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Reading all these comments, I was thinking the same thing. It seems like a ton of people are saying "why cant it work like MY mac."
But, you have a mac. So why not just use that when you want the mac experience? Based on sales, it seems like the Ipad is a large media consumption device. The majority of Ipad users aren't using it for things that are done on a mac. Its for web browsing, sending emails, watching Netflix, Youtube, reading books, facetime, texting, instagram. The mac doesn't do those things better then the Ipad currently does. And if you want your Ipad to do Mac things.......buy a mac. Really, what might be a good idea would be to release a new product called Macpad. Just Ipad pro with macos on it. If it sells great, maybe expand that option. But to change all Ipados to macos is going to confuse a ton of people who aren't even familiar with macos and dont need those features.
What you write is correct. But the problem is elsewhere I think. Mac is not touch. iPad is and accepts a mouse/keyboard. So people are hoping for 1 device that can do everything. And given the price of said devices, I understand them. If the iPad could dual boot macOS and iPadOS, I would just have an iPad.

At the moment, if you're more than a media-consumption user, the best option is to buy the best Mac you can afford and the cheapest iPad for the touch experience.
 
It’s a tablet one camera for granny to FaceTime with out complications ! Go play on a Mac, it’s a tablet
Except they have the pro line which isn't what the grannies are buying. They could easily add features that only work on the pro line like they do for everything else. It's not rocket science.
 
I’m convinced that Apple has deliberately held back iPadOS for days like today when growth is needed and they can release features people have been clamoring for in order to drive sales. There’s just no other possible explanation
There is another explanation - Apple has become too big, bloated and bureaucratic and their rate of innovation has slowed to a crawl.
 
Apple should copy SteamOS where they have a desktop mode (Arch Linux) and a game (tablet) mode on a shared file system. This should apply to all "Pro" iOS variants including iPhone Pro, iPad Pro and Vision Pro... Even Macs themselves should have an Apple TV mode...

They simply don't do this because MacOS is open and they can't lock developers and users to the App Store if they allow something like this. Edit: and they want people to buy multiple devices instead of just one.
 
Because there are enough people who are buying an iPad and a Mac. Allowing iPad to boot into MacOS would cannibalize Mac sales.
Initially the iPad was supposed to be the sub $1,000 computer with the Mac being above that. However Tim Cook got greedy and started pushing up the price to the point where iPad and Mac are competitors.
 
Initially the iPad was supposed to be the sub $1,000 computer with the Mac being above that. However Tim Cook got greedy and started pushing up the price to the point where iPad and Mac are competitors.
The iPad starts at $349, and can be found frequently on sale for $249 and, I’ve seen it as low as $199.
Same with the MacBook Air, you can find it for as low as $600-$700.
Sure, there are iPad pros in the Mac level prices, but then again there are also Macs that cost over $10,000.
So I’m not sure what the argument is here.
 
As much as I would enjoy this (I'm among those who think that iPadOS is really lacking), I still think this is not the correct move. Being able to run macOS on the iPad would - imho - be better.

Reason being that many people enjoy the simplicity of an iPad. And adding more and more features to iPadOS would just make those people feel overwhelmed. I'd even advocate for a removal of some features such as multitasking and stage manager in order to make it simple and "great again".

That would be:
  • iPadOS as it used to be ➡︎ simple and intelligible for everyday users
  • macOS in dual boot mode (or alike) ➡︎ for power users when they need it (requires a mouse/trackpad + keyboard and that's an acceptable tradeoff)
Just for comparison, despite using the exact same processor…
The iPad Pro is 54% thinner than the MacBook Air.
The iPad Pro only has about 58% the battery capacity of the MacBook Air.
The iPad Pro is 64% lighter than the MacBook Air.

Yet, despite all of this, the iPad Pro gets very similar battery life to the MacBook Air. Apple says 10 hours of browsing on the iPad compared to 15 on the MacBook Air, test show it’s a lot closer than that.
This is almost entirely down to the two different operating systems, they were meant for their own form factors, and it’s not just touch versus keyboard and mouse.
macOS on the iPad would be a terrible experience. An awful experience. The iPad just simply does not have the thermals or the battery to support something like that, it just simply does not.
I don’t think people realize how much more power-hungry macOS is than iPadOS.
It’s not even clear that the iPad would have the power output to handle macOS, the second you tried to do something power intensive like open Final Cut Pro for Mac, it’s possible that the power draw required could cause the entire thing to just stop working, the way the iPhone 6 started to do.
It is way more complicated than simply just shoehorning a much more power hungry operating system onto the form factor of an iPad, and that could end up being a usability nightmare.
It’s like running iOS off of the Apple Watch, sure it might technically be possible to get the thing to boot, but as soon as you require something that needs any sort of high power draw, the watch would more than likely just crash.
 
IMG_0245.jpeg
 
The iPad starts at $349, and can be found frequently on sale for $249 and, I’ve seen it as low as $199.
Same with the MacBook Air, you can find it for as low as $600-$700.
Sure, there are iPad pros in the Mac level prices, but then again there are also Macs that cost over $10,000.
So I’m not sure what the argument is here.
The iPad Pro starts at 1 grand. If you want the 13” model with a nano texture display that is 2 grand. That’s on a par with the MacBook Pro 14” so they are competing against each other which was the original posters point.
 
I’ve been using my 11” iPad Pro with macOS via Jump Desktop, as I’d rather not travel internationally with a £2,000+ computer. Instead, I’m using a £500 refurbed iPad Pro, complete with a second-hand Magic Keyboard and it does the job brilliantly!

I honestly don't know why people keep saying "MacOS isn't good with touchscreens". If you set it up properly and have a vague idea of what you’re doing, it works surprisingly well. I mean even I pulled it off, so I am 100000% sure Apple could but won't do it to avoid cannibalising their own product.

At the end of the day, Tim Apple still needs to sell both an iPad and a Mac.
 
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Tabs in News would be a start. Doesn’t make sense to have them in Safari but not news, but perhaps there is a reason?

The books app needs a massive overhaul so it can be used as a pdf management tool as well as a book reader.

I’m not asking for much, but absolutely, the iPad could do so much more.
 
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with these m4 chips in them, even the m1, it shouldnt be "like" macOS, it should absolutely be essentially a tablet form of macOS. otherwise why do they have desktop chips in them with a hamstringed mobile OS
 
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The one "more like macOS" upgrade I'm waiting for is a universally accessible filesystem. The Files.app (which is essentially Apple's version of Documents by Readdle) doesn't cut it for me. But I realize that for most people the Files.apps is just fine.
They will never allow a Universally accessible filesystem on iOS/iPad OS, because of the potential issue of non tech savvy users accidentally or intentionally deleting/moving files around causing crashes etc.

But of course the current Files.app needs to be more robust thats for sure.
 
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This is almost entirely down to the two different operating systems, they were meant for their own form factors, and it’s not just touch versus keyboard and mouse.
I think you're missing my point. If - and that's a big if - macOS ran on an iPad using a mouse/trackpad + keyboard in a more productive way, you'd also be sitting at a desk with the iPad powered either by an external display (the iPad behaving like a Mac mini for instance) or directly from the charger.

I mean, what else to expect? Using macOS on an iPad with a mouse/trackpad + keyboard while on the couch or in the bed? Of course not. So that's for the battery issue.

Also, over the years there were numerous leaks here about Apple running macOS on an iPad in their labs. There's no question a Mx iPad can run macOS.
 
I think you're missing my point. If - and that's a big if - macOS ran on an iPad using a mouse/trackpad + keyboard in a more productive way, you'd also be sitting at a desk with the iPad powered either by an external display (the iPad behaving like a Mac mini for instance) or directly from the charger.

I mean, what else to expect? Using macOS on an iPad with a mouse/trackpad + keyboard while on the couch or in the bed? Of course not. So that's for the battery issue.

Also, over the years there were numerous leaks here about Apple running macOS on an iPad in their labs. There's no question a Mx iPad can run macOS.
It’s not just about the battery though, and like I said it’s not about it being physically possible.
There are still absolutely thermal limits with the iPad that just don’t exist with even the MacBook Air, and even being directly plugged into the wall isn’t going to help, and being plugged into an external monitor might even make things worse seeing is that uses more processing power to push the extra pixels.
Once again, yes, of course Apple has internally tested macOS on the iPad. And they probably found, that as soon as you start using it intensively for anything, it becomes a trash experience.
Sure, if you leave it sitting on the desktop with absolutely nothing opened, it might technically run.
But the second you start to do anything, macOS’s significantly more power hungry RAM management will bring the iPad and it’s tiny thermal envelope, it’s tiny battery and it’s significantly lower power draw to its knees.
Again, we are talking about a product with about half the battery, half the thermal envelope and very small power draw.
Even just a couple Safari tabs easily uses over 9 GB of RAM on my MacBook Pro with 16, I can tell you with absolute certainty that that is not the case on the iPad Pro.
Fundamentally different operating systems, made for different form factors. Again, this goes beyond touch and keyboard and mouse.
I get it, iPadOS is far from perfect, there is tons of room for improvement and areas where using a Mac is just better. That’s undeniable. I have experienced that, as a user of both an iPad and a Mac, I know this to be the case. I am absolutely not denying that iPad software dramatically needs improvement.
But I also understand why they don’t just force it to run an operating system that is clearly not meant for it, that will actively cause it to function worse, throttle easier, and will bring the battery to barely usable levels.
We can argue that Apple should make a touchscreen Mac convertible all day, but that’s the thing. For a tablet to run macOS, they would first need to do some dramatic hardware changes. Just because the iPad and a MacBook happened to have the same SOC means very little.
The original HomePod and the iPhone 6 used the same chip, it’s simply does not mean anything when the form factor will not comfortably support it.
I think it’s very likely that if you boot an iPad into macOS and then try to run Final Cut Pro or logic pro, eventually, the thing just stops working, because it can’t handle that type of load. Back to my analogy earlier, it’s like trying to use an Apple Watch to run iOS. Sure you might be able to flip through the home screen just fine, but open a mobile game and the thing will likely die or overheat before the loading screen is finished.
 
Why not just enable MacOS instead of spending all these men hours and resources to make it look like partial MacOS? Doesn't make any sense.
Yes! And USE all those hours to FIX SIRI, like I've been saying since before they hired John Giannandrea from Google to work on Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence Strategy at Apple in 2018! (And… subsequently went forth - boldly - to do such a crappy job, he was recently relieved of his duties… 🤦‍♂️)
 
The one "more like macOS" upgrade I'm waiting for is a universally accessible filesystem. The Files.app (which is essentially Apple's version of Documents by Readdle) doesn't cut it for me. But I realize that for most people the Files.apps is just fine.
Exactly! I was just traveling and thought of only bringing my iPad. But I needed access to my files, and trying to enable offline access was hell, so I also brought my MacBook. A regular file system would make wonders.
 
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Just fix the irritating niggles with the Magic keyboard integration. It does work "a bit like a Mac" but it's not 100%, only 80%. A trackpad on the Mac works with all websites; the iPad+Keyboard doesn't, for example Xenforo editor buttons don't work when clicked; the mouse "rollover" doesn't fire on websites, etc.

Most, but not all, keyboard gestures work.

It's a little too much like a Microsoft product IMHO. MS products are never finished and are full of defects and "features" to make life more miserable.
 
Gurman said that iPadOS 19 will be "more like a Mac" in three ways:
  • Improved productivity
  • Improved multitasking
  • Improved app window management
"I'm told that this year's upgrade will focus on productivity, multitasking and app window management — with an eye on the device operating more like a Mac," said Gurman, in the latest edition of his Power On newsletter. "It's been a long time coming, with iPad power users pleading with Apple to make the tablet more powerful."
Stage Manager was supposed to address these.
 
The one "more like macOS" upgrade I'm waiting for is a universally accessible filesystem. The Files.app (which is essentially Apple's version of Documents by Readdle) doesn't cut it for me. But I realize that for most people the Files.apps is just fine.

It *cough* gets the job done.
 
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