- Affinity Photo or Pixelmator Pro? - Pixelmator Community

Looking for:

- The Best Pixel Editor for macOS – The Sweet Setup 

Click here to DOWNLOAD

     

Pixelmator photo vs affinity photo free

 

ZDNet's recommendations are based on many hours of testing, research, and comparison shopping. We gather data from the best available sources, including vendor and retailer listings as well as other relevant and independent reviews sites. When you click through from our site to a retailer and buy a product or service, we may earn affiliate commissions. This helps support our work, but does not affect what we cover or how, and it does not affect the price you pay. Neither ZDNet nor the author are compensated for these independent reviews.

Indeed, we follow strict guidelines that ensure our editorial content is never influenced by advertisers. ZDNet's editorial team writes on behalf of you, our reader. Our goal is to deliver the most accurate information and the most knowledgeable advice possible in order to help you make smarter buying decisions on tech gear and a wide array of products and services.

Our editors thoroughly review and fact-check every article to ensure that our content meets the highest standards. If we have made an error or published misleading information, we will correct or clarify the article. If you see inaccuracies in our content, please report the mistake via this form. My ageing iMac and MacBook Air are both approaching their sunset years, and while the Mac range has been given a shot in the arm with Apple's home-grown Apple Silicon processors, the inch iMac has now been discontinued, leaving me in something of a quandary as I ponder my future upgrade options.

Many people now simply use a laptop as their main computing device, along with an external display for when they're working at home or in the office. However, Apple has been pitching the iPad as an alternative to a laptop for a few years, and now that the latest iPad Pro and iPad Air models are using the same M1 processors as the Mac and, presumably, will use the forthcoming M2 at some point , the iPad should certainly compete with M1 Macs, such as the current MacBook Air , Mac Mini or inch iMac.

The basic M1 processor might not be powerful enough for professional users running demanding workloads like video editing or 3D graphics. These use cases need high-end chips like the M1 Max and Ultra , which run too hot for a fanless iPad. The M1 processor used in the iPad Pro and Air can handle all that perfectly well.

I have an M1-based However, the inch iPad Pro or Some iPad users were disappointed that Apple's recent WWDC didn't see the latest M2 chip come to the iPad, but it seems that an M2 update is more likely to arrive around September or October of this year.

There are also persistent rumours of a new Using an iPad as an alternative to a laptop is pretty straightforward, as manufacturers have been producing wrap-around keyboard cases and other portable accessories for the iPad ever since it was first launched back in Apple, naturally provides its own range of keyboards , although they're typically expensive, with the Magic Keyboard for my The Magic Keyboard is the better option for getting serious work done: it's very solidly built, and will provide good protection when travelling.

The scissor-mechanism keyboard has a better feel than the Smart Keyboard Folio -- essential in my line of work -- and there's also a small but useful trackpad. Many familiar Mac keyboard shortcuts also work with the iPad, such as Cmd-Tab to cycle through open apps and Cmd-Shift-3 to grab a screenshot, so it doesn't take long to get up to speed using the iPad with a keyboard. Read more: The 6 best iPad keyboards: Improve your productivity.

There are also plenty of full-size keyboards that will work an iPad, with Logitech's latest MX Mechanical keyboard providing a good alternative to Apple's Magic Keyboard for desktop Macs.

Read more: 3 very simple ways to take notes on your iPad using an Apple Pencil. Connectivity has long been a weakness with Apple's mobile devices heaven forbid that you might actually want to communicate with other devices that exist outside the Apple ecosystem!

This allows me to connect the rugged OWC Envoy solid-state drive that normally handles Time Machine backups on my Mac, providing quick file transfers when I'm away from the office and there's no free Wi-Fi around. Read more: Getting a new iPad Pro or iMac? Here are five OWC accessories you need. However, Kensington's UHP is a really useful portable hub that can handle one 4K display at 60Hz, along with a number of USB ports, memory card slots, and even Gigabit Ethernet for a wired office network.

And, for professional users, there are many desktop docks and hubs that require a mains power supply in order to provide additional charging and connectivity features. Companies such as Belkin, OWC, Kensington and Plugable, all provide versatile, fully-featured docks for pro users -- but remember to check the manufacturer's website to make sure that these docks are compatible with the particular iPad model that you own.

Read more: The best iPad accessories: Docks, hubs, and more for your tablet. The The iPad Pro can certainly pass muster as a lightweight laptop, but using it as a main desktop computer proves a little more troublesome.

The problem here is that iPadOS -- for the moment, at least -- provides quite limited support for external displays. The biggest limitation is that you can only use an external display to 'mirror' duplicate the iPad's own screen. You can't use the external display to extend the iPad display, as you can with a Mac or PC. The iPad Pro has a screen resolution of by pixels roughly 2. The same problem also affected an older QHD x display in the office, as the iPad's aspect ratio doesn't fit well onto conventional or displays.

Annoyingly, the iPad can output video to an external display at full size, which is great for watching films, but non-video productivity apps that you might want to use for work remain fixed at the native resolution of the iPad's own display. That's the state-of-play with the current iPadOS But, as keen Apple watchers will have noticed, the recent WWDC unveiling of iPadOS 16 -- due to be available as a public beta during the summer, with a final release towards the end of this year -- promised improved support for external displays.

Details are a bit thin on the ground right now, but Apple's website indicates that the Stage Manager feature that's part of both iPad OS 16 and MacOS Ventura will provide "full external display support", including displays up to 6K resolution. Stage Manager will also overcome the current limitation that only allows the iPad to mirror its own display on an external display, allowing you to run different apps on each display, and to have multiple overlapping windows on-screen as well, bringing it much closer to the multi-tasking capabilities of the Mac.

Ultimately, all this talk about hardware and connectivity will mean very little if the key apps and software that you use for work aren't available for the iPad. Thankfully, the basics are all covered for office work, with mobile versions of Word, Excel and Outlook available with a Microsoft subscription.

If you don't fancy paying a subscription fee, then Apple's own iWork suite -- Pages, Numbers and Keynote -- provides free alternatives. Creative users are well catered for too, with Adobe's Creative Cloud suite also available for the iPad. Admittedly, there are many high-end graphics and engineering tools, such as the AutoDesk range, which are still primarily focused on the Mac and Windows operating systems, but these generally require more powerful workstation-class Macs and PCs, and the iPad isn't quite ready to compete in that arena just yet iOS and Android apps are available from Autodesk though.

The software situation can only get better, now that Macs and iPads are using the same Apple Silicon processors, which makes it far easier for developers to create apps that run on both platforms. Read more: The 5 best iPad apps for productivity: Get more work done.

With iPadOS 16, Apple is promising 'desktop-class' apps with productivity-enhancing features like customisable toolbars. Apple's roadmap for iPadOS 16 also promises 'desktop-class apps' that offer greater productivity. Bundled apps like Photos and Files will now include a more Mac-like document menu that provides easy access to commands like duplicate, rename and print.

You'll also be able to customise toolbars within apps, so that the tools you use most often are always available. There's also a new app planned for iPadOS called Freeform. At the moment, Apple is only saying that Freeform will be available "later this year", so it may not be included in the public beta that's due in July. However, Freeform looks rather like a souped-up version of Notes, providing a 'canvas' where you can jot down notes or sketches, and add web links, audio or video files.

And, crucially, Freefrom will also allow you to collaborate with colleagues simply by sharing a link that provides access to your documents. In addition to Stage Manager and improved support for external displays, iPadOS 16 will also provide a 'display scaling mode' -- presumably similar to the display scaling options on the Mac, which allows you to adjust the apparent resolution of the display, depending on whether you prefer more room on-screen or greater visibility with larger graphics and font sizes.

And, for creative users, the So while the iPad Pro isn't quite ready to replace my iMac just yet, it'll certainly work as an alternative to my MacBook Air when I'm travelling. And if Apple's roadmap for iPadOS and its second-generation M2 chips goes according to plan, then a desktop-class iPad Pro could be a tantalising possibility before too long.

How to use an iPad Pro to power your home office. Apple iPad Pro review: Impressively powerful, but the hardware is only part of the story. The iPad as a PC peer: Are we there yet? A killer iPad feature you're probably not using. Nomad cases, cable, and adapter for the Apple iPad Pro: in pictures.

Why you can trust ZDNet ZDNet independently tests and researches products to bring you our best recommendations and advice. When you buy through our links, we may earn a commission. Our process. Home Innovation Computing Tablets iPad. Apple's iPad Pro can work well as an alternative to a MacBook, but demanding workloads still require a more capable platform.

Show Comments. Log In to Comment Community Guidelines. The 4 best iPad models of The 4 best iPad models of Tablets. Don't waste your money on these Apple products: August edition. Don't waste your money on these Apple products: August edition Mobility.