20 AUGUST 2019|COMPUTER SHOPPER|ISSUE 378
THE BRIGHT STUFF
That’s it formajor new features, but there are
plenty of improvements, and one of them is
the 7.9in display. It has aresolution of
2,048x1,536 forapixel density of 326ppi, uses
IPS technology and, impressively,supports
both HDR 10 and DolbyVision playback.
In asense,atleast. While the iPad Mini
can playback HDR and DolbyVision titles via
Netflix and iTunes, the peak brightness of the
displayisn’t high enough to give the full HDR
effect. We measured it at 530cd/m2, which
is more than enough foreverydayuse
(including outdoors), but short of the
700cd/m2 required fortrue HDR 10 playback.
DolbyVision is even more demanding,
requiring aminimum of 1,000cd/m2.
Nonetheless, this is still ahigh-quality
display. It delivers 91.3% coverage of the
sRGB colour gamut, which is excellent, and
colour accuracy is superb.
It’s as sharp as anyone needs at this size,
and also reads well in less-than-ideal
conditions, mainly thanks to two factors.
The first is full lamination, where the glass is
stuck to the IPS LCD beneath it, eliminating
any glare-inducing air gap; the second is a
highly effective anti-glare coating. Both are
features the 9.7in iPad doesn’t have.
The anti-reflective coating, in particular,is
remarkably effective at cutting down on
reflections from the iPad Mini’s glossy display,
making it readable just about anywhere.
DOTHEROBOT
However,the real reason forbuying anew
iPad Mini is this: it’s incredibly powerful and
responsive.Infact, with 3GB of RAM and the
same hexa-core A12 Bionic chip inside as
Apple’s iPhone XR, iPhone XS and iPhone XS
Max, it’s an absolutebeast of atablet.
In Geekbench 4’s single-core test, it scored
4,814, enough to breeze past the 9.7iPadand
Huawei’s MediaPad M3, which scored 3,
and 1,906 respectively.Its multitasking
prowess is even better: its 11,551 score in
Geekbench’s multicore test is just over
double that of the 2018 iPad.
The new iPad Mini is also farbetter than
these other tablets at gaming: a59fps result
in GFXBench’s Manhattan onscreen test, as
well as 126fps in the offscreen test, show that
more graphically intensive titles will run
noticeably better than on the 9.7in iPad, with
its onscreen test score of 41fps, and the
MediaPad M5 (27fps onscreen).
There is atrade-offfor all this power,
however.Battery lifehas taken abit of a
dipfromthe fourth-gen iPad Mini: that
lasted for10h 43m in our video loop test,
but this new model fell to 8h 21m. That’s still
adequate, and only amatter of minutes
behind the more recent 9.7in iPad, but it’s
nonetheless astepback.
WATCHTHIS FACE
Tablets never make the most ergonomically
friendly camera alternatives when you want
to grab aquick snap,especially when most
people have asmartphone in their pocket as
well, but then the larger screen can make for
abetter viewfinder.
If you do prefertouse atablet over your
phone,the iPad Mini’s camera won’t
disappoint; however,itwon’t astound with
its quality.The main camera at the rear has
an 8-megapixel sensor with an aperture of
f/2.4, which shoots 1080p video at up to
120fps forslow-motion footage.
This is fine if the light is good –alittle
down on detail compared with adecent
smartphone camera, perhaps, but not
dramatically so –but it struggles to produce
sharp shots in darker situations.
At the front –which is perhaps the more
important camera foratablet –you have a
7-megapixel FaceTime HD camera, which
delivers superlative quality forvideo calls at
Thereisn’t
much wrong
with the
iPad Mini.
It takesa
popular recipe
and updatesit
Batterylife
0% -50 Reference + 50 + 100
Seepage110forperformancedetails
PROCESSORHexa-coreAppleA12Bionic•SCREENSIZE
7.9in•SCREENRESOLUTION2,048x1,536•REARCAMERA
8megapixels•STORAGE64GB•WIRELESSDATANone•
DIMENSIONS203x135x6.1mm•WEIGHT300g•
OPERATINGSYSTEMiOS12•WARRANTYOneyearRTB•
DETAILSwww.apple.com/uk•PARTCODEiPadMini
SPECIFICATIONS
8h21m
up to 1080p in HDR. If you’re looking fora
device to improve the quality of your video
calls, the iPad Mini is worth considering for
that alone. The camera is much better than
you get on many modern Windows laptops.
REPEAT SHOWING
Besidessomeexteriordesign stagnation,
there isn’t much wrong with the 2019 iPad
Mini. It takes apopular recipe and updates it,
adding more performance and Apple Pencil
support along the way.
There’s still the sense that Apple has
missed an opportunity to do even more,
however.In2019,it’s crying out foran
edge-to-edge displayoraSmart Keyboard
connector to turn it intothe ultimate
compact 2-in-1.
Those hoping foramore affordable price
will be disappointed, too. Although £399 isn’t
ahuge outlaythese days compared with
prices forthe iPhones and iPad Pro,it’s still
considerably more than Apple is asking for
thelarger, 9.7in regular iPad, which
incidentally also has Apple Pencil support.
Forall that, however,it’s hard to criticise
the iPad Mini toomuch when it’s so superior
to any of its rivals at this size.Despiteits
slightly old-fashioned appearance,it’s still a
great tablet. It’s fast, it has awonderful
display, and is neat and pocketable.
JonathanBray
