iPad Pro 2021 Review: The Only Computer I Need By Christopher Lawley

I've had the new iPad Pro here for almost a week, and I have some thoughts well, actually, that might be the biggest understatement ever for those that don't know I've been working from the iPad for almost five years now it's been my main computer. I do everything on it right here. Furthermore, I have the 12.9 inch one terabyte silver 2021 iPad, pro complete with the white magic keyboard, m1 chip and Dr display it's pretty cool. The biggest upgrade to this generation of iPad Pro is the m1 chip. This was introduced in the fall of 2020 to help move apple to their own GPU and CPU for the mac. This gives a significant speed increase to the iPad.

The CPU and GPU aren't the only things to get faster with this iPad Pro. The internal storage is now two times faster than the 2020 model and for 128 256 and 512 gig model. They now come with 8 gigs of ram and for the 1 terabyte and newly added 2 terabyte model. It now comes with 16 gigs of ram. For some context.

The 2020 iPad pros came with six with the addition of the m1 chip, faster storage and extra ram. These new iPads have a huge boost in speed over the 2020 models. Like I mentioned, I work entirely from the iPad. This includes my creative workflow as well. Video photo and podcast editing the biggest benefit I have seen from this iPad to my workflow is in the video editing category now I know most people don't edit video on their iPad and that's totally.

Okay, I'm just using this as an example to show what the m1 chip in the iPad can do. I recently released a video talking about the bridge 10.2 max plus keyboard. Now that video was entirely edited on the 2021 iPad Pro. This was mostly 4k footage shot at 24 frames per. Second, all I c-log h.264. Now there was some b-roll clips in there that were 1080p 60 frames per second, but still h.264 24 frames per second all I these files, these clips right here, are huge. Now when it comes to editing on the 2020 iPad Pro it handled that kind of footage.

Fine I've been shooting with that forever. Ever since I got my canon EOS r here, but every once in a while when editing, if you had a large timeline or a large library of a ton of clips, it would freeze for like a second or two. It was never that big of a deal it was a little frustrating. It was like a paper cut almost, but those paper cuts start to add up, and they start to get really frustrating after a while with this iPad Pro, I didn't have that issue at all. I was able to just speed through my timeline, flipping back and forth or browse through a large library, no freezing at all everything about it was just fast.

In fact, I was able to export this 11 minute and 33-second video in 5 minutes and 32 seconds when exporting video, it's using the CPU and GPU, but it's also writing to the internal storage so that faster internal storage comes into play here. An issue that I've had with all other previous iPads is doing background file transfers. Now I move a ton of files from SD cards to the files app with previous iPads. I would have to leave the files app open in the foreground. I wouldn't be able to do anything else, because files might crash or get kicked out of memory.

If that were the case, with these new iPad pros and the extra ram that they have, I was able to transfer files in the background close the files app and check twitter email, edit some photos, whatever I wanted to do, and the background file transfers would be fine. I tested this in two ways. First, using a single mp4 file, this was a 43.6 gig file. It was the a-roll for that bridge. Keyboard video, I started the file transfer, closed files went to the home screen, started, opening twitter email, Lightroom to edit photos and checked back later, and the file transfer was complete.

The one annoying thing is, you: do have to go back into files to see if the file transfer is complete. There's no notification or anything saying hey. This thing that you were doing in the background is finished. Then I did a second test, because I wanted to make sure this wasn't a fluke or anything. Just that just happened to go right.

One time I wanted to try it a second time, so I took 82 clips. This was all the b-roll clips for that bridge video. This is mostly 4k footage, but some 1080p 60 frames per second footage and I did the same process. I started the file transfer closed the files app twitter, email, Lightroom, whatever I just kept, opening different things safari, and then I went back checked on it and all the files were transferred. Everything worked perfectly.

There was no corrupt data, no missing files, nothing crashed! It just worked perfectly the way it should. This is a great example of why computers can and always should be getting faster. Now. I know this is really specific to my workflow, but my point of this is because these are getting faster because they have more ram more CPU, GPU, faster internal storage power. All that stuff means iPads in the future can start doing more with software, and hopefully this means they can start doing more stuff in the background as well.

This should help everyone's workflows, in fact, procreate, an app that I don't use that much because I can't draw to save my life, but is a very popular app on the iPad recently announced you're going to be able to import 3d files, so 3d image files in a 3d space and be able to paint them in procreate using the Apple Pencil. That's pretty cool! Speaking of the Apple Pencil. That brings me to today's sponsor paperlike, like is a channel sponsor and one of my favorite iPad accessories and hey. You probably just got a new iPad if you're watching this video or might be getting one. So this is perfect for you.

It's a screen protector with a matte textured display. So when you're using the Apple Pencil when you're drawing on the screen, there's feedback, so it's like pen and paper, so it feels really nice. It's not that plastic on glass feeling that I can't stand. I just don't like that feeling. This is something I use every day now, like I said I don't draw, but I do take a lot of handwritten notes.

I journal on my iPad just to kind of like get thoughts and ideas out of my head and onto a digital device. The paper like also helps cut down on the reflection of light, so with a glass display if you're working outside, and you're working in direct sunlight, it can be pretty hard to see. Paperlike is a matte display, so it'll help cut down. On that light reflection, I highly recommend picking up a paper lake and I will put my link in the description below to where you can get one. My thanks to paper lake for sponsoring my channel, the new iPad Pro's USB port also got upgraded.

It's now thunderbolt 4. Now that means it can do up to 40 gigabits per second of data transfer. If you have the right, thunderbolt device, the iPad can also support. Higher resolution displays now, including the 6k pro display. Dr and thunderbolt.4 also enables a whole host of new devices. You can plug into your iPad like thunderbolt, docks and external drives.

I have a few different thunderbolt docks on their way. Unfortunately, they just didn't make it here in time. Most of them are back ordered, but when they do come in, I'm going to be making videos on those kinds of accessories so be sure to subscribe. Ben q recently sent me this monitor to test out and review, and a video is coming on that very soon. I was just waiting for these new iPads in order to make that video.

This is a 32-inch 4k HDR display, and it has a whole host of ports, including DisplayPort HDMI, but most importantly thunderbolt. So I can take that thunderbolt, cable and plug it into my iPad and have access to the full 4k HDR display, unfortunately, still in 4x3, because that's the way the iPad handles external monitors, but I can take advantage of all the other ports that are on that monitor, including the extra thunderbolt port and USB ports between the iPad gaining the extra ram and thunderbolt. I feel like I can rely on the background file transfer system so once those thunderbolt docks come in, and I test them out and decide which one I, like I'm going to take the archive drive that I've been using with my Mac mini now. My Mac mini is just a file server and an automation, server, and I've been using it to back up footage that I want to keep around for future videos finished videos, finished podcast things like that, but I have a two terabyte NVMe and a thunderbolt case plugged into it. I'm going to take that from that Mac mini, and I'm going to plug it into the dock.

For my iPad Pro this way, I can just drag and drop files to that archive and I don't have to go through the SMB file transfer to move stuff from my iPad to that Mac mini and honestly. At that point I don't know if I'll need that Mac mini anymore, I might just get rid of it. I've also been looking into thunderbolt raids as well. I haven't made a decision on anything yet, but if I do, of course I will make a video about it. The feature that I do think is the sleeping giant of this release is center stage, so center stage is for video calls and basically what it does is.

It has a wide angle, 125 degree fields of view, 12 megapixels, front-facing camera that it has access to. That's that's the front-facing camera on the iPad and when you move around it crops automatically, so it would crop in and zoom in, so that I am centered, and I'm in frame and then, if somebody else comes and sits in frame, it'll widen up, and it'll have both people in frame. This is a really cool feature that I've just been opening the FaceTime app and like running around it, and I have my iPad in that corner back there facing this corner, and I was able to run around my whole office, and it kept me in frame the whole time didn't matter. If I wasn't facing the camera directly, I was able to run around. I could go stand in the doorway back there or go stand over here by my camera, and I was in frame.

It was fantastic, so I found a couple of things when doing testing when just opening the FaceTime app and running around my office. If you just kept the iPad in a keyboard case like the magic keyboard or something like that, it was still looking up your nose, which isn't very flattering, but that's to be expected. It's not a periscope, it's just cropping what it sees so the way I found it worked best is put it on a laptop stand or an iPad stand, or something like that, and just do the call from there now that's what I was doing even before this iPad Pro showed up, but I was having to put Legend of Zelda art books underneath the laptop stand to get it to eye level. Because again you don't want the camera being underneath you because that's not flattering, you don't want the camera being above you because that's not great either you want it to be eye level. So I was having to use those art books before, but what I found is, I don't have to do that anymore.

So, if I have a video call, I can just turn to my iPad and start the video call and do it from there. Any third-party apps can update and support center stage. I know Webex already supports it, so your video conferencing, app of choice, should have no barrier to entry when it comes to supporting center stage. I know a lot of people want apple to move the camera to the long edge, the top edge, if it's in the keyboard case, but that's where the Apple Pencil charger is and magnets. So I don't think that would really work out and honestly, I think center stage is a better trade-off like, especially if you're going to have multiple people in the frame or, if you're, going to be walking around a room like while you're cooking or, if you're, presenting something or something like that like center stage, I think, is the better option, especially considering that's you know the Apple Pencil chargers there.

You can't have two things in the same: space defies the laws of physics. The 12.9-inch iPad Pro got an exclusive feature: the 11-inch iPad Pro this generation did not get. This is the liquid retina Dr display. This is a HDR display, built with mini, led and has a million to one contrast ratio for those that aren't aware contrast ratio is basically the difference between white and black, so the larger, the number and a million to one is very big, basically means you're going to have deeper darker blacks, like they're, not going to look washed out or anything like that. They're going to be black low contrast ratios will give you that washed out look and just it is like it, doesn't get that black look or like.

If you have a dark scene or something like that, all the details, you really you won't be able to see them for the mini LEDs. There are over 10 000 with 2 596 local dimming zones. This gives your iPad an OLED like experience, so the blacks are true blacks, the colors are vibrant and nothing looks washed out. This also brings the return of HDR to the iPad Pro. I don't think a lot of people remember this, but the second generation iPad Pro when it still had the home button that one had HDR they dropped that feature in 2018 in favor of the liquid retina display.

This thing looks stunning and is the hardest feature to talk about, because I film everything in SDR, and you can't really film a screen to show it because you don't know what the people are watching it on it. It's a hard feature to kind of explain how good it is, because, typically, I could just show you something, but you kind of have to see it to believe it. To be honest, so I have two movies that I watch whenever I'm testing a display mad max fury, road and Blade Runner 2049. On this iPad, they looked stunning. In fact, it's probably the best viewing experience I've had of these movies, since I saw them in theaters the bright scenes looked great.

The dark scenes looked amazing, and you could see all the detail in them and the colors were fantastic for SDR content, you're still going to get the benefit of mini led and that contrast ratio. So everything is going to look even better than the 2020 and 2018 iPad pros. With the newly announced iPad pros came the white magic keyboard. Now, when I first saw this my first thought was: I must have this. My second thought was: oh, this is going to be hard to keep clean after having it for a week.

Now I will say it is pretty easy to clean. You can just wipe it down, and it looks brand new, but that's only a week, but the real test for this is going to be using it for months or a year. Even my magic keyboard that I got in 2020 when they first came out is already looking really worn, but I use it for hours upon hours. So I'm really curious to see how this new white one holds up I'll make a video about that in the future. Once I've used it for a long period of time, but unfortunately that's the thing, I need time all that aside, the white magic keyboard with the black bezels of the iPad Pro gives it the Stormtrooper look that just looks so cool, I'm I'm all for that.

Look speaking of the magic keyboard, there's a little of confusion as regards to the new 12.9-inch iPad, pro being supported with last year's magic keyboard. Now it works perfectly uh. You can close it open it type on it functionally it's perfectly fine. The new 12.9-inch iPad Pro is just 0.5, millimeters thicker, really not that much, so it just doesn't fit perfectly but honestly, looking at it and just eyeballing it, I can't tell the difference. So if you have the old magic keyboard, and I'm getting the new 12.9-inch iPad Pro, there really shouldn't be any issues and the 11-inch version just stays the same. One thing you haven't heard me comment on is the state of iPadOS, because the hardware of the iPad and the software of the iPad are never updated at the same time, but we do have WWDC coming up in a couple of weeks.

This is where apple typically announces the next OS updates for all their platforms, including iPadOS. So we should see what's coming for iPadOS here really quickly. My hope is. We see why these devices are so powerful. I would like to see big improvements to system features and apps, like files shortcuts and safari I'd, also like to see pro apps from apple final cut logic Xcode.

These are things that I truly think the iPad Pro needs in order to be pro, that's it for this iPad Pro in this video, I have a ton of more iPad Pro videos coming up centered around this device and what you can do with it. I have some ideas for really cool things so be sure to subscribe. If you have any questions about this iPad Pro, please put them in the comments below I'll, be making follow-up videos, and I can answer them in there. Thank you all so much for watching like this video, if you liked it subscribe, if you haven't already- and I will talk to you later- have a great day.

Source : Christopher Lawley