iPad Mini 3 Review

This time Apple seems to have gotten stuck. With the same screen, the same chassis and the same power as its predecessor, this certainly isn't the iPad Air 2 mini.

Design

In terms of form factor, the iPad mini 3 is 7.5mm thin and 331g, 

compared to 7.5mm and 331g from last year.

The iPad mini 3 is still more than distinct enough from the iPhone 6 Plus though - if you owned both devices there would still be a reason to put both in your bag.

The volume switch is there, it's got the same A7 chip from last year.

The curved back, with the same ceramic feel as before, is very much welcome, making the iPad mini 3 one of the most premium-feeling tablets on the planet.

The chamfered edges add a high quality detail, but there's a distinct feeling that apart from Touch ID and increased storage.

The screen, a 7.9-inch affair as before, hasn't increased in resolution, but that's hardly a bad thing given Apple was probably already overreaching with the previous model.

The color reproduction seems to be improved.

iPad Mini 3 Hands On from Tech Reviews on Vimeo.

Touch ID

Again, it's hard to see why this new tablet is really warranted beyond the addition of Touch ID. The reason I say that is the fact the iPad mini 2 is still on sale, which means that most of the things you can get on this new model are available at a lower cost on another device.

However, Apple reckons Touch ID will be a winning feature, with customers willing to pay a premium to secure their tablet with the fingerprint scanner.

We all know about the security side of things here, as Touch ID is hardly a new technology. You can also use it to confirm downloads on the App Store, and with iOS 8 opening up the Touch ID scanner to other apps, it begins to look like this is a decent feature to add in on all Apple devices.

Apple Pay is obviously the other big win here, as you can go from browsing to buying with just a tap of your finger, with all your payment and shipping information right there.

The only problem is that Apple Pay isn't available in most places. Even if you live in the US, where the service is about to roll out, it's currently limited and if you're elsewhere then it could be months before it even appears, let alone becomes widely used.

Battery and Camera

The battery life of the iPad mini 3 is likely to be comparable to that of the previous model - although Apple is quoting 10 hours for web surfing, watching video or listening to music.

The same with the camera. As in: it's not a worry, because here's hoping people don't use the camera on an iPad to take pictures.

The new iPad mini 3 features a similar 5MP iSight camera as on the iPad Mini 2, with a few optimizations like the bigger brother.

The good news is other tools like slo-mo video aren't available, although I'd probably have accepted those more, while a larger viewfinder would be great for time lapse video.

Non-Improved Processor

The A7 processor at the heart of the iPad Mini 3 isn't a very powerful chipset at all, and it's strange that Apple has stuck with the same chip as before.

There are more health benefits and tracking (presumably, although this hasn't been confirmed) but it seems the internals are very similar.

Video editing might be a little over the top on a tablet with this screen size, but it's still an option.

The 64-bit architecture of the processor is a little redundant given Apple has packed a maximum of 2GB in here (we're still yet to find out the correct number but I doubt it's upgraded) but there are optimisations that allow for more powerful apps.