2024-08-20 - Some iPads, and, The Revolution

📆 Written: 2024-08-20

The revolution will not be on desktop.

A tale of of two iPads, which ends in revolutionary musings.

For a long time, I owned a terrible XPS13 (1250U CPU, 32GB RAM, 1TB Storage) which had major cooling issues. It throttled to the point of unusable and even general Windows navigation was a chore. I have spoken in great length about what a turkey it was. When finally gathered together the spare scratch to buy my MacBook Air (M2, 16GB Unified Memory, 1TB storage) I was instantly sated. My computing life was transformed by having the correct tool for the job. No more distracting fans spinning up when I opened Scrivener. No more odd slowdowns while typing. Best of all no more ‘Windows Modern Standby’ destroying my battery. My MBA is always on when I open the lid. It has a great battery, no fans to spin up and consistently performs well enough for my needs. I really like it. Though its chassis isn’t as pleasing as the XPS, but that is trivially minor, as the MBA is also pretty good looking. 

Since having the correct tool for the job, I have not looked at other laptops. I lost my laptop-lust because I have the thing which is correct for me. Honestly, had I got an M1 I probably would have felt the same, since my most used applications are Scrivener and… well, Scrivener.

I wanted to reach the same zen-like state of satiation with other aspects of my device-life. 

Hence, the iPad(s)

When I got my MBA, I casually ordered a base specification iPad 10 (64GB Storage) because I wanted to use it as a second screen and ‘reading the news’ device. However… I loved it. I loved my iPad SO MUCH! It became way more central to my workflows and, I can not articulate how convenient it was to use. I soon hit the walls on the 64GB of storage. 

Once I had a few magazines downloaded (Apple News: the only useful thing it actually does is let me read New Scientist) Procreate (I like to draw,) Procreate Dreams, and the Affinity suite, I had literally no space for anything else. 

This was an issue for me. I like Affinity suite, for making things, book covers, compositions, website assets. I like the Procreate apps for relaxing (I am very bad at art, but I really like doing it.) When I couldn’t quite fit all the things I like on my little glass job slate, I was mad. 

Another problem with the iPad 10 was the air gap in the screen. This was a secondary issue for me. I’m not actually good enough of an artist for it to matter but the iPad 10 lacks a laminated screen which results in a small but noticeable air gap between the bit the pencil touches (font glass) and where the pixies place the pixels (the LCD) which makes precision far harder when drawing. Again, to be clear this was a minor one for me because I can’t actually draw very well.

The solution was two fold and quite organic in some ways

I had a bunch of old technology which I didn’t want. Old Joysticks, some old RAM, an eGPU Enclosure and some retro controllers. I took them all to CEX, unrelated to iPads. I just wanted to get things out of my house. The result was £350ish of CEX store credit. That was far more than expected. I ordered a ‘B’ grade iPad mini 6 (256GB Storage) and it arrived very quickly. Ordering a ‘B’ is always a bit of a risk but CEX offer no quibble returns so I planned on just ‘retrying’ until I got a good one. The iPad arrived and was basically perfect, save for a small ‘dent’ in one corner. I am not someone who cared about chassis cosmetics so I was thrilled with the device.

I had some amazon credit which I didn’t pay for (it was a ‘gift’ from work) So I ordered a second generation Apple pencil and a cheap folio case.

The iPad mini has been awesome! I love reading on it and its amazing for silly games. I have enough space for all the apps I could want and its small enough to throw in a bag without really noticing its there. I love my iPad mini!

However, for creative works, it’s not good, not good at all. While it has a superior screen to the iPad 10, and sports support for a sane Apple pencil (the lollipop charging of the gen1 was not okay, but that’s another story) the 8inch screen does not leave a lot of room for activities.  - Side note, my daughter was thrilled with the iPad 10 I gave her! 

Given that my iPad mini was basically free, I only felt a small pang of guilt, when I ordered a 13inch iPad Air (M2, 513GB storage) and an Apple pencil pro. Since its arrival, I have seen a clear improvement in my awful art. The screen is big enough that it is not a limiting factor, and because space is no longer an issue, I have access to all the tools I could want at any given time and don’t face the dreaded ‘offloaded’ icon. 

The iPad air is a excellent device, while not as premium or slim as the pro, it has quite literally all the features which I care about. The screen is nice, and despite what some YouTube pundits claim, there really is no pencil lag; or at least not something I notice. The size is immense. It’s an awesome size and feels ‘correct’ for art. And, while I am not a good enough artist to leverage the pencil pro features, it’s vibrating feedback is luverly. 

Outside of art and comparisons to my previous issues: This is the first iPad which has given me access to Stage manager. While Stage-manager doesn’t make a lot of sense on macOS it is quite nice on iPadOS, especially when it’s connected to an external monitor. The ability to access a real second screen on an iPad makes it feel like a ‘real’ computer. I don’t plan on using my iPad as a desktop (past doing is a ‘game’ of sorts) it really is nice that I can do it, should I need to. 

Honestly, between my modest needs and the overkill power of the M2 chip, I am about 90% sure I could use it as my only computer, should the need arise. Actually, if I’m honest with myself, I probably should have gone this route instead of getting a MBA. I think my reliance on the so called ‘desktop operating system’ is more of a habit than anything else. While I do accept that there are many people who do need a ‘full fat OS’ I am not one of them. I spend most of my PC time in Scrivener, GFN from time to time, and, a web browser. All of which work excellently on an iPad. Thanks to the flexibility of Stage manager, I don’t even think that the experience would be particularly challenging. 

All of this rambling was, surprisingly in service of something, a forming statement of fact… 

Everyone thinks Apple have some secret AI weapon to release, to match the power of the M4 iPad Pro. But I think the reality is far simpler. The iPad is the flagship device of the future, not the MacBook Pro. Apple see the TikTok generation growing up with phones as their ‘computer’ and they know that the natural progression for them is iPadOS, not macOS. And, with the recently developing trends of long refresh cycles on the iPad, making it a generation in front (CPU wise) of the MBP, means that it won’t feel long in the tooth when it doesn’t see a substantial change for a couple of cycles. 

The thing about all the people screaming that iPad’s need macOS is that they are ‘grown up’ professionals in the industry. The next generation will be more likely to be screaming that they want iPadOS on a mac. We are at a pivot point right now where the desktop paradigm is not only cumbersome for the next generation, but it is also alien. We can be certain that you need a ‘real’ OS to get work done if we want, but a generation of nerds are coming up, for whom, your ‘real’ OS is simply old fashioned.

You may not like how things are changing but do not make the mistake of thinking that the next generation are ‘stupid’ or lack knowledge. They just do things differently to you. They do not prioritise the perfectly setup environment with meticulously curated files. They are however, still getting things done. They just use whatever is in front of them, or whatever the zeitgeist puts in front of them. They, often correctly assume that the popular thing is the most convenient. They do, not lack skill. They do, lack interest in the things you value. 

• The zoomers don’t care where files are, so don’t need file system access
• The zoomers don’t want five things on the screen at once, they want to hyper focus on one thing at a time for a short time. They don’t need your multi window desktop (though stage manager does appear to bridge this gap.)
• The zoomers don’t want to ‘fix’ a broken install, they just ‘cloud’ all their files and do a device wipe when things  get sluggish. 
• The zoomers don’t care how much RAM is in something or what the CPU’s FSB is clocked at. The zoomers buy the biggest number they can afford and work with it until they need a new one. 
• The zoomers don’t care that you can’t upgrade an iPad. They just buy a ‘bigger’ one next time.  In short, the revolution will not be televised.

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Note

This Was written by HexDSL, if this was liked by you, you can email him at Hexdsl@gmail.com or use this link to join Discord