The Apple iPad Review (2012)
by Vivek Gowri & Anand Lal Shimpi on March 28, 2012 3:14 PM ESTSince Apple launched the first iPad two years ago, the tablet market has evolved rapidly. While slate tablets were nothing new, the original iPad was the first serious tablet to be built around smartphone components and a user interface designed specifically for touchscreen input. The hardware was enough to run the OS smoothly while maintaining good battery life, the thin and light form factor lent itself to easy portability, and the touch-based user experience was miles better than earlier devices based on desktop operating systems.
We take it for granted now, but this was all news back in 2010, and the iPad was practically in a category of its own, with no real competitors to speak of. After Apple started shipping the iPad, the segment basically exploded—we had Google jump in with Honeycomb, HP got into it (and then out of it) with webOS, RIM had a go with the PlayBook, Amazon pushed the Kindle line into the tablet space, and Microsoft created its next release of Windows with tablets in mind. Along the way, Apple updated the iPad, both on the software side with multitasking, a new notifications system, and a myriad of UI updates, as well as launching second generation iPad hardware. The iPad 2 was a comprehensive update, bringing a dual core processor, unrivaled graphics performance, cameras fore and aft, and a ground up redesign that brought a thinner and lighter form factor.
The iPad 2 was a significant improvement over the original—faster, more portable, and generally a far more polished device. Not that it was perfect: iOS 4 still had issues with smooth multitasking and an archaic notifications system, the cameras were mediocre, and the XGA display, while a great quality panel, didn’t have the kind of pixel density expected of a premium mobile device. The iPad 2 hit market around the same time as Honeycomb (in Motorola’s Xoom) early last year, and at first Apple still held a major edge in terms of hardware. As more impressive Honeycomb devices like Samsung’s Galaxy Tab 10.1 and the ASUS Transformer Prime were launched, along with Ice Cream Sandwich looming on the horizon, Android became a much more viable tablet alternative to iOS. And with Microsoft planning for a major push later this year for ARM-based Windows 8 tablets centered around the Metro UI, Apple has never faced such stiff competition in the tablet space. Which brings us to the third generation of iPad hardware.
It has a display resolution that dwarfs most high-end desktop displays. The panel also puts a real emphasis on quality, not just resolution. For a computing device targeted squarely at the consumer market, both of these things are rarities.
Its SoC is the absolute largest ever squeezed into an ARM based tablet. The chip itself is even bigger than what you find in most mainstream notebooks. It’s expensive, it puts out a ton of heat and it offers a tremendous GPU performance advantage over anything else in its class.
And it has a battery that’s larger than what ships in the current crop of similarly sized ultraportables and Ultrabooks.
The new iPad doesn’t significantly change the tablet usage paradigm, but it does put all previous attempts at building hardware in this space to shame. It’s the sort of no holds barred, performance at any expense design that we’re used to seeing from enthusiast PC component vendors—but in a tablet...from Apple.
Welcome to the new iPad.
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sjael - Wednesday, March 28, 2012 - link
On the 'A5X vs Tegra 3 In the Real World' page, you mention Modern Warfare 3 as a iOS+Android game.I think, since I haven't seen this game ported to phones/tablets, you *might* be thinking Modern Combat 3.
And then of course you show the market page for it further down..
Anand Lal Shimpi - Wednesday, March 28, 2012 - link
Correct - thanks for the heads up!Take care,
Anand
Celestion - Wednesday, March 28, 2012 - link
Looks like the 3rd gen iPad was CPU limited in that first GlBenchmark test.Anand Lal Shimpi - Wednesday, March 28, 2012 - link
That would be vsync :)Take care,
Anand
Celestion - Saturday, March 31, 2012 - link
I see. Thanks!Kevin G - Wednesday, March 28, 2012 - link
Memory bandwidth tests just seem to be off for what you'd expect a quad channel 128 bit wide memory bus to perform as. Performance didn't move from the dual channel 64 bit wide bus in the iPad 2. Could there be a software bug (Geekbench or iOS) limiting performance there? It'd be nice to revisit the memory tests after the next major revision of iOS and in conjunction with a later release of Geek Bench.Any chance of getting the exact resolution that Infinity Blade 2 runs on the rev 3 iPad? I'm assuming it'd be either 1536 x 1152 or 1368 x 1024 for quick scaling purposes.
slashbinslashbash - Wednesday, March 28, 2012 - link
They addressed this in the article."It would appear that only the GPU has access to all four channels." - Page 12
The GPU is hooked up to the RAM controllers. The CPU communicates to the RAM through the GPU. The GPU gets all 4 channels, the CPU only gets 2. The benchmark measures CPU-RAM bandwidth, not GPU-RAM bandwidth.
It's actually kind of interesting, as it's an inversion of the typical architecture that we're all used to from PCs. But it makes sense, since the new iPad is basically a very nice screen with a smartphone CPU attached. The very nice screen requires a very nice GPU to drive it, so the GPU is more important (and would be memory starved with only 64 bits). The CPU just has to be "good enough" while any shortcomings in the GPU would be magnified at this resolution.
tipoo - Wednesday, March 28, 2012 - link
Which way is the PS Vita configured? That has the same quad core GPU and a quad core CPU as well.tipoo - Wednesday, March 28, 2012 - link
Huh, the Vita actually has 128mb dedicated video memory, can't find the bandwidth though.pickica - Monday, April 2, 2012 - link
We should also consider a possible higher clock on Vita.