iPad Air - page 15

I picked up one of Apple’s new iPad Airs on Friday. I didn’t think I’d be impressed — but I am. It’s light, fast, and beautifully constructed. Is it the perfect tablet? It’s pretty close. Here’s all you need to know:

• It’s amazingly light. It almost feels hollow. It’s much lighter than you expect. Which means that it’s effortless to hold for reading and carrying around. It’s a big and important difference. It’s super portable.
• It’s plenty fast. Annoying little lags on previous iPads — like slow rendering Web pages with multiple tabs — are gone. It’s much more useable than my iPad 3.
• Battery life is great — more than 10 hours of continuous use.

And there you have it. It’s almost as light as the iPad mini with the speed and big, beautiful screen of a full-size tablet. Go get one. It’s great.

Get your silver bullets and holy water ready dear friends, because our new CultCast: some Dell laptops are emitting a mysteriously pungent smell; iPad Air gets benchmarked, is murderously speedy; our fave photo app brings darkness… out of the shadows; Apple says some 5S batteries are dieing… faster than they should; Tim Cook says upcoming Apple products will blow… your mind; and we chant… aloud our favorite apps so you can vote on which is best… it’s an all new Faves N Graves!

Put down that candy and join us for this week’s best Apple stories! Stream or download new and past episodes of The CultCast now on your Mac or iDevice by subscribing on iTunes, or hit play below and let the spookiness begin.

[Editor’s note: This review has been stickied to the top of Cult of Mac. Scroll down for more news.]

Let’s face it, we’ve been waiting for Apple to make drastic changes to the iPad since it released the third-generation device in early 2012. While it did introduce a high-resolution Retina display with that model, and it has made nice improvements in speed and other areas since then, we’ve all been clamoring for improvements to its design.

We’ve got those with the iPad Air — and a whole lot more. The new slate looks just like a larger version of the iPad mini. It maintains its 9.7-inch Retina display, but it has narrower bezels, a substantially thinner design — it is now just as thin as the iPad mini at 7.5mm — and it’s 28% lighter than its predecessor at just one pound.

In addition to that, we get Apple’s incredible 64-bit A7 processor that promises up to two times the power and graphics performance of the A6X, the new M7 motion coprocessor that made its debut in the iPhone 5s last month, and two W-Fi antennas with MIMO technology. And all of this will cost you just $100 more than the iPad 2.

Rather than cruising the streets for candy, the guys at iFixit spent All Hallow’s Eve tearing down the new iPad Air with all the tender loving care we’ve come to appreciate from the fixit gurus.

iFixit found few surprises during their teardown, but did discover that the APL5698 A7 processor Apple packed away in the iPad Air is a slightly different from the  APL0698 version of the A7 found in the iPhone 5s, though it’s not clear what customizations Apple added to the chip.

The iPad Air comes with a gigantic battery that iFixit says is the one of the most difficult they’ve tried to remove, and the other components are much easier to swap out. As with most Apple devices, iFixit found that the iPad Air is horrifically hard to repair and gave it a repairability score of 2 out of 10.

Here are some of the internal goodies iFixit found in the iPad Air:

The iPad Air has been on sale for nearly 12 hours now and early reports are starting to indicate that the higher end models are becoming scarce as initial supply is dwindling. It may not be quite as hard to get your hands on the iPad Air as a the gold iPhone 5s, but our pal who made the extremely useful iPhone Tracker tool is back with an update that will help you find the iPad Air you want.

The simple web app scrapes data from store.apple.com for the most up-to-date info on local pick-up options for the iPad Air. A chart of green and red squares indicate whether local Apple Stores have stock of 16GB, 32GB, 64GB and 128GB units in the color of your choice,  so you can know where to head to for the best shot at getting the iPad you want.

Apple Tracker has also been updated to support stock information on the iPad mini with Retina display too once it becomes available this month. Use the drop downs to select the color and carrier you want, press submit and viola. There’s even a purchase button at the bottom of each inventory listing to speed up the shopping process.

Source: Apple Tracker

Wondering what to download first on your new iPad Air? If you’re an Angry Birds fan, you’ll probably want to get the new Angry Birds Star Wars II update, which adds a bunch of new “secret” levels, new characters — including silver C3PO and Darth Sidious — and more.

Unless you got incredibly drunk last night and you don’t know what day it is, you’re probably already aware of the fact that the iPad Air launches today. And if you don’t want to venture out and wait in line to get one, you can order yours now from the Apple online store.

Apple was bested by Samsung in the results of J.D. Power’s latest tablet customer satisfaction survey, marking the first time that Apple hasn’t come out ontop in the rankings in over two years.

Samsung was the only tablet manufacturer to improve its score since the last survey was released in April by jumping from a 822 to a score of 835, even though it finished third behind Apple and Amazon in the last survey. Apple ranked second in the latest survey with a score of 833 with strong scores in both performance and ease of use.

iPad Day is  less that 12 hours away if you live on the East Coast – or already here if you live in Japan. Either way, Apple fans across the globe are already lining up in front of the nearest Apple Store, waiting anxiously to fork over their cash for the new iPad Air.

We don’t expect to see quite as long lines as at the iPhone 5s and 5c launch last month, but early indications show that Apple’s new lightweight tablet will be in high demand over the weekend. One reader in Hong Kong told us their reservation system filled up in 15 minutes.

If you’re planning to brave the night in front of the Apple Store, tweet us a pic @CultofMac. If not, check out all these people crazy enough waiting for their iPad Airs.

The iPad Air is the first 9.7-inch Retina iPad to ship without an A-X series chip. Put more simply, it’s the first such iPad to forego bolting more graphic cores onto the core chip to drive the massive 2048 x 1536 display.

But if you think that means the iPad Air will have weaker graphic performance than the fourth-gen iPad, you don’t know Apple very well. In fact, graphic performance is as much as 70% better than the last 9.7-inch iPad.

As the fifth generation full-sized iPad, users likely know what to expect from the newly-released iPad Air. And while the device doesn’t try and reinvent the wheel by radically altering the iPad’s genetics in either abilities or form factor, the mere fact that Apple has proven able to further hone what was already a winning concept — by decreasing the size and weight, upping the speed and power, all while maintaining battery life — is reason enough to mark down the iPad Air as an assured winner in the tablet category. This verdict is more than backed up by the reviews which have begun flooding in over the past 24 hours, with reviewers now having had around a week to test Apple’s newest tablet.

The fourth-generation iPad with its dual-core A6X processor was certainly no slouch, but it looks like one when you put it up against the new iPad Air. Thanks to that new 64-bit A7 chip, the iPad Air is an incredible 80% faster than its predecessor in Geekbench tests, and over five times than the iPad 2 (which is only $100 cheaper).

Last week, we reported that cutesy-wutesy-fuzzy-wuzzy-wumpus-bear (and Apple co-founder) Steve Wozniak was unimpressed with the new iPad Air and iPad mini with Retina Display. His supposed complaint? 128GB just wasn’t enough for a man with a huge media collection like him!

It seemed uncharacteristic for Woz to publicly bash the company he helped create. Woz is an innocent, and usually reacts to every new Apple product with wide-eyed glee, so his complaints seemed strange. For good reason, too, because Woz says he was misquoted, and actually likes the new iPads just fine.

I wonder just what effect the new iPad Air will have on keyboard covers? The iPads one to four were all big enough that you could pretty much squeeze a full-sized keyboard into a matching cover, but all the keyboard cases I have so far tried for the iPad mini have been unusable, like a netbook keyboard.

Belkin’s new keyboards for the iPad Air hope that physics will continue to favor the former situation.

iPad Air. Retina iPad Mini. New Macbook Pros. The new Mac Pro. Mavericks goes free. So does the new iLife and iWork. There’s a TON to talk about on our Special Edition CultCast! Join us, and special guest (and MacCast host) Adam Christianson, as we discuss our first impressions of the huge pile of hardware and software Apple unveiled at the jam-packed event.

Have a few laughs and get caught up on each week’s best Apple stories. Stream or download new and past episodes of The CultCast now on your Mac or iDevice by subscribing on iTunes, or hit play below and let baseline roll!

T-Mobile is bringing its “Uncarrier” strategy to tablets with the upcoming launch of Apple’s new iPads. Yesterday we reported that T-Mobile will offer 200 MB of free (yes, totally free) data to iPad Air and mini owners.  But that’s not all.

Apple unveiled the new iPad mini with Retina display yesterday along side the iPad Air, and while we were expecting a bump up in resolution, we also got some nice internal hardware upgrades in the form of the A7 processor, M7 co-processor, improved cameras and faster WiFi.

We still think the iPad mini is the best 7-inch tablet on the market but the number of competitive Android tablets keeps growing every year, each with their own set of compelling features and ecosystems. To sort out whether the iPad mini really is the best purchase for you, check out the chart above that breaks down the iPad mini’s specs compared the Kindle Fire lineup, Nexus 7 II and the Galaxy Tab 3.

Source: BI

Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak says he’s not interested in Apple’s new iPads because the neither model meets his needs. Woz didn’t get a chance to watch the keynote live because he was on a plane, but he caught up with the news when he landed and then emailed his wife to say, “nope, I don’t want one of those.”

Apple packed a lot into one hour and 20 minutes today, with announcements about OS X Mavericks, Macbook Pro, Macbook Air, Mac Pro, and the stars of the show: iPad Air and Retina iPad mini. We think that this is about an hour and 18 minutes too long to watch, though, so we’ve condensed it to around 90 seconds.

Here is the Apple iPad Air and iPad mini keynote, right from Yerba Buena, in just 90 seconds:

In all the hubbub yesterday, it’s possible you missed the most exciting iPad news of all: Apple has given the iPad Air and iPad mini an incredible new wallpaper!

We kid, of course, but featuring a lovely blue gradient, the new wallpapers are rather nice. With the iPad Air and iPad mini not shipping until November, though, you can only see it in Apple’s new iPad ads… or download it from us!

Just as night follows day, death follows taxes and blissful sleep follows energetic coitus, so a new iPad is always followed by a new case. And for me that case might just be Grove’s gorgeous new Wood Smart Case for the mini and the new iPad Air.

There’s little worse than coming home with a new iPad on the very first day it’s available, only to find your editor has suddenly and immediately re-assigned you to cover raging tropical storms on the Yucatán Peninsula (happens all the time). Or something.

Fear not, adventurer person, Griffin has announced their ruggedized, military-spec’d Survivor case will be available to protect the new iPad Air the same day you can buy it from an Apple Store.

The ring of Tim Cook’s softened Southern twang hasn’t yet left our ears, and yet Belkin has already announced, not one, but practically a whole wall at the Apple Store full of iPad Air cases and keyboards.

Of the ten cases and three keyboard cases announced by Belkin after today’s event, the most interesting is the minimalist Qode (perhaps a Star Wars character?) Thin Type Keyboard Case — one of Belkin’s excellent keyboards wrapped in aluminum and equipped with a hinge that lets it double as a cover for the screen. For a little more protection, there’s the Qode (Peruvian dessert?) Ultimate Keyboard Case, which adds a protective aluminum backing around the iPad Air.

Apple fans will have to wait until November 1st to get their hands on the svelte iPad Air, while the wait for an iPad mini with Retina display will be even longer. For those of us too impatient to wait until the new tablets hit store shelves to inspect the devices ourselves, Apple gave journos at today’s event a few precious minutes to get their hands all over the iPad Air and iPad mini.

Here’s a roundup of the best hands on videos of the new iPads:

To compliment the new iPad Air and iPad mini with Retina display, Apple has released not only updated Smart Covers, but a new Smart Case accessory. “We have a lot more to cover” was the tagline for today’s event, and it turned out to be true in more ways than one.