Yeah, I got another iPad… That took a lot less time than expected.
I grabbed a 2021 iPad Pro 11”, 128GB, cellular, in silver. It was from an open box company here in Canada, and the cost on it was less than half price. On receiving it, the unit is clearly a demo model, but a demo that’s never been taken out of the box… Battery health is still 100%+, no scratches or marks at all on the unit. I’m guessing a store here in Canada received this for display but never ended up putting it out. My gain I suppose. Only issue is expired/no warranty coverage. For the extreme discount, I don’t mind this.
This came in just before going to Toronto last week, so I threw it in my bag with me. While there I grabbed the pencil for 30 dollars off at Best Buy, and an Apple Smart Cover in black from The Source for 50% off.
The specs? Basically my old iPad Pro, but swap out the A12Z and 6GB of RAM for an M1 and 8GB of RAM. Otherwise it looks and handles the exact same. Going from 256GB of storage to 128GB isn’t a big deal with how much I leverage cloud storage. Cellular is a nice touch, though I’m not 100% sure if I’ll add it to my cell plan - It’s going to depend on how much it goes out with me in the near future.
Why did I pick this up? Well, it all started with a killer deal on an iPad Mini 256GB with cellular that I failed to jump on in time. Seeing this wasn’t much more, I decided to buy this as a salve for missing out on such a solid deal on the Mini. Would I still prefer the mini? Undecided.
What am I going to use it for? We’ll see. I want to get back to some journaling (Notability, Apple Notes) and doodling (Procreate). Tactile, hands on note taking (Again, Notability). It’s a lot smaller and lighter than my Macbook Pro too with a load of power in it thanks to the M1 chip, so I’m hoping it’ll be a nice in-between when travelling without a requirement for a laptop. Lightroom performance is astounding, as always. It’s a nice stand in for a portable speaker. It’s going to make for a capable secondary monitor for my Macbook Pro while on the go. Around the house it’s going to make for a solid little web browser/news reader. You know, normal iPad things.
I’ll probably write something in the next few months on how it’s going. For now, I’m happy with it.