The 9.7" iPad Pro Review
by Brandon Chester on June 1, 2016 9:00 AM ESTStill Image Quality
With the iPhone SE we saw Apple bring the 12MP camera from the iPhone 6s to a $399 phone. The 9.7" iPad Pro brings it to the iPad. More specifically, it's a ~1/3" 12MP sensor with a f/2.2 aperture. The A9X SoC comes with the same ISP as Apple A9, and so we should see parity between the photo quality on the iPhone 6s, the iPhone SE, and the 9.7" iPad Pro. In my iPhone SE review I said that the camera was a substantial upgrade over the one used in the iPhone 5s. In this case the gap is even larger, with Apple moving from an 8MP sensor with 1.1-micron pixels to a 12MP sensor with 1.22-micron pixels. Not only does moving to a higher resolution sensor enable UHD video recording, but the fact that the sensor is larger with more pixels will help to improve the quality of photos in good lighting, and even more so in poor lighting. Using Apple's latest SoC is also what allows for 1080p120 slow motion video and Live Photos.
| Daytime Photography |
As I said in my iPhone SE review, there's not a lot to say about this camera because we've already seen it in the market for many months now. While it's not the absolute best sensor in a smartphone, it's by far the best one in any tablet. Apple's processing gave them a lead over the competition when they were shipping 1.1-micron 8MP sensors in iPads, and with the 9.7" Pro moving to the same camera as the iPhone 6s the leap in image quality is significant. In the day you can see improved detail. It's also possible that the optics are an improvement over those used in other iPads, as you can see proper detail capture in some areas of photos where MTF limitations caused artifacting on older iPads.
| Night Photography |
As with the iPhone SE, the 9.7" iPad Pro is equivalent to the iPhone 6s when shooting in low light. In these particular shots there's a slight different in exposure but that could simply be due to me having a bit of trouble focusing on the same area with such a large device. The overall detail is equivalent between all the devices using Apple's 12MP sensor, and when you compare the 9.7" Pro to other tablets they're in completely different classes. The competition from Google is let down by worse cameras, worse ISPs, and worse processing, to the point where you basically can't use them to take a photo in low light. The best competition I've seen for the iPads was the Tab S2. Unfortunately, Samsung only loaned that to us for a short period so I no longer have it for comparisons, but given that it was equivalent to the iPad Air 2, it's safe to say that this new iPad Pro is really without competition for camera quality.
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zeeBomb - Wednesday, June 1, 2016 - link
About time! As a Canadian: to buy or not to buy... That is the question.sachouba - Wednesday, June 1, 2016 - link
It's funny how the iPad Pro 9.7 is compared with the Galaxy S6, the middle range Nexus 5X or the 6 months old Huawei Mate 8 instead of the Galaxy S7, Huawei P9, Xiaomi Mi5 or other 2016 flagships when it comes to performance, display accuracy, recharging time, storage speed, etc.Even with a multicore CPU performance that is not as good as the best CPUs on smartphones right now (the Galaxy S7, for instance), a mediocre contrast (what is the point of having accurate colors if blacks cannot even be rendered properly ?), a price that is way too high, and a battery life that is far from impressive, the iPad Pro is praised in your review...
When it comes to the conclusion, it looks like Apple has invented the "True Tone Display", although it is only a copy of the 2-year-old and not-much-marketed Adapt Display from Samsung – which works great and adapts the white point according to the surrounding environment. You have fallen in Apple's trap of making people believe they invented everything that is known and unknown to Man thanks to aggressive marketing, which is disappointing, to say the least...
Brandon Chester - Wednesday, June 1, 2016 - link
You must have missed the LG G5 in the charts, which is a Snapdragon 820 device. I can't compare to devices that haven't been fully reviewed.Also, you may want to re-read the article to find out why True Tone is not the same as Adapt Display, and to clarify some other things that it seems you missed.
jlabelle2 - Wednesday, June 1, 2016 - link
Quite condescending statement when what you wrote was : "As you move to different environments the color temperature of the display shifts to match how your eye adjusts its perception of white depending on the temperature and brightness of the light around you."Which is exactly what Sachouba describe about Samsung Adapt Display...
jlabelle2 - Wednesday, June 1, 2016 - link
Since departure of Anand, Apple product reviews look like PR marketing speech, although the tests and content itself of the review do not match the speech :- "It’s not hard to conclude that the display on the 9.7” iPad Pro is the best display on any tablet" : except that the Surface (Pro 4) has be shown as having a better display (proven also by Displamate) and the Surface 3 is also shown to have a better display or at least as good with the huge avantage for someone really after color accuracy that they can be calibrated.
- "However, the significant hardware upgrades that Apple has made with this new iPad Pro are enough to make up the difference. the 9.7” iPad Pro is only $50 more than the 128GB iPad Air 2 used to cost" : an argument that makes no sense. EVERYTIME the year passes and a new phone or tablet is released, we used to have more power or a better camera or better performance ... for the SAME price. Otherwise, what is the point of the new model ? Except that here, it is more expensive than the previous model. And it is between 100 to 200$ more expensive than the iPad Air 2. And if you want really to take advantage of the real benefit of the Pro (the keyboard and / or the pencil), you need to spend 100 to 270$ !?! Just insane.
- "As far as performance goes, A9X is still the fastest chip that you’ll find in an ARM tablet" : why restricting tablet to ARM processor ? What does it change for the end user if a tablet is running an ARM chip or a x86 chip ? Especially when even a fanless core M smokes the A9X ? And this is good to make the apology of the power of the "small" iPad Pro but what application is taking advantage of this power versus the iPad Air 2 ? Especially with the 2Go of RAM only ?
- "In the end, the 9.7” iPad Pro is clearly the best standard-sized tablet on the market." : and here it is. How can it be objectively labelled like this ? It seems an excellent tablet but making this universal statement when it is the most expensive, it has not the best display (when it really counts for some), it does not have the best keyboard implementation, it is limited by its RAM, and the biggest asset is also its biggest issue of course as it suffers from limited external peripheric support and of some powerful application / program that people who want a powerful tablet with a good display usually are after (photo / video editing, graphist...). So the hardware strengths are constrained by the software capabilities.
Strange wordings and conclusions regarding a overall very nice tablet but with its share of drawback for its intended audience.
Lochheart - Wednesday, June 1, 2016 - link
Do you know any 10" Tablet with Core M ?digiguy - Wednesday, June 1, 2016 - link
Have a look: http://www.onda-tablet.com/onda-v919-3g-core-m-tab...kmmatney - Thursday, June 2, 2016 - link
I would not recommend an Onda tablet - I bought one myself and it was a bit of a nightmare. There is very little support. A windows update reversed my touchscreen and was a pain to fix. The glass on the screen cracked with very minimal pressure, and finally one-third of the touchscreen simply stopped responding to touch. This was all within 4 months. I finally just sold mine on ebay, with a cracked screen, and telling the buyer that it could only be used with a mouse and keyboard. At least mine was a lot cheaper than the one you linked to, but cannot recommend an Onda tablet...digiguy - Thursday, June 2, 2016 - link
I am not recommending either, just showing that it's feasibleLochheart - Friday, June 3, 2016 - link
Feasible... but does it works ? Throttling, Heat, 1h battery life...And... Windows !