iPadOS seems to be an afterthought no one actually cares about or pays attention to.
It exists because something must run on the expensive iPad Pro Apple wants to sell us.
So it exists as a bare minimum of a software to support the hardware sales. It is neither functional nor elegant it remains just an oversized inefficient weak useless clon of iOS. No wonder that iPad sales are tanking and consumers are balking at spending thousands of dollars on useless softtware even if hardware itself is amazing.
I am one of those who bought an expensive iPad Pro after it was outfitted with a USB-C port and got new features to support external drives and monitors.
However, the severe limitations of iPadOS made all of that little more than a bunch of gimmicks. At the end of the day, for me there’s absolutely nothing in that Pro to justify paying extra over Air or even the base model. Yea the screen is a tad nicer. I don’t care that much about that, the base model screen is good enough for me. What I do care about is functionality, and the super-duper Pro is just as limited as the base iPad. I can take either of them on a business trip or vacation, and neither of them can replace a laptop on a daily basis. The Pro certainly has the processing power to do that. But Apple decided to not provide an OS that can actually utilize that power.
At this point, I am fully immersed into Apple ecosystem for my personal uses (with an exception of a powerful desktop running Windows which I don’t use daily). And to be honest, I am starting to feel really ambivalent about it.
iPhone is a good phone, but the camera on my 12 sucks ass compared to the similarly priced Android competitors from the same year. Even a moderately backlit situation results in severe loss of contrast. I swear that 7+ had a better camera. Yea I can upgrade to the top of the line Pro Max and hope for improvement.
iPad… see above. Love the apps. But I also love Samsung DEX, or the fact that their tablets have a real filesystem.
MacBook… great hardware. Love it. OS thought… well I am a lot more productive in Windows. Love the integration with iPhone. (MS is just getting there with their phone link software). But hate the window management (Rectangle helps, but only so much), inability to change system fonts to actually readable size without changing resolution, the fact that my two external 32” monitors are crisp and bright in Windows but low res and washed out when connected to Mac, the way app sandboxing is implemented, and the overall approach to multitasking.
Apple Watch… well it’s actually the best Apple product. Not as good looking as some Android watches, but functionally great. Not sure that it is enough to keep me in the ecosystem all by itself.
Apple AirPods Pro… this is the worst Apple product I have. Don’t freaking tell me “everyone’s ears are different” when cheap Chinese no-name brands figured out how to produce a good seal in pretty much anyone’s ear long time ago. The microphone in one of them quit working just as the warranty expired. The “seamless connection to Apple devices” isn’t all that seamless. And the sound quality is just mediocre. It’s a $250 pair of $30 earbuds.
HomePod Mini… I have 3. Another purchase I am not all that happy about. They are a mediocre, overpriced product that needs to be rebooted at least once every two weeks to keep working. Siri is half deaf and mentally disabled, the “smart” functionality is unreliable and limited. The sound quality is … meh.
Apple TV… it’s a good product. Not any better than my bedroom Roku, just with a better looking interface.
All in all… it’s an OK ecosystem, but very expensive. A far cry from when it was the top, premium ecosystem that nothing else could approach.
My $.02…
