Phil Schiller called the Apple Pencil “the greatest accessory Apple has ever made” during yesterday’s keynote event, and now Apple’s giving you the chance to keep your official Cupertino stylus alive for a bit longer — thanks to a new pack of four extra Apple Pencil tips.
Small was the new big at Apple’s “Let us loop you in” keynote today. And while some felt the 64-minute unveiling was the most snooze-worthy event ever, Apple used it to unleash the most important iPad its made since the original tablet launched in 2010.
The new 9.7-inch iPad Pro is much more than just a smaller variant of the 12.9-inch super slate Apple came out with last year. It’s a machine built to target Apple’s next big customer pool: the 600 million people still using 5-year-old PCs.
“That’s just sad,” Apple VP Phil Schiller said onstage, describing the unfortunate souls toiling with aging Windows machines. And the new, right-sized iPad Pro is exactly what those people need.
Forget the iPad Air 3. Apple’s new 9.7-inch tablet will be a scaled-down version of its supercharged 12.9-inch iPad Pro — called (drumroll, please) the 9.7-inch iPad Pro.
The new, smaller iPad Pro features four-speaker audio, a rear flash, Apple Pencil support, a Smart Connector for an all-new 9.7-inch Smart Keyboard, Apple’s most advanced iPad camera yet, and some very, very cool True Tone technology for matching the ambient light wherever you are.
Oh, and a fancy new 256GB storage option.
Don’t worry iPad Pro lovers, Apple isn’t nerfing it’s fancy Pencil.
The company removed the ability to navigate in iOS 9.3 with the Apple Pencil in the last four beta updates, but Apple reassured users today that it will bring the functional it back by the time iOS 9.3 is available to the public, it’s just fixing a few things in the meantime.
With yesterday’s release of the latest iOS 9.3 beta, one thing is looking more and more likely: Apple has intentionally debuffed the Apple Pencil so it can no longer be used to navigate through iOS.
Now, it’s only meant for drawing and writing within apps.
The iPad Pro and Apple Pencil are making paper and pencil design workflow a thing of the past.
Amanda Somers, a user experience (UX) designer for mobile app developer Mindsea Development, writes on Medium about her newfound respect for the Apple Pencil and iPad Pro combination.
“We are confident in saying we are able to sit down with iPad Pro and Apple Pencil and create something just as good, if not better, than sketching traditionally using pencil and paper,” she writes.
Keeping track of my Apple Pencil is a royal pain. Either I’ve got to slip it into a bag like an actual writing implement, carry it around in my pocket, or get one of those cases for my iPad Pro that adds a ton of bulk just to include a fabric loop to strap the Pencil in.
Not so the CoverBuddy case, an ultra-thin plastic sheath for the rear of the iPad Pro that includes something I wouldn’t expect from such a thin, light case: a secure spot for the Apple Pencil.
It’s simply the best minimalist pencil-holding cover I’ve seen yet.
The iPad Air 3 is poised to be the biggest upgrade the iPad lineup has ever seen, but all those new features might come with a price of extra thickness.
An alleged schematic of the iPad Air 3 has been leaked that shows the upcoming device’s exact dimensions. The schematic also appears to confirm that the iPad Air 3 will use the Smart Connector found on the iPad Pro.
Check it out:
It appears we won’t have to wait much longer to see what the next-generation iPad Air will look like.
Apple plans to unveil the iPad Air 3 at a special event in March, according to a new report, which claims new Apple Watch hardware will also get some stage time during the keynote.
Companies have designed shoulder bags exclusively for iPads, but let’s face it — most of us just toss them in whatever bag we have. Sure, we’ll spend on a hard cover or even a protective sleeve, but the iPad’s size and sleekness don’t demand that we dedicate a separate bag.
But the iPad Pro changes things a bit. It’s larger, is best utilized with an attachable keyboard and, if you live the creative life, you need a place to stow that Apple Pencil.
2015 was a bold year for Apple. The company jumped into new product categories, polished its existing hardware and software lines, and wowed us repeatedly.
Apple also made most of us throw up in our mouths a little bit now and then, due to some questionable (and some undeniably bad) choices.
These are Apple’s biggest wins and most epic fails of the past year, as remembered — fondly and otherwise — by Cult of Mac staffers.
A tribute to late public-television legend Bob Ross shows you the joy of painting on the iPad Pro, and it’s not so much about happy little trees as it is really thinking about those bushes.
YouTube user iPhonedo, who may want to rethink his wig choices, gives a Rossian demonstration of basic techniques using the iPad Pro and Apple Pencil to create beautiful landscapes. It’s about planning layers, thinking about light, and bushes. We can’t impress upon you enough how important bushes are. Bushes are so important that the video gets kinda weird.
Check it out below.
The iPad Pro has become a huge favorite of illustrators and artists all over the place, and as these talented individuals get their Apple Pencils, they’re starting to see the joy of drawing directly on Apple’s massive and powerful tablet.
Thing is, the Apple Pencil doesn’t have an eraser on the end of it, unlike competitor artistic styluses (including 53’s own Pencil stylus, which features a big, soft eraser on the end opposite the drawing part).
Luckily, if you’re using an app like Savage Interactive’s Procreate, you can tweak things to make your finger do the magic eraser job.
The ever-expanding holiday season is upon us once again, and Cult of Mac wants to help make your obligatory family dinners the least awkward they can be.
We know that a certain amount of discomfort is unavoidable. Kids might have tantrums, Grinches might get a bit too much “holiday spirit,” or some cousin with a beef might have been waiting for everyone to be in the same room before they announce how they really feel about Grandma.
Family drama aside, we have a few tips for conversation tech topics to avoid during dinner to keep everyone as happy and un-yelled-at as possible. It was a big year for tech, but some topics are best left in Internet forums and the comments of your favorite Apple blog.
The iPad Pro is the most impressive tablet Apple’s ever created, but it’s missing one killer feature: 3D Touch.
Developer Hamza Sood has found a clever workout around though that brings Peek and Pop features to the iPad Pro, and it’s all made possible thanks to the pressure sensitive features of the Apple Pencil.
Check it out:
Destructive YouTuber TechRax is like the Tyler Durden id to our tech-loving superego — constantly wanting to destroy something beautiful because, you know, who hasn’t briefly wondered what would happen if you stuck your iPhone in a lava lamp or if you used to magnets to crush a $10,000 Apple Watch Edition?
TechRax’s latest stunt? Shoving an Apple Pencil in an electric pencil sharpener. Check it out below.
The Spider-Man drawing above was created entirely on the iPad Pro using Procreate and the Apple Pencil. After many years, my love of drawing has been reignited and transported to the digital age.
The Apple Pencil stylus accessory was one of the most-praised parts of the newly-launched iPad Pro — which, naturally, means that our friends at iFixit were tripping over one another to pull it apart and scoop through its gory innards like geeky zombies with a taste for tech components.
Here’s what they discovered in their customary teardown.
One of the neatest features of the new Apple Pencil is its ability to easily charge it by plugging it into the Lightning port of your iPad Pro — with 15 seconds of charge giving you an impressive 30 minutes of use.
But how easy is it to break Apple’s high-tech stylus while it’s in this vulnerable position? In the long tradition of people buying the latest Apple products solely to break them carrying out informative stress tests for would-be customers, YouTuber Zach Straley recently picked up an Apple Pencil for this exact reason.
Check out the video below.
Given that Apple Pencil critics love to whip out Steve Jobs’ quote about how, “If you see a stylus [on the iPad], they blew it,” it was always going to take a require a good reason for Apple to adopt the stylus, as it did for the iPad Pro.
In a new interview for design journal Wallpaper, Jony Ive lays out some of his thought process on the decision — which, from the sound of things, Apple didn’t exactly take lightly.
We’re all excited to start unlocking the full potential of the iPad Pro, but we have a problem: We can’t really start doing that until we can get our hands on the Apple Pencil stylus that the company swears will change how we draw virtual lines forever. As of this writing, it’s showing a four to five week wait for shipping, and that’s up from the one to two weeks we saw when the peripherals first went on sale.
So if you have an iPad Pro to play around with but aren’t sure what to do while you wait for your awesome stylus to show up, we have your back.
The iPad Pro has received lukewarm reviews, but one thing no reviewer’s failed to be amazed by is the Apple Pencil stylus — which Cupertino has advertised as a “highly responsive” input method with “virtually no lag.”
But exactly how responsive is the Pencil compared to rival products like the stylus for Microsoft’s new Surface Pro 4? Journalist and photographer Angel Jimenez de Luis decided to test out both with a head-to-head comparison, recorded in close-up at 120fps slow-motion.
Check it out below.
In what seems to be less of a rare occurrence these days, Chief Design Officer of Apple Jony Ive gave an interview about the iPad Pro for launch day. Specifically, he talks about the infamous optional accessory called the Apple Pencil. Being that most people at first glance will see this as an overpriced, $100 stylus, it’s fair that Ive wanted to state his case.
Get ready to empty that rainy-day fund and smash every piggy bank you can find: iPad Pros are now for sale.
After a brief production delay, Apple’s latest hardware is live online (in the United States, anyway), and the company says it will hit stores later this week. Those wanting to get in on the latest and greatest — i.e. biggest — iOS device just need to head over to Apple’s site and start clicking.
The wait is almost over for the biggest tablet Apple has ever made: Pre-orders for the 12.9-inch iPad Pro go live sometime tonight.
We don’t expect iPhone-level day-one sales for the massive new hardware, but if you’ve been champing at the bit to pick up the new shiny thing, here’s how you can get it.