The Apple iPad Pro Review
by Ryan Smith, Joshua Ho & Brandon Chester on January 22, 2016 8:10 AM ESTSmart Keyboard
The other half of what makes the iPad Pro worth talking about is the Smart Keyboard. For those that are unfamiliar with how this keyboard works, in essence it’s really a flip cover that happens to hide a keyboard inside of it. This is yet another thing I mentioned that the iPad really needed to improve its potential as a productivity tool.
I’m going to go ahead and spoil this section by saying that while the Smart Keyboard is worthwhile if you’re typing out more than a paragraph, this feels like one of the clunkier aspects of the iPad Pro.
However, the important question is how I got to that conclusion. Going over the user experience of the keyboard is a pretty simple matter. Attaching the cover to the tablet works the same way it always does, which is accomplished by placing the edge of the cover onto the edge of the tablet which also contains the Smart Connector. There are some strong magnets that help with alignment here, and provide the positive pressure needed to ensure that the data and power pins of the Smart Connector are firmly connected to the keyboard.
Once the cover is connected, setting up the keyboard is done by folding it out and doing some origami until the tablet is docked into the right place on the keyboard, which has a noticeable notch to it. Aligning this despite the strong magnets does take some work, as it seems that unless the cover is setup correctly the keyboard isn’t enabled at all.
If you’re trying for precision, I would say that there’s roughly a 4-5 second time delay from the moment that you decide that you need to use the keyboard to actually using it. In addition to this time delay, the keyboard is rather precarious and is basically only stable when you’re using it on a table. While gravity can keep the whole setup somewhat stable on your lap when the display is leaning backwards, if the display starts leaning forwards there’s really nothing stopping it from collapsing and detaching from the cover, as while the magnets are strong enough to hold the tablet in a static state, they aren’t strong enough to hold the tablet if there’s the additional force of decelerating the tablet as it falls. As a result, the angles that the keyboard and tablet can hold relative to each other is fixed.
To be fair, once the keyboard is set up and it’s in a stable position, typing on the tablet is a great experience. The Surface Pro 3 was decent in my experience, but the touchpad with its lack of strong palm rejection made for some frustrating experiences. In this respect, the iPad Pro does a lot better, to the extent that I didn’t have any trouble doing things like typing up long forum posts or various sections of this review. Key travel is short, but there’s good haptic feedback and the layout of the keyboard doesn’t have any strange issues that seem to happen so often to so many tablet keyboards. Something like the Pixel C just doesn’t even compare here, especially because due to the use of Bluetooth it’s absolutely useless in an apartment or any remotely dense environment where the 2.4 GHz spectrum is crowded to the point that it approaches being unusable.
However, despite this significant setup time for the keyboard cover, pretty much the only value for the keyboard cover is text input. Due to the ergonomics of a near-vertical touch screen it’s really not something that can be used for extended periods of time as once you’re done with text input to comfortably use the touch screen you really need to break down the keyboard and revert it back to a simple tablet.
I’ve spent a lot of time thinking about the conundrum of the keyboard when it comes to these tablets, and honestly I don’t think anyone has figured out the right way of doing things yet. I think the Pixel C in form is a step in the right direction, but the execution is unfortunate to say the least. The iPad Pro touchscreen keyboard has the size to allow for touch typing, but the utter lack of position feedback makes it difficult to know where to keep your hands and because touching the display means inputting a character it’s necessary to awkwardly keep your hands right above the glass of the display. The heart of the issue here is that it’s necessary to have an input method where it’s easy to keep your fingers resting on the home row of the keyboard, with clear haptic feedback for input and some indication of where the keys are. It’s also necessary to make sure that this keyboard is easily accessible when it’s needed but quickly stowed away when it isn’t.
I can’t help but wonder whether the better solution here would be something like Lenovo’s Yoga Pro design, but with a different method of execution. Instead of making the two halves a single unit, the keyboard portion should be easily and quickly detached with the smart connector held within the hinge. Rather than a traditional laptop keyboard, something more like the current Smart Keyboard would make a lot of sense. However, I suspect that in doing this a traditional flip cover would no longer make sense as the keyboard would really become an integral part of the user experience once properly integrated. We can talk about how touch-only is a faster and more convenient experience, but this really only applies to navigation as while I can type at about 40 words per minute without issue on a phone or tablet trying to reach 100 words per minute is hard to say the least.
Overall, I should make it clear that the iPad Pro’s Smart Keyboard is not a bad keyboard by any means. When I’m able to just focus on typing, the user experience far exceeds pretty much anything else I’ve tried in the industry. The problem is that as the Smart Keyboard starts to approach the point where I can actually use it, I start to really notice all of the flaws that the implementation has. In this case, the two major issues that really need to be solved here are speed to deploy/stow and lap stability. While a lot has been made of the iPad Pro’s inability to have adjustable viewing angles realistically it only needs two viewing angles, similar to how the Smart Cover only has two viewing angles. If the Smart Keyboard can feel like it appears and disappears almost instantly and can be used without a table effectively, it would probably be the ideal solution to the keyboard problem that tablets face.
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nsteussy - Friday, January 22, 2016 - link
Well said.Wayne Hall - Friday, January 22, 2016 - link
WHAT IS MEANT BY PROFESSIONAL TASKS. I AM THINKING OF THE I-PAD PRO.gw74 - Friday, January 22, 2016 - link
Why do Apple only want content consumers' money in mobile, and not creators' too? Apple are in business to make a profit. If there was money to be made building workstation apps for mobile, it would happen. Furthermore "exploit their owners commercially" is just a pejorative way of saying "sell them stuff in return for money", i.e. "business".Sc0rp - Friday, January 22, 2016 - link
1) Apple made the pencil. I'm sure that they want creator's money too.2) The "Pro" market is incredibly small and fickle.
AnakinG - Friday, January 22, 2016 - link
I think Apple wants people to "think" they are creators and professionals. It's a feel good thing while making money. :)Constructor - Saturday, January 23, 2016 - link
The iPad Pro is a fantastic device for all kind of uses – I personally also use it as a mobile TV, streaming radio (due to its really excellent speakers), game console, internet and magazine reader (since it is pretty much exactly magazine-sized!), drawing board, note pad, multi-purpose communicator (mail, messaging, FaceTime etc.), web reader, ebook reader and so on...As to the numbers: According to an external survey it seems about 12% of all iPads sold in the past quarter were iPad Pros. We're talking about millions of devices there at the scale at which Apple is operating – most other tablet manufacturers and even PC manufacturers would kill for numbers like thes at prices like these!
It's almost funny how some people completely freak out about the iPad Pro because it crashes through their imaginary boundaries between their imaginary "allowed" kinds of devices.
The iPad Pro is a really excellent computer for the desktop (if for whatever reason an even bigger display is not available), which also works really well on my lap (actually much better and almost always more conveniently than a "laptop" computer!) and even in handheld use like a magazine or notepad. It's very light for its size, has a really excellent screen, excellent speakers and is fast and responsive.
Yeah, you can find things which you at this moment can't do on it yet. But there are many, many practically relevant uses at which it excels to a far greater extent than any desktop or notebook computer ever could.
jasonelmore - Sunday, January 24, 2016 - link
so you basically use it as a consumption and a communication device.. our point is, a professional cannot use this as their only computing device. they need PC's or MAC's to supplement it, which all use Intel or AMD.Until this fact changes, intel is far from being in trouble. iPad sales are in a huge slump as well, not just pc sales. Actually, Notebook PC sales are great, its the desktop that slows down every 3-4 years. iPhone is about to become a 0 growth product as well. Apple see's the writing on the wall, and that's why they are exploring cars, and other unknown products. The Chinese market never turned out like they had hoped, with stiff competition at low costs with similar quality.
Constructor - Sunday, January 24, 2016 - link
so you basically use it as a consumption and a communication device..Among many other things! So let me guess, when you happen to play some streaming music on your workplace computer or if you're watching the news on it, does it automatically turn into a "toy" and yourself into one of those mythical "only consumers" as well?
This silly ideology is really ludicrous.
our point is, a professional cannot use this as their only computing device. they need PC's or MAC's to supplement it, which all use Intel or AMD.
Nope.
Some portion of workplaces actually requires a desktop OS. This portion is not 100% but substantially lower than that.
A very large portion of workplaces (likely the majority) could very well use iPads as well, but external circumstances make regular PCs or Macs just more convenient and practical.
And some other portion can and does use mobile devices already now as their primary tools.
The tedious and absurd conclusion from people's own limited knowledge and imagination to absolute judgments of the entire market is anything but new, but it's really old news by now.
Until this fact changes, intel is far from being in trouble. iPad sales are in a huge slump as well, not just pc sales. Actually, Notebook PC sales are great, its the desktop that slows down every 3-4 years. iPhone is about to become a 0 growth product as well. Apple see's the writing on the wall, and that's why they are exploring cars, and other unknown products. The Chinese market never turned out like they had hoped, with stiff competition at low costs with similar quality.
You should seriously get better sources for your information as your imaginations are rather far off from actual reality.
Intel is already in a tightening squeeze between the eroding PC market (especially regarding its crumbling profitability) and the ever-rising development costs they face with their creaking x86 antiquity. That their CPU performance is stagnating at the same time is also increasingly problematic, too, since it puts another damper on the PC market.
When you're talking about Apple you clearly live in a different universe from the rest of us: Apple is actually booming in China while the cheap manufacturers have run into unexpected difficulties against them, and your other imaginations of Apple's doom are neither original nor do they have anything to do with the actual reality on the ground.
Even the iPad is a massive cash cow on a scale the competition can only dream about – it's just dwarfed by the absolute gigantic profits from the iPhone.
But yeah, surely that spells inescapable doom for the company.
Sure!
Coldmode - Friday, January 22, 2016 - link
This is the stupidest paragraph about computing I've ever read. It's equivalent to lamenting Bell's role in telephony because we managed to win World War 1 with telegraphs but now teenagers spend all their time hanging off the kitchen set chatting to one another about their crushes.ABR - Monday, January 25, 2016 - link
@ddriver I disagree with most of what you say in these contents, but, "today we have gigahertz and gigabytes in our pockets, and the best we can do with it is duck face photos," hits the nail on the head! The problem though is not that software developers don't try to do more, but that they can't make any money doing so. The masses just want to buy the latest duck photo app, and there's not enough of the pie left over to support much else. In the early days of the iPad this wasn't so, but nowadays take a look at the top charts in iOS to see what I mean. Games makes more than all others put together, and then even in categories like Utilities, you see mainly Minecraft aids, emoji texters, and a few web browser add-ons. Apple doesn't promote this in their advertising, but they do so in more subtle but effective ways like which apps they choose to feature and promote in the app store. In fact, the store is littered with all kinds of creativity- and productivity-unleashing apps if you search hard, but they all tend to die on the vine because they get swamped out by the latest glossy-image joke-text-photo-video apps and the developer loses interest.