BRIGHTER, better, faster and smaller
THE NEW 9.7-INCH IPAD PRO BRINGS POWER TO YOUR COMPUTING NEEDS
PAISAL CHUENPRASAENG
THE NATION
NEW TO THE market and already causing a sensation with tech reviewers all over the globe, the 9.7-inch iPad Pro, Apple’s most popular size of iPad, boasts the impressive performance and breakthrough features of the 12.9-inch iPad Pro but is not merely a smaller clone.
Quite the contrary in fact, |as the 9.7-inch boasts several improvements over its 12.9-inch sibling while retaining its performance. And of course, it’s also much more powerful and has better features than the iPad Air 2.
In short, the new 9.7-inch iPad Pro retains the high performance of 12.9-inch as it is powered by the desktop-class 64-bit A9X chip like that of its predecessor but also comes with several greatly improved features.
The first improvement will please those who enjoy taking photos. This is because the new iPad Pro comes with a 12-megapixel iSight camera that is used in Apple’s flagship iPhone 6s and iPhone 6s Plus as well as a 5-MP FaceTime HD front camera.
The iSight camera allows the 9.7-inch iPad Pro to shoot 4K video, which is four times the resolution of a HDTV, and capture slow-motion video of up to 240 frames per second.
It’s also the first iPad to take Live Photos. At the heart of a Live Photo is a 12-megapixel still image – together with brief video clips of the moments just before and after it was taken – captured with both movement and sound thus bringing your snapshot to life when viewed on Apple devices.
The iSight camera can also capture 63MP panorama shots. It uses the Focus Pixels technology, which makes the autofocus fast, and has the advantage of allowing you to use the new 9.7-inch Retina display as a viewfinder for composing your shots.
During the test, I found that the iSight camera of the new iPad Pro captured sharp and clean shots in very good detail and colours. Night shots were also impressively sharp and colourful and indoor shots of colleagues looked great.
The display is also an improvement over its 12.9-inch predecessor and much better than the iPad Air 2.
The new iPad Pro features 9.7-inch Retina display with 2048 x 1536-pixels resolution at 264 pixels per inch. It’s brighter than its big brother, displays more colours and has a fingerprint-resistant coating and an anti-reflective coating, making it better for reading outdoors. The True Tone display technology will please those who prefer eBooks to the printed page. Easy on the eyes, the technology uses four-channel ambient light sensors that automatically adapt the colours and intensity of the display to the match the light in your environment, making for a more natural and comfortable viewing experience. Furthermore, the display is automatically adjusted to your eyes doing away with the need for your eyes needing to adjust to the light.
The new display is 25 per cent brighter and the anti-reflective coating delivers 40 per cent less reflectivity and 25 per cent greater colour saturation than the iPad Air 2. It uses the same wide P3 colour gamut that Apple introduced on the 27-inch iMac with Retina 5K display. This technology is also used in the digital cinema industry so you can expect your photos and videos to look more vivid and true to life.
The new iPad Pro is also good for playing games and watching HD videos with immersive sound. It features four speakers – one in each corner – to provide clear and rich stereo sound that has twice the audio output of the iPad Air 2. Its built-in sensors automatically adjust the sound whether you are holding the table in portrait or landscape orientation. This ensures that mid and high frequencies always come from the topmost speakers while bass comes from all four.
To make most of the computing performance of the new iPad Pro, you should also invest in the Apple Pencil and Smart Keyboard cover.
The new Smart Keyboard is designed for the 9.7-inch iPad Pro. It features the same 64 keys as the keyboard for the 12.9-inch iPad Pro and attaches magnetically to the tablet. Fold it up and it becomes a slim Smart Cover. The top layer is crafted from a sheet of highly durable custom-woven fabric that’s laser ablated to form the shape of each key. The fabric also provides a spring-like tension for each key, eliminating the need for conventional mechanisms.
The Apple Pencil allows you to enjoy more productivity and creativity. It features a precise force sensor that is sent to the iPad Pro via Bluetooth that determines how hard the tip is being pressed onto the display. Press harder to draw thicker lines or use a gentle touch for tiny hairlines.
It’s easy to pair the Apple Pencil with your iPad Pro. You just remove the magnetic cap and plug the Apple Pencil to your iPad Pro to pair. The Apple Pencil can work for up to 12 hours of drawing. If the battery is low, you can plug it to the Lightning port on the iPad Pro for 15 seconds and you get 30 minutes of battery life.
You can scribble notes just as you would with pen and pencil and even convert your scrawl to text using the MyScript Smart Note app. The application supports both English and Thai and I was amazed at the accuracy of the text conversion when I gave it a shot in both languages.
Like the previous iPad Pro, the new tablet is powered by A9X chip, which is Apple’s third-generation desktop-class architecture. With up to 1.8 times the CPU performance of the iPad Air 2, the A9X chip makes even complex tasks – like editing up to three streams of 4K video in iMovie – smooth and responsive. In apps such as AutoCAD 360 and Complete Anatomy, the A9X chip is able to handle zooming in and out of complex models faster.
I found that it generated complex 3D details of body parts in the Complete Anatomy smoothly in real time without any performance hiccups.
The A9X chip of the iPad Pro also offers up to twice the graphics performance of the iPad Air 2 so it can render incredibly detailed visuals, fluid animation and great effects even in the most demanding 3D apps and games.
Thanks to its good performance and the Apple Pencil, the new iPad Pro is a productive computer that can shorten several steps of conventional computing.
For example, a football coach can use the new iPad Pro to shoot a match and edit it on the tablet right away without the need to convert the video.
The coach can also use the Apple Pencil to make notes of particular moments in the video clips and play it back to the players.
It can equally be used with effect by a medical trainer who can take screen shots of body parts rendered by Complete Anatomy and then use the Apple Pencil to write notes for his or her students.
The 9.7-inch iPad Pro runs on Apple iOS 9.3.1, which supports multitasking in three modes – Slide Over, Split View and Picture in Picture.
The Slide Over lets you open a second app without leaving the one your are in. You can browse the web and respond to a text message for example and then slide the app away.
With the Split View, you can open two apps and keep them active at the same time. The Picture in Picture lets you open a second app as a small picture in a corner on top of the first app.
Another nice feature of the iOS 9.3.1 on the iPad Pro is Night Shift, which uses the tablet’s clock and geolocation to determine exactly when the sun goes down in your current location. As evening falls, Night Shift automatically adjusts the colours in your display to the warmer end of the spectrum, limiting the amount of blue light and making it easier on your eyes. In the morning, it returns the display to its regular settings.
Best of all, the Night Shift feature can work in perfect harmony with the True Tone display making the screen easy on your eyes.
The iPad Pro has cellular and Wi-Fi only versions. I tested the cellular version on True Move H’s LTE 4G network and found the connection really fast. I managed to back up snapshots from the tablet to Google Drive in no time and while mail checking was fast and smooth. I used Ookla Speedtest app to measure the connection speed and found that it reached the download speed of 50.33 Mbps and upload speed of 19.85 Mbps.
The 9.7-inch iPad Pro Wi-Fi-only version retails for Bt22,900, Bt28,900 and Bt34,900 for models with 32 GB, 128 GB and 256 GB storage respectively. The cellular version with 32 GB, 128 GB and 256 GB storage retails for Bt27,900, Bt33,900 and |Bt39,900 respectively.
The Apple Pencil retails for Bt3,900 and the Smart Keyboard for Bt5,700.
Key Specs
OS: iOS 9.3.1
– Cellular: UMTS/HSPA/HSPA+/DC-HSDPA (850, 900, 1700/2100, 1900, 2100 MHz); GSM/EDGE (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz); CDMA EV-DO Rev. A and Rev. B (800, 1900 MHz); LTE Advanced (Bands 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 12, 13, 17, 18, 19, 20, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 38, 39, 40, 41)
– CPU: A9X chip with 64-bit desktop-class architecture, M9 co-processor
– Capacity: 32GB, 128GB, 256GB
– Display: 9.7-inch LED-backlit Multi-Touch Retina display with 2048-by-1536 resolution at 264 pixels per inch (ppi)
– Cameras: 12-MP iSight camera with f/2.2 aperture, 5-MP FaceTime HD camera with f/2.2 aperture
– Video recording: 4K at 30fps, 1080p at 60 fps, Slo-mo video support for 1080p at 120 fps and 720p at 240 fps
– Connectors: Lightning connector, Smart connector
– Sensors: Touch ID, Three-axis gyro, Accelerometer, Barometer, Ambient light sensor
– Speakers: Four-speaker audio system
– Microphones: Dual microphones for calls, video recording, and audio recording
– Battery: Built-in 27.5 watt-hour rechargeable lithium-polymer battery, Up to 10 hours of surfing the web on Wi-Fi, watching video, or listening to music
– Dimensions: 240×169.5×6.1mm
– Weight: 144g (Wi-Fi+Cellular version)
This source first appeared on The Nation Life.