iPad iPadOS is severely holding the iPad back... and Microsoft is going to save us...

[Momof9]

For me, I tried for months to send illustrations back and forth between Photoshop on my MBP, and Procreate on my iPad Pro, and constantly be unable to find them once they made it to iOS. The last straw was trying to install fonts on my iPad… having to navigate between AnyFont, then import to garbage-iOS-version Photoshop, then try to share with Procreate, when all the apps are sandboxed from each other… it was a constant nightmare.

Uh… the actual apps that those iOS apps are trying to emulate are certainly killers. I love Procreate, but it’s no match for Photoshop or Clip Studio. And LumaFusion is a Tonka toy compared to Davinci Resolve or Premiere, or AVID. Just try importing ProRes files into LumaFusion 😂

Have you tried Affinity Photo??? I LOVE it on my iPad and Mac mini.... I said goodbye PS a few years ago, when the garbage iOS version (I so agree) came out.... I was anticipating it, in the meantime I start working with Affinity Photo etc. I think it works fantastic - yes there were some work arounds (trying to figure out how to do something I did in PS) - google search is great for that !!!!

How were you trying to share your illustrations? I do "share" and it asks me on my iPad what I want to import it to....

 

[Rafterman]

Don’t forget paying over $2K to check that email a little a little faster or reply in 22 tabs of Mac forums at one time lol.

serious work for most of the world still needs windows and for sure any real type of gaming…iPad is a sidepiece no need to waste $2k on a sidepiece

I agree. iPads can exist as supplemental devices for consumption or light to moderate work. But until they port Adobe's Creative Suite, or whatever, to iOS, iPads can't really replace a desktop/laptop.

 

[Digitalguy]

I agree. iPads can exist as supplemental devices for consumption or light to moderate work. But until they port Adobe's Creative Suite, or whatever, to iOS, iPads can't really replace a desktop/laptop.

I think full office is even a bigger deal than adobe apps... And full Office on iPad will never happen...

 

[sparksd]

I agree. iPads can exist as supplemental devices for consumption or light to moderate work. But until they port Adobe's Creative Suite, or whatever, to iOS, iPads can't really replace a desktop/laptop.

But for some people it can replace a laptop and/or desktop because of their use cases. There is no universal can or can't in this - it depends upon individual needs.

 

[eltoslightfoot]

Procreate crushes the battery, as you’d expect it to do, with dozens of Bluetooth handoffs every minute of drawing. Granted, I’ve used my iPad Pro a lot over the last year, (including resource hogs like Shapr3D) so the battery may have degraded a bit.

Also the GBP uses Wacom EMR for the pen, not Bluetooth, so it’s far less demanding on the processor for drawing. For other tasks, my GBP and iPad Pro get similar (and very impressive) battery life.

You have something wrong. My daughter uses Procreate for hours on a regular iPad 6th generation with no problem. Even building animations…

 

[Flabasha]

Have you tried Affinity Photo??? I LOVE it on my iPad and Mac mini.... I said goodbye PS a few years ago, when the garbage iOS version (I so agree) came out.... I was anticipating it, in the meantime I start working with Affinity Photo etc. I think it works fantastic - yes there were some work arounds (trying to figure out how to do something I did in PS) - google search is great for that !!!!

How were you trying to share your illustrations? I do "share" and it asks me on my iPad what I want to import it to....

Yep, have Affinity Photo, and you’re right, it’s the only game in town for an iOS Photoshop. Actual iOS Photoshop, as you know, is an utter joke. Adobe’s following in Apple’s footsteps, completely gimping their iOS software to make users upgrade to Creative Cloud. However, as one who is given a Creative Cloud license by my work, Affinity Photo on the iPad just isn’t as robust as actual Photoshop, running on my Windows tablet. But it’s still an awesome iOS app, a must-buy, really.

Yeah, iOS prompts me to choose which “sandbox” to transfer my files to, but half the time that process fails. I’ll send a PNG from my Mac, tell it to open in Procreate, and it never makes it there. Or, I’ll get that PNG into a different sandbox, say, Affinity Photo, then try to get it over to Procreate… but Procreate doesn’t “see” into Affinity’s sandbox. Etc., etc, etc…

I’ve sent many files over to my iPad, to different apps, never to see the file again. There’s no system-wide search, so I’d have to drill down into the sandbox file structure of each of my 30 apps, just to find out where iOS put it. Not worth it. For me, MacOS is fantastic, but iPadOS is hot garbage.

 

[Flabasha]

You have something wrong. My daughter uses Procreate for hours on a regular iPad 6th generation with no problem. Even building animations…

Again, layers are the key to battery drain in Procreate. I’m constantly at 99 layers. I’d happily put each page of my comic into its own project, but unfortunately Procreate doesn’t allow multiple projects open at the same time. So, if I’m working on a scene/sequence that spans 4 pages, just to reference the other pages, I’d have to quit out of the one I’m working on, open the other page, wait for it to load, copy my element, close that project, reopen my original project, etc. etc.

So I end up with a ton of layers, many with composite modes, and that redlines the processor in Procreate, killing battery life.

I ended up switching to Clip Studio on iOS, as it’s made for comic creation, and allows multiple pages open at once. But it’s a ton more comfortable using Clip Studio on the Windows tablet, as it allows resolution scaling, so I can have my layer and palette windows open, and still maintain a decent size drawing space.

 

[MNLondon]

Surely a Mac OS Light would be easy for Apple to install on iPads.

I'm sure they could do it tomorrow, if they wanted to. I don't understand why not.

 

[Digitalguy]

I'm sure they could do it tomorrow, if they wanted to. I don't understand why not.

I think most people do understand why, they just don't like and cannot accept the reason....

 

[cupcakes2000]

I’ve sent many files over to my iPad, to different apps, never to see the file again.

Don’t you just put the files where you want them? Like on a mac? It’s really no different. Move the files, put them where you want and then remember where they are. I really really don’t understand the confusion here. I have never lost a file for it to be never found again. It’s just a hard drive like any hard drive.

There’s no system-wide search,

Spotlight always finds everything for me, straight from the homescreen. Where does it not search but you expect it too?

 

[thefriendshipmachine]

I think most people do understand why, they just don't like and cannot accept the reason....

Apple wants us to buy both a MacBook and an iPad, so-- by design-- they make a worse MacBook and a worse iPad. This has worked well for them so far, but now they've made the iPad hardware too good, and they face real competition for once thanks to Microsoft in the Surface Pro + W11. I think over the next few years Apple will have no choice but concede on iPadOS, and to actually open it up.

 

[jsmith1]

Lol…you guys don’t get it…Apple CANT install a full Mac OS on the iPad cause it would melt trying to run it. They know it’s a sidepiece because of their design.

 

[thefriendshipmachine]

Lol…you guys don’t get it…Apple CANT install a full Mac OS on the iPad cause it would melt trying to run it. They know it’s a sidepiece because of their design.

it would run quite well on the iPad. The iPad has a very similar profile to the SPX, and that runs Windows 11 just fine. This is Apple's problem, they've lost the plot. Everyone knows the iPad is capable of so much more than Apple gives us:

Put macOS on the iPad, you cowards

The new iPad Pro is a laptop in everything but operating system.

www.theverge.com

I will continue to buy Macs but I absolutely wont fork over $1,500 for a new iPad. The value proposition just isn't there anymore in light of what else is available for that price tier. They claim the iPad "Pro" is pro, and that it's a computer but it's not so because of their own software limitations.

 

[jsmith1]

No it wouldn’t it has heat issues

 

[Surfman]

No it wouldn’t it has heat issues

You must have a dud

 

[azentropy]

No it wouldn’t it has heat issues

I assumed your first post was sarcasm, but then you doubled down on it.

 

[Flabasha]

Don’t you just put the files where you want them? Like on a mac? It’s really no different. Move the files, put them where you want and then remember where they are. I really really don’t understand the confusion here. I have never lost a file for it to be never found again. It’s just a hard drive like any hard drive.



Spotlight always finds everything for me, straight from the homescreen. Where does it not search but you expect it too?

The “Spotlight” in iOS doesn’t function the same way it does in MacOS. The structure of the filesystem is completely different, by design.

Try this, search for “Times Roman”. Nothing will come up, even though obviously the font exists on the iPad.

 

[adib]

I can’t speak for Mcckoe (and would be interested to know what s/he uses), but I use a program called ‘Jump Desktop’ from the App Store.

For the 5% of things that my iPad doesn’t do, I interact with an old Windows laptop in my house via Jump Desktop on my iPad Pro + magic keyboard. Another thing I added was a £3.79($5) dummy HDMI dongle so that I could remotely interact with the laptop with the lid closed (tricks Windows into thinking an external monitor is attached so it doesn’t turn off graphics drivers).

It works really well. Next year I will probably replace the laptop with a Mac Mini and use the same setup.

... or use a compute stick and not risking your home computer being unplugged while away.

 

[FrozenDarkness]

Dex turns the Samsung tablet into a sort of Chromebook, but without full Chrome. Are Chromebook iPad killers? I don't think so...
Where Dex puts iPad to shame is when you connect the tablet to an external monitor. Then Dex will run on the external monitor and the tablet will run as usual, which is only a dream for iPad users so far....
Having said that, it's not like you now have a laptop, since you have even less pro apps than on iPad (which already lacks important things like a full desktop browser, full Microsoft Office, background apps and realtime cloud syncing, but at least has some pro drawing, photo and video editing apps, some pro music creation and playing apps, etc. things that miss on Android, other than Clip Studio...)

External Monitor support
Resizable Windows
Drag windows anywhere

Those 3 things, if apple brought to the iPad, people on this forum will go nuts.

 

[DeepIn2U]

I love iPad and use it every day, and have done so since launch day with the iPad 1. I use it as a computer replacement for most of my non-work stuff. I also own a Surface Pro X. I installed Windows 11 on the Surface Pro X.

Microsoft has made the entire user interface touch friendly, with a vastly improved touch typing experience as well as swipe gestures. And I'm honestly surprised at how bug free it is. I always think of iOS as something that "just works", and I love that reliability on my phone, and it's more or less there too on the iPad, but W11 surprisingly is also very bug free-- especially for a beta.

I honestly never thought I'd see the day where Microsoft beat Apple at making their flagship operating system touch friendly. But as it stands the Surface + Windows 11 looks like an iPad killer to me. IMO, The iPad has historically been so good that it hasn't really had competition. I think this is about to change and it's going to be really good because Apple will be forced to up their game and give us real functionality in iPadOS!

The iPad with its beautiful hardware is stuck in almost a prison with a painfully crippled operating system. You can have your M1 but can't even do basic things like easily sign PDFs or navigate the file system properly. In contrast, my entire windows and linux development environment runs flawlessly on the Surface Pro X. It's capable of running Windows software, Linux software through WSL (CLI + GUI) and x86 and amd64 software via emulation. And soon Android app support. All with a touch friendly interface. It puts the ipad to shame. iPad may have mind blowing faster hardware, but it doesn't matter at all because you just can't do very much with it compared to the Surface.

With Windows 11, Microsoft is taking on both Apple (the iPad) and Google (with Android support).

Apple will have to retaliate now by opening up iOS even more over time. Make no mistake, the Surface + Windows 11 is currently a real iPad killer. And it's only going to improve as Windows 11 officially launches, as the SQ3 chip is released in the Surface lineup this year, and as Android support is added to W11.

As this ^ unfolds people are going to pay attention and Apple is going to lose market share to the Surface. They will have to throw us some meat to make us happy and compete. I'm very excited!

You can’t easily sign ODFs on an iPad?! Not sure what you’ve been doing but I can do that all day everyday on the native OS!

show me a native function in Microsoft’s Windows that can do that!? I haven’t seen mention of this in Windows 11 either, but the MACH kernel supports PDF in macOS and in iOS and iPadOS.

editing tables created in Adobe PDFs with some restrictions can be tricky, and you cannot circumvent or make changes to a secure PDF except only what’s allowed by the person the secured the document. But you’ve not said that complexity at all just simply signing PDFs.

whent he surface Pro was announced pas version 4 I was interested. After 4 corporations that trialed it and 200+ ppl later - again in corporate setting with Computer & user GPO’s - today was THE first person that stated they liked it. I support those devices too.

I’ve gotten to try the surface Pro 5 & 6 I wasn’t impressed at all with its touch screen navigation forced NOR its attachable flimsy keyboard. I personally ended up purchase a wel loved lightly used iPad Pro 2018 11” and I use it as my main/only personal computer. Oh and I have full access to my entire time machine backups without any third party software/configurations. And I have no issues navigating the file system via iPad for backups done on macOS

Oh ever wonder that Windows 11 is fancy looking and larger better placed touch targets, that people tend NOt to heavily use explorer.exe via touch or pen input for navigation like they would a convertible or full desktop pic or laptop?!

there is a BIG reason corporations use GPos to restrict users who know just enough to seriously mess up the OS vs fully knowing and thinking critically what they can/should do va what they end up doing and shouldn’t in Windows.

But if you like it go for it. Let’s wait until the product launches and ppl get about 2-3mths daily use to report back on it.

 

[DeepIn2U]

Windows on ARM works very well, and x86 and amd64 emulation works well too. The SQ3 comes out this year, and WoA will have first class android support with no instruction emulation required. All of this is a threat to apple.

Mira not a threat it’s a knee jerk reactions slowly catching up.

once Qualcomm launches their Arm chip form lessons of SQ1 & 2 - it will not be in SQ3, their chip that the new CEO Amon is planning is for end of this year early next year and it’ll not be limited to Surface products. So I think Microsoft thats to be much more worried as part for part Asia’ surface copycat is a much better built machine with better hardware at a significantly cheaper price; model escapes me atm. It’s had TB3 for 2-3yrs now but the Surface is still playing about with Mini Display port?!??

 

[Shanghaichica]

It’s not holding me back. I’m so basic in what I do. I haven’t really changed what I do on my iPad since I got my first iPad in 2012. On top of that I also have a MacBook if on the rare occasion I want to do something my iPads can’t do. Having said that I understand that other people want it to be more capable.

I won’t be having anything to do with Microsoft. Windows was nothing but a PITA for me. I haven’t looked back since 2015 when I switched to the Mac. It’s annoying that I still have to interact with them at work. They are just as bad there.

 

[ian87w]

I'm still baffled how people are still wanting the iPad to be what it wasn't designed to be, just because they have a specific usage scenario that is not being fulfilled by the iPad.

I don't buy the iPad. Why? Because not only it's expensive for me, I need my "computer" to be able to have multiple windows of the same app (eg. 8 different Excel worksheets). The iPad cannot do that, thus I'm sticking with desktop OS like Windows/Mac.

I don't buy a Surface Pro either. Why? First, it's not available in my country officially (so no warranty support). Second, it's an overpriced laptop with the keyboard sold separately, and it's top heavy making it a poor laptop. I want a good laptop, not a middling poorly designed laptop with tablet features that I won't use.

But that's me. That doesn't mean the iPad nor the Surface Pro are poor products and that Apple/Microsoft are "holding them back." They have users with specific needs that are fulfilled by those devices. Just because their purpose don't meet mine, doesn't mean they are being hold back. That's like saying Toyota is holding back the Corolla by not putting in a larger engine and an SUV body. Well, if you need an SUV, buy an SUV. The iPad is an iPad. If one needs a Windows PC with Pen/stylus capability, the iPad is obviously not the choice.

 

[Duckyduckbumps]

It’s not. There are no game changer apps like Procreate, Vectornator, LumaFusion.

I love the apps you mention, but Windows already has Adobe Fresco, Illustrator and Premier.

How usable are they when using the Surface as a tablet though? This the the question. Only Fresco has a UI built for touch input.

I used two generations of Wacom Cintiq Companions. Now have an iPad Pro, MSI laptop and Cintiq 16 Pro.

The poor drawing experience using Surface Pen has always been a dealbreaker for me. MS might fix that with the next iteration.

As for Galaxy Book Pro 360, I like the look of it but it remains unavailable in Australia.

iPadOS is limited yes, but my iPad Pro still gets far more use than my other gear.

 

[iZac]

I've just upgraded from a Gen 2 12.9" to this M1 and it's fabulous, much faster than my old iPad with ProCreate and LumaFusion. Trouble is, now I know I have all this power, I want to do more with it. I use Sketchup, Rhino, Revit, Microstation at work and I'd love to do something similar with the iPad. I already have Sketchup Viewer on the iPad and God knows, it's not a complicated program, would it be so difficult to build it out fully for iPad OS?