Even after playing around with it for a while, it's still just weird, you know?
It just looks kind of wrong.
But there's no denying it. The argument
about whether this thing is a computer
or not is over. With the Magic Keyboard
and trackpad, Apple's iPad Pro is, for better or for worse, a laptop, leaving
only one question behind. Is it a good
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At first glance, you'd be forgiven for thinking that the Magic Keyboard case is
an incremental upgrade over its predecessor, the iPad Smart Keyboard
Folio. It's got the same polyurethane exterior and color palette, and it
attaches to the iPad Pro with super strong magnets. But the two keyboards
are in entirely different categories.
For one, look at the range of motion on this puppy. It is leagues beyond the two
static positions of the keyboard folio, improving ergonomics in almost any
situation. Our one complaint here is that it would have been nice for it to
be able to go a bit further back. But I understand that that's hard because the
iPad Pro is pretty heavy for a laptop
display. Which is why, as Riley pointed out on ShortCircuit, the Magic Keyboard
actually weighs slightly more than the iPad Pro to prevent the whole assembly
from being comically unable to stand upright. Another big improvement is the
built-in USBC port. Now, it doesn't
carry data, but it's kind of magical to be able to charge the iPad Pro through
the keyboard smart connector without having a cord dangle from the tablet's
own USBC port. Of course, even the most
magic keyboard still has to be a good
keyboard. And good news, cuz it is. It
uses the same scissor-based switches that Apple has now returned to the
MacBook line after replacing them with the universally loathed butterfly
switches. And while the key caps are a bit wobblier than their laptop
counterparts, and it would have been nice for them to include a row of
function keys for things like volume and brightness adjustment, this magic
keyboard gives an undeniably more laptop-like experience than the keyboard
folio did. And if you really do want an escape key, you can just modify another
key to serve as one, although the go home trackpad gesture mostly does the
job. As for the typing experience, there is a distinct tactile bump with a soft
bottom. And typing at speed makes you feel like you really are being
productive with an iPad. A thought that renders me, a PC enthusiast and laptop
die hard, deeply uncomfortable. Thankfully, I can feel a lot more
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Ah, surprisingly though, an equal, if
not greater contributor to this productive feeling is the trackpad. Yes,
iPads can have trackpads now, and this one is actually kind of great. I mean,
don't get me wrong, it is tiny. But if Microsoft can get away with using the
same tiny trackpad on every Surface Pro ever, I think I can accept that there
simply wasn't enough room to make this one any bigger without other
compromises. It's got a smooth glass top layer just like MacBook trackpads and
does not use a diving board mechanism, so it's actually clickable everywhere on
its surface. And because it's so small yet feels so smooth, we actually ended
up leaving trackpad inertia on in the
settings. I know it's a sin, but seriously, guys, it's kind of neat cuz
it lets you fling the cursor from one end of the monitor to the other with
just a tiny finger movement. Did I just call an iPad Pro a monitor?
What is happening right now? Okay, now we've already talked about the way that
regular mouse support works in iPad OS, but the trackpad has a number of
multi-finger gestures that completely change the game for using the iPad on a
desk. Obviously, two-finger scrolling is here along with two-finger tap to right
click. Although, that doesn't work on everything in iPad OS. In fact, nothing
works on everything in iPad OS. It's not very cohesive. But you can also use
two-finger swipe in browsers to go forward and back and two finger swipe
down from the home screen to bring up Spotlight search. The big navigation
gestures involve three-finger swipes though. Swipe left or right to switch
apps, up to go home, and swipe up and hold to enter the multitasking menu from
which you can two-finger swipe on any app to close it. I got to say, being
able to zoom around the iPad's UI without lifting your ARM up or moving
around so much to touch the screen not only makes navigation feel much less
tedious, it actually feels kind of cool. But the story here isn't all rainbows
and lollipops either. Making the Magic Keyboard more like a laptop conversion
mod and less like a tablet folio means you cannot flip it all the way around
and use the iPad Pro like a tablet with the case still attached. And the stiff
supportive hinge and super strong magnets mean that it's impossible to
open with one hand and actually annoyingly difficult to open even with
two hands. Here's one. Something we found infuriating in the age of laptops
whose lids can be lifted effortlessly with a single finger. Then there's iPad
OS. Now, it's come a long way. I mean,
using multiple Windows in the same app while replying to messages with slide
over and dragging and dropping files to an external hard drive while plugged
into an external monitor is something iPad users could only dream about a
couple of short years ago. But the fact remains that as an operating system, it
is still miles behind the versatility that one can find in Windows, macOS,
and Linux. And that continues to make Apple's moves with the iPad Pro and by
extension the Magic Keyboard so confusing to me. In our last video about
the iPad Pro, we said that Apple had dropped the ball by turning it into a
laptop because it seemed like they had envisioned this grand future where the
iPad Pro existed as a different kind of professional computing device, one that
you use with touch and a and a pencil input instead of with a mouse and
keyboard. And then they pulled this big, hey, gotcha and released a $350
attachment that seems to completely negate that vision. I just had no idea
how to interpret it. Like, what what what is this thing? And then making my
life as a reviewer even more complicated, this 12.9 in iPad Pro
starts at $1,000
with just $128 gigs of onboard storage.
That means that altogether this setup is $1,400
for a machine that in the mind of any sane laptop user is a clear downgrade
from a MacBook or a Windows Ultrabook. But then there's this funny thing that
doesn't seem to be how iPad users see it. We keep making these videos about
the iPad where we express confusion and incredul at Apple's huge missteps with
their flagship Pro tablet. And then iPad Pro users keep telling us about how each
of these updates, iPad OS in 2019 and the Magic Keyboard this year, have made
them love their iPads even more. They
talk about alternative workflows where they type on their iPad at their desk,
then pop it out of the keyboard and use it on the couch. They extol the virtues
of apps that PC enthusiasts like me have never even heard of that let them mix
audio and edit images and 4K videos and
write code on their iPads. I mean, sure,
the shortcomings that we find so frustrating mean that they actually
cannot do the exact same things the exact same way that we do them on a
traditional laptop, but they just don't care. It seems like that different way
of using this separate pro category device is still
alive and well, but rather than an eitheror, it's more of a both. And use
the iPad Pro as a touch and pencil device. Use it as a keyboard and
trackpad device. It works pretty well
either way, mostly. As I alluded to
before, iPad OS has a long way to go before the kind of uninterrupted,
magically smooth UI experience that you get in Apple's apps extends to the whole
ecosystem. But even with that in mind,
after this review, I think I'll be looking at the iPad Pro's future with
less confusion and more
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