Apple has no plans to create a “converged Mac and iPad,” said the firm’s chief executive, Tim Cook, in a recent interview with the Irish Independent. Cook said customers were not looking for this type of device, and that the company would have to make too many compromises.
Instead, Cook wants to build the best iPad and MacBook possible. He says that while the gap between the iPad and MacBook has shrunk, this gives customers the best possible productivity experience on both platforms.
The comments come a few days after Cook said nobody should buy a PC anymore, because the iPad offers enough performance to become a daily driver. He is still confident that the iPad will bounce back into form, after eight straight quarters of decline.
At least Cook is consistent in his views, recently saying that Microsoft’s latest hybrid, the Surface Book, isn’t impressive.
The iPad Pro is as close as we’re going to get to a hybrid from Apple, at least in the short-term. The 12.9-inch tablet comes with a stylus and keyboard, and apparently has the CPU performance of the MacBook Air and the GPU performance of a MacBook Pro. The only major difference is it runs iOS rather than OS X.
In our own review, we came to the conclusion that the iPad Pro is one of the best tablets on the market, but that it is expensive even for a PC alternative. The 12-inch MacBook is similar, a super-slim laptop thinner than some tablets, but expensive considering the performance downgrade.
Apple is clearly still trying to reach the perfect balance between performance, size, and price for the iPad and MacBook, so it is probably not the right time for a hybrid. And even if that day came, we suspect Apple would rather sell you an iPad and a Mac, rather than a hybrid.
