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Posts tagged with "May 2024 Event"

Apple Reveals New Keyboards and the Apple Pencil Pro

Source: Apple.

Source: Apple.

Along with the iPad Pros, Apple today introduced new keyboards and an Apple Pencil Pro.

The new Magic Keyboard for iPad Pro, at long last, has a function row of half-height keys similar to what you’d find on a Mac. The trackpad is bigger, the palm rest is aluminum, and the whole thing is thinner and lighter than before, which are all great additions. The keyboards come in black (with a black aluminum palm rest) and white (with a silver palm rest). What hasn’t changed is the cantilevered design of the keyboard, which some had predicted would be replaced by a more laptop-like hinge.

Source: Apple.

Source: Apple.

There’s a new Smart Folio for iPad Pro, too. According to Apple’s press release:

The new Smart Folio for iPad Pro attaches magnetically and now supports multiple viewing angles for greater flexibility. Available in black, white, and denim, it complements the colors of the new iPad Pro.

Source: Apple.

Source: Apple.

The new Apple Pencil Pro sounds as though it’s a big step forward. There’s a sensor in the device’s barrel so that, with a squeeze, users can summon a tool palette on the iPad Pro or iPad Air. The new Pencil also incorporates haptics, allowing it to provide a bit of feedback when a user squeezes the Pencil. There’s even a built-in gyroscope that senses when the barrel is rotated, which can be used to rotate brushes and onscreen objects. The rotation functionality is incorporated into the hover feature, allowing users to see the rotation of a brush before placing the Pencil on the screen, for example. The new model Pencil also supports Find My. As before, the new Apple Pencil Pro connects to the iPad Pro magnetically for pairing, charging, and storing.

I like the look of the Magic Keyboard for iPad Pro and Apple Pencil Pro a lot. The previous Magic Keyboard always felt too cramped, and it was frustrating to not have function keys. And, although I’m not a heavy Apple Pencil user, I’m excited to see how developers implement the new Pro features.

The new Smart Folio comes in black, white, and denim and is $79 for the 11” iPads and $99 for the 13” iPads. The new Magic Keyboard comes in white and black and is $299 for the 11” iPad Pro and $349 for the 13” iPad Pro, with $20 off those prices for education customers. The Apple Pencil Pro is $129 and $119 for education customers.

You can follow all of our May 2024 Apple event coverage through our May 2024 Apple event hub or subscribe to the dedicated May 2024 Apple event RSS feed.

Apple Announces New 11” and 13” iPad Pros

At its Let Loose video event today, Apple introduced new 11” and 13” iPad Pros. Both models come in Silver and Space Black and feature OLED displays, the M4 chip, and more. Based on the specs Apple shared, both iPad Pro models appear to be significant upgrades over the existing M2 models.

The Design

Apple has made its thinest device ever with the iPad Pro. The 11” model is 5.3 mm thick, and the 13” model is 5.1 mm thick. That’s a remarkably thin device, achieved though a combination of new display technology and power efficiency, which allow it to use a smaller battery.

The Display

It’s not surprising that the new iPad Pros have OLED displays. That’s been rumored for a while. However, Apple says these are the most advanced OLED displays available.

The display, which Apple calls Ultra Retina XDR, is made from two OLED panels, allowing the device to achieve higher brightness than a single-panel setup. So in addition to the deeper blacks and high-contrast that OLED typically achieves, Apple says the new iPad Pros will support 1,000 nits of full-screen brightness for SDR and HDR content and 1,600 nits peak for HDR.

A nano-textured display is also available for the first time in the 1TB and 2TB configurations of both iPad Pros.

The M4 Chip

The new iPad Pros are the first devices made by Apple to include the new M4 chipset, skipping the M3 generation altogether. Apple says that the M4, which is built with a second-generation 3-nanometer process, builds on the technologies found in the M3 chips, including features like Dynamic Caching and hardware-accelerated mesh shading and ray tracing that were only available on certain Macs before.

The 256GB and 512GB configurations of the new iPad Pro include a 9-core CPU with three performance cores and six efficiency cores. Those models also have a 10-core GPU and 16-core Neural Engine. The 1TB and 2TB models add one performance core to the CPU but have the same GPU and Neural Engine.

Apple spent a lot of time talking about the M4 and its ability to handle difficult AI tasks, pointing out that the latest Neural Engine can handle 38 trillion operations per second. The company says that’s 60x faster than its first Neural Engine in the A11 Bionic chip. Apple also claims that the Neural Engine is faster than any equivalent chip in PCs, implying that it’s the rest of the AI industry catching up to it and not the other way around.

Cameras

The front camera has been moved to the landscape side of the iPad Pro, which will make video conferencing less awkward. Plus, there’s a new Adaptive True Tone flash that removes shadows by taking multiple exposures of documents when scanning, and neither model includes an Ultra Wide camera anymore.

I’m excited about the new iPad Pro. It remains to be seen how the advances in hardware translate into everyday experiences, but it’s still good to see Apple pushing the iPad’s capabilities forward aggressively, which should encourage developers to push the boundaries of what is possible with a tablet.

The new 11” iPad Pro starts at $999, and the 13” model starts at $1,299. Both models can be ordered today and ship next week.

You can follow all of our May 2024 Apple event coverage through our May 2024 Apple event hub or subscribe to the dedicated May 2024 Apple event RSS feed.

Apple’s May 2024 Let Loose Event: Replay Today’s Keynote

If you didn’t follow the livestream of today’s ‘Let Loose’ Apple event, you can replay it on Apple’s Events site or YouTube.

The keynote video can be streamed here and on the Apple TV using the TV app. A high-quality version will also be available through Apple Podcasts as a video and audio podcast. An American Sign Language version of the event keynote is available on the Apple Events page too.

We’ll be adding links to the product videos released by Apple today as they appear on YouTube after the break.

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Apple Announces May 7th Let Loose Event

Today, Apple announced that it will be holding a video event on May 7, 2024 at 7 AM Pacific.

The announcement, which was sent to members of the press, doesn’t specify what it is about, but based on the illustration in the invitation, which clearly depicts an Apple Pencil, and based rumors, I expect the company will reveal new iPads and related accessories.