Breaking records or surpassing previous benchmarks is a confirmation that you can do something better than anyone else in the world. We like to set goals, stretch boundaries and go further than ever before. In fact, the greatest race at the Olympics always proves to be a joyful experience of watching eight runners speeding down the track, all trying to complete 100 metres in less than 10 seconds.

In the tech space, Apple is doing just that, flexing its silicon muscles, always trying to perform better than competition and going by track records, it has managed to remain the Usain Bolt across product categories.

You have probably heard of the new iPad Pro being powered by Apple’s M1 chip, which is upending the very concept of performance, leaving competition behind by a mile (and not just by a nose). We have been using the iPad Pro 2021 (11-inch, 1TB version) for around 10 days and tell you what, it’s blazing fast but more importantly, the power is useful for any workflow.

Professional-grade photo editing on the move

Instead of giving you a rundown of specifications, which you can find on Apple’s website, let me take you through what it means to work on the new iPad Pro, of real-life examples rather than just benchmarks, which anyway the company has been crushing lately. Besides writing every day, I spend a lot of time trying to improve my photography skills, video-editing chops and a few other things.

Be it photographs or videos, ideally I like to have all my files on the device, which means transferring 150-200 files from my Canon camera, each time I go out early morning. Though only a handful get selected, I like to see what I have captured. By having the M1 chip, the USB-C port now supports Thunderbolt/USB 4 connectivity (up to a massive 40 gigabits per second), which means I can attach an external SSD and allow the Files app do its magic. When all these files are being transferred, I can move away from the Files app and check Twitter, email or whatever I want to do without worrying about the transfer. Future iPads, I believe, will be able to do a lot more in the background.

Photos load on Adobe Lightroom at the blink of an eye while applying presets to a collection happens instantaneously. While going through different crops for a photo, I don’t have to wait and the same goes for playing with exposure or highlights. The benefit of having all the power and RAM is appreciated when I am editing photos on the move while taking the advantage of the touchscreen as well as the Magic Keyboard (needs to be bought separately; we will look at the product in another article in a few days time).

Attaching the Magic Keyboard (needs to be bought separately) lends the iPad Pro versatility The Telegraph

New milestones while video editing

Working with videos is a different game. LumaFusion is the editor of choice. Though it doesn’t have a whole lot of graphic titles but it is among best apps out there.

The first thing I noticed is that there are no stutters while playing videos within the editing software. Single timeline video editing is something you can do on many apps but it’s when you double or triple stack, there is a need for power.

Double stacking timelines or stacking different footage on top of each other is something I usually do on the PC, especially if the video is 4K. Running LumaFusion on the iPad Pro, I can easily double stack and get away with it, without having to experience lags… not even a microsecond. So I decided to triple stack, which the machine handled effortlessly. The iPad didn’t even heat up while blazing through the process. Of course, if DaVinci Resolve is your choice then the MacBook is something you should look at. Otherwise, the new iPad Pro is a spec monster. Usually Apple doesn’t talk about RAM but this time it’s different. There is 16GB of RAM with the 1TB or 2TB storage, and this helps to reach new milestones while editing videos.

Significant advantage for illustrators

For someone who likes to do illustrations as a hobby, then any iPad works. For a professional illustrator, it will be a wiser to go for the iPad Pro 12.9-inch version. It’s not just about the size but the screen. There is not much the iPad from 2020 can’t handle when it comes to an app like Procreate, which is fun to use and perfect for any kind of sketching.

With the 12.9-inch version you get a Liquid Retina XDR display (vis-à-vis Liquid Retina on the 11-inch), which uses mini-LED backlit multi-touch technology. Mini-LED isn’t self-emitting, like OLED, or the upcoming micro-LED. It still has a backlight, just a ton of them, over 10,000 to be specific, grouped into more than 2,500 local dimming zones, so you can achieve almost OLED-like high dynamic range but without some of the drawbacks of the OLED that are especially prominent on larger displays. For example, mini-LED doesn’t have the same off-axis colour shifting issues when you are looking from the sides, which is less annoying on the phone but it enhances around a tablet. And mini-LED has more consistent brightness and can ramp up to 1,600 nits peak brightness. So yes, there is significant advantage for illustrators, especially if the person is doing a live sketch sitting under the sun. Or for that matter, streaming movies should be a joy on the bigger iPad Pro.

Enter, the podcaster

There’s a good reason to move all your basic podcast editing and recording to the new iPad Pro. It has four speakers that can perform brilliant tricks. You can turn the device any which way you like, yet get a full spatial audio soundstage. And thanks to the sensors on the iPad Pro, the experience gets improved if you are wearing AirPods Pro or the AirPods Max. It’s sort of a personal cinematic experience. In terms of mics, it has studio-quality mics, basically the equivalent of plugging in a USB mic. Try Ferrite, a spoken word audio recording and editing app.

Take centre stage

Of course, the new iPad Pro is something worth having on your shopping list if you are upgrading after three-four years. Besides speed which comes with M1, one feature makes the purchase worth it — Centre Stage.

It’s a brilliant camera trick while videoconferencing or even while demonstrating products or culinary skills. Centre Stage uses machine learning to adjust the front-facing ultra-wide camera during FaceTime video calls on your iPad Pro 12.9-inch (5th generation) or iPad Pro 11-inch (3rd generation) to help keep you and anyone else with you in the frame.

In case you decide to move around the room while giving a lecture, the camera will seem to move with you. If more people move into the frame, the camera will automatically zoom out to accommodate them. In other words, the camera is always on you.

Not just FaceTime, Zoom and Webex can take advantage of the feature. In case you want to switch the feature off only in one app, you can do so without disturbing the settings for the others.

Where does it fit in?

Does this mean you can move completely to the 2021 iPad Pro and ditch the MacBook? No. These are different products, even though the M1 chip runs them all (not the iPhone, of course). On the iPad Pro you have the advantage of using touch, keyboard as well as the Apple Pencil, a combination that has its advantages but you can get around 10 hours out of the device while the MacBook Pro lasts 17 to 20 hours, depending on your activities. There is the Magic Keyboard for the iPad Pro but it still doesn’t have the entire layout of the MacBook.

Apple has been trying for years to put out the message that the iPad is a computer. And after coming up with the M1 chip for its Mac, Apple has managed to put it into the iPad, making the hardware so good that it’s basically future-proofed. As and when Apple ups the app game by offering more powerful titles on the App Store, your machine is ready for it. The new iPad Pro is by far the best tablet ever made. More importantly, the iPad Pro strikes a balance between wowing and delivering tech that creative professionals actually need, besides future-proofing a purchase.

More about it

The Apple Pencil (separate purchase) is a must for illustrators and it makes life easier if you take a lot of notes

Device: iPad Pro (2021, 11-inch)

Price: Upwards of Rs 71,900

High notes

• Blazing M1 processor, desktop-level CPU

• Centre Stage is a unique camera feature during video calls

• Thunderbolt support

• You can work on multiple video timelines using an app like LumaFusion

• Excellent cameras and audio

• Built for creative tasks

Muffled notes

• Supports external display but can only mirror the iPad interface.

• Doesn’t have the XDR display that’s available on the 12.9-inch version