The Apple iPad Pro Review
by Ryan Smith, Joshua Ho & Brandon Chester on January 22, 2016 8:10 AM ESTCamera
While it’s pretty much a universally terrible idea to use a tablet as your primary camera, for something like video chat or in an emergency it’s better to have one than not. In the case of the iPad Pro, the camera is essentially identical to what we saw with the iPad Air 2, which is to say an 8MP 1.1 micron 1/4” sensor, with an F/2.4 aperture and 3.3mm focal length, which translates to a 35mm equivalent focal length of 31mm. There’s no PDAF or anything fancy going on here, so it’s pretty much a guarantee that the camera is the exact same module that we saw with the iPad Air 2. The front facing camera is still a 1.3MP F/2.2 2.65mm focal length module, which leads me to believe that it too is shared with the iPad Air 2. I honestly don’t see any difference between the iPad Air 2 and iPad Pro cameras, so rather than spending time dwelling on those this comparison will be focused upon how it compares to popular smartphones and the tablet competition. As I don’t have a tripod mount that can actually fit the iPad Pro, I’ve elected to forgo some of our standard latency tests to avoid presenting data with confounding variables.
| Daytime Photography Scene 1 |
In our first daytime scene the iPad Pro is actually not that far off from the iPhone 6s. If you look closely it’s obvious that there is less detail to be seen, but it’s honestly quite difficult to see the difference. Relative to the iPhone 6, detail is almost identical. For a camera that should basically be never used for the kinds of photos I’m taking for this review, the camera will work well in a pinch. By comparison the Pixel C is rather disappointing. Even in this ideal condition, detail is visibly worse when compared to the iPad Pro. I’m not sure whether this poor showing is caused by camera shake or AF issues but in general the AF system for the Pixel C had some pretty noticeable issues in general. There are also some obvious problems with color noise despite base ISO, which is shocking.
| Daytime Photography Scene 2 |
In the interest of trying to collect more than one data point for presentation in the review, I tried another scene. Once again, the iPhone 6s shows a minor resolution lead and the iPad Pro is pretty close to the iPhone 6 here. By comparison while there isn’t any obvious weirdness going on the Pixel C clearly has less detail and a noticeable amount of color noise, which is surprising even for a tablet camera. Color noise is one of the most distracting things in any photo, so I’m always concerned when any mobile device has a camera where the JPEG output shows color noise.
| Low Light Photography Scene 1 |
| Low Light Photography Scene 2 |
Moving on to the low light testing, we clearly see the disadvantage that comes with smaller pixel sizes. The iPad Pro is just clearly worse than the iPhone 6 and 6s here. The 6s Plus is the clear winner of this test. While the iPad Pro has dark output, it’s miles better than the Pixel C and Nexus 9, both of which show enormous amounts of color noise. The Tegra X1 and K1 ISP for whatever reason is struggles with doing things like hot pixel compensation in low light, as in the dark areas of the photo there are obvious bright speckles of pixel noise.
| Low Light Photography Scene 3 |
In another low light scene we see the same sort of ordering that was in the previous scene. The iPad Pro is acceptable here, but the iPhone 6, 6s, and 6s Plus are all clearly superior. However, the iPad Pro is clearly superior to the Pixel C and Nexus 9 on the basis of better detail and noise reduction. Unlike most smartphones I don’t really see a huge difference in how well everything freezes motion here, but I suspect this might just be because the entire image for the Pixel C and Nexus 9 is so lacking in detail.
Video
| 1080p30 Video |
Looking at video performance, the iPad Pro noticeably lags behind the iPhone in feature set, which isn't entirely unsurprising given that the camera on any tablet should be strictly reserved as a fallback for when you can’t get to a smartphone or literally anything else. 1080p30 is encoded with H.264 high profile at 17 Mbps, with around 82 Kbps single channel AAC audio. For the most part, quality here is actually comparable to the iPhone 6 and 6s in daytime, with a noticeably tighter crop due to the longer 35mm equivalent focal length. The iPhone 6s Plus is again the obvious winner here though, due to its use of OIS in video. By comparison, the Pixel C shows clearly less detail, and the higher contrast leads to worse detail in areas like the road and in shadows.
| Slow-Motion Video |
In 720p120, the iPad Pro is clearly worse than the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus just by virtue of not supporting 1080p here. That's not exactly surprising, but as a result the quality looks to be roughly comparable to the iPhone 6. Given that both are using H.264 high profile at 30 Mbps it’s not exactly a surprise though. The Pixel C and Nexus 9 are both unable to participate in this test at all as they don’t support slow motion video, which might be an ISP limitation of some sort as we’ve seen Nexus devices on the smartphone side with support for slow motion video.
Overall, camera performance on the iPad Pro is probably as good as it gets for tablets, but it's obviously not competitive with the best smartphones. No one should really be surprised that this is the case though, as tablets are basically cameras of last resort, while smartphones are often primary cameras now.
Misc.
On the WiFi side unfortunately I have reason to doubt the validity of our current testing methodology, especially on iOS. As a result for this review we won’t be running any particular benchmarks for the iPad Pro but I never saw any particular issues with WiFi performance on the iPad Pro, which uses Broadcom’s BCM4355 WiFi/BT combo chipsets.
I also don’t have any particular equipment to really test speaker quality to its full extent, but subjectively the speakers are some of the best I’ve ever experienced on a mobile device in terms of sheer volume and frequency response. The speaker amps are shared with the iPad Air 2, which is Maxim Integrated’s MAX98721 IC. The audio codec/DAC is Cirrus Logic’s CS42L81, which isn’t entirely unsurprising given how most every Apple mobile device seems to use a Cirrus Logic codec of some sort.
I also found a number of interesting design wins, which include TI’s BQ27540 for the battery fuel gauge, and an MCU related to the Orion dock that seems to handle accessories like the Smart Keyboard. This MCU is connected over i2c, with some suggestion that this connector can act as a USB port, but I haven’t been able to figure out much else about this system.
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MathieuLF - Monday, January 25, 2016 - link
Obviously you don't actually work in a real office where they require lots of specialized software. What's the point of having one device to complement another? That's a waste of resources.LostAlone - Tuesday, January 26, 2016 - link
Totally agree. For a device to really be useful on a professional level then it needs to be something that is useful all the time, not just when it suits it. If you already wanted a tablet for professional stuff to begin with (a pretty shaky assumption since pro users tend to be working in one place where proper keyboard and mouse are usable) then you need a tablet that can be the only device you need to work on. You need something that you can put in your bag and know that whenever you arrive somewhere you are going to have every single tool you need. And that is not the iPad Pro. It's not even close to replacing an existing laptop. It's certainly very sexy and shiny and the big screen makes it great for reading comics and watching videos on the train but it's not a work device. It's simply not. Even in the only field where it might have claim to being 'pro' (drawing) it's not. It's FAR worse than a proper Wacom tablet because the software is so hugely lacking.It's an iPad dressed up like a grown up device laying in the shadow of actual professional grade devices like the Surface Pro. You get a Surface then you can use it 24/7 for work. You can buy a dock for it and use it as your primary computer. You can get every single piece of software on your desktop plus anything your employer needs and it's easy for your work sysadmins to include it in their network because it's just another Windows PC. Just dumb stuff like iPads refusing to print on networked printers (which happens ALL the time by the way) exclude it from consideration in a professional space. It's a great device for traditional tablet fare but it's not a pro device.
Constructor - Tuesday, January 26, 2016 - link
Your straw man scenarios are just that. In reality most users don't need every last exotic niche feature of any given dinosaur desktop software as a praeconditio sine qua non.Which you also might be able to deduce from the fact that most of those features had not been present on these desktop applications either when "everybody" nevertheless used them professionally even so.
In real life the physical flexibility and mobility of an iPad will often trump exotic software features (most bread-and-butter stuff is very much supported on iOS anyway) where the circumstances simply call for it.
Actual professionals have always made the difference notably by finding pragmatic ways to make the best use of the actual tools at hand instead of just whining about theoretical scenarios from their parents' basements for sheer lack of competence and imagination.
kunalnanda - Wednesday, January 27, 2016 - link
Just saying, but most office workers use a LOT more than simply notetaking, email, wordprocessor and calendar.Demigod79 - Friday, January 22, 2016 - link
Software companies only create crippled, lesser versions of their software because of the mobile interface. Products like the iPad are primarily touch-based devices so apps must be simplified for touch. Although the iPad supports keyboard input (and have for years) you cannot navigate around the OS using the keys, keyboard shortcuts are few and far between and and it still has touch features like autocorrect (and of course the iPad does not support a trackpad or mouse so you must necessarily touch the screen). The iPad Pro does not change this at all so there's no reason why software companies should bring their full productivity suite to this device. By comparison, PC software developers can rely on users having a keyboard and mouse (and now touchscreens as well for laptops and hybrids) so they can create complex, full-featured software. This is the primary difference between mobile and desktop apps. Just like FPS games must be watered down and simplified to make them playable with a touchscreen, productivity apps must also be watered down to be usable. No amount of processing power will change this, and unless the iPad Pro supports additional input devices (at the very least a mouse or trackpad) it will remain largely a consumption device.gistya - Sunday, January 24, 2016 - link
This is just wrong. There are many fully-fledged applications available on iPad. It comes with a decent office suite, plus Google's is free for it as well. I haven't touched MS Word in a couple of years, and when I do it seems like a step backwards in time to a former, crappier era of bloatware.Sure, I still use Photoshop and Maya and Pro Tools on my Mac, but guess what? iPad has been part of my professional workflow for four years now, and I would not go back.
Ask yourself: is a secondary monitor a "professional tool"? Heck yes. What about a third or fourth? What if it fits in your hand, runs on batteries, and has its own OS? Now you cannot find a professional use?
Give me a break. People who are not closed-minded, negative dolts already bought millions of iPads and will keep buying them because of how freaking useful they are, professionally and non-professionally. They will only keep getting more useful as time goes on.
The main legit critique I've heard is a lack of availability for accessories but that's a production issue, not a product issue. iOS 9 has been out for only a few months and the iPad Pro much less than that... companies have to actually have the device in-hand before they can test and develop on it. Check back in another year or two if it's not up to speed for you yet though.
That's what I did, waited for iPad 3, iPhone 3gs before I felt they were ready enough. 3gs for its day was by far the best thing out, so was the 4s. I don't think the iPad Pro is nearly as far back as the iPad 1 or iPhone 1 were when they launched but give it time...
xthetenth - Monday, January 25, 2016 - link
If you consider features to be bloat, I guess you could say that the iPad has full-fledged applications. It's not true, but you could say it. Actually trying to do even reasonably basic tasks in google sheets is horrifying next to desktop Excel. Things like straightforward conditional formatting, pivot tables, the ability to dynamically order the contents of a table and so on might strike you as bloat but they're the foundation of the workflows of people who make the program the cornerstone of their job. An extra monitor is a much better professional tool if it doesn't have its own special snowflake OS with different limitations and way of moving data.Relic74 - Saturday, February 27, 2016 - link
The fffice suits available aren't fully fledged applications, they are still just mobile apps. I can't open 80% of my Excel sheets on the iPad Pro simply because it doesn't support Macros. Visual Basic and Databases. Stop trying to convince everyone that the iPad Pro is a laptop replacement, it's not. It's just a bigger iPad, that's all. Which is fine and has it's uses, but the only people who would use the iPad Pro as an actual computer are the same ones who could get by using a ChromeBook. A professional person could use the iPad Pro, yes but they would have a focused purpose, which means only a few specific apps, the rest of time would be spent on a desktop or laptop computer. It's a secondary device.Relic74 - Saturday, February 27, 2016 - link
Their not crippled, just mobile versions and they have their uses. The problem I have with these comments is when someone says that the iPad Pro is immensely better than the Surface Pro 4. These are completely different devices intended for completely different tasks. These comparisons honestly need to stop, one doesn't buy a Surface Pro 4 to use as a tablet and vice versa. The iPad Pro is a content consumption device first and foremost. Yes there are some productivity apps and certain professions like a musician or an artist could take advantage of the iPad Pro's capabilities however it is not and I cannot stress this enough, is not a laptop replacement . Those that can use the iPad Pro as a laptop are the same types of people who can just as easily get by using a ChromeBook. The iPad Pro is a secondary device where as the Surface Pro is a primary device.IOS is just to limited in it's capabilities to be even considered as a standalone professional device. No, an Architect would not use the iPad Pro to design an house with, the Architect might use one to show off the plans to a client, mark down corrections with the Pencil. No, a programmer would not use the iPad Pro to develope on, he however might use one to create an outline of what needs to be done or even as a second monitor for his laptop. No, a musician would not use one to create his album with, he might use one as the brain for one of his synthesizer, a recording device, instrument, etc. it's a companion device, it's an iPad, nothing wrong with that but stop trying to convince everyone that it's some super computer with fantasy powers. Just the file system issue alone should be enough to tell you that the iPad Pro isn't really meant for connect creation.
FunBunny2 - Friday, January 22, 2016 - link
-- Modern software is very bloated memory consumption wise, especially software relying on managed languages, the latter are also significantly slower in terms of performance than languages like C or C++.well, that was true back in the days of DOS. since windoze, 80% (or thereabouts) of programs just call windoze syscalls, which is largely C++.