Don't say "good that there is no flash" as if it's a good thing that any device isn't more robust. If it's not capable of doing flash because of hardware limitations, fine, but why would anyone WANT a gadget to lack features?
[CENTER]Because Steve J deemed Flash support unworthy of inclusion on his beloved device, of course had he included the feature, then it would be heralded as the second coming by the Apple-worshipers
The iPad is far from perfect, but that won't stop me from buying one as it does quite a few things I require rather well, where it goes in the future remains to be seen.[/CENTER]
Now that I've had all day to consider the announcement, I think I would have rather that Apple just released the product without any fanfare. This to me seems like a turning point that may signal an end to their latest winning streak. Steve seems out of touch now and the other leaders at Apple are not as inspirational as he has been in recent years. I'm happy with OS X for my desktop/MBP, but now my iPhone seems somehow less desirable after this let down of a product launch. Feels like the magic is fading.
Hear, hear. There are Apple fanboys here who laughed their heads off because I wrote that I preferred my MSI Wind running Snow Leopard. And yet today I was able to simultaneously run Safari, Firefox and Chrome (a total of about 20 tabs) along with Safari Adblocker for the most egregiously ad-overrun sites, plus edit a document in Pages and update a website using Fireworks and Dreamweaver CS4 before uploading it using Transmit. Not bad for a "joke/junk" computer. Oh, and the webcam even works, if I decide to videoconference in Skype. I'm also not limited to videos encoded in AVC Main Profile. I can play back MPEG2 videos as well as AVC High Profile, which I prefer to encode in.
[CENTER]The MSI Wind + OSX is a pretty potent combination, but alas it's not from the mind of Steve J so therefore it's regarded as junk by many in here though it's infinitely more capable than any of Apple's portable 'i' offerings.
The iPad is a lot of things, but for those seeking a complete computing experience, netbooks are still the more sensible choice.[/CENTER]
Now that I've had all day to consider the announcement, I think I would have rather that Apple just released the product without any fanfare. This to me seems like a turning point that may signal an end to their latest winning streak. Steve seems out of touch now and the other leaders at Apple are not as inspirational as he has been in recent years. I'm happy with OS X for my desktop/MBP, but now my iPhone seems somehow less desirable after this let down of a product launch. Feels like the magic is fading.
[CENTER]I wouldn't write them off just yet, but it appears that the general consensus around the 'interweb' is that the iPad is far less than it could/should have been given Apple's recent experience with mobile computing.[/CENTER]
There was a meta-message in today?s Apple event, not about the iPad in particular, but rather about Apple as a whole. Jobs?s brief preamble included a bit of extra emphasis on the fact that the Apple now generates over $50 billion per year in revenue. (Apple also emphasized this $50 billion revenue thing in their PR two days ago announcing their Q1 2010 financial results.) He also said that when you consider MacBooks as ?mobile? devices, that Apple generates more revenue from mobile hardware than any other company in the world; the three competitors he singled out were Sony, Samsung, and Nokia. The adjective he used was ?bigger?.
Lastly, there?s the fact that the iPad is using a new CPU designed and made by Apple itself: the Apple A4. This is a huge deal. I got about 20 blessed minutes of time using the iPad demo units Apple had at the event today, and if I had to sum up the device with one word, that word would be ?fast?.
It is fast, fast, fast. The hardware really does feel like a big iPhone ? and a big original iPhone at that, with the aluminum back. (I have never liked the plastic 3G/S iPhones as much as the original in terms of how it feels in my hand.) I expected the screen size to be the biggest differentiating factor in how the iPad feels compared to an iPhone, but I think the speed difference is just as big a factor. Web pages render so fast it was hard to believe. After using the iPhone so much for two and a half years, I?ve become accustomed to web pages rendering (relative to the Mac) slowly. On the iPad, they seem to render nearly instantly. (802.11N Wi-Fi helps too.)
The iPad hardware is exactly what you think. It looks great, it feels great. It?s very nice to hold. (People are complaining about the wide bezel around the display, but without that, where would your thumbs go? You don?t want your thumb that?s holding the device to cover on-screen content or register as a touch. Trust me, it?s just right.) Just like with the iPhone, it?s all in the software. And the software is obviously marvelous in many ways. It is clearly the result of deep thought and hard work.
But: everyone I spoke to in the press room was raving first and foremost about the speed. None of us could shut up about it. It feels impossibly fast. (And our next thought: What happens if Apple has figured out a way to make a CPU like A4 that fits in an iPhone? If they pull that off for this year?s new iPhone, look out.)
Apple doesn?t talk much about the technical details of the iPhone. They never talk about CPU speed or the name of the chip being used. They don?t tell you how much RAM is in there. Part of their vision for moving computers from technical culture to popular culture is about getting away from defining these things by their technical specs. So the prominent talk about A4 is telling. This is something they want us to notice.
I mentioned this year-ago quote from Apple COO Tim Cook the other day, but it?s apt here, too. Cook told BusinessWeek, ?We believe in the simple, not the complex. We believe that we need to own and control the primary technologies behind the products we make, and participate only in markets where we can make a significant contribution.?
Apple now owns and controls their own mobile CPUs. There aren?t many companies in the world that can say that. And from what I saw today, Apple doesn?t just own and control a mobile CPU, they own and control the hands-down best mobile CPU in the world. Software aside (which is a huge thing to put aside), it may well be that no other company could make a device today matching the price, size, and performance of the iPad. They?re not getting into the CPU business for kicks, they?re getting into it to kick ass.
They?re Microsoft and Intel rolled into one when it comes to mobile computing. In the pre-taped video Apple showed, Bob Mansfield said of the iPad, ?No one else could do it.? Only Apple.
And so my takeaway from this ? with the bragging about making their own CPUs and their annual revenue and their size compared to companies like Sony, Samsung, and Nokia ? is that this is Apple?s way of asserting that they?re taking over the penthouse suite as the strongest and best company in the whole ones-and-zeroes racket.
There is nothing groundbreaking in this product. The innovation is minimal. It "does it" the same way the iTouch does it. Just bigger.
dude yes
innovation is minimal !!!!!
EITHER YOU area troll
or you are a very sad little man who on a great day for mankind chooses to try to belittle a grand slam new product to make him self look like a big man . or i guess feel like big man /
is your life so sad and small you come here to attack us every day with child like insult posts ??
There was a meta-message in today?s Apple event, not about the iPad in particular, but rather about Apple as a whole. Jobs?s brief preamble included a bit of extra emphasis on the fact that the Apple now generates over $50 billion per year in revenue. (Apple also emphasized this $50 billion revenue thing in their PR two days ago announcing their Q1 2010 financial results.) He also said that when you consider MacBooks as ?mobile? devices, that Apple generates more revenue from mobile hardware than any other company in the world; the three competitors he singled out were Sony, Samsung, and Nokia. The adjective he used was ?bigger?.
Lastly, there?s the fact that the iPad is using a new CPU designed and made by Apple itself: the Apple A4. This is a huge deal. I got about 20 blessed minutes of time using the iPad demo units Apple had at the event today, and if I had to sum up the device with one word, that word would be ?fast?.
It is fast, fast, fast. The hardware really does feel like a big iPhone ? and a big original iPhone at that, with the aluminum back. (I have never liked the plastic 3G/S iPhones as much as the original in terms of how it feels in my hand.) I expected the screen size to be the biggest differentiating factor in how the iPad feels compared to an iPhone, but I think the speed difference is just as big a factor. Web pages render so fast it was hard to believe. After using the iPhone so much for two and a half years, I?ve become accustomed to web pages rendering (relative to the Mac) slowly. On the iPad, they seem to render nearly instantly. (802.11N Wi-Fi helps too.)
The iPad hardware is exactly what you think. It looks great, it feels great. It?s very nice to hold. (People are complaining about the wide bezel around the display, but without that, where would your thumbs go? You don?t want your thumb that?s holding the device to cover on-screen content or register as a touch. Trust me, it?s just right.) Just like with the iPhone, it?s all in the software. And the software is obviously marvelous in many ways. It is clearly the result of deep thought and hard work.
But: everyone I spoke to in the press room was raving first and foremost about the speed. None of us could shut up about it. It feels impossibly fast. (And our next thought: What happens if Apple has figured out a way to make a CPU like A4 that fits in an iPhone? If they pull that off for this year?s new iPhone, look out.)
Apple doesn?t talk much about the technical details of the iPhone. They never talk about CPU speed or the name of the chip being used. They don?t tell you how much RAM is in there. Part of their vision for moving computers from technical culture to popular culture is about getting away from defining these things by their technical specs. So the prominent talk about A4 is telling. This is something they want us to notice.
I mentioned this year-ago quote from Apple COO Tim Cook the other day, but it?s apt here, too. Cook told BusinessWeek, ?We believe in the simple, not the complex. We believe that we need to own and control the primary technologies behind the products we make, and participate only in markets where we can make a significant contribution.?
Apple now owns and controls their own mobile CPUs. There aren?t many companies in the world that can say that. And from what I saw today, Apple doesn?t just own and control a mobile CPU, they own and control the hands-down best mobile CPU in the world. Software aside (which is a huge thing to put aside), it may well be that no other company could make a device today matching the price, size, and performance of the iPad. They?re not getting into the CPU business for kicks, they?re getting into it to kick ass.
They?re Microsoft and Intel rolled into one when it comes to mobile computing. In the pre-taped video Apple showed, Bob Mansfield said of the iPad, ?No one else could do it.? Only Apple.
And so my takeaway from this ? with the bragging about making their own CPUs and their annual revenue and their size compared to companies like Sony, Samsung, and Nokia ? is that this is Apple?s way of asserting that they?re taking over the penthouse suite as the strongest and best company in the whole ones-and-zeroes racket.
By eBook reader, I meant the several existing apps I have on my iPhone. Most of them are free. I like some better then others. All of them have easily-obtainable titles.
I agree that the hardware eBook readers are of questionable value.
Quote:
Originally Posted by iGenius
Why are you being defensive? Are you disappointed with the product?
Quote:
Originally Posted by iGenius
Yeah - they always release half-done products, eh?
Quote:
Originally Posted by iGenius
Yeah - Apple typically makes stripped-down devices built to meet a price point. That's their style, eh?
Quote:
Originally Posted by iGenius
Yes. Apple typically sells stripped-down devices in order to hit a price point. Right?
C'mon. They failed to make it great, and had to cut the price.
Quote:
Originally Posted by iGenius
Wow! So I won't need uncle iSteve's permission to load the cool new software?
Guess again. This is a razor and blades sales strategy.
Quote:
Originally Posted by iGenius
But he's generally full of shit, isn't he? He seems often to overstate the obvious, using superlatives as crutches.
Quote:
Originally Posted by iGenius
Ummmm....is there any indication at all that this thing can print? If not, all that iWork stuff seems even less useful.
Quote:
Originally Posted by iGenius
There is nothing groundbreaking in this product. The innovation is minimal. It "does it" the same way the iTouch does it. Just bigger.
Quote:
Originally Posted by iGenius
QUOTE=Carmissimo;1559093]To those who require a device that performs tasks the iPad will not perform, I suggest looking elsewhere.
You seem to relish the mediocrity of the device. To see it as a feature, even.[/QUOTE]
Quote:
Originally Posted by iGenius
New here? Think Bizarro World from Superman. Some folks here are happy as pigs in muck that, for example, the iPhone will not multitask.
Quote:
Originally Posted by iGenius
QUOTE=lifterus;1559223] Media can (and should) be stored on a NAS and accessed over wifi.
Can the 'Pad do that? That seems like a huge stretch for iOS.[/QUOTE]
Whatever, the thing should have set us free of all constraints. Not just be carrier unlocked. I wanted a file system, the ability to load or write any software I want to run on it and it should have USB, camera, SD and unrestricted BT, Anything less is just unacceptable. And I'm not buying the bezel for thumbs either. Just lame.
And as others have said multitasking, and stylus. I say let us be the the ones to decide what to do on the machine, Let us crash it, get infected by viruses, anything but tell us that something is not approved by Apple or we are not allowed to do it. On my iPhone I don't care but this is a computer not a subsidized phone so I should be able to do as I please with it. Bring on the jailbreaking!
That doesn't stop me from seeing that this is really nothing new technology wise, and is primarily a device for passive consumption of media, rather than a mobile computer that one can use to produce media.
You folks weren't watching the same demonstrations I was then. This is one of the best meldings of desktop-like functionality with a mobile touch based interface I've seen. The calendar and email look fantastic...especially for a software TWO MONTHS from launch (you could see a glitch or two in some of the hands on videos of things not resizing as one might expect, etc).
The interface design supports layered information like in a desktop and unlike the iPhone interface. The popup menu system is very nice from a UI perspective and will work better here than in a traditional WIMP interface.
This provides the same user interaction capabilities as in desktop applications within a multitouch device which means apps will be far more like full featured desktop applications than iPhone apps.
As far as content creation goes, it has a keyboard dock. It has iWork. For a quick email or doc the virtual keyboard will work but for long documents you can pull out your keyboard doc or bt keyboard on the plane and type away.
No iMovie or iPhoto but I guess those were computationally far more intensive than iWork but at least you'll be able to take a quick look at your imported movies or photos in a larger format before taking it back for post processing. Which, honestly, if you NEED to do on site you better be packing a new iCore 7 17" MBP that they didn't announce today.
But for normal office-style content creation? iPad iWork looks awesome, Numbers in particular. Even a 3rd party app like Brushes looked great. Not bad for fingerpainting and much more like a desktop app than an iphone app in terms of richer interaction for content creation.
Nothing new technology wise? They have a desktop scale (as opposed to handheld scale) multi-touch UI design style/metaphor that isn't desktop based and that doesn't suck! Calendar is a great example of how well desktop apps can transition to the touch interface.
Give app developers 2 months to revamp apps and we can expect some nice launch titles and even maybe a few desktop ports by then.
Geez, technology advances aren't all hardware related.
Utterly useless. What do you do when you travel, bring the desktop its tethered to along? No I/O and the available, useless, file system apps can't handle anything remotely large and are sloooow.
No problem, I get an Air. 2" wider than my old G4 Powerbook, no way.
Won't cannibalize anything, won't sell. MS is laughing its butt off.
No, MS is making commercials bragging about how amazing it is that you can click windows into position.
There was a meta-message in today?s Apple event, not about the iPad in particular, but rather about Apple as a whole. Jobs?s brief preamble included a bit of extra emphasis on the fact that the Apple now generates over $50 billion per year in revenue. (Apple also emphasized this $50 billion revenue thing in their PR two days ago announcing their Q1 2010 financial results.) He also said that when you consider MacBooks as ?mobile? devices, that Apple generates more revenue from mobile hardware than any other company in the world; the three competitors he singled out were Sony, Samsung, and Nokia. The adjective he used was ?bigger?.
You say this like it is a good thing. They are just admitting they charge way too much for all their products.
What we have is a big iPod, with *no* new technology, that solves none of the problems associated with tablet computing and on top of that, eschews the use of some previously discovered solutions, like a stylus.
Why leave out a stylus, if what you have without it is not as good? I was assuming they would leave out the stylus, but have some cool method that replaced it. Instead they just left it out.
I have...hmmm...3 slate tablets, a convertible tablet, various pdas, a couple touch screens, a cintiq, 3 pen based computing devices (Seiko, Crosspad, Transnote) and do research in human computer interaction.
I obviously like the stylus as an interaction device...but looking at the UI design on the iPad I don't need one except for drawing diagrams. If the virtual keyboard works well enough that's good enough for most note taking.
If not, there's the keyboard dock.
Quote:
Why leave out thumb typing (which works so well on the iPhone), when they have nothing to replace it with?
They have a virtual keyboard and the keyboard dock.
Quote:
The main physical design problems with tablets always have been input related. The biggest one of all has always been, .... how do you type on it without putting it down? The idea being that if you have to put it down on a surface to type on it, you might as well be carrying a laptop.
Oddly, I have never really wanted to type standing up. Granted all my slates are heavier than a pound, even the Motion one but that's simply not the natural interaction metaphor. I've never really wanted to hold one in two hands like an oversized iphone to type with my thumbs either.
Thumb input is just sub-optimal IMHO for a lot of stuff. The use cases start to fall apart after closer examination of the work flows.
Did I mention the keyboard dock? The one thing I thought Apple would never do for their tablet.
Quote:
The most often proffered solution to this problem has been pen input, and either holding the big tablet in the crook or your arm, or making the tablet smaller. Apple has made it smaller and lighter, but they've taken away the stylus and replaced it with basically nothing at all.
A stylus for pen input would have been nice but you know, I have years of notes in ink with so-so handwriing recognition so it's not really that searchable without me entering metadata after the fact. Something I never really did consistently. Something most folks don't do.
So you lose the ability to take notes standing up. Mkay, when was the last time you really did that with a clipboard? Or with anything?
I actually have used tablets as data collection devices for human performance measurements. Meh.
Quote:
Apple's solution is that you simply don't type on it without putting it down or you type on it like all tablets in the past by poking at a virtual keyboard with one finger at a time. This is seriously lame, and worthy of criticism.
With the numbers demo and the form builder with checkboxes and slider scoring that covers a good chunk of the use cases for standup data collection. Instead of writing "3" I just slide across and activate three stars. Data cells can bring up specialized virtual keypads tailored for that data type for one handed entry that is faster than using thumb based entry and navigation.
The lack of these input methods may seem glaring unless you actually have been using tablets and realize most of those other mechanisms sucked. How well the iPad interface seemed to work in the demos is very nice in the same way that not banging your head on the wall seems very peaceful.
And there's a keyboard dock! I said that right? Maybe not as cool as the Lenovo one but the interaction design is FAR FAR FAR FAR superior to what MS has done. And I say that as a huge defender of MS Research's work in multitouch R&D, MSDN developer and former OneNote fan.
The one thing I'll really miss is being able to easily capture drawings during meetings. That's the primary thing that made pen computing very appealing to me as an engineer. Especially as a UI designer as I could mock up interfaces on the fly as if on paper and have an electronic form to modify later. i could do onion skin like interaction flows.
Maybe a capacitance based stylus will work well enough for that.
Wow! They made a big iPod Touch! So impressive! NOT!
"1GHz...which includes the CPU and graphics...and it screams" seems like a contradiction to me. Since when has a non-mobile device with an integrated 1 GHz been touted as screaming? I haven't seen the detailed specs yet to be 100% on my previous statement but I doubt it has multiple cores, an impressive bus, or anything of that nature.
What about the app store? Will its restrictions make it suck just like the iPhone app store? There's one other issue that I foresee. The iPad looks like it may only be compatible with one browser. I hope Microsoft and Google sue you, Apple.
LOL - don't think much of it?
Looks fast enough to me (have you looked at the video?) - and if Apple have their own CPU - it'll get faster AND bulletproof - not literally - but I'm sure you [read troll] wont bother finding out.
Now that I've had all day to consider the announcement, I think I would have rather that Apple just released the product without any fanfare. This to me seems like a turning point that may signal an end to their latest winning streak. Steve seems out of touch now and the other leaders at Apple are not as inspirational as he has been in recent years. I'm happy with OS X for my desktop/MBP, but now my iPhone seems somehow less desirable after this let down of a product launch. Feels like the magic is fading.
C'mon. The expectations were too high. To me the iPad looks like an amazing machine. The iPhone is still fantastic. People are loosing perspective here. The fanfare serves as a free marketing generator. Unfortunately with it comes hopes and dreams way beyond what is realistic or even feasible. The iPad will be huge and one or two iterations down the road it will be even better. What are beginning to look long in the tooth are 'normal' laptops.
You folks weren't watching the same demonstrations I was then. This is one of the best meldings of desktop-like functionality with a mobile touch based interface I've seen. The calendar and email look fantastic...especially for a software TWO MONTHS from launch (you could see a glitch or two in some of the hands on videos of things not resizing as one might expect, etc).
The interface design supports layered information like in a desktop and unlike the iPhone interface. The popup menu system is very nice from a UI perspective and will work better here than in a traditional WIMP interface.
This provides the same user interaction capabilities as in desktop applications within a multitouch device which means apps will be far more like full featured desktop applications than iPhone apps.
As far as content creation goes, it has a keyboard dock. It has iWork. For a quick email or doc the virtual keyboard will work but for long documents you can pull out your keyboard doc or bt keyboard on the plane and type away.
No iMovie or iPhoto but I guess those were computationally far more intensive than iWork but at least you'll be able to take a quick look at your imported movies or photos in a larger format before taking it back for post processing. Which, honestly, if you NEED to do on site you better be packing a new iCore 7 17" MBP that they didn't announce today.
But for normal office-style content creation? iPad iWork looks awesome, Numbers in particular. Even a 3rd party app like Brushes looked great. Not bad for fingerpainting and much more like a desktop app than an iphone app in terms of richer interaction for content creation.
Nothing new technology wise? They have a desktop scale (as opposed to handheld scale) multi-touch UI design style/metaphor that isn't desktop based and that doesn't suck! Calendar is a great example of how well desktop apps can transition to the touch interface.
Give app developers 2 months to revamp apps and we can expect some nice launch titles and even maybe a few desktop ports by then.
Geez, technology advances aren't all hardware related.
This.
Do people imagine that application development just stopped with the desktop OS and more lately the iPhone?
If you were an iPhone developer, wouldn't you even now be poring over the SDK, looking to see if you could hit early with a screamingly cool app that takes advantage of this particular device's hardware and software combo?
Oh, that's right, everyone will just port their fart apps and that'll be that, poor little orphaned iPad.
Some people seem to be incapable of learning from recent history.
Comments
Even the name is meh.
Kudos to the long battery life however.
Please stop that idiotic posting with center-aligned text.
[CENTER]Please stop being so petty over trivialities and try to stay on topic... Thanks
In case you forgot, we're discussing the Apple iPad.[/CENTER]
If they included flash you'd be celebrating it.
Don't say "good that there is no flash" as if it's a good thing that any device isn't more robust. If it's not capable of doing flash because of hardware limitations, fine, but why would anyone WANT a gadget to lack features?
[CENTER]Because Steve J deemed Flash support unworthy of inclusion on his beloved device, of course had he included the feature, then it would be heralded as the second coming by the Apple-worshipers
The iPad is far from perfect, but that won't stop me from buying one as it does quite a few things I require rather well, where it goes in the future remains to be seen.[/CENTER]
Hear, hear. There are Apple fanboys here who laughed their heads off because I wrote that I preferred my MSI Wind running Snow Leopard. And yet today I was able to simultaneously run Safari, Firefox and Chrome (a total of about 20 tabs) along with Safari Adblocker for the most egregiously ad-overrun sites, plus edit a document in Pages and update a website using Fireworks and Dreamweaver CS4 before uploading it using Transmit. Not bad for a "joke/junk" computer. Oh, and the webcam even works, if I decide to videoconference in Skype. I'm also not limited to videos encoded in AVC Main Profile. I can play back MPEG2 videos as well as AVC High Profile, which I prefer to encode in.
[CENTER]The MSI Wind + OSX is a pretty potent combination, but alas it's not from the mind of Steve J so therefore it's regarded as junk by many in here though it's infinitely more capable than any of Apple's portable 'i' offerings.
The iPad is a lot of things, but for those seeking a complete computing experience, netbooks are still the more sensible choice.[/CENTER]
Now that I've had all day to consider the announcement, I think I would have rather that Apple just released the product without any fanfare. This to me seems like a turning point that may signal an end to their latest winning streak. Steve seems out of touch now and the other leaders at Apple are not as inspirational as he has been in recent years. I'm happy with OS X for my desktop/MBP, but now my iPhone seems somehow less desirable after this let down of a product launch. Feels like the magic is fading.
[CENTER]I wouldn't write them off just yet, but it appears that the general consensus around the 'interweb' is that the iPad is far less than it could/should have been given Apple's recent experience with mobile computing.[/CENTER]
There was a meta-message in today?s Apple event, not about the iPad in particular, but rather about Apple as a whole. Jobs?s brief preamble included a bit of extra emphasis on the fact that the Apple now generates over $50 billion per year in revenue. (Apple also emphasized this $50 billion revenue thing in their PR two days ago announcing their Q1 2010 financial results.) He also said that when you consider MacBooks as ?mobile? devices, that Apple generates more revenue from mobile hardware than any other company in the world; the three competitors he singled out were Sony, Samsung, and Nokia. The adjective he used was ?bigger?.
Lastly, there?s the fact that the iPad is using a new CPU designed and made by Apple itself: the Apple A4. This is a huge deal. I got about 20 blessed minutes of time using the iPad demo units Apple had at the event today, and if I had to sum up the device with one word, that word would be ?fast?.
It is fast, fast, fast. The hardware really does feel like a big iPhone ? and a big original iPhone at that, with the aluminum back. (I have never liked the plastic 3G/S iPhones as much as the original in terms of how it feels in my hand.) I expected the screen size to be the biggest differentiating factor in how the iPad feels compared to an iPhone, but I think the speed difference is just as big a factor. Web pages render so fast it was hard to believe. After using the iPhone so much for two and a half years, I?ve become accustomed to web pages rendering (relative to the Mac) slowly. On the iPad, they seem to render nearly instantly. (802.11N Wi-Fi helps too.)
The iPad hardware is exactly what you think. It looks great, it feels great. It?s very nice to hold. (People are complaining about the wide bezel around the display, but without that, where would your thumbs go? You don?t want your thumb that?s holding the device to cover on-screen content or register as a touch. Trust me, it?s just right.) Just like with the iPhone, it?s all in the software. And the software is obviously marvelous in many ways. It is clearly the result of deep thought and hard work.
But: everyone I spoke to in the press room was raving first and foremost about the speed. None of us could shut up about it. It feels impossibly fast. (And our next thought: What happens if Apple has figured out a way to make a CPU like A4 that fits in an iPhone? If they pull that off for this year?s new iPhone, look out.)
Apple doesn?t talk much about the technical details of the iPhone. They never talk about CPU speed or the name of the chip being used. They don?t tell you how much RAM is in there. Part of their vision for moving computers from technical culture to popular culture is about getting away from defining these things by their technical specs. So the prominent talk about A4 is telling. This is something they want us to notice.
I mentioned this year-ago quote from Apple COO Tim Cook the other day, but it?s apt here, too. Cook told BusinessWeek, ?We believe in the simple, not the complex. We believe that we need to own and control the primary technologies behind the products we make, and participate only in markets where we can make a significant contribution.?
Apple now owns and controls their own mobile CPUs. There aren?t many companies in the world that can say that. And from what I saw today, Apple doesn?t just own and control a mobile CPU, they own and control the hands-down best mobile CPU in the world. Software aside (which is a huge thing to put aside), it may well be that no other company could make a device today matching the price, size, and performance of the iPad. They?re not getting into the CPU business for kicks, they?re getting into it to kick ass.
They?re Microsoft and Intel rolled into one when it comes to mobile computing. In the pre-taped video Apple showed, Bob Mansfield said of the iPad, ?No one else could do it.? Only Apple.
And so my takeaway from this ? with the bragging about making their own CPUs and their annual revenue and their size compared to companies like Sony, Samsung, and Nokia ? is that this is Apple?s way of asserting that they?re taking over the penthouse suite as the strongest and best company in the whole ones-and-zeroes racket.
Daring Fireball 10-01-27 10:40 PM John Gruber http://daringfireball.net/
There is nothing groundbreaking in this product. The innovation is minimal. It "does it" the same way the iTouch does it. Just bigger.
dude yes
innovation is minimal !!!!!
EITHER YOU area troll
or you are a very sad little man who on a great day for mankind chooses to try to belittle a grand slam new product to make him self look like a big man . or i guess feel like big man /
is your life so sad and small you come here to attack us every day with child like insult posts ??
why would anyone visit a place he hates ??
and hang out in a place where no one likes him ??
go back to the palm pre site dude
★ The iPad Big Picture
There was a meta-message in today?s Apple event, not about the iPad in particular, but rather about Apple as a whole. Jobs?s brief preamble included a bit of extra emphasis on the fact that the Apple now generates over $50 billion per year in revenue. (Apple also emphasized this $50 billion revenue thing in their PR two days ago announcing their Q1 2010 financial results.) He also said that when you consider MacBooks as ?mobile? devices, that Apple generates more revenue from mobile hardware than any other company in the world; the three competitors he singled out were Sony, Samsung, and Nokia. The adjective he used was ?bigger?.
Lastly, there?s the fact that the iPad is using a new CPU designed and made by Apple itself: the Apple A4. This is a huge deal. I got about 20 blessed minutes of time using the iPad demo units Apple had at the event today, and if I had to sum up the device with one word, that word would be ?fast?.
It is fast, fast, fast. The hardware really does feel like a big iPhone ? and a big original iPhone at that, with the aluminum back. (I have never liked the plastic 3G/S iPhones as much as the original in terms of how it feels in my hand.) I expected the screen size to be the biggest differentiating factor in how the iPad feels compared to an iPhone, but I think the speed difference is just as big a factor. Web pages render so fast it was hard to believe. After using the iPhone so much for two and a half years, I?ve become accustomed to web pages rendering (relative to the Mac) slowly. On the iPad, they seem to render nearly instantly. (802.11N Wi-Fi helps too.)
The iPad hardware is exactly what you think. It looks great, it feels great. It?s very nice to hold. (People are complaining about the wide bezel around the display, but without that, where would your thumbs go? You don?t want your thumb that?s holding the device to cover on-screen content or register as a touch. Trust me, it?s just right.) Just like with the iPhone, it?s all in the software. And the software is obviously marvelous in many ways. It is clearly the result of deep thought and hard work.
But: everyone I spoke to in the press room was raving first and foremost about the speed. None of us could shut up about it. It feels impossibly fast. (And our next thought: What happens if Apple has figured out a way to make a CPU like A4 that fits in an iPhone? If they pull that off for this year?s new iPhone, look out.)
Apple doesn?t talk much about the technical details of the iPhone. They never talk about CPU speed or the name of the chip being used. They don?t tell you how much RAM is in there. Part of their vision for moving computers from technical culture to popular culture is about getting away from defining these things by their technical specs. So the prominent talk about A4 is telling. This is something they want us to notice.
I mentioned this year-ago quote from Apple COO Tim Cook the other day, but it?s apt here, too. Cook told BusinessWeek, ?We believe in the simple, not the complex. We believe that we need to own and control the primary technologies behind the products we make, and participate only in markets where we can make a significant contribution.?
Apple now owns and controls their own mobile CPUs. There aren?t many companies in the world that can say that. And from what I saw today, Apple doesn?t just own and control a mobile CPU, they own and control the hands-down best mobile CPU in the world. Software aside (which is a huge thing to put aside), it may well be that no other company could make a device today matching the price, size, and performance of the iPad. They?re not getting into the CPU business for kicks, they?re getting into it to kick ass.
They?re Microsoft and Intel rolled into one when it comes to mobile computing. In the pre-taped video Apple showed, Bob Mansfield said of the iPad, ?No one else could do it.? Only Apple.
And so my takeaway from this ? with the bragging about making their own CPUs and their annual revenue and their size compared to companies like Sony, Samsung, and Nokia ? is that this is Apple?s way of asserting that they?re taking over the penthouse suite as the strongest and best company in the whole ones-and-zeroes racket.
Daring Fireball 10-01-27 10:40 PM John Gruber http://daringfireball.net/
wow great post dude
By eBook reader, I meant the several existing apps I have on my iPhone. Most of them are free. I like some better then others. All of them have easily-obtainable titles.
I agree that the hardware eBook readers are of questionable value.
Why are you being defensive? Are you disappointed with the product?
Yeah - they always release half-done products, eh?
Yeah - Apple typically makes stripped-down devices built to meet a price point. That's their style, eh?
Yes. Apple typically sells stripped-down devices in order to hit a price point. Right?
C'mon. They failed to make it great, and had to cut the price.
Wow! So I won't need uncle iSteve's permission to load the cool new software?
Guess again. This is a razor and blades sales strategy.
But he's generally full of shit, isn't he? He seems often to overstate the obvious, using superlatives as crutches.
Ummmm....is there any indication at all that this thing can print? If not, all that iWork stuff seems even less useful.
There is nothing groundbreaking in this product. The innovation is minimal. It "does it" the same way the iTouch does it. Just bigger.
QUOTE=Carmissimo;1559093]To those who require a device that performs tasks the iPad will not perform, I suggest looking elsewhere.
You seem to relish the mediocrity of the device. To see it as a feature, even.[/QUOTE]
New here? Think Bizarro World from Superman. Some folks here are happy as pigs in muck that, for example, the iPhone will not multitask.
QUOTE=lifterus;1559223] Media can (and should) be stored on a NAS and accessed over wifi.
Can the 'Pad do that? That seems like a huge stretch for iOS.[/QUOTE]
TROLL
this is Apple’s way of asserting that they’re taking over the penthouse suite as the strongest and best company in the whole ones-and-zeroes racket.
Daring Fireball 10-01-27 10:40 PM John Gruber http://daringfireball.net/
Whatever, the thing should have set us free of all constraints. Not just be carrier unlocked. I wanted a file system, the ability to load or write any software I want to run on it and it should have USB, camera, SD and unrestricted BT, Anything less is just unacceptable. And I'm not buying the bezel for thumbs either. Just lame.
And as others have said multitasking, and stylus. I say let us be the the ones to decide what to do on the machine, Let us crash it, get infected by viruses, anything but tell us that something is not approved by Apple or we are not allowed to do it. On my iPhone I don't care but this is a computer not a subsidized phone so I should be able to do as I please with it. Bring on the jailbreaking!
I
That doesn't stop me from seeing that this is really nothing new technology wise, and is primarily a device for passive consumption of media, rather than a mobile computer that one can use to produce media.
You folks weren't watching the same demonstrations I was then. This is one of the best meldings of desktop-like functionality with a mobile touch based interface I've seen. The calendar and email look fantastic...especially for a software TWO MONTHS from launch (you could see a glitch or two in some of the hands on videos of things not resizing as one might expect, etc).
The interface design supports layered information like in a desktop and unlike the iPhone interface. The popup menu system is very nice from a UI perspective and will work better here than in a traditional WIMP interface.
This provides the same user interaction capabilities as in desktop applications within a multitouch device which means apps will be far more like full featured desktop applications than iPhone apps.
As far as content creation goes, it has a keyboard dock. It has iWork. For a quick email or doc the virtual keyboard will work but for long documents you can pull out your keyboard doc or bt keyboard on the plane and type away.
No iMovie or iPhoto but I guess those were computationally far more intensive than iWork but at least you'll be able to take a quick look at your imported movies or photos in a larger format before taking it back for post processing. Which, honestly, if you NEED to do on site you better be packing a new iCore 7 17" MBP that they didn't announce today.
But for normal office-style content creation? iPad iWork looks awesome, Numbers in particular. Even a 3rd party app like Brushes looked great. Not bad for fingerpainting and much more like a desktop app than an iphone app in terms of richer interaction for content creation.
Nothing new technology wise? They have a desktop scale (as opposed to handheld scale) multi-touch UI design style/metaphor that isn't desktop based and that doesn't suck! Calendar is a great example of how well desktop apps can transition to the touch interface.
Give app developers 2 months to revamp apps and we can expect some nice launch titles and even maybe a few desktop ports by then.
Geez, technology advances aren't all hardware related.
Please stop that idiotic posting with center-aligned text.
LOOK TO THE RIGHT............................................. . please - just to humor DaHarder?
[RIGHT]Lets start a new trend (BTW this is OT -
We could all go - (well, you and me - eh?) RIGHT WING
Utterly useless. What do you do when you travel, bring the desktop its tethered to along? No I/O and the available, useless, file system apps can't handle anything remotely large and are sloooow.
No problem, I get an Air. 2" wider than my old G4 Powerbook, no way.
Won't cannibalize anything, won't sell. MS is laughing its butt off.
No, MS is making commercials bragging about how amazing it is that you can click windows into position.
★ The iPad Big Picture
There was a meta-message in today?s Apple event, not about the iPad in particular, but rather about Apple as a whole. Jobs?s brief preamble included a bit of extra emphasis on the fact that the Apple now generates over $50 billion per year in revenue. (Apple also emphasized this $50 billion revenue thing in their PR two days ago announcing their Q1 2010 financial results.) He also said that when you consider MacBooks as ?mobile? devices, that Apple generates more revenue from mobile hardware than any other company in the world; the three competitors he singled out were Sony, Samsung, and Nokia. The adjective he used was ?bigger?.
You say this like it is a good thing. They are just admitting they charge way too much for all their products.
What we have is a big iPod, with *no* new technology, that solves none of the problems associated with tablet computing and on top of that, eschews the use of some previously discovered solutions, like a stylus.
Why leave out a stylus, if what you have without it is not as good? I was assuming they would leave out the stylus, but have some cool method that replaced it. Instead they just left it out.
I have...hmmm...3 slate tablets, a convertible tablet, various pdas, a couple touch screens, a cintiq, 3 pen based computing devices (Seiko, Crosspad, Transnote) and do research in human computer interaction.
I obviously like the stylus as an interaction device...but looking at the UI design on the iPad I don't need one except for drawing diagrams. If the virtual keyboard works well enough that's good enough for most note taking.
If not, there's the keyboard dock.
Why leave out thumb typing (which works so well on the iPhone), when they have nothing to replace it with?
They have a virtual keyboard and the keyboard dock.
The main physical design problems with tablets always have been input related. The biggest one of all has always been, .... how do you type on it without putting it down? The idea being that if you have to put it down on a surface to type on it, you might as well be carrying a laptop.
Oddly, I have never really wanted to type standing up. Granted all my slates are heavier than a pound, even the Motion one but that's simply not the natural interaction metaphor. I've never really wanted to hold one in two hands like an oversized iphone to type with my thumbs either.
Thumb input is just sub-optimal IMHO for a lot of stuff. The use cases start to fall apart after closer examination of the work flows.
Did I mention the keyboard dock? The one thing I thought Apple would never do for their tablet.
The most often proffered solution to this problem has been pen input, and either holding the big tablet in the crook or your arm, or making the tablet smaller. Apple has made it smaller and lighter, but they've taken away the stylus and replaced it with basically nothing at all.
A stylus for pen input would have been nice but you know, I have years of notes in ink with so-so handwriing recognition so it's not really that searchable without me entering metadata after the fact. Something I never really did consistently. Something most folks don't do.
So you lose the ability to take notes standing up. Mkay, when was the last time you really did that with a clipboard? Or with anything?
I actually have used tablets as data collection devices for human performance measurements. Meh.
Apple's solution is that you simply don't type on it without putting it down or you type on it like all tablets in the past by poking at a virtual keyboard with one finger at a time. This is seriously lame, and worthy of criticism.
With the numbers demo and the form builder with checkboxes and slider scoring that covers a good chunk of the use cases for standup data collection. Instead of writing "3" I just slide across and activate three stars. Data cells can bring up specialized virtual keypads tailored for that data type for one handed entry that is faster than using thumb based entry and navigation.
The lack of these input methods may seem glaring unless you actually have been using tablets and realize most of those other mechanisms sucked. How well the iPad interface seemed to work in the demos is very nice in the same way that not banging your head on the wall seems very peaceful.
And there's a keyboard dock! I said that right? Maybe not as cool as the Lenovo one but the interaction design is FAR FAR FAR FAR superior to what MS has done. And I say that as a huge defender of MS Research's work in multitouch R&D, MSDN developer and former OneNote fan.
The one thing I'll really miss is being able to easily capture drawings during meetings. That's the primary thing that made pen computing very appealing to me as an engineer. Especially as a UI designer as I could mock up interfaces on the fly as if on paper and have an electronic form to modify later. i could do onion skin like interaction flows.
Maybe a capacitance based stylus will work well enough for that.
Wow! They made a big iPod Touch! So impressive! NOT!
"1GHz...which includes the CPU and graphics...and it screams" seems like a contradiction to me. Since when has a non-mobile device with an integrated 1 GHz been touted as screaming? I haven't seen the detailed specs yet to be 100% on my previous statement but I doubt it has multiple cores, an impressive bus, or anything of that nature.
What about the app store? Will its restrictions make it suck just like the iPhone app store? There's one other issue that I foresee. The iPad looks like it may only be compatible with one browser. I hope Microsoft and Google sue you, Apple.
LOL - don't think much of it?
Looks fast enough to me (have you looked at the video?) - and if Apple have their own CPU - it'll get faster AND bulletproof - not literally - but I'm sure you [read troll] wont bother finding out.
BTW - why did you post?
no really - why did you post?
Now that I've had all day to consider the announcement, I think I would have rather that Apple just released the product without any fanfare. This to me seems like a turning point that may signal an end to their latest winning streak. Steve seems out of touch now and the other leaders at Apple are not as inspirational as he has been in recent years. I'm happy with OS X for my desktop/MBP, but now my iPhone seems somehow less desirable after this let down of a product launch. Feels like the magic is fading.
C'mon. The expectations were too high. To me the iPad looks like an amazing machine. The iPhone is still fantastic. People are loosing perspective here. The fanfare serves as a free marketing generator. Unfortunately with it comes hopes and dreams way beyond what is realistic or even feasible. The iPad will be huge and one or two iterations down the road it will be even better. What are beginning to look long in the tooth are 'normal' laptops.
You folks weren't watching the same demonstrations I was then. This is one of the best meldings of desktop-like functionality with a mobile touch based interface I've seen. The calendar and email look fantastic...especially for a software TWO MONTHS from launch (you could see a glitch or two in some of the hands on videos of things not resizing as one might expect, etc).
The interface design supports layered information like in a desktop and unlike the iPhone interface. The popup menu system is very nice from a UI perspective and will work better here than in a traditional WIMP interface.
This provides the same user interaction capabilities as in desktop applications within a multitouch device which means apps will be far more like full featured desktop applications than iPhone apps.
As far as content creation goes, it has a keyboard dock. It has iWork. For a quick email or doc the virtual keyboard will work but for long documents you can pull out your keyboard doc or bt keyboard on the plane and type away.
No iMovie or iPhoto but I guess those were computationally far more intensive than iWork but at least you'll be able to take a quick look at your imported movies or photos in a larger format before taking it back for post processing. Which, honestly, if you NEED to do on site you better be packing a new iCore 7 17" MBP that they didn't announce today.
But for normal office-style content creation? iPad iWork looks awesome, Numbers in particular. Even a 3rd party app like Brushes looked great. Not bad for fingerpainting and much more like a desktop app than an iphone app in terms of richer interaction for content creation.
Nothing new technology wise? They have a desktop scale (as opposed to handheld scale) multi-touch UI design style/metaphor that isn't desktop based and that doesn't suck! Calendar is a great example of how well desktop apps can transition to the touch interface.
Give app developers 2 months to revamp apps and we can expect some nice launch titles and even maybe a few desktop ports by then.
Geez, technology advances aren't all hardware related.
This.
Do people imagine that application development just stopped with the desktop OS and more lately the iPhone?
If you were an iPhone developer, wouldn't you even now be poring over the SDK, looking to see if you could hit early with a screamingly cool app that takes advantage of this particular device's hardware and software combo?
Oh, that's right, everyone will just port their fart apps and that'll be that, poor little orphaned iPad.
Some people seem to be incapable of learning from recent history.
Also, looking forward to hearing more about A4, not expecting details to be released though.