Is the regular 9.7 iPad a good mid-long term investment?

[minervx]

I plan to use it for Youtube, Netflix, Twitch, light web browsing and MIDI controlling. Storage is not an issue for me.  Gaming is low priority.  At $200-300, the price is good.  It's gotten some criticism for having a dated display, but it's IPS, high-res and better looking than my television.

 

Should I get it or wait for a better tablet and/or price?

[light-v]

iPads are pretty good on the long run in general. While the IPS screen isn't a good as AMOLED, it doesn't burn in and to be fair I find it more than satisfying since I never use my tablet in bright sunlight and specs are more than enough for next 3-5 years in fact I know plenty of people still running an iPad 2 and yes it's bit slow but can't really fault such an old device 

[captain_to_fire]

If your budget allows it and you are in need of a tablet right now, the new 9.7" iPad is the way to go. However, the display criticisms comes from the fact that the 9.7" iPad (A10 Fusion) doesn't have the same color gamut, variable refresh rate and reduced reflectivity of the 10.5" iPad Pro (A10X Fusion) because the smaller 9.7" iPad has a gap between the cover glass and the touch sensor which results to glare. The 10.5" iPad Pro has a zero air gap between the cover glass and the touch sensor. However, those are pretty minor differences for me. With both iPads you get:

• timely software updates
• thousands of iPad optimized apps 
• Touch ID
• Apple Pencil support

But if you can wait until June for WWDC 2018, they will probably launch the updated iPad Pro together with iOS 12.

[minervx]

reflectivity could be an annoyance.

 

the ipad pro is nice but i dont think itll offer twice the amount of utility.

 

i never understood the airgap criticism.  i tried the 9.7" ipad in the store and i didnt see a problem.  it felt perfectly smooth and flat.  i dont think it broke any immersion.

 

i have an s8 with an amoled display, and i don't find it to be that much better than an ips.  although it is a small screen,

[Darkseth]

well, it offers twice the amount of refresh rate.

 

Try them both out in an Apple store^^ This is a "high end Feature" you are paying for. You will of course not get double the speed, double the lifespan, double anything. But maybe those few features it has, are so good and important for you, that you might be willing to go for it?

120 Hz + Stereo speakers are pretty nice ^^

 

But yea, the iPad 2018 is extremely good. Will be good enough for 98% of all users for the next few years, and doesn't really cost much for what you get.

But i would really sugest going for 128gb instead 32gb, except you 100% know, you won't need more than 30~ gb the next 3-4 years.

[MegaTechPC]

I'm PC and Android all the way myself, but with one very big exception:  Tablets!  I have two iPads (and original Air and a Pro 9.7) and IMO the iPad is the ONLY tablet worth buying.  As much as I love Android on my phone, Android for tablets is a mess.  Plus, the iPad is just so much better looking and feeling than any Android tablet I've ever used, which mostly tend to be built (and sold) cheaply.  Luckily for you, this new iPad's "killer app" is its low price, allowing you to get a very powerful and still premium looking/feeling iPad for relatively little money.  The only thing about the budget iPad for me is the non-laminated glass screen.  I love how the screen looks on my Pro 9.7 but my older Air has the gap below the screen which just looks annoying when comparing them side by side.  The Pro 10.5 also has the awesome 120Hz refresh rate so I'd probably consider splurging for that over the budget iPad, but if you simply can't spend more than $300 or so then the basic iPad is a really good buy.