Apple’s iPad Air just got an upgrade to an M4 chip, but it won’t be getting a price bump over the last generation’s MSRP. Like the last generation, the base 11-inch iPad Air will start at $599, while the 13-inch will start at $799, which is a decent value proposition considering the significant spec bump over the previous M3 chip.
Apple says the M4 chip has a 30% faster CPU compared to the M3 chip on previous iPad Air models, though this generation will have the same number of CPU and GPU cores as the last generation—eight and nine, respectively. Apple is also touting a significant jump in unified memory over the last generation, jumping 50% to 12GB, with memory bandwidth increases to 120GB/s, which Apple says should help run AI models faster.
In addition to the M4 chip, the new iPad Air will also get the N1 and C1X, which are Apple’s newest and fastest Wi-Fi and cell connections. According to Apple, the N1 should equate to better performance when connected to 5GHz networks and should improve reliability with hotspots and AirDrop. If you’re using a cellular model of iPad, the C1X brings up to 50% faster cellular data performance, according to Apple, and up to 30% less modem energy usage compared to the M3 iPad.
You can preorder the new iPad Air with M4 starting on Wednesday, March 4, and it will start shipping to customers on March 11. Both the 11-inch and 13-inch iPad Air M4 will be available in blue, purple, starlight, and space gray, with the same storage configurations as the last generation: 128GB, 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB.
Source: gizmodo.com
