Not to mention that export times tells only one part of the equation. They note in the article that file transfer times differ, and when you add the 45 extra seconds to the iPP’s time for the file transfer you end up fairly close to the MacBook Pro. Extrapolate that out to more complex projects where one might be dealing with many files from multiple sources and the iPad Pro can start to fall behind despite its raw power.
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iPad Pro Is the 2020 iPad Pro really ‘faster than most laptops” like Apple claims?
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Not to mention that export times tells only one part of the equation. They note in the article that file transfer times differ, and when you add the 45 extra seconds to the iPP’s time for the file transfer you end up fairly close to the MacBook Pro. Extrapolate that out to more complex projects where one might be dealing with many files from multiple sources and the iPad Pro can start to fall behind despite its raw power.
This is also a good point! Yes indeed they did mention the difference in files transfer. And yes complex video projects require lots of files handling. And as far as I know you cannot use videos from external drive in Lumafusion. I mean you will have to transfer all those files to the iPP first before working on the video export itself.
"Most laptops" don't have Intel's best CPU either. Especially not those at an equivalent price point.
If you consider Macbooks yes but not for Windows laptops. My Windows laptop is with i7 CPU 2.8 GHz and is in the same price of iPP 11 inch 512 GB or iPP 12.9 inch 256 GB.
I also noticed that both laptops are with regular GPU that comes with the CPU. I am interested what would be the results with better GPU. I am with NVIDIA GTX 1050 and this usually helps a bit. Not the most powerful GPU for sure but it does perform better than the regular GPU in most ultabooks.
I found a comparison but it is obviously with not the same video that they tested. It is here - https://gpu.userbenchmark.com/Compa...-Iris-Plus-640-Mobile-Kaby-Lake/3650vsm262015.
The speed is definitely far better in those benchmarks but no idea how it translates in real life.
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To be fair some people do like the pro motion for playing games.
Now in all seriousness I am curious have you guys tested your workflows between iPad and powerful i9 laptop (Windows or Macbook)? I am talking about examples like that:
1. Using photoshop on the iPad and the PC for the same sort of job
2. Using Lumafusion for video processing on an iPad and then process the same video on laptop with Adobe Premiere/Final Cut Pro?
3. Using Affinity on an iPad and Windows for the same job?
I would love to see that kind of tests data. I am not saying that you should. I am asking if anyone has done that because benchmarks for me are just hype. Real test data is important here.
I am not saying that you don't use your iPPs professionally or that they don't satisfy your needs but the OP is asking a question - is an iPad faster than most laptops. And for me only with tests like the mentioned above we can answer this question.
There are several things the iPad Pro that laptops and even desktops can’t hold a candle too.
No fan noise is a huge one for creativity, and shouldn’t be dismissed. Intel laptops crank up the fan within seconds and remain there for the duration.
Promotion doesn’t exist on Mac laptops, And it’s a truly awesome experience.
Pencil and touch, now on top of traditional input methods, should you desire. You only have to have used an Apple trackpad compared to any other to know the likely experience you’ll have in the input department. The pen is equally as unmatchable.
These are the main differences, and of course, could be seen as trade offs for the lack of certain other things available in a more traditional computer.
As I have wittered on relentlessly About these past few days (lockdown boredom!), I use a Mac mini as the back end to my iPad Pro. As a photographer, I need on site lightroom libraries, and adobe haven’t allowed that feature within lightroom CC. So I’m tied to a Mac. (Although I love my Mac so it’s all ok!)
I have been editing on a Mac for years and years using lightroom, photoshop and final cut, mainly. My current set up is the Mac Mini, 32gb ram, i7 3.2, with a Synology DS1618+ for arcstorage attached via 10gbe. My scratch disk is a 500gb Samsung 970 pro.
1&3/ Photoshop on the iPad is somewhat feature lacking at the moment. The features it offers are fast and buttery smooth, which is not always the case with photoshop on any other system, but it’s hardly full photoshop yet. It will come, and when it does, this start is a good one.
You can, however compare it to Affinity Photo, which is much more feature complete. I’m not saying it necessarily offers everything on either the affinity or photoshop desktop versions do, but it offers everything I ever normally need for advanced portrait retouching.
To answer the question, I get frustrated with desktop photoshop. It lags, and the Spinning wheel comes on, and no matter how much a powerful Mac I’m working on, it always has some issue or another. It feels old fashioned and heavy and although it’s way more powerful than anything on an iPad - for general advanced use (photography, art, compositions), you’re more than able to do it on an iPad, and with much more pleasure and ease.
2/ this question is a big one! Final cut on the Mac is a beast of a programme. So is première but I haven’t used that for a while.
luma is like a miniaturised version of them. Not cut down! You can do everything you need an NLE to do on Luma.
I say miniaturised because it’s not really possible to do a full length Hollywood blockbuster on it, although you can try!
You have a track number limit (though it’s 6 video and 6 audio its it’s fine for even quite advanced stuff).
The answer to your question though, is that you can scrub through all 12 tracks, filled with music, natation, sound effects, and 6 simultaneous 4K streams, including titles and multiple effects- unrendered- and it rarely drops a frame. It’s ridiculous. You are not able to do that on any laptop that I have come across. That alone makes it more productive and less irritating than any other nle I have used.
This is with a 2018 iPad Pro 12.9 64 gb. The thing has 4 gb of ram ??. The future is SO bright and exciting.
This is a fact. I mean we cannot dispute this. The thing is I rarely am on my laptop without watching a movie or listening to music so to be honest I do not hear the noise. However the noise obviously there and we should all admit that.
That might be person specific (I have some eye issues) but I honestly do not notice the promotion that much.
Man completely true. In fact most probably the only place where I do appreciate Promotion is the almost non existing latency when it comes to pencil usage.
Definitely can be seen that way! Do not get me wrong I like my iPad and use it. I am just against focusing on benchmarks results without thinking about your workflow and your needs. Benchmarks is not everything. This is what I mean.
Man your mac sounds like a power house machine! Love the specs!
Thanks for providing this feedback! I honestly cannot work with Photoshop. I do not find it user friendly. Way too much options and far more complicated IMO. So I understand you when you say that it feels old fashioned. I use DxO's Photolab to process photos. I like it more. I usually do first batch processing and then tweak only what is necessary.
This sounds awesome! Thanks for sharing this! See this is what I wanted so I thank you for that!
I have a question related to Lumafusion. I was left with the impression that you need to have all project files (videos, music, photos etc) on your iPad to be able to work on the video. Is this true or I got it wrong? If it is true how you deal with this considering that your iPP storage is just 64 GB?
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This, right here, is THE biggest limitation to the iPad (Joint biggest actually - You cant let apps work in the background is also a hinderance). I’m not sure if its an apple restriction (I assume though), or whether it’s just not been achieved with apps yet, but you cannot seem to work, in that way, from an external drive. That’s why I cannot stop using my mac if I wanted, because Lightroom CC also has this limitation.
I have mentioned on various other threads similar, I bought the ipad as an experiment really, to see if I could get rid of my previous set up of an aging 17” MacBook Pro and a top line 27” iMac. To that end, I only got the 64gb model. With hindsight, for my usage, I should have got the 1 TB Model!! That said, my experiment worked for the most aprt and I’m more than happy with my new situation.
As for me, I can get round this because my iPad only has my working apps on it (plus a few guilty pleasures of course), so I have quite a lot of free space. I only really make 3-15 minute videos, as that’s all that’s required for my particular use case.
Luma deals with things fairly well though. You can add a link in the source window to any folder on any drive connected. You can view any video in the viewer in realtime without importing. You can even cut it. However, as soon as you drag it to the timeline, it imports. Furthermore, even if you cut it, it imports the whole clip. This last point can be mitigated if your external drive happens to be a “GnarBox’ drive. If this is the case then the software works between the two to enable just the cut portion to be imported (as far as I can gather as I dont have a GnarBox).
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Makes sense. Those two points are something that makes me choose laptop over iPP as well
.Now I see why you got the 64 GB model. Sorry for being nosy!
Ok, yes, I guess for such videos it could work. Though to be honest I kind of have used already 100 GB of space on my iPad. Most of it is not apps but books, documents, movies that I like to keep on my iPad as I have data limit restriction when it comes to Internet.
Thanks for this info! Question - how slow/fast is the video import part?
Remember the quote was "faster than 90% of laptops", not "faster than 100% of laptops".
If you take all laptops sold, and then remove the top 10%, then absolutely yes. Most people don't buy powerful and expensive laptops. I think the people on this thread saying their laptop is faster have one of the 10% laptops.
If you take all laptops sold, and then remove the top 10%, then absolutely yes. Most people don't buy powerful and expensive laptops. I think the people on this thread saying their laptop is faster have one of the 10% laptops.
Hard to answer! Obviously, we don’t have Thunderbolt or 10GBE options etc, so the ipad is automatically let down by just using usb c or wifi (from a basic standpoint). Also depends on the length and quality of the clip.
I find myself waiting sometimes.. but this is a little out of the remit of the original discussion as i’m now trying to directly compare it to my desktop workstation, which wasn’t the question. Also, hardware IO on the ipad has only just even realistically become a thing, so it’s unfair to put to much pressure on it. Suffice to say, any disk seems to load and save data as quickly as it would on a usbc equipped laptop, or my Mac mini - as fair as I have noticed.
Again though, the simple pleasure of working with the pencil, or even just the iPad itself, has sparked a whole new love of my already thoroughly enjoyable workflow experience. As I mentioned, whilst i believe for many things, the ipad pro can already be a laptop replacement for some - (Maybe most! There are plenty of people I know with just an ipad, or even with just an iPhone, that never even need a computer- that wasn’t even a thing 5 years ago) - it cant yet be one for me. That doesn’t mean I’m not trying! And in fact, I basically use MacOS as an app on it, admittedly, you need the mac too! But still.
Like i have mentioned before, this is reminding me of, and in fact bringing back, the excitement I used to feel in the late 80’s and early 90’s with any new tech release. It’s been so so stagnent across the traditional computer segment for so long. I really see this as a game changer, albeit in the early stages. Needs a different way of looking at things is all. It’s not for everyone yet, but nothing in computing ever was until it became so - from a main frame to the iPad Pro.
Just waiting for a model of iPad that has enough RAM to run these apps for professional users.
If it has the OS and the RAM to properly get traction together with powerful apps it surely will be a nice package.
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Well said. At the moment remote control and second screen functions is what the iPads are likely getting until the RAM is sufficient. Let’s not forget all the nice plugins that need to work inside of logic to make it as useful as the Mac version is. Those drink RAM like a pop drink.
Yeah, I think what iPadOS will need is a dedicated super fast swap volume to dump RAM into, like macOS uses a swap. That memory handling change would be a new paradigm for iPadOS.
I was thinking about it some days ago. That would be a great implementation for iPadOS, and will differentiate it even more from iOS. This and let apps work in the background would be a game changer for the iPad multitasking
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Got it! Thanks. I do not have USB C disks so I have not tested this myself. I have USB c dongle for card readers but this is not that good test because the card I tested with does not have the best speed out there anywa.
I am the same when it comes to the pencil. When it comes to the iPad without the pencil it is a different matter because I use my laptop for media consumption. Even now I am typing on my laptop in bed.
I agree with you that for the most part is stagnant. I am interested in what Asus is doing in the recent years though. They come up with interesting ideas. For example they have Zenbook with two screens. Basically you have regular screen and then a second one where the keyboard is and you can use the pen on that. It is a neat idea as you can watch stuff on the first screen and write down stuff on the second screen as you would do with a tablet. Plus it is a powerhouse laptop.
Their gaming laptops are also quite good. Powerful enough for a laptop and not super heavy. Like most laptops with that much power would be heavier. Still their ROG machines are basically desktop but in a smaller factor.
I also like the idea of the afterburner card Apple introduced in I think their last Mac. I am not sure how many applications currently can use it but it is an interesting idea.
I tend to like the idea of desktops as I kind of have interest in bioinformatics as a hobby and like to run some stuff for sequence alignment and comparison and their algorithms are really complex, pull data from lots of databases and require lost of RAM and CPU. So I like the idea but realistically I know that I do not have the time to do it so it always stays as an idea in my head to play around with those algorithms and tools.
That's great to hear and it's been my experience thus far. I have a MBP and I just picked up a 2020 12.9" iPad Pro with 512GB to mainly use for photography and some video editing.
I plan on getting rid of my MBP soon and pick up a mac mini to use as a headless desktop for the one or two things I might need a desktop for.
As much as I love my iPad Pro, I would never ever get rid of my Macs for it. I also do not believe that an iPad in its current state can fully replace a computer running a desktop OS, like macOS or Windows. The iPad has improved a lot though and the gap is closing by the day. If only the available apps started improving, that would be great. The main problem of the iPad are the mediocre, lightweight apps, especially for typical office productivity.
I do not believe that this gap will close soon, as long as there is no iOS based laptop available with a choice of different hardware configurations including RAM size.
I do not believe that this gap will close soon, as long as there is no iOS based laptop available with a choice of different hardware configurations including RAM size.
I think one thing is that the ipad can often feel faster than a laptop.
For example, software like photoshop can get very bloated on the desktop, and often take very long to load. Conversely, the iOS apps tend to be lighter and open faster, though they may do so at the expense of additional functionality.
That said, iOS is also home to many nice alternatives. For instance, you have affinity photo to serve as a possible replacement for photoshop.
The ipad definitely benefits from not having to deal with much of the cruft and bloat that comes with legacy desktop operating systems.
For example, software like photoshop can get very bloated on the desktop, and often take very long to load. Conversely, the iOS apps tend to be lighter and open faster, though they may do so at the expense of additional functionality.
That said, iOS is also home to many nice alternatives. For instance, you have affinity photo to serve as a possible replacement for photoshop.
The ipad definitely benefits from not having to deal with much of the cruft and bloat that comes with legacy desktop operating systems.
Wrong. Pixelmator photo, affinity photo, lumafusion, sharpr, affinity designer, games like fortnight.
Need I go on. Just because you can’t find a use case doesn’t mean there isn’t.
I think the ipad pro graphics are far more powerful than intel's onboard cpu. Your experience
suggests the cps may be less advanced
For a direct comparison in real world usage: I have a 2017 top of the line 15" MacBook Pro, and the 11" iPad pro. For scientific computing with Python, my iPad pro runs faster than the MacBook pro! This is true at least with computations that take a few minutes to run. For longer computations, I would think the iPad throttles more.
Most laptops are far more powerful than a MBA and the low-end 13” MBP. You can buy a Lenovo laptop with 6-core 2.6 ghz Core i7, 1.3 TB SSD and the RTX 2060 GPU for nearly the same price as a MacBook Air.
And if you buy the pencil + the $350 keyboard, you pay the same price as the high-end 13” MBP which the iPP does not beat.
I hope to see more “Pro” apps coming to the iPad. It is the available software that is holding my 12.9 iPad Pro back.
Not necessarily less advanced, software music production can be incredibly intensive for any cpu depending on what your doing.
"Many" are, but many/most people buy trash tier laptops. Just because there are a lot of higher end models, doesn't mean the majority of people buy them.
Businesses for most non-workstation requiring employees generally buy 13" i5s at best, more likely i3s.
Home users are often buying i3s and lower unless they're trying to buy gaming laptops which aren't in the same product category, they're more "mobile desktops" due to the size, weight, heat and power consumption.
Your RTX2060 6 core i7 laptop will not be in anything like the same form factor as an iPad, and that is relevant. It will be a brick of a machine with a power supply brick that's 1.5-2x the iPad weight alone... with fans, and 1 inch thick form factor.
That's not really a laptop, that's a "luggable" computer.