You’ve got to hand it to Apple … the new iPad has the write stuff

I thought my generation was the last that bothered much with handwriting. Apparently not.

iPadOS 14 further integrates Apple Pencil into the iPad experience.

There was a time when I had great handwriting. As a school kid, I spent hours copying cards of cursive script based on a handwriting style developed by British educator Marion Richardson.

It seemed the rage at schools in the 60s, along with Cuisenaire rods for arithmetic, and the SRA Reading Laboratory for comprehension – still used today.

When I meticulously copied those cards, vowels flowed into consonants and vice versa, and my writing was very readable. Memories also flowed of we school kids, filling our fountain pen bladders with ink, and having after school ink fights. The pens conveniently had a side lever that compressed the bladder and projected ink like a missile.

These days most of my handwriting involves scrawling a signature on delivery dockets for tech gadgets sent to me for review. With COVID-19, even that practice is lapsing. My much neglected handwriting often is indecipherable.

It was therefore interesting that Apple last week spent considerable time extolling the handwriting capabilities of its iPads at its virtual launch event. I thought I was in the last generation that bothered much about handwriting. Apparently not. I mostly type or use voice (dictation) input.

However, there are times where we are rendered technologically naked, without a laptop, tablet or phone in sight, and with a pen and paper as a last resort.

The latest iPad is a good conduit of this handwriting capability called Scribble.

Apple has sold more than 10 million iPads so far and this year the iPad is ten years old. Apple is up to the eighth generation of the standard iPad which I have been testing. It starts at $499. Go up $400 more, and you can buy an iPad Air. A new Air is slated for October. Spend another $430 again, and you can afford a top-of-range iPad Pro. This means the new 10.2-inch, eighth generation iPad is a relative bargain.

The eighth-generation iPad features the powerful A12 Bionic with the Neural Engine, a beautiful 10.2-inch Retina display, and so much more.

It does look a tad old-fashioned. It has a bigger bezel or frame especially at the top and bottom compared to the more expensive variants, and the old home button with touch-ID for fingerprint authentication. There’s no face authentication.

Being old-fashioned can be good. The iPad has a 3.5mm port for headphones, unlike the more expensive Air and Pro which delivers wireless audio only.

This new 10.2-inch iPad is no slouch performance wise. Apple has dropped an A12 Bionic chip into it, which is only two generations behind the current A14 bionic chip. The A12 chip has a neural engine aboard and so it is capable of some state-of-the-art augmented reality experiences on iPad.

I ran the AnTuTu benchmark test on both this iPad and this year’s 11-inch iPad Pro. We wouldn’t expect the standard iPad to match the Pro’s performance, but we get an inkling of its capability.

AnTuTu returned a score of 443,806 on the standard iPad compared to 757,773 on the Pro which while well behind, is pretty serviceable. Component scores are 140,328 (processor), 169,306 (graphics), 60,466 (memory) and 73,706 (user experience).

The 443,806 score is similar to the iPhone X of 2018 and better than the second generation iPad Pro of 2017. It beats the 2017 Pro’s processor and graphics scores. That makes it very usable.

The new iPad has Apple’s Retina display with 264 pixels per inch resolution density, and is bright at 500 nits.

Apple unfortunately is retaining its lightning connector with this iPad. The more up-market iPad Air and Pro models use a USB-C connector that not only offers faster transmission speeds, but the easy transfer of data from portable hard drives.

The new iPad with the A12 Bionic chip delivers a huge leap in performance, making it up to six times faster than the top-selling Chromebook.

Lightning was state-of-the-art once but there is little reason for Apple to persist with it now. I can’t see reduced cost as a justification as there are many inexpensive devices from rival manufacturers with USB-C connectors. USB-C is becoming ubiquitous.

The use of lightning means this iPad supports the first generation Apple Pencil which recharges via lightning and not wirelessly as with generation two pencils.

Apple says the neural engine on this iPad can process 5 trillion operations per second. Its machine learning can analyse images and video. For example, it can run an app that analyses tennis shots. I asked it to show me photos of bikes and it found them by viewing the shapes of images, rather than captions. This is basic AI for high end smartphone cameras but it also works with this basic iPad.

Apple offers examples such as apps that help you learn the guitar by following your hands across strings, or music apps that analyse sound and separate the vocals from instruments in real time.

Animal Safari which showed large animals in augmented reality stomping around my work room.

Apple Pencil adds drawing capabilities to iPad but it’s the new iPadOS 14 operating system that brings the Scribble handwriting functionality. It converts handwriting to typed text. I could create memos in the Notes app and paste them as text in an email.

The new eighth-generation iPad comes in space grey, silver, and gold finishes.

Writing on the screen can be disconcerting at first, because unlike paper, there is no friction on the display to help form letters. I had to write with the base of my hand on the screen. That worked.

The conversion of handwriting to digital text is achieved with a “copy as text” selection in the copy/paste options. I could drop my handwritten notes into an email as regular digital text. The conversion was successful providing I’m moderately careful when I write.

You can also fill out forms using your handwriting and have them changed to text.

This iPad supports split view, Apple’s multi-tasking feature. With two apps running side-by-side, I could copy handwritten text from one window to the next. I could watch a video on one side of the screen while adding a memo next to it.

While this is Apple’s least expensive iPad costing $499 for 32GB of storage, the price increases to $649 for 128GB of storage. This iPad costs $699 and $849 for cellular models with 32GB and 128GB of storage.

You’ll pay $145 more for an Apple Pencil, $235 for a smart keyboard and $79 for a smart cover. Remember too, the smart keyboard isn’t backlit. If that’s an issue you can consider third party keyboards from suppliers such as Logitech.