iPad Air 2020 Review By zollotech

Hi everyone Aaron here for zollotech- and this is the 2020 iPad Air fourth generation- I've been using it every single day since it came out. I switched over to this as my main iPad, and this is the device I'm using the most when I'm not editing video on a Mac. So this is what I've used most of the time every single day, so, whether I'm doing email or using safari or maybe YouTube. This is what I use most of the time. I even edited a 4k video on this, and I'll talk more about that a little later. Now, as far as the design, the iPad Air has been upgraded to look more like the iPad Pro.

In fact, I'm glad they did this, because this is one of my favorite designs. I love the squared off edges to go along with this year's iPhones and I think it's just better to hold on to it's maybe less curved around the outside edge, but I think it gives you more grip because it just sits in your hand a little better, at least for me now. The overall size is the same as the iPad Pro, so you can use the accessories for the iPad Pro, such as the magic keyboard. In fact, it's the same one for the 11-inch iPad Pro that you can use with the iPad Air. So it's nice that it's sort of standardized that way and then again the overall design is squared off.

On the right hand, side you have your volume buttons, then you have the little spot for your pencil to charge and also pair. So, if you take the second gen Apple Pencil, it sticks right on there and then pairs with the device. If you have the cellular model, you'll have a sim card tray here and then on the bottom. You have two speakers or what looks like two speakers, but this is really one speaker with sort of resonance chamber and the idea is, if you block one, the sound will still come out. The other one and so I'll show you that in a little also, we have USB.

So you can use this for USB drives charging, or maybe you have an accessory. You want to use with it connected to a mac, for example, on the other side, nothing really there and then on the top again, we have two speakers or sort of single speaker with a resonance chamber and then touch ID and touch ID is really great on this iPad press and hold you click it once hold it, and it unlocks. So let me show you that again press and hold keep your finger there, and it unlocks. This took me a little of time to get used to coming from an iPad Pro with face ID. So instead of swiping up on the iPad, you just press the button, and it unlocks it's nice and fast, no problems there, and again you'll see it unlocks nice and fast, no issues whatsoever with that.

The bezels are a little bigger on the display than what we had with the iPad Pro, but that's not really an issue. You put your thumb on there anyway, and I have fairly big hands and so you're going to cover part of that screen. Anyway, I don't think it's much of a big issue. For probably most people won't even care now the display is really nice, and it looks great it's not as bright as an iPad Pro and also doesn't have pro motion. While it is nice and smooth at 60 hertz, it works fine, no problems here.

If you're coming from an iPhone or any previous generation iPad, that's not a pro. You won't notice at all. So I don't think it's really a concern for most people, it's nice and smooth, and it's always fast- and this is superfast- with the a14 bionic. It only has four gigs of ram, but I was able to edit a 4k video on it, and I'll show you that in a bit, but let's first take a look at the speakers, and I wanted to show you what I mean by when you cover one it sort of comes out of the other. So let me go into YouTube and here's actually the video I edited on this iPad I'll hit play in general, they're, nice and clear.

So if I put my hand over photos, look amazing, of course, if you're using a 30-second exposure on a tripod you're going to get the best experience, and you can see how bright and vibrant these are with the new lens, that's in the iPhone 12. So as I cover the different speakers, yes, you can hear a little of a difference. It muffles it a little, but you don't block the sound entirely. So if you are using this to watch a video, and you're covering two speakers, you won't really miss out on the audio too much. There is a slight difference like I said, but it's not really much of an issue now, like I said this is superfast, even though it has only four gigs of ram.

I was able to edit a 4k video on it. If I go into iMovie here's the actual iPhone 12 Pro video. I fully edited this in a 10 bit HDR on this, so I recorded it with automatic settings on the iPhone 12 Pro imported it to this iPad and then fully edited the entire video on here, including titles. You can see there's some b-roll, that's the secondary video, that's on top here, and you can see all the different cuts most of the time it handled it without a problem and the reason I say most of the time is sometimes during playback. If I hit play here, the right size for most people turn it down.

Sometimes when it goes back over to where I'm talking on camera, it will sort of hiccup and pause like that. So I don't know if this is a memory issue or an iMovie issue, but it sort of keep catches up, and I only found this to be an issue once I got past about five to seven minutes of 4k video remember this is 4k 10-bit HDR, video, even high-end mac, pros will sometimes hiccup editing this sort of video. So it's really impressive. What it's doing and then, when I exported the video that was sort of mind-blowing, whatever they're doing with this a14 bionic exported the video in less time than the video is long. So the video is 12 minutes and 7 seconds it exported in under 10 minutes.

I don't know that you can do that on a high-end Mac pro, so whatever chipset they have in here, that's custom. That's incredibly impressive! So I've exported 10 bit HDR video on a Mac pro before using final cut, and it's taken or on an iMac Pro. Rather it took hours to export so to export. This in under 10 minutes really is a testament to whatever apple's doing with that a14 bionic. So that was incredibly impressive.

When I edited this video now. The other thing is you don't get studio mics with this iPad, so compared to the iPad Pro, you won't have studio mics. If you need to use this for a quick recording, you can do that, but the audio just won't be as good as say a studio microphone. So let me go into the camera, and we'll check out the forward-facing camera. So now I'm in the camera, let's flip it around to the forward-facing camera we're on video HD 60, which is the highest it can do.

Let me go ahead and hit record, and now you can hear the microphones from the new iPad Air, and so they're, pretty good they're, not amazing, and they're, not as good as the iPad Pro, but they're, pretty good and definitely usable if you want to use this for FaceTime or some quick video recording, and so I think that gives you a good idea of what it's capable of and then also the rear facing camera is pretty good as well. So let me get my iPhone out of my pocket here. The iPhone 12 Pro will go ahead and hit record, and now I'm recording from the rear camera of the iPad Air. So it is 4k 60, but it's not HDR. It's pretty good video.

It looks a little grainy, but in general it looks pretty good, so I think it's a decent camera. Of course, you can use it for whatever you'd like, if you want to use it for just capturing some quick video, maybe story boarding getting some ideas. I think it's perfect for that. So it's not great for everything. Your iPhone would be better for that.

In combination with this iPad Air, but it's perfect in general now one thing I find that I have to use all the time with this is the smart keyboard to me. This is a must-buy accessory and really transforms what the iPad can do as being mostly a main, your main computer, or what you would use all the time. So it is a fairly expensive accessory if we open it up like this snap, the iPad into place- and this is something that, like I said, I use all the time- I don't necessarily use the trackpad a lot. I use the keyboard a lot and then scroll through using touch and maybe going back to iMovie we'll go here, use space to play the video just like I would if I was editing a normal video in Final Cut Pro on a Mac. I used space jump ahead frame by frame using the keyboard.

Furthermore, I think it's essential, along with the pencil, to help you sort of edit and fine-tune that edit as well. So obviously, this can be made for used for movie creation. You could use iMovie suffusion and maybe any future versions and as far as accessories in general, this is a must-have for me. If you're going to use this as your main device, if you're just going to use it for some sketching- and you mostly draw well, then maybe you want to go over to the smart folio, where you don't necessarily need that keyboard, because you're doing more sort of art instead of maybe typing, but this shuts the iPad off and on when you open and close it just like any of the other smart keyboards, and it protects it on the back as well. So I think this is a must-have accessory if you're not using the smart keyboard, there are other cases out there.

These are my favorites so far and of course they match the iPad Air. Now, as far as battery life, I'm getting the expected 8 to 10 hours of battery life on the iPad Air. I think it's going to get that 10 hours, that most iPads do for most people. The only time I found that it got below that is when I was actually editing, 4k video and that's such an intensive process even on a MacBook Pro, for example, a 16-inch MacBook Pro that will pull the time of battery life down to about two and a half three hours on a MacBook Pro when you're using an iPad Pro, pulls it down a couple of hours, but it's still impressive what it can do. If we take a look at the last 10 days, it was last charged Tuesday at 8, 54, and you'll see there wasn't a ton of use since then, but I have been using it extensively, and you can see a couple of hours a day, usually down here, screen on time, almost three hours that day, five hours that day five hours the day before, so it just depends on what day.

But I use this a lot, and this is a device I really like now. Would I pick this up instead of an iPad Pro, I would say it depends on which size iPad Pro if you want to go for the 11-inch iPad Pro I'd, probably just pick up the iPad Air, unless you needed more storage, the iPad Air only goes up to 256 gigabytes of storage? So if you need more than that regularly, and you're editing video, then I might switch to an iPad Pro. Otherwise, this is basically an iPad Pro without studio mics without quad speakers and without pro motion. So if those things don't matter to you in everyday use, well, I'd definitely pick up the iPad Air first you've got different colors. It looks great now for me, I prefer the pro that's larger, so I've got it right here, and this is my 12.9-inch iPad Pro. Of course, you've got a couple different camera options with it as well, and I, like the larger size, it just depends on what you prefer, since I use it as my main viewing device for YouTube, and things like that, you can see.

The difference in size is significant. So if you're going to use it as your main computer, and you need a larger display, well then go with the pro. If you want the smaller display for most people, the error is plenty, it's a great device and I highly recommend it and so using the iPad Air. Every day I didn't miss the iPad Pro too much other than the larger size I had to get used to the smaller size touch ID did take a little to get used to. Everything else was so close that I didn't notice a difference, so I highly recommend an iPad Air if you're looking for a new iPad, and maybe you're coming from an older, regular iPad, an older iPad Air, I love this design and I highly recommend it if you need a LIDAR sensor or the larger display, then go with iPad Pro.

If you'd like to get your hands on this wallpaper, of course, I'll link it in the description like I always do and if you haven't subscribed already please subscribe and if you enjoyed the video please give it a like. As always thanks for watching I'll see you next time, you.

Source : zollotech