INTRODUCING THE NEW iPAD AIR: FULL REVIEW

Apple unveiled the iPad Air a couple of weeks back and it’s a breathtaking masterpiece reminiscent of the innovation Apple has been known for. Apple revolutionized mobile computing with the release of the original iPad 1 in 2010 and since then they have maintained a vice-like grip on the Tablet Market which they almost single handedly created.

OVERVIEW

The new iPad is a refresh of the apple iPad line-up , it has a sleeker design whose inspiration was taken directly from the new iPad mini, Apple claims the device is faster, thinner and lighter than the iPad 4 and at first glance it bears no resemblance  to the latter ,  which justifies the rebranded name iPad Air. Apple has managed to hold of other Manufacturers who want a slice of the their Tablet Market share and this device along with its pint sized relative the iPad Mini are meant to fly the banner for them in 2014 would this innovation be enough to fight off the competition? We were able to spend a few days with the iPad air courtesy of our friends at www.smartshopng.com. The following is what we think of Apple’s new flagship Tablet.

HARDWARE AND SPECS

If you had the iPad 3 or 4, you would know that those devices should be used  by professional weight lifters in the Olympics, they were very heavy, it was hard to hold them for minutes without spraining your wrist,  so you can already guess the most outstanding feature of this device is the significant loss in weight. Apple hit the gym with this device and shed a total of 183g, the older generation iPad weighed 652g while the iPad Air weighs just 469g.

Apple also managed to significantly slim the iPad in two dimensions: thickness and width. Though only 1.4mm shorter than its predecessor, at 169.5mm wide, it’s about 10% narrower than before. And it’s 1.9mm thinner, as well – only 7.5mm thick.

The entire look and feel of this device has been redesigned, the iPad air looks just like the iPad mini, Apple has done away with the tapered edges on the previous iPad, the new iPad now has rounded edges and the rear facing speakers found on its predecessors are now mounted on the bottom of the device, one on each side of the lightning port. This speaker positioning is the only gripe I have with this new design as the speakers tend to be covered by the palms when holding the device in landscape. The speakers are actually decent, the sound quality is nice, it’s just the positioning that’s off!!

the speakers are positioned in such an awkward manner

The internal components of this device hasn’t changed a bit, the device still comes equipped with 1GB of Ram besides the smaller 32.4Wh Battery the major difference  in its components is the redesigned A7 chipset – a dual-core Cyclone CPU with a quad-core PowerVR G6430 GPU. Clocked at 1.4GHz, the CPU is actually 100MHz faster than the A7 found in the iPhone 5S but unlike the iPhone 5S there’s no fingerprint scanner on this device which would have loved to see on this.

It still has the same non-expandable 16, 32, 64 and 128 GB storage configuration as before, Though the device is 1.4mm shorter in width it still packs the same 5MP camera and the same 9.7mm Retina display with a resolution of 2048 X 1536, the image quality is as good as ever, pictures are still as sharp as ever and the viewing angles are good….basically everything is on point just like before.

SOFTWARE

The new iPad comes with iOS 7 which we have spoken so much about in previous reviews. The new operating system was released in September and it was a striking new experience from Apple, as they traded their 3D like UI for a flatter, modern UI with much more vibrant colours. However there are certain iOS 7 features that add value to this device such as the new Control Centre, a pull-up settings toggle menu accessed from the bottom of the display, makes switching various settings much easier.  The redesigned Notification Centre was given a new, transparent appearance.  Siri was given more options, such as the ability to toggle settings via voice command.

Although the new iOS 7 is a refreshing OS compared to the previous iOS versions but it still relies solely on its Apps ecosystem with their 
suites of productivity apps, Apple revealed during its iPad announcement a few weeks back that the iWork software suite is now entirely free. Keynote, Numbers, and Pages are all free, which is great for on-the-go productivity.

in the iOS 7 update, the settings toggle is 
presented – loud and clear – in the General submenu: five-finger pinch to return home, four-finger swipe left or right to switch between recent apps, and four-finger swipe up to enter the task switching menu. These definitely aid in speed when switching tasks, but it’s still not the same as true multitasking but they still have lots of multitasking issues that would have made this iPad great. For instance there’s still no way to multitask without having to minimize the page you are on, you still can’t share files between apps on a system wide basis.

The iPad Air hasn’t been really impressive compared to other relatively cheaper tablets on
the market such as the 2014 Galaxy tab 10.1 with its awesome multitasking capabilities or the new Galaxy Note 8.0 with its S-pen multitasking support. We would have loved to be able to have more than one window opened at the same time, like watching a video and scribbling down something in our notepads…..well if wishes were horses though!

PERFORMANCE

The new iPad Air delivers well in terms of performance, we divided the performance into different categories as follow;

·       CHIPSET: Remember that A7 chipset I spoke off earlier…..its the lightning bolt that Perseus stole from Zeus…….Its superfast!!!!. The redesigned A7 chipset is way faster than its predecessor in the iPad . it’s a dual-core processor clocked at 1.4Ghz coupled with a quad-core GPU, these chipset highly complements the fact that the new iOS 7 is buttery smooth, there was no lag whatsoever in its operation, multitasking was smooth and effortless, we were able to run graphic intensive apps on this device without any hassles, games such as dead trigger II and asphalt 8  were a delight to play on this device.

·        CAMERA: the 5MP camera on this device is just about right considering the fact that this is a 10 inch tablet and it would be awkward using this device as a primary shooter. The camera software is the same as the one found on the iOS version on the iPhone 5S although its less feature rich has the latter, the built in effects such as filters and panorama shots are conveniently omitted. The pictures are of passable quality bearing in mind that its just a 5MP camera. The 1080p video recording isn’t bad as well, it has same image reproduction as the camera. The front facing camera is a meagre 1.2MP but this isn’t too bad since it would only be needed for video calling.

·         

     BATTERY: There’s a beefy 32.4Wh battery stuck somewhere in the back, it’s not removable but it can take a beating. The Battery Is absolutely perfect, we were able to go a whole day of gaming, chatting, browsing, etc. and we still had about 20% battery left after over 10 hours of use, this is very encouraging considering the NEPA issue here in Nigeria.  

PRICING AND AVAILABILITY

The iPad Air was released on November 1 in  the US with a base price of $499 plus tax for the 16GB model for the Wi-Fi version Each higher-capacity model increases in price by $100, meaning the 32, 64, and 128GB will cost $599, $699, and $799, respectively.

The iPad Air also comes in an 4G LTE variant for an additional $130 per storage capacity. Pricing, plus tax, is as follows: $629 for 16GB, $729 for 32GB, $829 for 64GB, and $929 for 128GB. This 4G LTE model is available in various regions worldwide but you would need to confirm with your service provider which model works in your specific region.

PROS:

·        Long battery life

·        Crisp display

·        Light weight

·        Good App ecosystem

CONS

·        Inconvenient speaker placing

·        Expensive

·        More tablet customized features for Ios 7

·        Almost absent Multitasking

CONCLUSION AND VERDICT: 8.5

The new iPad lived up to our expectations, Apple hasn’t exaggerated its features, the device is indeed lighter , thinner and faster than all previous iPads but it still manages to be plagued by the sae multitasking issues the older ones had.  We really wish we could do more with the device but iOS seems to hinder us at every turn. Although if you aren’t a heavy user you might not be concerned about multitasking and there is also  a very large app library to choose from in the app store  and there are tonnes of applications that are dedicated to iOS devices which might make up for the multitasking issue a little.

The iPad Air and the new iOS 7 experience has been refreshing and nothing like what we are used to from Apple but the still loose points for the  speaker position and the multitasking issues for this reasons we score the device 8.5……and this is our verdict. 

P.S: if you are interested in purchasing  this device or any of other gadget and devices, you can visit our retail website www.smartshopng.com to view all the prices, send us an email technerdng@gmail.com or call us on 08074795983. if this review has been helpful please remember to subscribe to this blog and share this information with your friends. thank you.