in Overcast has now saved me a whopping 120 hours. That's a LOT of incidences of mere milliseconds worth of skipped, silent audio combined!

I have yet to use Overcast, however the issues I've been having with downloading Democracy Now! are driving me nuts. How do I add podcasts to Overcast? Does it respond to the normal headphone controls?

Thanks

 

[yegon]

I have yet to use Overcast, however the issues I've been having with downloading Democracy Now! are driving me nuts. How do I add podcasts to Overcast? Does it respond to the normal headphone controls?

Thanks

Works fine with controls. It's great for skipping ads, you can choose seek back/seek forward durations. Long hold minus/plus volume skips forward back.

This image might help. Basic player is free if you wanted to try it.

 

[NT1440]

Works fine with controls. It's great for skipping ads, you can choose seek back/seek forward durations.

This image might help. Basic player is free if you wanted to try it.

View attachment 626623

Thanks!

 

[BeyondtheTech]

No, I have the iPad Air 2, just bought My Wife the 9.7 Pro, finally pried it out of her hands for a test run.
Screen is EXCELLENT, True Tone is amazing, it is FAST,FAST ,FAST! We have 350 MPS in our home, and this iPad can handle ALL of it, OOKLA Test gave me 368 MPS, on an iPad!!

Holy Toledo, I'd love to see that screenshot.

My last iPad was a mini 3 before I gave it to my daughter when I got my 6s Plus. Though it remains too big for leisure one-handed use, I thought I might as well go with the bigger iPad, since the minis would be considered an incremental size up from the Plus. Good thing the 9.7" model came out as I was ready to plunk down on the 12.9" model!

Even though I lose USB 3.0 and 4GB of RAM by not getting the bigger iPad Pro, I'm quite happy with my 9.7" version and a free Pencil to boot (Barclaycard Visa rewards you with Apple Store gift cards).

 

[h00ligan]

I exchanged for the larger ipad and for my needs it feels like a ,icy larger upgrade than the 9.7. The screen for photo editing is probably better than the super saturated but it's not as nice for reading. The ram difference is noticeable.

I'll shoot that video shortly. Even though I'll use the big pro the small one has just about the same performance.
'By the way I'm 6'5-6" so the large iPad in my hands is probably different than say my 4'10" girlfriend. I can type in portrait without much of an issue, but most people couldn't and I don't see a way to split the keyboard strangely enough it's on docket. But for me for drawing for creating presentations for watching video and the fact that I can multitask more 12.9 iPad seems like a better way to go and much more of an upgrade from the air too. That said I need to check eBay because it appears that the large iPad is substantially cheaper you can get them a couple months old with a smart keyboard for $700

 

[h00ligan]

Works fine with controls. It's great for skipping ads, you can choose seek back/seek forward durations. Long hold minus/plus volume skips forward back.

This image might help. Basic player is free if you wanted to try it.

View attachment 626623

Is it substantially better than downcast ? I own that already but ESPN fc ads are so loud. I wish someone would do,e up with an ad skipping technology but I guess that's virtually impossible.

 

[h00ligan]

12"

In terms of the air 2, 9.7" just isn't a substitute for a full page.

The iPad Pro is a lot more then the sum of its parts .....

After owning the smaller and the larger I can't stress how true this is. It feels like a different class of device. Even running the same iOS and with the fact it's not optimized it feels ,inch more like a computer than an iPhone. It's really strange how much different the increase in screen size makes the iPad. For me, I think large iPhone, iPad mini and large pro would be a great combo. I may buy a midis shield instead of the iPad mini due to price and video capabilities. But the general idea of small small big is good I think

 

[yegon]

Is it substantially better than downcast ? I own that already but ESPN fc ads are so loud. I wish someone would do,e up with an ad skipping technology but I guess that's virtually impossible.

You can do a bit more with Downcast in terms of settings, and it supports video (Overcast doesn't). Used it for ages prior to Overcast.

Smart Speed (removes silent audio, thus saves time) is great, and I'd kind of prefer the simplicity of the app in general. Marco Arment rewrote the entire audio engine and you can definitely tell when you play stuff at 1.2x or whatever, doesn't notably degrade quality like other apps I find.

Still use Downcast for video.

 

[bevsb2]

it's an altered iPad air 2 case, same materials are being used

Sold by Apple?

 

[mac4good84]

I actually tried out an iPad Pro 9.7 before returning it. I'm a current owner of an Air 2 and I asked myself the same question if it was worth the upgrade for me personally. I decided I actually wanted to try the smaller form factor instead so I got a mini 4 I'm trying out right now, but in the end I might decide to stick with my Air 2 and wait until the next upgrade. The Pro has pencil support, a nice screen and it was a nice performer, but in my opinion ultimately the performance on the Air 2 was good enough. In terms of true tone, I probably would not use it enough to justify the upgrade. I DID like having pencil support but again, its not enough of a factor for me to switch up now. In the end, if the mini 4 does not sway me enough to switch and sell my Air 2, I'm just going to wait for the next time they upgrade the lineup, whenever that may be.

 

[zhenya]

Just received my 9.7" Smart Keyboard from Best Buy. The entire purchase price of this is somewhat stupendous - 128GB + Pencil + Keyboard; but there is a potential that this setup will replace my retina MacBook so it would be worthwhile in the end. Key feel on the keyboard is surprisingly good although the size and spacing will take some getting used to, but not much if this short bit of typing is any indication. Having a note-book sized device that I can read with AND interact with both with a pencil and a keyboard is what I've been waiting years for. My Surface Pro's have been too heavy, too finicky, with poor battery life and mediocre stylus performance. They are decent work computers, but not what I want for personal use. Previous iPad's have been lacking the stylus, and every keyboard option doubled the weight and volume of the device, making them nearly as big as my MacBook.

Interested to see how this plays out in the long run...

 

[barkomatic]

I am torn. I ordered and received a refurbished iPad Air 2 128GB cellular model for $599. If I went with the iPad Pro 9.7 I'd go with the top of the line cellular model with AppleCare which brings me to $1228 with tax.

Most of the time, this iPad will sit at home where I will use it to surf the internet, play games and watch the occasional video. I will take it with my on trips where I will load it up with movies and books. I'm coming from an iPad 3 and at the end it was so laggy and frustrating that I can't use it any more. The iPad Air 2 I now have is a HUGE improvement over that but there is still very occasional stuttering.

On rare occasions in the past, I took my iPad with me to conferences where I used it to view PDF's rather than have to carry them with me as print outs. It *might* be useful in the future to take notes--though I have no conferences or trainings planned in the near future.

I got the Air 2 because it was so cheap comparatively and I thought that perhaps the next time the Pro is updated I'll jump on board. However, I'm a little paranoid that whatever I end up with will be like my iPad 3 in 2 years. That thing was smooth with only the version of iOS it was released with and became more of a disaster with each subsequent release. I have 13 days to return my iPad Air 2.

 

[aberrero]

I am torn. I ordered and received a refurbished iPad Air 2 128GB cellular model for $599. If I went with the iPad Pro 9.7 I'd go with the top of the line cellular model with AppleCare which brings me to $1228 with tax.

Most of the time, this iPad will sit at home where I will use it to surf the internet, play games and watch the occasional video. I will take it with my on trips where I will load it up with movies and books. I'm coming from an iPad 3 and at the end it was so laggy and frustrating that I can't use it any more. The iPad Air 2 I now have is a HUGE improvement over that but there is still very occasional stuttering.

On rare occasions in the past, I took my iPad with me to conferences where I used it to view PDF's rather than have to carry them with me as print outs. It *might* be useful in the future to take notes--though I have no conferences or trainings planned in the near future.

I got the Air 2 because it was so cheap comparatively and I thought that perhaps the next time the Pro is updated I'll jump on board. However, I'm a little paranoid that whatever I end up with will be like my iPad 3 in 2 years. That thing was smooth with only the version of iOS it was released with and became more of a disaster with each subsequent release. I have 13 days to return my iPad Air 2.

Keep the Air 2 and in 2 years when the iPad Pro 3 comes out with the money you saved you can buy an iPad Pro 2.

I also have an iPad 3 and that thing was terrible since the day it was released. Thats why the 4 came out only 8 months after. The iPad 2 today runs better than the 3. The 3 was a uniquely bad product in the iPad lineup, but damn if it didn't have the most beautiful display I'd ever seen.
[doublepost=1460654988][/doublepost]

You can do a bit more with Downcast in terms of settings, and it supports video (Overcast doesn't). Used it for ages prior to Overcast.

Smart Speed (removes silent audio, thus saves time) is great, and I'd kind of prefer the simplicity of the app in general. Marco Arment rewrote the entire audio engine and you can definitely tell when you play stuff at 1.2x or whatever, doesn't notably degrade quality like other apps I find.

Still use Downcast for video.

I can comfortably listen to Daring Fireball at around 2.3x with Overcast using smartspeed. It's pretty impressive actually.

 

[yegon]

I can comfortably listen to Daring Fireball at around 2.3x with Overcast using smartspeed. It's pretty impressive actually.

Yeah it is. I listen to my fave podcasts on about 1.2x, in no rush to get through them. Lesser podcasts, about 1.8x.

 

[KneelbfZod]

.

 

[Mufasa804]

I returned the iPad Pro 9.7". I own an iPad Mini 4 and could not notice an increase in performance. The screen quality and speakers are incredible and best in their class but not worth the additional $300 for the upgrade when I could have more portability with the mini.

 

[Leo90]

after returning 9.7 Pro, I ended up missing th amazing screen and snappy performance so I got a Pro again. This time Rose Gold xD

 

[spiderman0616]

I have started getting buyer's remorse about a lot of stuff lately. It seems like the Internet hates just about every tech product that launches. If you want to feel good about a purchase, you have to stay far away from comments sections and message boards, especially this one. The people here are so entitled and miserable about every Apple product I wonder why the even bother coming here most of the time.

People are so negative in general though, I've already talked myself out of two future purchases this year--one of them being PlayStation VR. I need to either quit reading so much about tech or quit caring about it.