This article has been indexed from MacRumors: Mac News and Rumors – Front Page
The new fifth-generation iPad Air will begin arriving to customers on Friday and, ahead of time, the first hands-on reviews of the device have surfaced. We’ve rounded up some of the reviews and unboxing videos below.
Key new features of the iPad Air include the same M1 chip found in the iPad Pro, 5G connectivity on cellular models, an upgraded 12-megapixel front camera with support for Center Stage, up to a 2x faster USB-C port for data transfer, and new color options. Pricing continues to start at $599 in the U.S. for 64GB of storage.
Overall, the new iPad Air remains a great value, with performance now on par with the iPad Pro thanks to the M1 chip and other Pro-like features.
M1 Chip
Geekbench 5 benchmark results that surfaced earlier this week confirmed that the M1 chip is not downclocked in the new iPad Air, resulting in the device having virtually identical performance as the iPad Pro.
Nevertheless, several reviewers pointed out that iPadOS makes it challenging to take advantage of the performance capabilities.
If you’re using the iPad for things like browsing the web, reading books, watching movies or TV shows, or even light productivity, you won’t likely notice the extra performance headroom the M1 chip provides. It mostly shines when doing especially demanding tasks, like editing and exporting 4K video or managing large file transfers. The Air is capable of doing those jobs, but there are better tools available if that’s what you intend to do that don’t have the limitations of iPadOS and a relatively small screen.
5G
The iPad Air now supports 5G networks on Wi-Fi + Cellular models, but not faster mmWave 5G like the iPad Pro does.
CNET‘s Scott Stein tested 5G on the new iPad Air:
This iPad doesn’t support mmWave, just sub-6 5G. Effectively, at many times, it feels similar to LTE: Speeds at my home were around 290 megabits per
[…]
Content was cut in order to protect the source.Please visit the source for the rest of the article.Read the original article: iPad Air 5 Reviews: Great Value With M1 Chip at $599 Starting Price