In this season’s Apple press conference, of course, only the weakest soldiers will be sent first. The 9th-generation iPad is the same as the previous upgrade method. It is replaced with the strongest processor of the previous generation. The 8th-generation iPad’s A12 bionic chip is replaced by an A13. The bionic chip is exactly the same in appearance, and the capacity of the entry-level version has been upgraded from 32GB to 64GB. Instead, the biggest upgrade is the front lens, which has been upgraded from 1.2 million pixels by 10 times to a 12 million pixel ultra-wide-angle lens. It also supports the Center Stage character centering function. For the first time, the new features of the flagship iPad Pro are directly transferred to the entry-level model.
The 9th generation iPad uses the A13 bionic chip. Compared with the A12, the performance has increased by 20%, and the performance is not outstanding. At the same time, the A13 is also 6 times faster than the mid-level processors used in many Android tablets of the same price. But the main user group of the iPad is students, and the A13 bionic chip is quite enough.
In addition to the “regular” CPU, the front lens on the screen has also been greatly upgraded. Considering that there are quite a lot of opportunities for students to use video discussions in class, the new iPad has specially upgraded the front lens to 12 million pixels. You can shoot 1080p HD videos at 25fps, 30fps or 60fps, while the previous generation iPad’s front lens has only 1.2 million pixels, and it shoots 720p videos. It has long been difficult to cope with the requirements of video conferences that are often used today. The new iPad lens also has a 2x zoom zoom, allowing you to shoot wide-angle scenes, which is convenient for students to do their homework speeches.
To meet the needs of video conferencing, Apple centered the new function Center Stage, a new feature that only appeared in the M1 iPad Pro, and added it to the new iPad. Center Stage supports commonly used video communication software such as Facetime, Zoom, and Microsoft Meet. When using the front lens to make a call, the lens will track the speaker’s face to keep it in the center of the screen. From the experience of using iPad Pro, Center Stage is very useful for video calls. The effect is as if a photographer controls the lens to chase the anchor. Users are not afraid of too much action and “came out”, which greatly enhances the professional feel.
This time the screen of the new iPad also supports Ture Tone Display. The text and photos on the screen look more natural, and iPad OS 15 will be pre-installed when it is released.
Another attraction of the new iPad this time is that the storage capacity has doubled, compared with the previous generation iPad’s capacity. 32GB and 128GB, of which 32GB minus the iPad OS itself and pre-installed apps, only about 20 GB capacity can be used. Students can install a few commonly used apps and then put photos, videos or PDFs in it will not be enough, although the price of iiPad is 2,599 It starts at RMB, but can only add up to HK$3,399 for 128GB. The price of the new iPad 64GB remains unchanged this time, the same price is HK$2,599, while the price of 256GB is increased to HK$3,799, and the LTE version is each plus HK$1,000. In most cases, 64GB is enough for students to buy, so this time the new iPad can save money, with more features, and the price/performance ratio will naturally increase.