The iPad Air 2 is officially available in stores, so it’s not really surprising to see the guys over at iFixit publish their official iPad Air 2 teardown. The slimmer-than-ever iPad Air 2 can be easily torn apart if you’ve got the right tools, but it’s not easy to repair, receiving a 2 out of 10 repaiarability score from the teardown experts. However, iFixit did manage to shed more light on the internal components of the iPad Air 2, many of which have been detailed in previous leaks and reports.
In the process, however, the publication made some interesting discoveries.
FROM EARLIER: iPad Air 2 and Retina iMac reviews are in: See how Apple’s best tablet and desktop performed in real tests
iFixit has confirmed that the iPad Air 2 packs an A8X 64-bit processor along with 2GB RAM and an M8 motion coprocessor, and it also revealed that the device has an NXP 65V10 NFC module “as found in the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus,” which could give the iPad Air 2 contactless payment support. Previously, it was believed the iPad Air 2 would only support online Apple Pay payments.
But the most interesting iPad Air 2 component appears to be its battery.
Since the iPad Air 2 is only 6.1mm thick — which is thinner than a pencil — Apple had to further shrink down the battery, as iFixit confirmed. But that doesn’t mean that Apple also sacrificed performance, choosing to also increase the power of its main tablet by packing in it an even faster processor than before.
The iPad Air 2 has a 27.62Wh battery, significantly smaller than the 32.9Wh battery in the iPad Air. However, battery life for the iPad Air 2 is still rated at around 10 hours, according to Apple’s official numbers, which is on par with the iPad Air’s battery life.
But then again, Apple also has extremely slim batteries in the iPhone 6 models, though both those batteries offer higher capacities than the previous-gen iPhone 5s, as the 2014 iPhones are both larger in size.
Apple is rumored to be working on a Retina MacBook Air laptop slimmer than previous MacBook Air, a device supposed to pack Intel’s Core M processor that allows OEMs to come up with fanless, ultra-slim laptop designs. Furthermore, Apple is also rumored to be developing a 12.9-inch iPad Pro. It’ll certainly be interesting to see what kind of battery life a Retina MacBook Air and the future iPad Pro will have to offer. It’s likely both devices will be extremely thin but also powerful, and thus it wouldn’t be surprising to see them pack slim iPad Air 2-like batteries as well.
A video of iFixit’s iPad Air 2 teardown follows below.
