Let me say first — I do not have an iPad Air. I have not held an iPad Air. But there are a few things I can already say about iPad Air.
Some people may say, if you have not held iPad Air, you have not experienced iPad Air. But since most people pay attention to reviews and blogs when deciding whether to buy products, I think I’m obligated to make a review without experiencing iPad Air. iPad Air.
So let’s start with the name. It’s a bit strange, seeing as Apple has already come out with a product using that tag…the MacBook Air. My dad thinks it’s ridiculous.
But what I think is that the name actually fits it to an extent. The iPad now is able to run at desktop speeds, meaning that the iPad can run as fast as a MacBook…or MacBook Air, hence the name iPad Air. The name also implies the flighty feel you get from how fast it runs…everything runs at the highest FPS, the iPad feels like it’s running with the power of air (that is NOT me getting soft, the style of the OS helps with that effect).
But this has a problem…what of the next version of iOS? Apple typically retains devices through 3 iterations of the OS, then they drop support for the device. If iOS 8-10 dosen’t have this glass/plastic/airy feel to it…I don’t think the iPad Air will hold up the name. Especially if there’s a monster update which requires the A9 chip or B7X2000 or whatever awkward name they can think up. The speed issues will really weigh down the Air (SEE WHAT I DID THERE).
Next, the weight. iPad 4 weighed 1.4 pounds, the iPad Air weighs 1 pound. In Apple-land, this means that the iPad Air is TEH BEST. But I’ve read one blog post where the writer is really disappointed with the iPad Air. Its name, its weight, its price, everything. And he already bought the iPad Air. In my mind, if one person is not completely satisfied with an Apple product, then Apple has lost that product battle already without even trying. Apple is supposed to make products sexy, shiny, intuitive, simple, and fun. If one of their customers feels the need to go buy an Apple product, and isn’t satisfied, I don’t care if Apple’s own board of directors puts Apple at 100% customer satisfaction, that product did not fit that one person’s needs, and that can get bad PR REALLY fast if the news spreads in the right direction. And Siri will get very angry about that (you can try telling her that…I don’t think she’ll react to it though…she’ll just look it up and cheerfully go “HERE RESULTS READ THEM”).
Overall…5/10 maybe? Sorry if that’s too low for you, ain’t too low for me. iPad Sulfur Hexaflouride…sorry, I’m just being silly now.
EDIT: I could have made a Pocahontas joke here…but that would’ve been overkill.