Hi, this is Wayne again with a topic “2020 iPad pro vs 2020 MacBook Air”.
What’S up folks how’s it going, this will watch hope you guys are all doing well, and this is the new generation macbook air for 2020.. Now, back about two years ago, when apple launched this new generation air, it was awesome in the sense that the design was really sleek. You had the retina display, but its major drawbacks for the limited internal specifications and the ultra low profile butterfly mechanism keyboard now apple has addressed both of these two concerns, which is great to see. We have a keyboard – that’s very similar to the 16 inch macbook pro that we really like it goes back to a traditional scissor mechanism. Plus you can upgrade the internal cpu for faster overall performance. We actually have the core i7 version on this air and you can upgrade the internal ssd drive up to 2 terabytes. Now, for the longest time, the macbook air was the dominant and most popular pc that you can buy from apple, and that was until things like the ipad pro were available and back in 2018.
We actually did a comparison between the ipad pro and the macbook air, and i want to do the same thing with the newest versions of those two products. We have the 2020 version of the 11 inch ipad pro with the magic keyboard, as well as the 2020 macbook air. Now, whether you get the 11 or 12.9 inch version of the ipad pro one thing is for sure is that they are definitely the most capable and sleekest looking tablets out there and very suitable for people looking to replace their laptops. That being said, if you’re looking for a budget oriented laptop on the apple side, i definitely think that the new generation air is very very compelling, especially if you get the upgraded cpu options now in terms of the price point, the ipad pro for the 11 inch Version starts at 789.
That’S the base model version that we’re going to be taking a look at in this article. The 12.9 inch version starts at about a thousand dollars now, in order to be a true laptop replacement, you definitely want the magic keyboard or some sort of keyboard attachment for your ipad pro, whether you get the one with a trackpad or without we’re actually using the One without because the new magic keyboard with trackpad is not available currently for us at the moment of shooting at this video, but that’s definitely going to add anywhere between uh two to three hundred and fifty dollars. Uh to your overall system. And if you wan na get at the apple pencil, that’s gon na add an additional cost, as you would assume, and in terms of the macbook air side. It starts in between 7.99 and goes all the way up to like fifteen sixteen hundred dollars, depending upon your specific memory, configuration and ssd and processor options, the one that we specifically have is basically the baseline configuration uh with the upgraded core i 7 processor, which cost Around 1250 dollars now from a portability standpoint, whether you get the 11 or 12.9 inch version, both ipad pros are certainly going to be sleeker, more compact and slightly more portable than the macbook air.
Although the macbook air is super thin at its thickest point, it’s only around 16 millimeters and weighs about 1.29 kilograms. Now the trade-off of that ultra portability, as some people have shown that the ipad pro, especially the 12.9 inch version, is susceptible to bending and even casual usage. There are plenty of examples out there.
In most cases, that’s fairly rare and if you get the 11 inch version that we have over here, that is very unlikely to happen. But it can happen, especially if you’re kind of rough with your electronic devices, even if you have it in your bag or do a lot of traveling. So, in terms of durability sake, you do have a little bit more comfort and assurance that the air will hold up to abuse to a greater level now beyond that, in terms of the displays of both devices actually have amazing displays, but the ipad pro has probably One of the best displays i have encountered on any consumer electronic device. Whether that’s a laptop or tablet has a 120 hertz. A refresh rate is very bright, is rated up to 600 nits. You also have a higher pixel density camera about 265 on all versions of the ipad pros and uh.
The retina version of the macbook air is pretty much the exact same specifications that we encountered in the first generation, retina macbook air. So it’s about 2560 by 1600, with a ppi count of about 227. It’S a great overall display for a macbook, but from a pure quality perspective. The ipad pro has the slightly superior display now from a physical connectivity standpoint.
Certainly, the macbook air is slightly ahead by the fact that it does have two additional usb c thunderbolt 3 connections. Now you can adapt these to many many uh different kinds of connections, but you do need an adapter for that and same thing goes uh for the ipad pro, which only has a single usb c connection, which can be adapted uh to uh fit multiple needs, but Again, you’re gon na have to deal with adapters, but in terms of having more physical ports and connectivity options. Certainly the laptop is gon na be the winner over here, and you do have a 3.5 millimeter headphone jack that the ipad does not have now. That being said, if you get the magic keyboard attachment with the trackpad, you get access to an additional usb c, slash under both three connections, which is nice to see and i’m sure there’s going to be other accessories out there for the ipad pro that are going To enable more connectivity options for physical ports and future expandability now in terms of using the keyboard and trackpad attachment for the new generation ipad pro, we don’t have that product available to us right now, as we mentioned before, but in terms of using the standard keyboard Typeface cover it’s great as a typeface cover, but compared to a real keyboard on a laptop like the macbook airs a new generation keyboard.
It is definitely a lot more comfortable to type with long term on the macbook air. Now we’re actually using the new generation keyboard that ditches the old low profile, butterfly mechanism, with a more traditional scissor mechanism for the keyboard itself, very similar to the 16 inch version of the macbook pro it’s very comfortable to type on gives you plenty of key travel And good tactile sensation and feedback in order to make typing a fun and fairly comfortable experience for prolonged periods of time. And although we still haven’t tested out the new magic keyboard for the ipad with the trackpad attachment, i’m sure it’ll be nice to have a trackpad. On an ipad, but until we’ve experienced that product itself i would personally still prefer the keyboard and trackpad experience that i get on the new generation macbook air now move forward in terms of the hardware aspect of things, as we mentioned before, the a12 z bionic processor Is going to be very, very competitive in terms of its overall shear processing capabilities, and although it’s going to be limited to what applications you can run on ipad os, which is fairly limited compared to the breadth and width that you’re going to encounter on the macbook Air which can run windows, linux and mac os 10 natively. The key thing that i want to take a look at is the actual performance differences between the a12 zbionic processor on the ipad pro versus the best processor, that’s available on the macbook air. The 10th generation intel core i7 processor, which has four physical cores at eight threads. It can turbo up to 3.8 gigahertz and the a12 zbionic is a eight physical core processor, which also has eight gpu cores, and now the only cross compatible a benchmarking suite that we can really use on io pad os, as well as mac os x geekbench.
And although they’re still not an apples to apples comparison because hardware, optimization is different on uh, both platforms but in terms of the multi-core single core performance from a single core performance side, they’re very similar, basically you’re. Looking at 1200 points on the i7 processor versus 1100 points on the a12 z bionic, but in terms of the multi-core performance as you’d imagine having uh more physical cores, although we have the same amount of threads uh, you are getting faster performance on the ipad. About 4 700 points versus around 2 800 points on the core i7 version of the macbook air.
Now another thing we can do to test out the internal capabilities of both these two platforms is take a look at the video editing capabilities in terms of how long it takes to export a three and a half minute 4k project on imovie, on both platforms respectively And it took around three minutes 11 seconds on the ipad pro versus 3 minutes and 58 seconds on the air and keep in mind. We have the same exact transition, clips cut points, effects on both platforms, uh and even in that pretty much exact same scenario. The ipad is faster at exporting that video.
Now, although from a pure content creation experience, standpoint uh having a nice keyboard and trackpad, is going to be definitely easier to edit videos on the ipad air side and if you’re, just using the touchscreen with a keyboard. Definitely going to be tricky on the ipad, but if you have a mouse attached or even using a keyboard, trackpad attachment on the ipad pro, it’s definitely going to make video editing and overall content creation, a lot more easier and fun to use on the ipad now. Lastly, there are two additional advantages that the ipad undoubtedly has over the macbook and indeed many other laptops in this category, and that is one camera capabilities.
You have dual facing cameras, which is a new addition with lidar capabilities on the ipad pro a one is a 12 megapixel uh wide one is a 10 megapixel ultra wide and you also have 4k video capabilities, and the front facing camera is a 7 megapixel. 1080P, camera and the only camera that we have on the macbook air is just a 720p front-facing facetime camera, definitely not as good as what we have on the ipad pro. The other big advantage is going to be battery life and although the macbook air has always been a leader in terms of battery performance for ultrabook, pcs and in terms of the actual battery capacity itself, you’re looking at a 49.9 watt hour, lithium polymer battery on the Macbook air and we have a 28.65 watt hour battery on the 11 inch and a 36.7 watt hour battery on the 12.9 inch version of the ipad pro now to test the battery performance. We actually do a video playback test where we simply run a video on the vlc app in airplane mode with 50 brightness, and we got a total run time about eight hours and four minutes on the macbook air versus doing the exact same tests on both the 12.9 and 11 inch version of the 2020 ipad pros.
We got our total runtime of about 13 hours, 27 minutes on the 12 inch versus around 13 hours and eight minutes on the 11 inch version of the ipad pro. So, certainly in terms of video playback and overall battery capabilities, you’re, probably gon na get longer usage and run times out of the ipads compared to the macbook air. Now, beyond all those measures, i would still conclude that from a laptop replacement tablet perspective, the ipad pro is certainly a leader in its class and really gives things like the surface pro a run for its money and certainly with a capable array of accessories. It definitely makes it a very useful and practical device uh. That being said straight out of the box, the latest generation macbook air is great for pretty much everybody out there for general computing needs. You can do some multimedia based stuff for it, but from a budget ultrabook a pc standpoint, it’s definitely a leader in its class and thanks for the fact that you do have upgradable cpu options, uh, more expandable storage and a great keyboard and trackpad.
It is really a no-brainer for anybody out there as a student or anybody looking for a new budget-oriented laptop from apple. Now, if you are interested to see how this macbook air compares against the macbook pro in the 13-inch division, definitely make sure you click on uh. The card or in the description down below, because we have that comparison available for you, but other than that. Please give us a thumbs up, make sure you have post notifications turned on, and i want to thank you guys so much for your support. Without you, none of this will be possible, stay safe and take care.
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