Astropad’s new hardware-based Luna Display is wireless, Retina-ready, and fast as all get out. (Even the prototype I tested smokes Duet Display.) Check out iMore’s review, and their Kickstarter.

Very interesting. You are, however, simply using a sort of macOS-ified iPad.

The iPad is the ultimate consumer media machine. Even with Apple issuing ‘Pro’ versions of the world’s favorite tablet, it still is primarily used for watching content on its big screen (between sending mails). However, it wasn’t built with that sole intent. It has single-direction speakers (no stereo) which aren’t particularly rich in audio output, lending to a rather bland multimedia experience. The immediate solution? Fire up an external speaker via bluetooth or aux. The better solution? Simulate the cinema experience with a home-theater dock for the iPad… More at YD.

I get the idea, but can’t get over the size of the screen. We actually watched a whole film on my iPad Pro when we were on holiday recently and the squinting really was a problem.

When we were an agrarian nation, all cars were trucks, because that’s what you needed on the farm – but as vehicles started to be used in the urban centers, cars got more popular. Innovations like automatic transmission and power steering and things that you didn’t care about in a truck as much started to become paramount in cars. […] PCs are going to be like trucks. They’re still going to be around, they’re still going to have a lot of value, but they’re going to be used by one out of X people… More at 9To5Mac.

Well worth reading the entire article. Thanks to Bob for the link.

The new feature that matters on this display is that it’s capable of a refresh rate of 120Hz, which is twice what most mobile devices are capable of. That sentence is as nerdy as it sounds, but stay with me for a second on this one. The refresh rate is how quickly the pixels on the screen get redrawn when you scroll or when something moves on a screen. 120Hz means that when you scroll, there’s less lag when the pixels move.

Reducing lag is important because the obvious goal for any tablet screen is to make the stuff that appears on screen sort of feel like actual physical things you’ve moving around. This refresh rate takes us a surprisingly large step in that direction. It also means that the latency when you draw with the Apple Pencil is also reduced to 20 milliseconds — so it too feels closer to physically drawing on paper.

There are other practical benefits. Because this is Apple, it’s given a name to this feature: ProMotion. And ProMotion does more than just ratchet up the refresh rate, it also ratchets it down. So if you’re watching a movie, the screen refresh rate will lower and optimize to the video’s frame rate. If you’re just looking at some static text on an ebook, the iPad will slow the refresh rate down even further to save battery life. Apple says that the tablet has a dedicated chip (sort of like the chip that’s used to process camera images) that looks at what’s going on on your screen and adjust the refresh rate accordingly… More at The Verge.

Every review I have read so far is extremely positive which is down to one of two possibilities; the new iPad Pro is very good or Apple is even better at ensuring that those who want review devices say the right things. Suspect it is a bit of both.

The sensation of writing on the high-friction surface is the best digital representation of paper I’ve tried, and that instantly puts its above using a consumer tablet such as the iPad Pro.

But the biggest barrier to entrance for this device is surely going to be the price. And, of course, the availability. The reMarkable Paper Tablet was originally conceived on Kickstarter and if you backed it there, you would have got yourself a decent deal. Prices started at $379 (around £295), and those units will begin shipping from August… More at Trusted Reviews.

Fairly sure I would love this product, but for how long? And can it really justify the price?