iFixIt Reveals New iPad is Basically Just 1st Gen iPad Air with Minor Updates

The latest iPad from Apple, currently in its 5th generation update has been released recently although according to the findings by teardown experts at iFixIt, aside from some minor updates, the new tablet is infact very nearly identical to the 1st generation iPad Air which came out in 2013. Many suspected that to be the case as they are both equal in size measuring 240 x 169.5 x 7.5mm and even weighs the same at 469 grams for the Wi-Fi-only version. Even their display specifications look the same having an LED-backlit IPS LCD capacitive touch screen with 1536 x 2048 pixel resolution.

Most of the difference lies on the chipset and CPU with the original iPad air running a dual-core 1.3GHz Cyclone ARM V8-based processor with a PowerVR G6430 quad-core GPU on an Apple A7 chipset while the latest 5th generation iPad has a dual-core 1.84GHz Twister processor with a PowerVR GT7600 six-core GPU on an Apple A9 chipset. The memory has been upgraded from 1GB to 2GB as well and the main camera has been upgraded to 8MP from 5MP.

The latest 5th generation iPad shares a lot more similarities to the original iPad Air than the iPad Air 2 shares with the first version. That part is actually a good thing according to iFixIt as it means it is slightly easier to fix since the LCD and digitizer are unfused, although they ultimately still ranked it as a 2-out-of-10 in the repairability scale with the only other redeeming factor getting it that second point being that the battery is not soldered to the logic board.

iFixIt was also doubtful of Apple’s claims that the new 5th generation iPad has a “brighter 9.7-inch Retina display” as it does not look different from the iPad Air 1’s display and the fact that Apple did not say specifically what display it is exactly brighter than makes the claim even more dubious. If they mean brighter than the iPad Air 2, it just very well mean that it is because they reverted to the brighter display on the iPad Air 1. Both the 5th generation iPad and iPad Air 1 also pack the same 32.9 Wh battery, an upgrade from the 27.6 Wh battery on the iPad air 2 so they basically downgraded for that second generation only to revert to the better first generation on this 5th generation iPad design.