Apple iPad Pro (2024) review: the best kind of overkill

Let it run OSX and I'd buy it

I’m pretty sure it can run it considering the M series Macs all run iOS apps. They probably haven’t figured out how to roll it out or they want to squeeze more money by making you buy both.
- It’s about the UX. The hardware can do it but they don’t want to simply port macOS to a device it was never designed for.
  
  Instead they’re just going to keep adding things to iPadOS over time until it’s the same. It’s just that they’re taking way too long to get there.
What’s the appeal of an iPad running OSX over a Mac?
- It would be super useful.
  
  When you want to draw something you go to tablet mode and use the pencil. - When the drawing you made needs some editing that iPad software can't do then you switch to mac os mode and finalize the drawing.
  
  Do some programming in mac mode because programming on ipad is extremely limited. - Then when you're done coding you switch to tablet mode and relax with some touch based jigsaw puzzle games.
  
  When you have to use the windows-only programs that work mandates you have to use then you go to mac mode with attached keyboard and run it through parallels. - Then that evening you switch to tablet mode and chill in bed reading a comic book.
  
  Etc etc etc.
  
  All the things that are better done on a mac, and all the things that are better done on an iPad, they all have no reason for existing on separate hardware
- Flexibility. And I wonder if remote work has altered that balance lately too. Many I suspect now have chiefly desktop computers, except they're actually laptops plugged into screens. Because there are still some occasions in which you want to be able to take a working computer somewhere else.
  
  But a laptop starts to look like a strangely optimised device for this. Too small to be a powerful desktop and sometimes (if you've gotten a beefy one) too big to be comfortably portable. However, a nice desktop machine coupled with a very portable tablet that can, in those few times its necessary, be a productive enough work machine, but also just be the nice portable media machine wherever you want, seems like an ideal pairing for many now. That the ipad absolutely cannot do some things you'd maybe, even just once a decade, need to do on the fly is a show stopper for this pairing.
  
  And so many probably have a laptop used as a desktop most of the time and an ipad used as a kindle most of the time.
- There is nothing. People just like to complain about the App Store.

Overkill hardware is OK with me. As long as it meets the need and has good battery life, I’m happy, but I don’t see overkill as a selling point.

My iPhone is absolutely overkill in the CPU department. I never push its capabilities. but I didn’t buy it for the benchmarks. I bought it because it’s a pretty good phone.

and has good battery life

Not sure about this pro, but the previous models had kinda lacking battery life in some workloads because the CPU was just too damn powerful (and power hungry)
- My pre-M-series pro has stupidly long battery life. Tablets are nuts.

So many unused iPads around the world collecting dust because they seem super convenient, but in reality kinda suck to use for anything other than streaming.

I did really like it for notes in school… but yeah, now it’s just sitting there. Not cuz it’s old or has performance issues, I’ve just got no use for it. I either use my phone or my laptop.
- I really wish Apple would just release the driver source codes for older devices so we can install linux on them. I have an old iPad 2 and its Safari browser is too old to even stream YouTube anymore.

I'm looking forward to checking out the thin design in a store later this week. I won't buy one cause that's not the product for me. I have an iPad mini at the sofa for quick one-handed browsing when we pause the tv. My partner gets a snack or goes to the bathroom and it's the perfect size for a brief distraction, then it goes in a pocket on the side of the sofa arm.

quick one-handed browsing
when my partner gets a snack or goes to the bathroom

Uh-huh