The Apple iPad Air 2 Review
by Joshua Ho on November 7, 2014 9:30 AM EST- Posted in
- Tablets
- Apple
- Mobile
- iOS
- ipad Air 2
GPU Performance
On the GPU side of things the iPad Air 2 seems to have a GX6650, which should provide a healthy boost to GPU performance when compared to the GX6450 in the A8. Apple has placed a strong emphasis on gaming for their iPad line, so there are some obvious comparisons to be made between NVIDIA's Tegra K1 and the A8X as well. To test this, we use a suite of benchmarks that can give a good idea of real world gaming performance.
In practice, while we see that the A8X's GPU is extremely close to Nvidia's single Kepler SMX across the board, with the sole exception of 3DMark which seems to be due to the dependencies present in the physics test that dramatically lower the overall score. NVIDIA's Tegra K1 seemed incredible for its GPU performance earlier this year, so it's just as surprising to see Apple successfully rival NVIDIA in this area. Of course, GPU performance is a function of both peak performance and sustained performance, so we'll have to look at the GFXBench battery rundown test to get the full picture here. If Apple can deliver far superior performance and battery life in such a situation, it's pretty clear that the jump to 20nm will be critical to pushing the limits on what's possible in a mobile device.
NAND Performance
As we've seen before on some tablets, poor storage performance can cause major issues with the overall experience as I/O pauses can far exceed just a few frame drops that one might expect from cases of UI lag induced by insufficient performance elsewhere. In order to attempt to quantify this performance we use a custom utility developed by Eric Patno. While such testing is far from a complete look at performance, this can give a rough idea of what to expect.
Overall, it seems that Apple does quite well on the storage tests. It seems that the iPad Air 2 shares its storage solution with the iPhone 6. While I don't have an iPad Air on hand for testing, it should match quite closely to the iPhone 5s. This represents a generally high-quality NAND solution, but as mentioned before random I/O could stand to improve a bit. Compared to most of the lower-cost Android tablets it's definitely as good as it gets though.
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DosOldie - Sunday, November 9, 2014 - link
I still have an iPad 2 and I do not plan on upgrading my iPad until there is add on space. Put in a usable SD slot and I' ll upgrade. Adding & deleting apps will not change w a new iPad w the same amt of space.ws3 - Wednesday, November 12, 2014 - link
So you will never be upgrading...tralalalalalala40 - Thursday, November 13, 2014 - link
See the iStick... You see. everything is going wireless. They have wireless HDs from toshiba that are for the iPad now. You don't need a random dust collecting/battery dwindling port to get done what you want to get done.sdagley - Monday, November 10, 2014 - link
The line "I’m not necessarily sold on TouchID on a tablet as an ergonomic ideal as the sheer width of the device makes it a bit harder than usual to properly place my finger for scanning" in the Final Words section doesn't make sense. The TouchID sensor works with multiple fingers at any any orientation which makes it easy to use no matter how you're holding it. This review makes it sound like Apple uses the old style vertical swipe sensor like the Galaxy S5 usesLgFriess - Monday, November 10, 2014 - link
Just picked up an Air 2 over the weekend. I'm no Apple fan boy (PC gamer, Note 3 phone and don't think I'll ever go back to an iphone, and I generally despise itunes) , I just wanted what I thought would work best for me. After agonizing for months over every tablet out there including the Nexus 9, I just liked the Air 2.The cons (since that's what everybody seems interested in);
1. It's almost too thin. It feels delicate to me. I'd much rather have a bit thicker tablet with a more substantial feel. Stop with the thin thin thinner crap. Of course I have a case on the way but still.
2. The vibration. Yep it's definitely there. However, I can't think of any situation that this would bother me in the least bit. I wouldn't have thought to mention it but I saw so many comments here saying it's worse then ebola. There is no way somebodies fingers are going numb when holding it. People are starting to make up things to enforce their argument. The vibration certainly goes back to problem 1. Too thin, too light, too delicate in the hand.
3. Speakers. Not that I'm expecting anything great on a tablet but I sure like the thought of the Nexus front facing speakers. It's just a better solution. The ipad speakers aren't bad at all. They're just typical tablet speakers.
All in all, it's been a great addition. Fast, smooth, great apps (just tried Hearthstone for the first time, and as a PC gamer, I'd say it makes a great tablet game which I generally can't stand), display is gorgeous, battery life is longer then expected though gaming will eat it up quickly. The fingerprint ID thing IS nice, which surprises me as I wouldn't have thought I would care.
Very happy with my purchase.
LgFriess - Monday, November 10, 2014 - link
One other thing. There is absolutely NO distortion just holding the tablet. Another instance of over dramatization. I've put a little pressure into the back and didn't notice any distortion in that case either, but as I've said above, I do feel it's too thin/delicate and I'm afraid I'll damage it if I were to squeeze it too much. By "too much" I mean actively trying to bend it to see if the screen will distort, but not under normal use.tralalalalalala40 - Thursday, November 13, 2014 - link
When I pile-drive my LCD monitors at work they distort so I took them back.yhselp - Monday, November 10, 2014 - link
It's worth mentioning that this is the first handheld device (apart from full-fledged Windows tablets) truly close to last-gen gaming consoles in terms of performance - 25.6 GB/s memory bandwidth and a powerful triple-core CPU. It'd be interesting to see how the 1.5 GHz enhanced Cyclone stacks against the 3.2 GHz PowerPC in the Xbox 360.spammy39 - Tuesday, November 11, 2014 - link
Is there any reason why Anandtech does not include the Surface Pro 3 on the benchmark list?Fairshare - Wednesday, November 12, 2014 - link
Do you see any Intel Core based tablets here? The Surface Pro 3 is a PC that just happens to be a tablet so it's not really comparable in terms of performance. You might compare other statistics such as battery, display etc. but it's otherwise a completely different animal.