It had been obvious for a while, but Apple's iPad Pro launch event today made it abundantly clear that the new oversized iPad is gunning directly for Microsoft's Surface Pro. With Apple's new Smart Keyboard attached, the new iPad Pro even looks just like a Surface Pro. And with pricing starting at $799, Apple is angling to match the competition dollar for dollar. If you're thinking about buying a big, powerful tablet to carry with you on your next project, consider these key points of comparison.
1) Nobody will want a $799 iPad Pro.
Sure, the iPad Pro starts at a relatively wallet-friendly $800 bucks, but take another look at the configuration. The low-end model has just 32 GB of storage on board. Cloud-connected workflow or not, you're going to want to keep at least some of your media on local storage alongside all your apps, and 32 GB isn't going to go very far when you start talking about editing 4K video, as Apple's Phil Schiller did today. The 64 GB on the entry-level Surface Pro 3 is less of an insult to content creators. Go a little upmarket, and the Surface Pro 3 starts to look more attractive. A 128 GB Surface Pro 3 with keyboard and stylus runs $1,029, compared to $1,348 for an iPad Pro with keyboard and Pencil. Advantage: Microsoft.
2) Drawing could be a dealmaker.
Seriously. Steve Jobs disdained the lowly stylus, but many people working in design, digital painting, and other fields need stylus support. It seems like the Apple Pencil's close integration with Apple's iOS could deliver a truly superior drawing experience on the iPad, that would be a meaningful advantage for a lot of creative pros. Advantage: Apple.
3) Size matters.
The iPad Pro is thinner and lighter than the Surface Pro 3, which becomes important in a device you're planning to haul around on set or on location all day long. At 0.27 inches thick (vs. 0.36 inches) and 1.57 pounds (vs. 1.76 pounds), the difference doesn't amount to much. But throw in a slightly bigger screen (12.9 inches vs. 12) and higher resolution (2732×2048 vs. 2160×1440) and Apple has Microsoft beat on that score for now. Advantage: Apple.
4) Microsoft makes the next move.
The iPad Pro won't ship until November, which gives Microsoft sufficient time to work on its head-to-head strategy, announcing the Surface Pro 4 and making any pricing adjustments that it deems advantageous. Microsoft will no doubt be looking to give its Surface as many competitive advantages as possible. Advantage: Microsoft.
We'll call it a draw, at least based on what we know right now. Apple has a chance to make a big impression with performance and usability — or to end up playing catch-up with Microsoft, who did after all get to this market first.
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BS, how is the pen, or pencil like Apple calls it their advantage or innovation, when its a feature that has worked like a full feature digitizer pen since surface 1, never a vanilla looking stylus….i know in the end you call this a drawn to save impartiality face, but it makes no sense.
Well, think of it as a way of giving Apple the benefit of the doubt. They’re pretty much outgunned on specs, and Microsoft is going to be able to come back at them with an advantage before the iPad Pro ships. But Apple has always gotten by on design and usability, which is important. I’m a Windows guy but I used a Retina MacBook Pro for a while before switching to a PC workstation (a Dell, with better specs). I like the PC, but I sure do miss the build quality of the Mac and especially the silky responsiveness of that touchpad. The Dell touchpad makes my fingers feel twice as fat and stubby as they are, and it makes me curse a lot. If the iPad Pro can bring a similar kind of advantage to the pairing of the new stylus with iOS 9, I think that will make a compelling case for a lot of creative users. For pure productivity users, the multitasking interface will probably be the key. The iPad Pro could do some of this stuff really well — but we won’t really know until people start getting their hands on it and putting it through its paces.
Yeah I agree with your points, kind of laugh in agreement at the dell touchpad comments, its better with the new versions but still, but me I don’t care much because I have been using touch screen on my surface 2 for a while(waiting for surface 4 now :)), several OEMs for PCs at several price ranges but to find the quality hardware there are not much…while I agree with the MacBook air in terms of hardware, and I have owned one before (just to end up installing windows7)..in this case… besides being a bit bigger and resolution, its still an oversize IPhone as its running iOS, not OSX, the new keyboard and 99$ stylus are very much like the Surface pro, they basically embraces it…..
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The stylus itself isn’t much in terms of hardware, much more the software and how the OS handles it…. which is why I pointed the digitizer like functions.
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You also have to compare the A9x vs a i9 core for processor…in the end, it goes to software besides hardware here, for ipad you are still going to be spending over $1300 to get a mobile OS vs a full productivity OS like the OSX or W10…
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I dont know how you feel about this but IMO a lot of the bigger news is how Natella is right to push Office to Apple products, as makes it a point how other software such as Cortana needs to be there too…. its s bigger move financially, and with the W10 being massively embraced, and all this fits more into pushing their software ecosystem all around which is unifying things and eliminating fragmentation…with Office365 its expanding dominance on enterprise over google docs now….Android still very much fragmented, Apple has and iOS, Watch, OS X, Apple TV…where everything by end of the year is basically at its core W10 from XBOX, to PC to phone…and AZURE and web services bringing other devices such as Apple and Android hardware tot he mix too…
Missed a key difference here. One is running legitimate laptop processors and a real deaktop OS. None of this paired down mobile OS, I can only run mobile apps two at a time stuff. One can run a full version of Photoshop or Premiere. This is a big difference.
It’s utterly incomprehensible how all the tech press completely ignore the massive elephant in the room when comparing the iPad Pro to Surface Pro – one is a full featured desktop class workhorse and a consumption tablet in one, while the other is a larger iPad. Try being productive in almost any field without the real desktop programs and the file management/connectivity Surface provides. Instead everyone is comparing things like the pixel density being 3% higher or the thickness being 2 millimetres less. Are you out of your freaking minds??
The only logical conclusion is that somehow Apple spent a huge amount of cash to buy all these articles. I just cannot believe that ALL these writers are so stupid.
The iPad is historically even less capable as a “workhorse” compared to the Surface Pro, and yet people keep finding uses for it. In production, there are apps for viewing dailies, for making preliminary color decisions on set, even for scouting locations. Newer versions of iOS improve functionality with limited multitasking features. And some people really do not like Windows. Yes, if you want to sit down and be very productive in Photoshop you should be looking at a Surface Pro (or perhaps a full-on MacBook Pro or HP/Dell/Lenovo workstation). But enough people want a dead-simple interface that there’s still demand for a device that bypasses the intricacies of a real OS, especially if it delivers a more elegant interface. File management is a huge pain in the ass, yes, but integration with purpose-built, cloud-connected apps is making some of that pain go away.
I totally get your point (and I’m mainly a Windows guy myself) but I don’t think it’s completely crazy to figure that the iPad Pro might find a niche, especially as a highly portable review/approval or annotation/collaboration tool. Some people might make rough cuts using iMovie, too, I dunno.