iPad Hardware Power Requirements

Posted on November 24, 2010 by iOSMidi.com (Pat)

With all the new apps hitting the store and the new capability of the iPad and the USB Camera Connection Kit, we are starting to get a better idea of which devices work and which don’t.

But the picture isn’t clear – we are getting conflicting reports for some MIDI devices (M-Audio Uno 1×1 and the Novation Remote Series being two).

It seems the iPad measures how much power is being drawn from the device and if it’s too much, it will show an error message saying it’s incompatible.  What I wonder is if that can vary from iPad to iPad, or depending on how much charge you have or even the health of the iPad’s battery?

Related to this, some hardware that worked perfectly during the early betas of 4.2 now doesn’t work at all!  It seems Apple changed the power requirements (developer access required) from 100ma to 20ma – devices that draw too much power throw up error messages and refuse to work. Is this because they were in danger of damaging the iPad?

While it’s been known for some time that these error messages are not entirely accurate, for MIDI devices it seems that whether they are accurate or not doesn’t matter – the devices simply will not be detected by your apps.

The good news is that Apple is aware that some hardware that worked early on now doesn’t, and has stated that is a ‘known issue’.  Hopefully Apple will change back the power requirements if safe to do so, and the list devices that work will get bigger.

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