Believe it or not, I've never owned an iPad. I always found the iPad too big and too heavy to carry around with me, and since my wife's iPad already lived at home, if I really wanted to use one while lounging on the sofa I could. What I really wanted was a smaller, lighter iPad, but Steve Jobs made it painfully clear that my wish wasn't going to be granted.
I was sorely tempted to buy a Nexus 7 when Google launched its 7in tablet back in July – not only was it a solid piece of kit, but it was also extremely affordable. But by then, rumours of a 7in iPad were already circulating, and given that my desktop, laptop and phone are all Apple, I figured it was worth waiting.
Design
As it turned out, the iPad mini isn't a 7in tablet, it actually has a 7.9in screen, but it's still significantly smaller and lighter than the full size iPad. Apple has managed to keep the dimensions down by reducing the size of the bezel around the screen. There's a far narrower bezel to the left and right of the screen than there is to the top and bottom – Apple couldn't reduce the top and bottom bezels too much since the camera and home buttons live there.
One of the reasons that tablet manufacturers have given for the customarily generous bezels is that it ensures that the user can hold the device comfortably without accidentally interacting with the touch screen. However, the iPad mini can recognise when your thumb or finger is holding the device, as opposed to interacting with it – in practice this worked flawlessly, and never has my resting thumb at the edge of the screen caused any problems.
The mini is significantly smaller than the regular iPad in every dimension (200 x 134.7mm compared to 241.2 x 185.7mm), while at only 7.2mm thick, the iPad mini is 23 per cent thinner than its sibling, with its 9.4mm depth. But it's the weight of the iPad mini that really stands out compared to its big brother. While the iPad weighs in at 652g, the iPad mini weighs less than half as much at 308g. So, while I always found the iPad too heavy to hold while watching a movie or reading an eBook, the iPad mini presents no such issue.
Apple offers the iPad mini in two colour combinations – a black bezel with a slate back, and a white bezel with a silver back. I would have liked a black bezel with a silver back, but there's no mixing and matching allowed, so I went for the black bezel with slate back and hope that it proves more resilient than the iPhone 5 slate back.
Screen
Of course it's not just the screen size that separates the iPad and iPad mini, there's also a small matter of resolution. The full-size iPad comes with Apple's Retina display moniker, thanks to its impressive 2,048 x 1,536 resolution and corresponding 264ppi pixel pitch. By contrast, the iPad mini sports a more conservative 1,024 x 768 resolution, with a far lower pixel pitch of 163ppi. Yes, that does mean that text and icons aren't as unbelievably smooth as on the bigger iPad, but I can't say that I find the display on the mini disappointing in any way.
If you were pinning your hopes on a Retina display equipped iPad mini, you're probably feeling a bit cheated and nothing I say in this review will change that. But I will suggest that you spend some time with the mini before discounting it because of its screen resolution – I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.
What's more interesting is that Apple stuck with its traditional 4:3 aspect ratio on the iPad mini, despite the fact that the iPhone 5 made the jump to a 16:9 widescreen aspect ratio. Of course when you think about it, that decision isn't so odd at all. In essence, the iPad mini is a smaller iPad 2, and therefore it's completely compatible with any apps developed for both the original iPad and iPad 2.
The display itself is an LED backlit IPS affair, which means that viewing angles are impressive enough to share a movie with a friend or two, or show a web page, document or presentation to a colleague. There is a fair amount of reflectivity in bright sunlight, but that's pretty much unavoidable on any tablet device.
Colours are vivid and rich, while blacks are deep and dark, but not at the expense of shadow detail when watching video. In fact video, looks simply brilliant on the mini, and its light weight means that you won't struggle to hold the device for the extent of a movie. Still images look equally impressive, and assuming you have PhotoStream enabled, any shots you take with your iPhone will appear on the mini as soon as it's connected to the Internet.
No comments:
Post a Comment