iPad Pro review: excellent performance, nice hardware and speakers, but expensive, suffers from iOS 9's limitations, and takes a long time to charge
iPad Pro review: Mac-like speed with all the virtues and restrictions of iOS — There's some promise here, but iOS makes this a very different kind of computer.
Context & Ripple Effects
This Ars Technica review is the origin point of a critique that would repeat for a decade: reviewers consistently find Mac-class performance and best-in-hardware speakers, then fault iOS for making the device 'a very different kind of computer' than a laptop. The same verdict structure recurs in The Verge's 2018 iPad Pro review, where missing USB-C storage support still blocks laptop replacement.
What makes the 2015 piece worth revisiting is how durable its complaints proved — pricing that climbs further with accessories like the Smart Keyboard in the 10.5-inch model, and software lagging hardware even as late as the M4 generation's review. Only the 2025 M5 review notes iPadOS finally getting more Mac-like, meaning the arc this article opened took ten years to bend.
First-order effects
- Buyers weighing the iPad Pro against a MacBook face the trade-off directly: they pay premium prices for hardware and speakers that outclass laptops, while accepting an OS whose multitasking and file restrictions cap what the machine can replace.
Second-order effects
- Apple's own accessory strategy compounds the cost objection — keyboard and Pencil add-ons push the effective price higher, which later reviews flag as the recurring affordability complaint against each successive Pro.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, Apple's tablet line converges with the Mac from the software side rather than the hardware side: silicon leadership arrives first, and OS capability becomes the bottleneck that determines whether the iPad is a companion or a computer.
The trend: Across a decade of reviews, Apple ships Pro-grade iPad hardware years ahead of the software needed to exploit it, making iPadOS convergence the deciding variable for the product's identity.