Review of the Apple iPad Air 2 tablet: the conqueror of our hearts

With the rise in popularity and falling prices of their smaller brothers, large tablets have had to lose market share to them. Even Apple gave up by the fourth generation of iPad and was forced to release a smaller tablet on the market - the iPad mini. At the same time, Apple was well aware that if the full-size iPad remained at the same level of development, then the public’s interest in it would be less and less: simply increasing power and adding some software “chips” would not get by. The Apple company's engineers had a really difficult task: they needed to make a full-size tablet that would be as convenient to use as its younger brother. And Apple did it.

iPad Air 2

Last year, the iPad Air saw the light of day, a tablet that is superior to its predecessor in all respects. It was worth it that he lost almost two hundred grams of weight, and his thickness decreased by two millimeters! In the camp of Android tablets, in fact, only the Sony Xperia Tablet Z could compete with it - also, it should be noted, a very successful tablet. There were no other analogues at that time.

The first Air really turned out to be extremely successful, no matter how you look at it. And on the way to a bright future he had only one problem. Its name is iPad mini with Retina Display (now iPad mini 2. The fact is that its technical filling completely copied the hardware of its older brother, and using the mini was in many ways more convenient due to the same dimensions. And let it be in Apple They say that they are not afraid of internal competition; in the new generation of tablets, Apple clearly decided to eliminate it - they left the mini almost unchanged, concentrating all their efforts on the Air.

Apple iPad Air compared to iPad 4 (bottom)

Air 2 received all the newest, all the best, and mini 3, shown with it on the same day, is content with last year's developments. Of course, this is not very good - Apple deprives users of the opportunity to choose, imposing either definitely the best or definitely last year's. What makes the situation worse is that the price difference between Air 2 and mini 3 is not very big: a modern Air costs from 24,490 rubles, and a mini costs from 19,490 rubles. And this is provided that the iPads of 2014 turned out to be fundamentally different...

⇡#Appearance and ergonomics

The exterior of the iPad Air 2 has remained virtually unchanged since the first Air. The shape of the device remains the same, the ratio of the areas of the screen and the front panel has not changed. Try to determine from the photo where the new Air is on it.

Apple iPad Air - new and previous

Of course, attentive readers will say without a shadow of a doubt that Air 2 is white, and they will be right. Not because it’s in the photo above, but because it clearly shows the central Home key with a Touch ID fingerprint sensor. In the exterior of the device, this is perhaps the most noticeable, but far from the only change.

Apple iPad Air 2 - Home button with Touch ID fingerprint scanner

The new Air has become slightly lighter than its predecessor. The gadget weighs only 437 grams in the version without a built-in modem and 444 grams with it. For a ten-inch gadget with a metal body, this is a very small figure. Even 480 grams of the previous model was considered a breakthrough, but Apple engineers did not stop there.

Apple iPad Air 2 has become even thinner

Perhaps the most significant change in the appearance of the gadget can be considered a reduction in the thickness of the case from 7.5 millimeters to a record 6.1 mm! At the moment, not a single ten-inch tablet can boast of this indicator (remember, the previous record holder is the same Xperia Z2 Tablet with a thickness of 6.4 mm). It is noteworthy that the length and width of the case have not changed one iota. It is probably due to the reduced thickness that the engineers had to abandon the physical switch for silent mode, located next to the volume keys. By the way, between these buttons there is the same unsightly glossy dimple as in the iPhone 6. The reduced thickness is emphasized by a single (and not double, as before) perforation opposite the external speaker at the bottom end.

Bottom end of Apple iPad Air and iPad Air 2 (top)

Apple iPad Air 2 - connectors and interfaces

Like all modern mobile gadgets from Apple, the iPad Air 2 comes in a gold case. In the subjective opinion of the author of this article, this color suits the tablet very well. It is exactly golden, not golden, not rich, but very soft, with a pleasant metallic sheen. Air 2 looks very nice. On the rear panel there is an eight-megapixel camera lens (the predecessor had only five megapixels).

Apple iPad Air 2 - back panel

We believe that the situation with the exterior of the iPad Air will be the same as with the appearance of the MacBook Air. Apple has not updated the appearance of this laptop for several years, simply because the standard, one might say, has been achieved. Coming up with something better will be very, very difficult, and it’s unlikely to be necessary at this stage of development. The same applies to the exterior of the iPad Air.

Judge for yourself: the thickness of the device’s case is minimal; it will hardly be possible to reduce it due to, for example, an audio jack. Of course, it is possible to reduce the thickness of the frame around the display, but then working with the gadget may be inconvenient - there will be nothing to grab onto. The weight of the Air 2 by the standards of 10-inch tablets is very, very small. In general, we really liked the appearance of the iPad Air 2. What's inside?

iPad 2

Thinner. Easier. Faster. —Apple

The updated tablet received a dual-core A5 processor, 512 MB of RAM, simple rear and front cameras, and a different body shape that lasted two more generations of iPad. It was 4.4 mm thinner than its predecessor and approximately 70 grams lighter. The display remained absolutely the same, but a white model appeared. The iPad 2 took two and a half months to reach Russia - a relatively short time.

This “old man” is still standing, you can download the latest version of iOS onto it, no need! True, he works on it “with a creak.”

⇡#Technical characteristics

* 64GB and 128GB versions of iPad Air are no longer officially sold

iPad Air

Power is lighter than light. —Apple

And again, Apple showed two tablets at once - Air and mini. Their design was brought to the same denominator, and the technical characteristics are generally identical, with the exception of the size and color rendition of the display.

The iPad Air fully lived up to its name in size and weight. Thin side frames make the tablet narrow. It was lighter than previous models by about 180 grams. And very powerful. The A7 processor, RAM with increased frequency and a new graphics chip were responsible for this.

⇡#Display

Perhaps the screen is one of the few elements of the iPad Air 2 that has not undergone significant changes compared to the previous model. By and large, its characteristics have not changed radically since the iPad 3. However, to be honest, it did not require replacement - everything is already good. The full-size iPad still has an IPS matrix with a diagonal of 9.7 inches with a resolution of 2048 × 1536 pixels. Accordingly, its pixel density is still the same high - 264 ppi. This is enough for comfortable work with a ten-inch tablet, and there is absolutely no need to enlarge it - the fonts are sharp, the picture at a half-bent arm's distance does not hurt the eye with a thick pixel.

The viewing angles of the screen are very wide, it is really convenient to watch movies and photos on it together - the size is suitable, the resolution is high, and there is no color distortion. The capacitive layer supports up to ten simultaneous touches, which can be tested and applied, for example, in the standard Garage Band application.

Apple iPad Air 2 - individual dots on the display are impossible to see at a distance of a half-bent arm

However, there are some changes to the iPad Air 2 display. For example, the air gap between the protective glass and the screen itself has become much less noticeable, but it is still present there. However, it did not interfere too much when working with the previous Air, but here it is practically unnoticeable. Of course, the Air 2 display has a polarizing filter and an oleophobic (grease-repellent) layer. The display doesn't fade even in bright ambient light, thanks in part to a new anti-glare filter that's a little more effective at dampening reflections.

The brightness reserve of the screen of the second Air has increased slightly: the maximum luminosity of the white field has increased from 409 to 427.5 cd/m2. True, perhaps, again it’s all about the matrix manufacturer. The minimum backlight level is only 12 cd/m2. In the dark, the device is very gentle on the eyes.

The maximum luminosity of the black field with a sufficiently high brightness margin is small - 0.4 cd/m2. This means that blacks look deep even when the display is at 100% backlit. The display is very contrasty - almost 1070:1, and this is when measured in an “honest” way: white and black are displayed on the screen in a 50/50 ratio.

The color temperature of the displays of both iPad Airs is approximately the same. On average it is 7000-7100 kelvin. Let us remember that the standard value is considered to be 6500 K. The deviation is insignificant; we did not see any noticeable “cold” tint on both screens. The color temperature is rather natural.

Both displays are configured very carefully. All kinds of gamma curves - both grayscale and color components - are close to the reference curve. This means that the color rendition of the screens is natural and believable. True, on the gray gamma curve of the iPad Air 2 display there is a small dip at the bottom from somewhere, but it does not change the situation. When using the tablet, we did not notice any deviations in the transmission of light shades of gray.

The color gamut of the displays is the same - it almost completely matches the sRGB color space, which is very good. In general, the display is configured almost according to the textbook. It’s no wonder that so many photo editing apps have been released for iPads.

Apple Pencil

Would Steve approve? The whole point of the iPad was that you didn't need a stylus to use it. And yet, the Apple Pencil stylus for the iPad Pro was introduced in 2015. It has become a hallmark of the Pro line. The 2nd generation stylus is now available and is compatible with the 3rd generation iPad Pro 12.9 and 11-inch iPad Pro. All other current-generation iPad models support the 1st generation Apple Pencil.

First version of the stylus

Third-party manufacturers have long offered styluses for the iPad. They may have a transparent disc around the tip that simulates pressing a finger on the screen. However, the Apple Pencil allows for more refined input and interaction. With it you can draw, make sketches, notes, notes on screenshots and messages. It detects the pressure applied. The harder you press, the thicker the line you get, and by tilting you can create shadows. The 2nd generation model attaches to the iPad Pro body with magnets and supports wireless charging. Double clicking on its body changes tools.

⇡#Hardware and performance

From a technical standpoint, the iPad Air 2 is a largely unique phenomenon for Apple and the industry as a whole. It’s worth starting with the fact that this is the first gadget from Cupertino that uses a platform with more than two cores. The device has an A8X system-on-chip installed. You might think that this is a slightly modified version of the A8 platform that is installed in the iPhone 6/6 Plus, but this is not entirely true. Well, or not at all: this is a fundamentally different SoC - much more powerful.

Apple A8X - still from Apple presentation

We have already given you the key difference between the “X” version: it uses three modified Cyclone cores, and not two, as in the regular A8. Their frequency has been increased by 100 MHz - from 1.4 to 1.5 GHz. It uses the 64-bit ARMv8-A instruction set, which Apple has switched to since the iPhone 5s. The chip is made at the Taiwanese TSMC factory using the most advanced technological process that TSMC is capable of at the moment - 20 nm. A finer process technology results in energy savings or increased productivity. From the frame from the presentation, it’s easy to guess that Apple chose to increase the power of the chip.

Another equally important innovation can be safely considered that Apple has finally decided to install two gigabytes of RAM in its gadget. Let us emphasize, with your permission, this significant fact: Air 2 is the company’s first device to feature 2 GB of RAM. Of course, “fast” LPDDR3 memory is used. The positive effect was not long in coming - the new Air passed the SunSpider cross-platform test in almost three hundred milliseconds - extremely quickly. The best result in our memory.

The graphics controller in the A8X is also not exactly the same as in the “regular” A8 - while the latter uses the Imagination Technologies PowerVR GX6450, the A8X uses the GX6650. The differences, in general, are indicated by the only changed number: if the GX6450 is a gluing together of four modules, then the GX6650 is a gluing together of six of the same modules. Apple itself is happy to talk about how far the graphics of the iPad Air 2 have gone from previous solutions. For example, in graphics tasks, the iPad Air 2 outperforms the very first iPhone (which is 2G) by as much as 84 times. The benchmark results make it clear that the PowerVR GX6650 and the Apple A8X in general are really very cool things.

Air 2 is noticeably faster than the first Air, mini 2/3, iPhone 6/6 Plus. Moreover, the difference in gaming tests is so significant that it amounts to a small revolution. It's no joke - three thousand frames “on screen” in GFXBench 3. We admit, we have never seen this before. In general, the Air 2 openly and in some places even boldly lays claim to the title of the most powerful tablet of 2014. Yes, we have not yet compared its achievements with the results of the Tegra K1 and Qualcomm Adreno 420 as part of the Snapdragon 805, but, according to foreign colleagues, the new Air comes out victorious even in such a competition.

Honestly, watching the iPad Air 2 crush the benchmarks is a real geek's treat. Both Airs were tested at the same time, but only the new tablet from Apple captured frame after frame so clearly, so smoothly that we were amazed and literally gave a standing ovation. The first Air, to its credit, was also good. However, he periodically stumbled and allowed himself to slow down slightly, while nothing similar was noticed in his successor. Not surprisingly, the Air 2 completed all tests noticeably earlier.

It is clear why the A8X platform was not given to the new iPhones - its power consumption is still not very suitable. And it’s very good that Apple chose the iPad Air 2 to test new, really high power. After all, tablet computers require more power - they are the ones that most often run resource-intensive 3D games and keep many open programs and browser tabs in memory. So two gigabytes of RAM are also very useful here. Finally, I would like to note that the Apple iPad Air has not become obsolete in a year - it has enough capabilities for both multimedia and games. But Air 2 is faster in almost everything, and it just has a reserve for the future.

⇡#“Continuous work” aka Continuity

In our iPad mini 3 review, we started talking about the new Continuity software package for iOS 8, which allows you to synchronize application data between mobile devices and computers running Mac OS X Yosemite. Let us recall the essence of this function: if you have a browser open on your mobile device with some tab loaded or a certain point on the map loaded, you can open the corresponding application on your laptop or computer with the same data. This feature is called Handoff.

It is noteworthy that the iPad can be paired not only with a Mac, but also with an iPhone. Let's say you are reading an electronic document on a tablet, your smartphone is somewhere in another room. Suddenly my iPhone received an incoming call. If you have the Continuity option configured on your tablet, you won't have to go get your smartphone. You can answer a call from your iPad (or Mac) without touching your phone.

Apple iPad Air 2 - answering an incoming iPhone call

To enable this Always-On feature, you need to connect your iPhone and iPad (and/or Mac if you want to answer calls to and from it) to the same Wi-Fi network and sign in to the same iCloud account. After that, you need to sign in to FaceTime using the same iCloud account, and then make sure that iPhone Cellular Calls is enabled in the Settings menu. If everything is done correctly, the user will be able to make and answer calls from an iPad or Mac using FaceTime.

Apple iPad Air 2 - FaceTime settings

iPad mini

iPad down to the last inch. —Apple

Another new product of the same year. In the fall, Apple introduced two iPads at once for the first time. At one time, Jobs was categorically against a smaller tablet, but consumers thought differently.

A low-resolution display and other internals of the iPad 2 were “stuffed” into the 7.9-inch device. This in no way detracts from the capabilities of the old hardware, but on the contrary, speaks of its large power reserve. Many people didn’t like this move, but even with this filling, the first mini “pulled” and worked faster than its competitors.

The design of the case has changed, the main elements of which still migrate from one new product to another; this can be seen even in the huge iPad Pro.

⇡#Camera

Cupertino did not forget to update the main camera of the iPad Air. The first Air used a five-megapixel sensor, to which we had well-founded complaints - it shot noticeably worse than the camera of its predecessor, the iPad 4: due to the fact that the Air's body was much thinner than the body of the Four, it The camera had to be cut down a bit. For a tablet, in our subjective opinion, the rear camera is not at all critical, but it’s still unpleasant when something in a new device is done worse than in its predecessor, isn’t it?

Apple iPad Air 2 - main camera (official photo)

And now Apple is correcting the errors. The Air 2 has a new eight-megapixel iSight camera that takes pictures with a resolution of 3264x2448 pixels. We were already saying that she moved to Air from the iPhone 6/6 Plus, but we hasten to upset you: this is not so. The main camera of the iPad Air 2 has a physical pixel size that is significantly smaller than the camera of the new iPhone - 1.12 versus 1.5 microns. This means that it is able to capture less light, making it less suitable for shooting in low light conditions. In addition, the optics of the Air 2 camera are also less aperture: the maximum relative aperture is ƒ/2.4 versus ƒ/2.2 for the iPhone 6 lens. Finally, the Air 2 camera does not receive support for fast phase (PDAF - Phase Detection Autofocus) autofocus , which the “six” can boast of. The tablet camera is focused in a standard way - by contrast.

Of course, the Air 2 shoots noticeably better than the first Air - both the higher resolution and faster aperture optics have an impact here. However, the iPad Air 2 camera is still far from ideal. Even in room conditions, photographs turn out to be quite noisy, with a lot of artifacts. However, we must give the camera its due; the color rendition in the photographs is more or less natural, the picture is very detailed and contrasty. Autofocus works smoothly and quite quickly. The percentage of errors and misses is minimal.

The tablet's camera is great for capturing text. It copes with this task in any conditions, of course, except complete darkness. Even in a photo taken in low light, the text can be read. Sharpness is almost uniform across the entire field of the frame, except that there is a slight “softness” towards the edges. Overall, the Air 2 has a standard rear camera by 2014 standards - neither good nor bad. She doesn't have a flash. With the front-facing 1.2-megapixel webcam, you can get a decent-quality self-portrait if you wish. With its help, you can make video calls, the main thing is that there is at least some source of lighting nearby. In general, nothing supernatural, but it copes with its tasks.

iPad mini 4

Nimble. Small. —Apple

This is roughly what we expected from mini 3. A8 processor, 2 GB of RAM, anti-glare display and a more serious camera. In terms of power and size, it is on par with last year's iPhone 6 Plus.

The previous generation of smaller tablets was sold for only a year, then the new iPad mini 4 took its place.

The start of sales in Russia began simultaneously with the first wave of countries. We can only hope that this will happen with the releases of the next new Apple products.

⇡#Autonomous work

The surgical operation to reduce the thickness of the case from 7.5 to 6.1 mm could not pass completely without leaving a trace. The iPad Air 2 engineers had to sacrifice something. After carefully studying the technical characteristics of the device, it becomes clear what exactly they had to deteriorate: as usually happens in such cases, the battery was damaged. The first Air had a 32.4 Wh battery, but its successor only had a 27.3 Wh battery.

However, the battery life of the Air 2 has not changed compared to its predecessor. Moreover, according to our tests, the gadget lasts even a little longer on a single battery charge than the first Air: that’s what life-giving optimization does! In continuous video playback mode, with an active Wi-Fi connection and at maximum screen brightness, the gadget worked for eight hours. For a full-size tablet, this figure is not a record, but very, very good. With moderate use, the tablet's battery is more than enough for a day of battery life. If you do not use the gadget too actively, its battery may last for three to four days, depending on the usage scenario.

iPad 4

Just as gorgeous. But twice as fast. —Apple

This is exactly what the iPad 3 should have been, because it is no coincidence that Apple called the fourth generation of the device “iPad with Retina display.” Although a similar screen was in the previous tablet. The new product received an improved A6x processor, higher frequency RAM, a Lightning connector, a front camera with adequate matrix resolution and 4G operating in Russia. The tablet just “flyed”.

Its release was unexpected and significantly spoiled the mood of those who bought the third generation of the tablet in the summer. At the moment, this is the last iPad in the “classic” case.