Artificial intelligence (AI) has been at the forefront of tech trends, but it’s lacking a major player in the field: Apple. Even as upgraded M-series chips and iOS devices continued to roll out over the past few years, it seemed to steer clear of AI territory – where in fact, it’s been integrated into the system.
The latest iPad lineup is the first Apple offering to sport the company’s M4 chip, alongside a host of new features. Available in 11 and 13 inches, the M4-powered iPad Pro touts two OLED panels that Apple calls Tandem OLED technology, a peak full-screen brightness of 1,600 nits, and the slimmest profile to date. The former measures 5.5 millimetres, while its larger sibling comes in at 5.1 mm, making it thinner than the iPod Nano and the lightest device in Apple’s history.
Under the hood, CPU performance is expected to be 50 percent faster than the M2 chip found in previous-gen iterations. The new silicon upgrade marries a 10-core GPU with next-generation machine learning accelerators to offer 120GB/s of unified memory and powerful capabilities like Dynamic Caching, ray tracing, and hardware-accelerated mesh shading. According to Apple, the iPad Pro with M4 is host to the most efficient Neural Engine ever, allowing users to execute AI-enabled tasks with greater ease.
Document scanning is now made easier with Adaptive True Tone Flash on the 12-megapixel f/1.8 rear camera, with the front camera swapped to landscape position. Other notable features include support for 4K ProRes video, as well as nano texture glass for preserving image quality and reducing glare (albeit at an extra cost).
The M4-powered iPad Pro is now available in silver and space black finishes. Prices will start at S$1,499 for the 11-inch and S$1,799 for the 13-inch with a base storage of 256GB. Separately, accessories for the tablet are also getting a refresh – the Apple Pencil Pro, for instance, supports squeeze gestures and Find My location tracking, while the Magic Keyboard includes a function key row.
As for the updated iPad Air, users can expect a Liquid Retina display in both 11 and 13 inches, alongside support for the Apple Pencil Hover feature, a single rear 12MP camera lens, and landscape stereo speakers with spatial audio. It comes outfitted with the M2 chip, 128GB of base storage, and four colour options: blue, purple, starlight, and space grey. The 11-inch and 13-inch models will retail for a starting price of S$899 and S$1199, respectively.
Si Jia is a casual geek at heart – or as casual as someone with Sephiroth’s theme on her Spotify playlist can get. A fan of movies, games, and Japanese culture, Si Jia’s greatest weakness is the Steam Summer Sale. Or any Steam sale, really.
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