iPad Air 2-128GB going for same price as mini 4-128GB?

AlexB

@MusicInclusive said:
I just picked up a mini 4 128 refurb in the BF sales for a decent price and am very pleased with it. It's thinner and lighter than my mini 2 64, and although not by much, it's a difference I can feel mini 4 comes in at 0.66lb / 299g vs. 0.73lb / 331g. and 0.24" / 6.1mm vs. 0.23 " / 7.5mm.

I've largely used minis in the past couple of years, though I do still have a couple of iPad 3s. The form factor works for me in terms of being able to more comfortably hold it, both in terms of weight and size - esp. while lying down. and composing on the couch. I don't find an issue with small "fiddly" controls on it personally, although I appreciate some do and prefer larger iPads for that alone.

I like the fact that with the mini 4 I can really get serious with Auria Pro FX in tracking mode, not just for mixing (I did that before on a mini 1 and 2 even, but this is even nicer and I can do more easily).

I set up 10 MIDI tracks each using Lyra, and then added 4 FX to each of 3 channels (for a total of 12 FX), which included 2 instances of Saturn, 2 of ProMB (with 4x oversampling), 2 Timeless, 2 Volcano (not in HQ mode - that really kills things! :-) ) a Pro-C 2, a Pro-Q 2, Pro-L (with 4x oversampling) and Turnado, as well as 3 AUX channels, one running Convolution reverb on high CPU mode, another running PSP chorus and another running PSP stereo delay.

I then recorded 3 tracks of simultaneous MIDI and the CPU is still only at around 70%.

Buffer was set to 512 as well!

Cool!

I also set up this kind of chain:

which was making use of the 2GB memory in the mini 4 quite nicely

and also wasn't breaking a sweat on the CPU either.

W> @MusicInclusive said:

I just picked up a mini 4 128 refurb in the BF sales for a decent price and am very pleased with it. It's thinner and lighter than my mini 2 64, and although not by much, it's a difference I can feel mini 4 comes in at 0.66lb / 299g vs. 0.73lb / 331g. and 0.24" / 6.1mm vs. 0.23 " / 7.5mm.

I've largely used minis in the past couple of years, though I do still have a couple of iPad 3s. The form factor works for me in terms of being able to more comfortably hold it, both in terms of weight and size - esp. while lying down. and composing on the couch. I don't find an issue with small "fiddly" controls on it personally, although I appreciate some do and prefer larger iPads for that alone.

I like the fact that with the mini 4 I can really get serious with Auria Pro FX in tracking mode, not just for mixing (I did that before on a mini 1 and 2 even, but this is even nicer and I can do more easily).

I set up 10 MIDI tracks each using Lyra, and then added 4 FX to each of 3 channels (for a total of 12 FX), which included 2 instances of Saturn, 2 of ProMB (with 4x oversampling), 2 Timeless, 2 Volcano (not in HQ mode - that really kills things! :-) ) a Pro-C 2, a Pro-Q 2, Pro-L (with 4x oversampling) and Turnado, as well as 3 AUX channels, one running Convolution reverb on high CPU mode, another running PSP chorus and another running PSP stereo delay.

I then recorded 3 tracks of simultaneous MIDI and the CPU is still only at around 70%.

Buffer was set to 512 as well!

Cool!

I also set up this kind of chain:

which was making use of the 2GB memory in the mini 4 quite nicely

and also wasn't breaking a sweat on the CPU either.

@MusicInclusive said:
I just picked up a mini 4 128 refurb in the BF sales for a decent price and am very pleased with it. It's thinner and lighter than my mini 2 64, and although not by much, it's a difference I can feel mini 4 comes in at 0.66lb / 299g vs. 0.73lb / 331g. and 0.24" / 6.1mm vs. 0.23 " / 7.5mm.

I've largely used minis in the past couple of years, though I do still have a couple of iPad 3s. The form factor works for me in terms of being able to more comfortably hold it, both in terms of weight and size - esp. while lying down. and composing on the couch. I don't find an issue with small "fiddly" controls on it personally, although I appreciate some do and prefer larger iPads for that alone.

I like the fact that with the mini 4 I can really get serious with Auria Pro FX in tracking mode, not just for mixing (I did that before on a mini 1 and 2 even, but this is even nicer and I can do more easily).

I set up 10 MIDI tracks each using Lyra, and then added 4 FX to each of 3 channels (for a total of 12 FX), which included 2 instances of Saturn, 2 of ProMB (with 4x oversampling), 2 Timeless, 2 Volcano (not in HQ mode - that really kills things! :-) ) a Pro-C 2, a Pro-Q 2, Pro-L (with 4x oversampling) and Turnado, as well as 3 AUX channels, one running Convolution reverb on high CPU mode, another running PSP chorus and another running PSP stereo delay.

I then recorded 3 tracks of simultaneous MIDI and the CPU is still only at around 70%.

Buffer was set to 512 as well!

Cool!

I also set up this kind of chain:

which was making use of the 2GB memory in the mini 4 quite nicely

and also wasn't breaking a sweat on the CPU either.

What tool are you using for measuring the CPU load and RAM intensity?