iPad Pro - Wifi+Cellular

[choreo]

I know this may be the dumbest post ever, but I have never owned or had a need for a cellular phone, so I have absolutely no idea how any of the Cellular Plans work or what they really do (to me they just look like a giant money suck).

I have been making a living as a graphic/web designer/photographer exclusively on Macs for over 25 years, but I have never owned or used a "mobile" device - never even picked one up! I doubt that I would be making many phone calls from an iPad? I know for sure I will never send a "text" in my lifetime (I am holding out for them to re-introduce Morse Code as the next leap "forward"!). So I have two questions in deciding whether I should order a new iPad Pro with the "Cellular" add-on...

(1) Based on the above paragraph, is there any advantage "for me" to have Cellular connectivity (over just WiFi)? I do shoot studio photography sessions both tethered to my Macbook Pro and I also have a CamRanger for WiFi connectivity between the camera and my MacBook Pro (which should also work with the iPad Pro via WiFi).

(2) How much would it cost to add Cellular Service to one of these iPads. Apparently they are not tied to a Carrier Plan of some sort like the iPhones (as far as I can tell).

 

[rigormortis]

it used to be $130 extra to add cellular to an iPad. now with the iPad pro, if you want cellular you have to spend $1,079 for a 128 gb iPad. this is $280 more then a base 32 gb model

cellular would allow you access to the net whenever wifi is not available.

a lot of people say that cellular is not necessary because you can always tether from your iPhone or you can always hunt for wifi. but the single most important reason why you want a cellular iPad, is find my iPhone / theft protection. a wifi only iPad that is locked with a passcode is going to have a bit of difficulty trying to contact apple when it sitting somewhere near a wifi hotspot that it has never connected to before. it is basically going to have to grow legs and walk to a wifi hotspot that it knows about. you might as well turn off your passcode and hope someone uses it.

yeah, the person could remove the sim, but that is the risk you take.

if you are confident that your iPad will never get stolen or you won't get kidnapped then just getting the wifi only version would save you money.


cellular plans go from around $0 to $50 a month, depending on how much data you want

most "share" plans will let you add an iPad to your plan and share the data for $10 a month. a share plan is where you pay a company like AT&T $100 for 15 gigs of data , then pay $15 each for every iPhone or iPad you connect to that data bucket.

T-mobile gives every cellular iPad 200 megabytes a month for free. this is all u need if your iPad gets lost. you can add more.

t-mobile plans are $20 and up. $20 gets you 1 gb and $40 gives you 5 gb. if you run over your limit on a paid data plan, the data does not stop and it slows down to 2G speeds. no other company does this , they all either shut you off, or they charge you an overage., like $10 for every GIG you go over. a $20 plan gives you unlimited music streaming for your iPad.

AT&T and Verizon and Sprint have similar plans ranging from $15 to $50 a month

"data stash" the feature that t-mobile gives you that saves unused bytes for a year, is only available on a post paid iPad plan, if you use a prepaid plan ( like most iPad plans are ) then you do not get this feature.

the iPads are unlocked and universal. you can try any cellular company willing to give you or sell you a sim card. to see what works best.

the iPad pro comes with an apple sim, so you can sign up to AT&T - t-mobile or sprint (?) without having to go to one of their stores. they originally wanted the ability to use the same apple sim and you would never change the apple sim each time you switched a carrier, but people have said that once you put it on AT&T and want to switch, you need to replace the apple sim.

verizon does not like apple sim and you would need a verizon sim card. when ordering iPads, they offer to send you a version sim card separately.

 

[rigormortis]

another thing is GPS, a wifi only iPad does not have a real GPS chip. so navigating and using it for driving directions may not be possible. i don't think it is actually possible at all, i never tried it

when you locate your lost iPad with cellular, it uses GPS and cellular to determine its whereabouts within 30 feet and then sends you its location via the always available cellular data network.

when you locate your lost iPad with wifi only, first of all , it needs a working wifi network to connect to. it needs to have connected to that wifi network sometime in the past, or it needs the wifi password pushed to it. or it just sits there with no connection, once it does get a connection, it then scans the wifi networks around it, and it phones in this list of wifi networks to apple, google, or skyhook, and the those companies send back their best guess.

on an iPhone your 'best guess' is used temporarily until a real gps lock can be obtained. on an iPod touch or wifi only iPad, your best guess is used permanently.

 

[TheBuffather]

Serious question. If you're a web designer, how can you design good websites without testing them on mobile devices? I would answer the questions you asked, but the two above me have said everything I would have.

 

[choreo]

it used to be $130 extra to add cellular to an iPad. now with the iPad pro, if you want cellular you have to spend $1,079 for a 128 gb iPad. this is $280 more then a base 32 gb model

Thanks... that helps.

Since I could see shooting a lot of Digital RAW files to the iPad, I would probably be getting the 128GB model anyway. I was thinking that for an extra $100 it might help the resale value if I upgrade it in a year or so.

 

[choreo]

Serious question. If you're a web designer, how can you design good websites without testing them on mobile devices? I would answer the questions you asked, but the two above me have said everything I would have.

I have been using online simulators for the "responsive" sites, that is one of the reasons I am looking at an iPad. I do belong to forums that help me test new sites as well on all their mobile devices which are much broader in scope than I would have if I just owned one or two devices myself. I have about 50+ responsive websites online currently and have never had a complaint from any client or their users that something was not working correctly.

I also have an old Gen4 iPod Touch that I sometimes check sites on.

 

[TheBuffather]

I have been using online simulators for the "responsive" sites, that is one of the reasons I am looking at an iPad. I do belong to forums that help me test new sites as well on all their mobile devices which are much broader in scope than I would have if I just owned one or two devices myself. I have about 50+ responsive websites online currently and have never had a complaint from any client or their users that something was not working correctly.

I also have an old Gen4 iPod Touch that I sometimes check sites on.

Ah, I see. Makes sense. I believe you'd be very happy with your purchase if you go forward with it. Personally, I'm a fan of the iPad Mini as I mainly read on iPads. If I were more of a freehand artist, I'd be snatching up an iPad Pro as fast as I could. Best of luck with your decision.

 

[colodane]

It sounds as if you truly don't need the cellular option. Just for clarification, the iPad data plans are not the same thing as the plans for iPhones. They are data only, and do not include the usual voice and text you get with a smartphone plan. But they are much cheaper. Zero for the Tmobile 200 mB/mo option and about $20 for a Verizon 1 GB/mo pre-paid plan for example.

As was pointed out above, the other major thing you get with a cellular iPad is the GPS chip. But if you don't use the iPad for driving or navigating this may not have any value to you.

If you never need any connectivity other than the wi-fi in your home/studio, then you may not benefit from the cellular option.