Apple iPad
Pro The iPad Pro is a much bigger
device than the average tablet – with a 12.9-inch display, it's always going to
be a bit hefty.The design language follows on strongly from the rest of the
iPad family, with the same ceramic-like metal on the back, the curved edges and
TouchID home button above the Lightning port.The new iPad Pro is the biggest
and fastest Apple tablet to date. The pressure-sensitive Pencil stylus offers
superior sketching and drawing, and the Pro's gorgeous giant screen and quad speakers
are ideal for split-screen apps, multitasking and watching
movies.
PERFORMANCE: In terms of the engine Apple's stuck inside
the iPad Pro, the company has gone all out here. The Pro features an A9X chip
inside, coupled with 4GB of RAM (according to Geekbench, although Apple hasn't
confirmed this).
This makes the iPad Pro
easily the most powerful non-Mac device Apple's ever made by some distance.
What that means in real life is two fold: you can execute multiple apps at once
without a hint of slowdown, with heavy titles like Adobe Photoshop working in
an instant and the ability to do many things at once a really slick experience.
The Split Screen mode
of iOS
9, introduced in June at WWDC 2015, seemed like an odd thing - the
9.7-inch size of the iPad Air
sort of made sense with two apps running at the same time, but now we've got
this whopping screen to play with it makes a lot more sense.
If we're talking raw
numbers, and I know that's why some of you cheeky people are here, then you're
in for a treat. Using Geekbench 3 to test, the iPad Pro scores 5472, which is
well ahead of the 4506 from the iPad Air 2 and the 4974 of the next-most
powerful device, the Galaxy Note
5.
That won't mean much in day to day use, but it gives the iPad Pro a massive
boost in terms of future proofing it. The apps to come are going to make more
and more of that impressive chipset running at the heart of the tablet, and
having the raw grunt to keep up will mean that you're going to keep getting a
decent performance for years to come.
The interface is nothing
special though - I don't mean that critically, as the simplicity of iOS is
something that's one of the selling points of Apple's devices. However, some
people looking at the iPad Pro as a dedicated professional device will be a
little disappointed as it still runs the same way as the iPad Air 2, albeit
with a lot of accessories to play around with. The same grid of
apps prevails, with the notifications shade above and the Control Center
The larger screen means
you need to move your hand further to achieve these, but it's not like you're
being asked to throw yourself over a waterfall in a barrel, just moving your
finger a little further up and down.
However, it's worth
noting as it is one of the drawbacks of having a larger device like this, and
you'll need to be aware of them before puchase. But,At
launch, very few apps are currently optimized to take advantage of the iPad
Pro's full potential. Its large size makes it less portable than other iPads.
Once you've paid for the Pencil and keyboard peripherals, the iPad Pro costs as
much as a good laptop, but lacks its flexibility.
The Bottom Line The iPad Pro is a dream machine for
graphic designers and media mavens, but this elegant tablet needs more
optimized apps and accessories before it can fully achieve laptop-killer
status.
Key Features:
12.9-inch 2048 x 2732 screen; A9X 2.26GHz dual-core processor ; 4GB RAM; 8
megapixel rear camera; 1.2-megapixel FaceTime camera; 4 stereo speakers; iOS 9
Manufacturer: Apple
Price:$799 VS Battery life is long.
Unlike previous models, there's no IR blaster. Design:
The Galaxy Tab S2 feels nicer to hold in two hands than the Samsung Galaxy Tab S 10.5 and its sibling, the Galaxy Tab 8.4. In fact, it's now light enough to comfortably clutch in one hand. Design
The Galaxy Tab S2 feels nicer to hold in two hands than the Samsung Galaxy Tab S 10.5 and its sibling, the Galaxy Tab 8.4. In fact, it's now light enough to comfortably clutch in one hand.
The Samsung Tab S2 is lighter in part because it's backed by a soft-touch plastic cover instead of an aluminium shell. Metal edges outline the tablet instead of a plastic frame this time.
The entire device may not be metal, but it does feel smooth. It's better than the dimpled plastic of the Samsung Galaxy Tab S, yet remains just as grippy.
Two small, springy buttons are embedded into the back of the Tab S2, but they're meant for clipping a cover onto the tablet and aren't releases to pop off the back. It's all sealed shut.
There is, however, a microSD card slot on the frame to optionally boost the 32GB and 64GB configurations with an additional 128GB of expandable storage.
Alongside this same rail are a solid-feeling power button and volume rocker. Stereo speakers, a headphone jack and an off-center micro USB port line the bottom of the tablet.
The Tab S2 has a physical, fingerprint-sensing home button in front with the usual oval shape, and two capacitive buttons on either side. These keys light up by default every time the display is touched.
The beams of light are a bit distracting when scrolling and reading text near the bottom of the screen, and turning them off in settings doesn't help orient your fingers in the dark. This wider tablet isn't like a narrower phone, where you know the exact location of these keys.
The latest Galaxy Tab comes in three colors: Black, White and Gold. Gone are the fancy names like Dazzling White and Titanium Bronze, reflecting Samsung's minimalist design with this year's ultra-thin tablet. Display:
A tablet is all about the display and we've seen some unusual flip-flopping in resolutions over the past few years. With the 2012 Nexus 10 (which is made by Samsung) plopping out a 2560 x 1600 pixel display and the original Samsung Galaxy Tab S following suit, the Tab S2 now steps down to 2048 x 1536 pixels (264ppi density). That's the same resolution as we saw on the 2014 Nexus 9 tablet and it's the same as the iPad Air 2, which is the exact same size at 9.7-inches too. The shift from higher resolutions might be partly due to the shift in aspect ratio from 16:9 (or 16:10) to 4:3, or it could simply be that the returns for that resolution weren't hugely apparent. However, the Tab S2 is equipped with an AMOLED display whereas most competitors offer LCD. Samsung is known for AMOLED and has enjoyed great results on its Galaxy smartphones and Note tablets with this technology. On the Tab S2, you're again rewarded with great contrast, lots of punch in visuals, and deep, rich colours that are typical of such a panel. You might notice that the richness makes some content look a little dark so you have to bump up the brightness to get best out of movies and videos. We found the colours a little overwrought in the opening scenes when watching Mockingjay, for example, but the deep blacks and brilliant blues set up Gravity nicely. On the flipside, some games are incredibly rich, making us wish we could dial it down a little for a more natural view. AMOLED can also struggle to produce clean and bright whites as a result, something that Samsung has worked hard to improve on recent devices - but there's a hint of cool blue white here. The thing you will notice, however, is that on this size of display some of Android's apps don't scale as well as they should. You'll find softness becomes apparent in some games, for example, or some of the graphic elements in apps don't look as sharp as they do on your smartphone, phablet or smaller tablet. Take Real Racing 3 as an example: it looks blocky, so visually it's not as pleasant as on smaller or even 16:9 tablets with less display height. If that's a factor for you, the smaller 8-inch Tab S2 model might be the better choice. The display aspect also means the Tab S2 works a little better in portrait orientation than 16:9 devices, making for a better reading experience, whether that's on the included Flipboard-based Briefing newsreader, or when using something like the Kindle app. On the flip side, you'll have a lot of empty space top and bottom when watching movies in landscape - especially if they are shot in the cinematic 21:9 aspect ratio.
Hardware
The Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 houses an octa-core Exynos 5433 chipset, comprised of a 1.9GHz and 1.3GHz quad-core CPU. It also has 32GB of internal storage and a microSD card expansion slot that's expandable up to 128GB. The Samsung website lists a 64GB version, but only the 32GB model is available for purchase; Samsung hasn't released details on when and if the 64GB one be available.
Other features include Bluetooth 4.1 with low-energy function (BLE) and Wi-Fi 802.11 a/b/g/n/ac MIMO -- which is faster than regular Wi-Fi.
SOFTWARE
The Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 runs the latest version of Android with the scaled-down version of TouchWiz. It's a similar software experience to what we see on the Note 5 and latest Galaxy S6 devices.
There are not too many apps loaded out of the box, but since this is an AT&T LTE model you get plenty of bloatware from this US
Samsung apps include Galaxy Apps, Hancom Office Viewer, Memo, Samsung Milk Music, SideSync, and Smart Manager. You will also find several Google apps, but these have been reduced by Google so loading up your preferred Google apps is up to your own preferences in many cases.
One of the reasons to pick up a Samsung tablet is to be able to use a couple apps at the same time in a side-by-side format. As you can see in a couple of screenshots in my gallery, many apps look absolutely terrible in this format and neither app ends up being useful.
The Samsung Galaxy Tab S2's brilliant screen, plentiful storage capacity and slender build make it a great tablet for everyday use at home or on the go. Price ;$347.99
iPad Air 2
It's even thinner and lighter than last time around and to a
noticeable extent. The screen is better, with more vibrant colours, it's more
powerful thanks to its A8X processor and the battery life holds up just as
well. It even benefits from Touch ID and Apple Pay and while these features
aren't as exciting here as they are on phones they're still nice to have. Performance
The 64-bit A7
processor introduced on the iPhone 5S was altered to provide a power boost to
last year’s iPad Air. Called the A7X this chip was similar in performance to
the A7 – up 5-10% in our benchmark tests.
This year Apple
has gone further and designed a processor specifically for the iPad Air 2. The
A8X has a tri-core CPU running at 1.5GHz and a quad-core graphics processing
unit coupled, for the first time, to 2GB of RAM.
If we play Specs
Top Trumps the iPad Air 2 looks a shadow of top-end Android tablets such as the Samsung Galaxy Tab S 10.5 and its 2.3GHz quad-core processor.
Don’t let that fool you, though. The iPad Air 2 is the most powerful tablet
we’ve ever tested – and that’s including Nvidia’s Shield Tablet that packs the great new Tegra K1.
And while the
processor is key to that performance, Apple has also ensured that iOS 8 can
make the most of it. Metal lets developers take full advantage of the quad-core
GPU, while the new iOS programming language, Swift, means apps can hook into
certain features such as Touch ID.
Some observers have even compared the iPad Air 2's
performance to a desktop PC. In some respects they’re right. The A8X processor
performs a few tasks faster than PCs just a few years old, but the question is:
do you need all that power? If you intend to use your iPad as a productivity
device then you’ll appreciate it. Even if you don’t, you may find yourself
using it more as a laptop replacement than you anticipated.
During the launch of the Air 2, Apple showed off a
video-editing app called Replay that lets you create slick-looking videos with
ease. The iPad Air 2 powered through the edits.
There are clear benefits to be had from the extra
performance, but let’s see how it stacks up against the competition.
The iPad Air 2 scores an excellent 4,509 on Geekbench 3.
To put that in some context, the next fastest tablet we’ve reviewed, the Nvidia
Shield, scored 3220 – that’s 40% faster. That also makes the iPad Air 2 almost
70% faster than the iPad Air. That’s some impressive work in just a year.
And the wins keep coming with a 3D Mark Ice Storm
Unlimited score of 21,797. That’s 33% higher than the Shield and almost 50%
better than the first-generation iPad Air.
The iPad Air 2 is astonishingly fast – so fast, in fact,
that you might not know what to do with all that power. Not that we’re
complaining, of course. The extra grunt means that this is a tablet you can use
for more than just checking out the latest memes and Facebook. It future-proofs
the Air 2 to some degree.
There’s also been an upgrade to the co-processor, now
called the M8. This handles all the sensor data from the iPad Air 2, such as
the accelerometer and the new barometer. The reason that Apple favours a
co-processor is that it uses much less power than the main processor, helping
the battery to last longer.
In short the iPad Air 2 really is the complete package and while
you can always find things to niggle about there are no significant flaws.
In the time since the original iPad Air
launched everything else is still struggling to match it and yet Apple has
managed to raise the benchmark higher still. Everyone else really has their
work cut out if the iPad Air 2 is going to be unseated from the number one
spot. The new iPad Air gets an improved A8X
processor, better rear and front-facing cameras, an even thinner and lighter
design, an anti-reflective screen, a Touch ID fingerprint sensor, and more
built-in storage at higher configurations than last year. But The Air 2 isn't a big change from last year's iPad in terms of
overall function; battery life remains the same, although its battery life is
already pretty good. Audio playback via speakers makes the thin metal body
resonate more than before. The
Bottom Line The iPad Air 2 is a nice refinement and finesse of last year's
model, with a bevy of tweaks, enhancements, a much faster processor, and the
welcome addition of Touch ID. Simply put: it's still the gold standard for
tablets.
Weight: 437g | Dimensions:
240 x 169.5 x 6.1mm | OS: iOS 8.1 | Screen size: 9.7-inch | Resolution:
1536 x 2048 | CPU: Triple-core 1.5 GHz | RAM: 2GB | Storage:
16/64/128GB | Battery: 7340mAh | Rear camera: 8MP | Front
camera: 1.2MP 
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