Fans of Apple's smaller iPad Mini caught a tough break last fall when the company unveiled its new tablets for the year. Although Tim Cook & co. lavished plenty of attention on the faster, slimmed-down iPad Air 2, the upgraded iPad Mini 3 was regarded as a mere afterthought. The list of changes was so short, in fact, that some of us wondered why Apple would introduce a performance gap between the Air and Mini lines. Still more people wondered when they'd get a Mini with enough power to match its larger sibling. Turns out, the answer was "a year later." I've been testing the new iPad Mini 4 for over a week now and can say with confidence this is the Mini we should've gotten last year.
Hardware
Apple's design
team did most of the heavy lifting with the iPad Air 2 and now we're finally
seeing that sleek aesthetic trickle down to the Mini. The 4's fit and finish is
still first-rate and, more importantly, the whole package is about a tenth of a
pound lighter than last year's model. That might not sound like a dramatic
difference, but when you're building a device with a bigger-than-phone-sized
screen, every ounce and gram matter. The iPad Air 2 felt almost unnaturally
light for its size, so you can imagine how light the even smaller Mini 4 feels
holding it aloft and watching YouTube videos for hours was none too painful.
The Minis were never exactly tanks, of
course, but this year's thinner and lighter model (0.65 pound and 6.1mm, the
same thickness as the Air 2) makes prolonged, one-handed use a pleasure. The
Air-ification of the Mini line also means that handy rotation-lock switch part
of the iPad's hardware formula for years -- has been excised. Keeping your
screen from spinning around now requires you to swipe up the Control Center and
tap an icon down there. This is one of those little changes that most people
won't notice until they start feeling around for that familiar nubbin. Despite
not using it that frequently, I still miss having it there.
It's easy to imagine Apple just took a
shrink ray to an iPad Air 2 and called it a day, but there's more going on here
than meets the eye. You see, rather than carry over the modified A8X from the
Air 2, Apple kitted out the new Mini with the same A8 processor that's
currently powering the iPhone 6, albeit except it's paired with 2GB of RAM
instead of one. I've never had much reason to complain about the iPhone 6's
performance, and the combination of that chipset and the extra RAM means the
Mini 4 is, unsurprisingly, a snappy performer (more on that later). My review
unit was a 128GB model, although Apple also offers 16GB and 64GB options with
prices starting at $399 for a WiFi-only configuration. Toss in an updated
8-megapixel rear camera, not to mention faster 802.11ac WiFi and 20 LTE bands,
and we've got a much-improved device on our hands.
Display
and sound
The iPad Air 2 might give you more screen
real estate, but the Mini 4 wins on pixel density, hands down. Like the Mini 3
before it, the newest generation squeezes 326 pixels into each linear inch of
the device's 7.9-inch screen, making for crisp text and eye-popping visuals.
Even better, Apple finally got rid of that tiny gap between the Mini's display
panel and the slate of arsenic-free glass covering it; it's all been combined
into a single, laminated panel.
What sounds like an exercise in LCD screen
minutiae makes for some dramatic changes: It means less glare, better viewing
angles and a touch more crispness. When we tested the Air 2 and the Mini 3, the
difference in color clarity and saturation was pretty pronounced, but that's
thankfully now a non-issue. Oh, and a brief aside: Older Minis also made a bit
of a hollow thunk sound when you tapped them a certain way, an issue that's
been addressed on the new model.
If you're hell-bent on using the Mini as a
media machine, you've probably got a decent pair of headphones to go with it.
Thankfully, you needn't fret if you accidentally leave them at home: The
speakers housed on the Mini's bottom edge are impressively loud for their size.
You won't be able to fill a room with the mid-heavy sound they churn out, but I
discovered I could leave a video playing in the kitchen and still hear it while
folding laundry downstairs.
Software
iOS 9 is such an important step forward
that we just published a few thousand words all about it. Assuming you don't
have the time to sift through our full review, here's a quick rundown on what
iOS 9 means for the new Mini. In short, Apple's latest software update is
focused more on stability and thoughtfulness, using Siri's new proactive smarts
to surface information and apps when you might want them. Throw in plenty of
neat design changes -- like a revamped app switcher and a fantastic
"Back" button that lets you follow the breadcrumb trail of apps you
were just using -- and we've got a more smartly put-together update than we
initially gave Apple credit for.
iPads got plenty of attention in this
update, and fans of mobile multitasking should be especially pleased. Consider
Slide Over, which lets you swipe open a drawer full of first-party apps that
can be opened in a smaller, separate window that takes up about a quarter of
the screen. By jumping into any of those apps, you're effectively putting the
other, primary application you were just using on pause until you're done
texting or checking Apple News. You can go a step further and drag the line
that divides those apps; that resizes both of them until they each take up 50
percent of the screen. Why hello, Split View. Honestly, as neat as this trick
is, it feels sort of silly on a screen this small. Running two apps side by
side makes sense on a larger display -- say, on a full-sized Air 2 or an
enormous iPad Pro. Shoehorning two apps onto an 8-inch screen can feel a little
claustrophobic after a while.
Then there's picture-in-picture mode,
which, yes, is exactly what it sounds like. Any time you play a video in
Apple's stock media player, you can tap an icon to shrink it down and stick it
in a corner so you won't miss a moment of JK Simmons being an epic jerk in
Whiplash. Give that small window a quick pinch-zoom and it'll roughly double in
size; the default view on the Mini 4 is pretty tiny, so you'll probably spend
most of your time in this mode.
Moving on, the Notes app also now supports
richer text formatting (heck yeah, subheadings) and packs a reasonably thorough
sketching tool for adding drawings and diagrams to your text. The smaller
screens on iPhones make random doodling tricky, but that's not a problem with
the Mini's nearly 8-inch screen. All told, iOS 9 is a must-have download, and
the Mini 4 gives it plenty of space and power to shine.
Camera
I'll be the first to admit I sometimes
glare at people shooting tab-photos in public, but the appeal is pretty
obvious. For one, it might be the only camera folks have on them, and we all
know the adage there. A bigger screen also makes it easier to frame shots, and
really, who among us couldn't stand to be better at that? What I'm saying is
this seemingly silly habit isn't going anywhere, and the iPad Mini 4's
rear-facing 8-megapixel camera does a fine job of capturing the world around
you.
Tablet photos are hardly ever outstanding,
but the Mini 4, like the Air 2 before it, is capable of capturing crisp colors
and reasonable detail when the light is right. White balance is generally more
accurate now too, which is especially apparent since the Mini didn't get left
in the display quality dust this time. Things obviously get muddier in dimmer
conditions, but really, if you're using a tablet to take photos in the middle
of the night, you might want to rethink your strategy. Meanwhile, the
front-facing camera is stuck at 1.2 megapixels, but it now has an f/2.2
aperture lens to help suck in the light bouncing off of your face. Still, I haven't
noticed much of a difference between this camera and the one in last year's
Mini.
Other changes include the ability to shoot
in burst mode thanks to the A8 chipset thrumming away inside, and improved
support for HDR photos and video. The iPad Mini 4 isn't going to be anyone's
first choice for mobile photography, but it's a solid, if unremarkable,
performer.
Performance
and battery life
I sort of alluded to this earlier, but
let's be clear: The Mini 4 is not just a shrunken-down Air 2. The difference in
the chipsets powering these things is apparent in our benchmark tests below,
but the Mini 4 is still no slouch compared to its more premium cousin. It's
buttery smooth as you leap in and out of apps and swipe through web pages. The
only time I noticed the Mini's A8 chipset struggling was while running two apps
in Split View, and even then, it was only when I was trying to fiddle with both
simultaneously. While I'm comparing the Mini 4 to other iPads, it's noticeably
quicker to react than last year's Mini. In fact, Apple says the A8's CPU is 30
percent faster than the Mini 3's A7, and that graphical performance is up 60
percent from last year. That helps explain why Asphalt 8 and Modern Combat 5:
Blackout ran like a dream, but I'll let the numbers do the rest of the talking.
iPad Mini 4iPad Air 2iPad Mini 3NVIDIA
Shield TabletGeekbench 3.03,2364,5102,4703,423Basemark
X17,21229,51814,839TBD3DMark IS Unlimited16,29121,65914,59530,970SunSpider 1.0
(ms) 349303439463 SunSpider: Lower scores are better.
So, pretty much exactly what I expected:
The Mini 4 strikes an appropriate balance between the Mini 3 and the Air 2
(which has the edge thanks to an extra CPU core). Usually it performs just a
hair better than last year's iPhones too. Of course, horsepower means nothing
without battery power, and the new Mini has that in spades. The usual Apple
refrain is that the Mini is rated for about 10 hours of continued use, but that
might have been understating things a bit. In our usual video rundown test
(video looping with the screen brightness set to 50 percent), the Mini 4 lasted
13 hours and 4 minutes before needing an emergency trip to the power outlet.
That's just short of the 13 hours and 45 minutes on last year's model, which
isn't bad at all considering the new Mini 4 actually has a smaller, 5,124mAh
battery.
The Mini fared similarly well in the
battery test called "living with me." After pulling it off of the
charger at around 7 AM, schlepping to the office and using it for
emails/reading articles/the occasional game, I'd usually wind up with 10
percent remaining when I returned home at 9 PM.
TabletBattery lifeiPad Mini 413:04iPad Air
211:15iPad Mini 313:45iPad Air13:45 (LTE)Apple iPad Mini12:43 (WiFi)Samsung
Galaxy Tab S (10-inch)12:30Microsoft Surface 39:11Galaxy Tab S27:30
The
competition
If you're in the market for a sleek
tablet, consider Samsung's Galaxy Tab S2 (starting at $400 for the 8-inch
model). While it lacks the kooky style of its immediate predecessor, the
10-inch screen is one to behold -- it is Samsung after all -- and it's only
5.6mm thick. The downgraded battery might sting, though: It only managed 7.5
hours in our tests, down from 12.5 hours for the previous-gen model. Itching
for something more portable? ASUS just launched its 8-inch ZenPad S, a $200
Android slate with a waistline similar to the Mini 4's and a 2,048 x 1,536
display, to boot. Then there's the iPad Air 2 itself, which is still the most
powerful tablet in Apple's roster. It's incredibly sleek and can be held
one-handed for longer than you might expect, but its size means it's just not
going to fit into some lifestyles. The thing is, it's almost worth trying to
see if the size can work for you; prices for the Air 2 start at $499, and sales
or buying refurbished can bring that base price down even lower.
Wrap-up
Some might gripe about the Mini 4's
year-old internals, but after my week of testing, I feel confident saying that
it doesn't matter much. The tablet's entire package, from the still-snappy A8
chipset to the beautiful and almost-pocketable screen, to the incredibly sleek
chassis, makes it worthy of your consideration. If you're on the lookout for a
super-portable tablet with strong fundamentals and great app support, you
probably won't find a contender better than this one. That said, if you can fit
a bigger tablet into your life, you could easily upgrade into an iPad Air 2 for
not much more money and get even more processing power.
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