The Verge reviews Apple’s 64-bit iPad Air: The best gets better

12 years ago

“Starting at $499 and climbing to an incredible $929 for a fully loaded model with mobile broadband and 128GB of storage, the Air is a complete redesign of the familiar 9.7-inch iPad into a package that’s smaller, thinner, and lighter than ever before, with far more powerful internals and the same industry-leading 10-hour battery life,” Nilay Patel writes for The Verge. “It’s also Apple’s first tablet to be released with iOS 7, the company’s complete rethinking of its mobile operating system.”

“Visually, the iPad Air is a larger iPad mini,” Patel writes. “That doesn’t mean the iPad Air isn’t stunning — it is. It’s nearly a half-pound lighter than the outgoing model and .07 inches thinner, and the difference is astonishing in person: you can hold it comfortably in almost any orientation or position, and it feels far more tossable and casual than any other large tablet I’ve used. Compared to the fake plastic leather of the Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1 or the chunky heft of the Microsoft Surface 2, the Air is in an entirely different league. There’s an element of braggadocio about the entire thing, really: anyone paying even the slightest bit of attention saw this hardware design coming a mile away, and now here it is, with hardly a real competitor in sight.”

Patel writes, “The iPad Air is the best large tablet ever made, and its only real competition will be the forthcoming Retina iPad mini, which will offer the same experience in a smaller form factor for a lower price.”

Read more in the full article here.