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Jackbequickly

macrumors 68020
Aug 6, 2022
2,442
2,495
The OLED iPad will just not produce that much better results than my current iPad Pro to justify the price.
 

Ludatyk

macrumors 603
May 27, 2012
5,402
4,375
Texas
One thing on my list is a second USB-C port. My monitor has a USB hub built in, but it's kind of slow when transferring files, and I don't think it has enough power for things. My Pebble USB speakers lose power if I turn them up too high, or my Elgato Capture Card works, but loses a lot of frames. Both I have no issues with connected directly to the iPad. I'm sure a dedicated USB hub would work too, but I think a second USB-C port would be welcome by a lot of people, even if it's just built into the next Magic Keyboard accessory - which I'd hope gets proper ports for data connection.
Yeah, I decided to get a Thunderbolt 4 hub (Belkin one)… it was that or the Satechi one.

So, this gives me more additional ports… I have a carrying case to travel with, I like the fact I need only one plug and it powers the iPad, portable monitor, phone and I can hook up external storage.

But on the topic of the thread…
What improvements have to come the next iPad Pro or iPadOS 18 with, for you to pull the trigger?
Well, I‘m curious what Apple has in it’s plans for this supposedly redesign… my current M1 iPad Pro is perfectly capable of doing my current tasks thus there is nothing in terms of performance I’m seeking.

Could Apple unlock two external display support for the next iPad Pro similar to what they did for the M3 MacBooks, but I don’t see that being a motivating factor for me. At this point, Apple is betting on OLED to push people to upgrade and I’m really anxious to see what that looks like…. I think we get StandBy mode with iPadOS 18 because of OLED support.
 
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sidewinder3000

macrumors 65816
Jan 29, 2010
1,183
1,286
Chicagoland
Sorry for the clickbait title, this sub-forum sometimes feels a bit quiet.

You’ve already read me before complaining about PWM on OLED iPhones. I bought the M2 iPad Pro, because it is the last iPad Pro with an LCD display, with all the features of an iPad Pro (FaceID, 4 speakers, 120HZ refresh rate display…). However, lately, a lot of theories and rumors have been floating around.

I use my iPad Pro a lot, but the 128GB of storage are becoming a small constraint. I can live with it, but I’d really appreciate a better iPad Pro with more storage… And I would also like to have the newer SoC, with the AV1 hardware decoder, better efficiency… However, all of that is not enough for me to replace my M2 iPad Pro, which I honestly love.

So here’s a list of features on the upcoming 2024 11” iPad Pro that will have to be met in order for me to (sell my current M2 iPP and) purchase it. This is somewhat a reminder for my future self, to not give into the temptation unless this requirements are met:

List of requirements, from more to less important:

OLED display easy on my eyes. The next iPad Pro is supposed to use a double layer hybrid panel, combining a flexible OLED panel with a rigid one. Hopefully, this tech that has been in development for years, will combine two different flickering rates (PWM) with a high enough frequency to not bother my eyes. I mean, if we combine two different flickers, I guess the results can be different from what we have on iPhone. Or maybe, it gets even worse. Only trying it out I’ll be able to know, but this is the minimum requirement for me to jump to the next iPad Pro: Not having my eyes strained, hurt or irritated because of the OLED display.

M4 SoC: Honestly, now that we have this rumors, and they seem pretty plausible, I’ve hyped myself to a point that if the next iPad Pro comes with an M3, I’m probably waiting until the next one. Because my M2 is already powerful enough, and the M3 is just a higher clocked M2, with the extra heat we get from it. And I want to preserve the iPad battery’s health, so if the SoC overheats, that’s a no for me (to be fair, if I push my M2 iPad Pro CPU and GPU, it already gets pretty hot).

Improved external monitor experience with iPadOS 18. And no, I’m not saying necessarily having macOS on the external display when I plug it to the monitor (although that would be neat, and Apple already has patents with that). But a more desktop-like mode for when the iPad Pro is plugged to an external monitor, a keyboard and a pointing device. Better than Stage Manager (or even a much improved Stage Manager 3.0 would work for me). Something that allows my iPad Pro to become almost a Mac replacement, and that includes a better Files app (hopefully a more complex Finder), being able to download Open Source apps, and even apps that don’t meet the criteria of the App Store rules, or are no longer available such as Xbox Game Pass or Nvidia GeForce Now. If my next iPad Pro allows me to completely replace my 2014 Mac mini, I’m probably upgrading to it.

12GB of minimum RAM: This is the last, and less likely requirement, that’s why it is my least important one out of the four. I mean, it the previous 3 boxes are ticked, I won’t probably mind the base model being 8GB of RAM, although I’ll probably go to the 1TB model for the 16GB of RAM. Not that I’m noticing a lack of RAM on my 8GB M2 iPad Pro, mind you, but if I buy this new M4 iPad Pro, it will be a long time investment. That’s why I’ll also get Apple Care with it, probably.

Having such machine would allow me to finally replace my old Mac mini, and current M2 iPad Pro, which I use more than the Mac itself, for instance, I put the Mac mini on the shelf two weeks ago for cleaning, and I haven’t brought it out yet.

Having an easy way to connect to my Mac mini from my iPad Pro, wireless and seamlessly, would be ideal in order to use my Mac mini for those few tasks that I cannot or do not want to do on my iPad Pro. Maybe Sidecar could work, but my 2014 Mac mini doesn’t support Sidecar… And getting an M1 Mac mini just to do a few tasks over Sidecar from my iPad Pro isn’t something worth for me.

Now, are you set to get the next iPad Pro?
Are you like me, doubting?

What improvements have to come the next iPad Pro or iPadOS 18 with, for you to pull the trigger?
Ditto. I have the M1 iPad Pro and love it. But it has some product-wide limitations. Gotta bring the noise and fix those nagging problems to get me to switch, because I wanna lock in freshness for years.
 

Alameda

macrumors 6502a
Jun 22, 2012
939
560
The current Magic Keyboard has an extra USB C port on the bottom left side. Sure ideally they could add one to the bottom right side for a total of 3 USB C ports. Not sure if the ports are hight data connection points though.
But the USB-C port on the keyboard is only for power. It can’t do anything else.
 
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m0nkeyb0y

macrumors regular
Jun 16, 2009
157
107
I hope to upgrade from my m1 11" pro with some graduation gift money, regardless. (Screen is slightly cracked in corner.) I'm excited for m3/4, and OLED, as well as smaller size and, I hope, weight. (Titanium?) But I would love to see an ip68 rating. I can't be the only person who enjoys using my iPad in a bathtub or hot tub, and I'd prefer to do it with less fear.
 
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transpo1

macrumors 6502a
Jul 15, 2010
975
1,640
I have never had my iPad accidentally disconnect from its Magic Keyboard, even when open. I literally just picked my 13” Pro up by the iPad and shook it vigorously and the MK didn’t fall off. Mac MagSafe was designed to disconnect when the cord is pulled, iPad Pro magnets not so much.
The only times I’ve found the Magic Keyboard to accidentally disconnect have been when my iPad Pro 11” is misaligned (operator error). It’s a much more reliable connection than the older Apple iPad keyboards.
 

seggy

macrumors 6502
Feb 13, 2016
373
259
Most of my current iPads are getting pretty long in the tooth, but the main thing for getting the M4 is after making sure it's actually been fixed in-die, not via mitigations.

Otherwise anything with an M chip isn't worth buying right now.

On that note, the (lack of) coverage over that is interesting. You couldn't move for Spectre coverage, but when it comes to Apple, crickets despite it being just as catastrophic
 

DoghouseMike

macrumors regular
Jan 18, 2011
162
16
UK
Is macOS 14 Sonoma already available to those machines??

I was a bit fearful of installing the OCLP, because it is a pretty low level patch of the EFI and, IIRC, it requires providing the Apple ID and the password, or something like that.

I already had a confrontation with a quite disrespectful member on the official support thread here on MR (one with a white dove on their profile picture) when I asked them how safe it was to install the patch. I was confronted in a pretty rude way by this individual and, rather than clarifying my doubts, they dissuaded me from installing it.
Yea, it is pretty low level, no getting away from that with what it’s doing! It won’t need your appleID deets, but will need your system password to apply the patches.
There’s always the option of installing a patched version of the os on an external drive/separate partition for testing. It’s pretty widely known/used so I imagine if there were any glaring security issues they’d be widely reported. Anecdotally I’ve been running it on 3 different machines over the last 4 years or so and have yet to be hacked ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
 
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Populus

macrumors 601
Original poster
Aug 24, 2012
4,727
6,989
Spain, Europe
Most of my current iPads are getting pretty long in the tooth, but the main thing for getting the M4 is after making sure it's actually been fixed in-die, not via mitigations.

Otherwise anything with an M chip isn't worth buying right now.

On that note, the (lack of) coverage over that is interesting. You couldn't move for Spectre coverage, but when it comes to Apple, crickets despite it being just as catastrophic
Yeah, fixing the hardware security vulnerabilities is important, and I’m not sure Apple can do something about it with M4 generation, because the design was probably done when the vulnerability was discovered/published.

And, yes, I agree with you, there hasn’t been too much noise regarding this compared to Spectre and Meltdown vulnerabilities.
 

Jackbequickly

macrumors 68020
Aug 6, 2022
2,442
2,495
I bought the last Magic Keyboard for my M2 12.9 iPad Pro and hardly use it. Does not do well in the lap and the lap is where I use my iPad the most.
 
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Speedman100

macrumors 6502
Jul 21, 2013
425
349
I am pretty sure the 2024 iPad Pro will have M3. Which is unfortunate because that means it will only support Wi-Fi 6E. It’s possible Apple products with M4 will come with Wi-Fi 7 later this year.
 

Kingcoherent

macrumors member
Aug 30, 2022
64
64
Longer battery life would probably be my single biggest ask.

A second usb c port would also be great for me, it sometimes gets used with an older Native Instruments Tractor audio interface that lacks power over usb c.

As it stands my iPad is probably my most used device: I use it for reading academic papers, white papers, analyst reports for work, idle web browsing when not at work, finally it controls my HiFi (a Naim streamer) throughout the day and plays ambient noise when I try to sleep at night. I don't really use it in my home music studio as it's a faff with dongles to keep power on while also giving audio out (although using it to control logic loops is sometimes a great addition to my workflow).
 
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The Game 161

macrumors Nehalem
Dec 15, 2010
30,288
19,512
UK
More ram across the board would be ideal

ram on the iPad non 16GB of ram models aren’t enough
 

Populus

macrumors 601
Original poster
Aug 24, 2012
4,727
6,989
Spain, Europe
Man, the more I use my M2 11” iPad Pro the more I love it as a portable device, more than a MacBook. I had never imagined myself saying this 5 years ago, when I still relied on my old 2010 13” MacBook Pro. I wish Apple could give us a more hybrid solution to be able to keep using it as an iPad outside my home, and as a more desktop oriented machine in home, when plugged to an external display.

Reminder to my future self: If I end up getting a new iPad Pro, 128GB is becoming too constraint for my use and, specially, for future uses, when I’ll have to grab more data with it. Last year I was tempted to get the 256GB model but because of the screen (different manufacturer), I ended up with the 128GB one. However, I don’t think 256GB would be enough either so I’d probably should go for, at least, the 512GB one.

The bright side of having a 128GB model, if there’s any is that at least it forces me to make regular backup, so the risk of losing data is minimized. If I had a more storage iPad I could really lose tons of valuable data if it broke up.
 

MayaUser

macrumors 68030
Nov 22, 2021
2,806
6,004
probably ipads pro on May event, so M4 is out of the question
This topic is for 2025 maybe
 

jclardy

macrumors 601
Oct 6, 2008
4,164
4,393
The only thing that would get me to upgrade is a major upgrade to the software. Everything iPadOS has been upgraded with so far has mostly been lipstick on a pig. Stage Manager is nice, but you are still running iOS apps. Files looks usable, but try and drag a folder around and you'll immediately want to go back to a mac. Still no terminal access.

I really don't know how they can fix it on the current trajectory of iPadOS. In my opinion the best option would be a dual booting device, that ran macOS in a virtual machine when you wanted to do more power user things (Accessing the same filesystem as iPadOS.)

M4 is just not useful in iPadOS unless you use final cut, it will just be wasted 95% of the time.

Don't get me wrong - I still love my iPad for "iPad Things" - email, web browsing, youtube, reminders, calendar, notes. But beyond that iPadOS is holding the system back from anything more than that.
 

AlastorKatriona

Suspended
Nov 3, 2023
559
1,023
Sorry for the clickbait title, this sub-forum sometimes feels a bit quiet.

You’ve already read me before complaining about PWM on OLED iPhones. I bought the M2 iPad Pro, because it is the last iPad Pro with an LCD display, with all the features of an iPad Pro (FaceID, 4 speakers, 120HZ refresh rate display…). However, lately, a lot of theories and rumors have been floating around.

I use my iPad Pro a lot, but the 128GB of storage are becoming a small constraint. I can live with it, but I’d really appreciate a better iPad Pro with more storage… And I would also like to have the newer SoC, with the AV1 hardware decoder, better efficiency… However, all of that is not enough for me to replace my M2 iPad Pro, which I honestly love.

So here’s a list of features on the upcoming 2024 11” iPad Pro that will have to be met in order for me to (sell my current M2 iPP and) purchase it. This is somewhat a reminder for my future self, to not give into the temptation unless this requirements are met:

List of requirements, from more to less important:

OLED display easy on my eyes. The next iPad Pro is supposed to use a double layer hybrid panel, combining a flexible OLED panel with a rigid one. Hopefully, this tech that has been in development for years, will combine two different flickering rates (PWM) with a high enough frequency to not bother my eyes. I mean, if we combine two different flickers, I guess the results can be different from what we have on iPhone. Or maybe, it gets even worse. Only trying it out I’ll be able to know, but this is the minimum requirement for me to jump to the next iPad Pro: Not having my eyes strained, hurt or irritated because of the OLED display.

M4 SoC: Honestly, now that we have this rumors, and they seem pretty plausible, I’ve hyped myself to a point that if the next iPad Pro comes with an M3, I’m probably waiting until the next one. Because my M2 is already powerful enough, and the M3 is just a higher clocked M2, with the extra heat we get from it. And I want to preserve the iPad battery’s health, so if the SoC overheats, that’s a no for me (to be fair, if I push my M2 iPad Pro CPU and GPU, it already gets pretty hot).

Improved external monitor experience with iPadOS 18. And no, I’m not saying necessarily having macOS on the external display when I plug it to the monitor (although that would be neat, and Apple already has patents with that). But a more desktop-like mode for when the iPad Pro is plugged to an external monitor, a keyboard and a pointing device. Better than Stage Manager (or even a much improved Stage Manager 3.0 would work for me). Something that allows my iPad Pro to become almost a Mac replacement, and that includes a better Files app (hopefully a more complex Finder), being able to download Open Source apps, and even apps that don’t meet the criteria of the App Store rules, or are no longer available such as Xbox Game Pass or Nvidia GeForce Now. If my next iPad Pro allows me to completely replace my 2014 Mac mini, I’m probably upgrading to it.

12GB of minimum RAM: This is the last, and less likely requirement, that’s why it is my least important one out of the four. I mean, it the previous 3 boxes are ticked, I won’t probably mind the base model being 8GB of RAM, although I’ll probably go to the 1TB model for the 16GB of RAM. Not that I’m noticing a lack of RAM on my 8GB M2 iPad Pro, mind you, but if I buy this new M4 iPad Pro, it will be a long time investment. That’s why I’ll also get Apple Care with it, probably.

Having such machine would allow me to finally replace my old Mac mini, and current M2 iPad Pro, which I use more than the Mac itself, for instance, I put the Mac mini on the shelf two weeks ago for cleaning, and I haven’t brought it out yet.

Having an easy way to connect to my Mac mini from my iPad Pro, wireless and seamlessly, would be ideal in order to use my Mac mini for those few tasks that I cannot or do not want to do on my iPad Pro. Maybe Sidecar could work, but my 2014 Mac mini doesn’t support Sidecar… And getting an M1 Mac mini just to do a few tasks over Sidecar from my iPad Pro isn’t something worth for me.

Now, are you set to get the next iPad Pro?
Are you like me, doubting?

What improvements have to come the next iPad Pro or iPadOS 18 with, for you to pull the trigger?
Just get a Mac.

I want an OLED iPad for watching video, because that's largely what the iPad is for.
 
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AlastorKatriona

Suspended
Nov 3, 2023
559
1,023
M4 is just not useful in iPadOS unless you use final cut, it will just be wasted 95% of the time.
This oversimplification of what Apple Silicon is for is extremely annoying and needs to stop being repeated. Why is it that forum members' imagination is limited to maxing out the CPU when discussing what a new chip is used for in an iPad? This idea that "unless you're encoding video you don't need a newer chip" is simply wrong.
 

mcled53

macrumors regular
Jun 15, 2022
120
106
West of the Cascades
Sorry for the clickbait title, this sub-forum sometimes feels a bit quiet.

You’ve already read me before complaining about PWM on OLED iPhones. I bought the M2 iPad Pro, because it is the last iPad Pro with an LCD display, with all the features of an iPad Pro (FaceID, 4 speakers, 120HZ refresh rate display…). However, lately, a lot of theories and rumors have been floating around.

I use my iPad Pro a lot, but the 128GB of storage are becoming a small constraint. I can live with it, but I’d really appreciate a better iPad Pro with more storage… And I would also like to have the newer SoC, with the AV1 hardware decoder, better efficiency… However, all of that is not enough for me to replace my M2 iPad Pro, which I honestly love.

So here’s a list of features on the upcoming 2024 11” iPad Pro that will have to be met in order for me to (sell my current M2 iPP and) purchase it. This is somewhat a reminder for my future self, to not give into the temptation unless this requirements are met:

List of requirements, from more to less important:

OLED display easy on my eyes. The next iPad Pro is supposed to use a double layer hybrid panel, combining a flexible OLED panel with a rigid one. Hopefully, this tech that has been in development for years, will combine two different flickering rates (PWM) with a high enough frequency to not bother my eyes. I mean, if we combine two different flickers, I guess the results can be different from what we have on iPhone. Or maybe, it gets even worse. Only trying it out I’ll be able to know, but this is the minimum requirement for me to jump to the next iPad Pro: Not having my eyes strained, hurt or irritated because of the OLED display.

M4 SoC: Honestly, now that we have this rumors, and they seem pretty plausible, I’ve hyped myself to a point that if the next iPad Pro comes with an M3, I’m probably waiting until the next one. Because my M2 is already powerful enough, and the M3 is just a higher clocked M2, with the extra heat we get from it. And I want to preserve the iPad battery’s health, so if the SoC overheats, that’s a no for me (to be fair, if I push my M2 iPad Pro CPU and GPU, it already gets pretty hot).

Improved external monitor experience with iPadOS 18. And no, I’m not saying necessarily having macOS on the external display when I plug it to the monitor (although that would be neat, and Apple already has patents with that). But a more desktop-like mode for when the iPad Pro is plugged to an external monitor, a keyboard and a pointing device. Better than Stage Manager (or even a much improved Stage Manager 3.0 would work for me). Something that allows my iPad Pro to become almost a Mac replacement, and that includes a better Files app (hopefully a more complex Finder), being able to download Open Source apps, and even apps that don’t meet the criteria of the App Store rules, or are no longer available such as Xbox Game Pass or Nvidia GeForce Now. If my next iPad Pro allows me to completely replace my 2014 Mac mini, I’m probably upgrading to it.

12GB of minimum RAM: This is the last, and less likely requirement, that’s why it is my least important one out of the four. I mean, it the previous 3 boxes are ticked, I won’t probably mind the base model being 8GB of RAM, although I’ll probably go to the 1TB model for the 16GB of RAM. Not that I’m noticing a lack of RAM on my 8GB M2 iPad Pro, mind you, but if I buy this new M4 iPad Pro, it will be a long time investment. That’s why I’ll also get Apple Care with it, probably.

Having such machine would allow me to finally replace my old Mac mini, and current M2 iPad Pro, which I use more than the Mac itself, for instance, I put the Mac mini on the shelf two weeks ago for cleaning, and I haven’t brought it out yet.

Having an easy way to connect to my Mac mini from my iPad Pro, wireless and seamlessly, would be ideal in order to use my Mac mini for those few tasks that I cannot or do not want to do on my iPad Pro. Maybe Sidecar could work, but my 2014 Mac mini doesn’t support Sidecar… And getting an M1 Mac mini just to do a few tasks over Sidecar from my iPad Pro isn’t something worth for me.

Now, are you set to get the next iPad Pro?
Are you like me, doubting?

What improvements have to come the next iPad Pro or iPadOS 18 with, for you to pull the trigger?
12 GB of RAM? I don't think you get to choose RAM.
 
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