I feel that apple's goal is to be the dominant mobile computing company. I think that Steve has learned from the mistakes that apple made in the pc wars and is now applying that knowledge to the mobile industry.
Portable computing is still in its infancy and with the introduction of the ipad along with the iphone, ipod touch and the app store, apple is now the dominant player in this industry. They offer more compelling products in different segments of the market and are also creating new ones.
Today's event and the CES (Ballmer holding up a hp tablet for a second and not demonstrating a thing on it, what a joke!) proves that everyone is just waiting for and reacting to what Apple does. Wonder what dell is going to do with their pathetic 5in tablet without the benefit of the app store behind it?
This product may be great for what it is aimed for (entertainement black holes) but it seems to be designed almost as an App Store's extension and that makes Apple's greedy/totalitarian/populist evolution only more obvious...
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.
The real big picture is its an expensive device and can't multitask at all. You can't listen to Pandora while using Pages. Thats not a downside thats a total joke. No multitasking at all.
Based on your earlier predictions this was going to be the start of slate computing taking over notebooks.
•It's not light. It feels pretty weighty in your hand.
•The screen is stunning, and it's 1024 x 768. Feels just like a huge iPhone in your hands.
•The speed of the CPU is something to be marveled at. It is blazingly fast from what we can tell. Webpages loaded up super fast, and scrolling was without a hiccup. Moving into and out of apps was a breeze. Everything flew.
•There's no multitasking at all. It's a real disappointment. All this power and very little you can do with it at once. No multitasking means no streaming Pandora when you're working in Pages... you can figure it out. It's a real setback for this device.
•The ebook implementation is about as close as you can get to reading without a stack of bound paper in your hand. The visual stuff really helps flesh out the experience. It may be just for show, but it counts here.
•No camera. None, nada. Zip. No video conferencing here folks. Hell, it doesn't have an SMS app!•It's running iPhone OS 3.2.
•The keyboard is good, not great. Not quite as responsive as it looked in the demos.
•No Flash confirmed. So Hulu is out for you, folks!
This product may be great for what it is aimed for (entertainement black holes) but it seems to be designed almost as an App Store's extension and that makes Apple's greedy/totalitarian/populist evolution only more obvious...
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.
You're right if the iPad were meant to be a true computing tablet, but it isn't. When you think of it as a premium Kindle, then Apple hasn't really "stripped-down" the device at all. Instead, Apple has done what it has conventionally done --take an existing product and then pimp it out.
I do agree with you that it is a needless device for most of us. Kindle loving upper-middle-class wasps will love this thing, but I am not neither upper-middle-class nor a wasp.
I'd be interested to see what the target demographics for this device are. I'd wager most buyers don't even know what Pandora is, have never streamed Hulu, nor have the necessity to be chatting and tweeting while reading a book listening to music and browsing the internet at the same time. I want my entertainment devices to work well be fast, and have a long battery life. Multitasking is for computers; the iPad is not a computer. Sure the Android wannabe iPad tablet will tout having 50 apps open at once. They won't tell you the batty will only last 30 minutes doing so, however.
It really needed a single new app to come with it. Not that the improvements to the existing iPhone/Mac apps were nothing, but still. I suppose iBooks was it.
The real big picture is its an expensive device and can't multitask at all. You can't listen to Pandora while using Pages. Thats not a downside thats a total joke. No multitasking at all.
Based on your earlier predictions this was going to be the start of slate computing taking over notebooks.
?It's not light. It feels pretty weighty in your hand.
?The screen is stunning, and it's 1024 x 768. Feels just like a huge iPhone in your hands.
?The speed of the CPU is something to be marveled at. It is blazingly fast from what we can tell. Webpages loaded up super fast, and scrolling was without a hiccup. Moving into and out of apps was a breeze. Everything flew.
?There's no multitasking at all. It's a real disappointment. All this power and very little you can do with it at once. No multitasking means no streaming Pandora when you're working in Pages... you can figure it out. It's a real setback for this device.
?The ebook implementation is about as close as you can get to reading without a stack of bound paper in your hand. The visual stuff really helps flesh out the experience. It may be just for show, but it counts here.
?No camera. None, nada. Zip. No video conferencing here folks. Hell, it doesn't have an SMS app!?It's running iPhone OS 3.2.
?The keyboard is good, not great. Not quite as responsive as it looked in the demos.
?No Flash confirmed. So Hulu is out for you, folks!
Not exactly innovative.
I'm slowly getting over my disappointment.
It's easier if you look at it like it's the iPad beta... which it totally is. Even the most devout of Apple fans will admit to you it's lacking the features it needs to be a truly useful device.
At a minimum it needs a software update... iPhone OS 4.0, multi-tasking, Flash, document management, a plug-in model for Safari and a driver framework. This could come in March\\April but I doubt it.
I think the iPad will be like the iPod\\iPhone in that a second generation will be released and it will be released soon (i.e. this time next year). Faster CPU\\GPU, camera, more inputs\\outputs (HDMI!!!), proximity screen and any other gadgets Apple can come up with along with another OS update.
Just like iPod\\iPhone everyone will dump their beta iPads without a second thought for the real iPad.
That said, the iPad was still somewhat of a rushed release. The market will be flooded with eReaders and tablets over the next 12 months and Apple simply couldn't afford to hang around and do nothing. They needed to get in and mark their territory in the new market. I think the Gen1 iPad, regardless of its faults, will do that.
Actually the iPad should be great for viewing outdoors.
Unlike OLEDs which are impossible to view in direct sunlight, the iPad has an LED-backlit display like the Macbooks glossy display units
Most notably, LED-backlit displays are being used commercially in outdoor display and digital signage units. Images on traditional, matte or worse OLED displays tend to be washed out under sunlight and ambient light conditions. The brighter the display, the better contrast the screen will have under those conditions.
I have a Samsung phone with an AMOLED screen. It is no more washed out in sunlight than an LCD screened device powered by small batteries. It is not 'impossible' to view in sunlight. I was using mine recently when skiing to take movies and photos.
You don't suppose those commercial screens could be mains powered, using Something like 10 or more Cree EZbright LEDs pulling a full amp each? Those commercial units are not powered by a piddling little 25 wh battery. They are four times brighter than a typical LCD TV so probably need upwards of 600w to light them.
Got any other stupid comparisons, like comparing a naval search light to a battery powered flashlight maybe?
I'm quite astonished at the attitude to the iPad. I seem to remember the lack of enthusiasm for the iPod Touch when it was first released but I took a gamble on it and thought why not. After apps started getting released and now seeing how good the iTouch is (screening movies from my computer from anywhere in the world) I reckon this will take that concept on to a completely new level once we get more and more high end apps. The general ability of the device will be astonishing in a couple of years but I'll probably get one this year as a device like this fits the needs I currently have.
In terms of who will buy this I think it makes most students needs for a laptop completely irrelevant as you can do all the functions you need to write essays, look at pdf files etc but you can also use the device as an entertainment device. It also has flexibility for the needs of business with easy use for presentations with the vga output dongle as just two markets to exploit at the moment.
The flexibility and usability of the device looks completely unique, it wasn't designed for tech geeks to design things on but is ideal as an output device for information held on other devices, watching videos, communicating and networking and entertaining the family through games etc.
The talk of the A4 processor also takes things to new levels, its like a car company building that builds all the parts to function together instead of using a customer engine. It allows everything to be built to increase usability and for the processor to work to the needs of the device directly. I don't think this can be underestimated.
I'm sure people would want extra features on this device and I agree that multi tasking would be a great feature (even just a couple of tasks) but for the quality of the software built in to a hardware device that is so easy to use I'm not complaining much about that as I'm sure it will come in the summer. The other concern for myself is the quality of the speakers, I wouldn't want to have to use headphones to listen to music or watch films all the time, I'd just get frustrated with that, so I hope the speakers are of a high quality.
Essentially I think there is more to this device than the abuse it is receiving!
seriously though, they could have included some touch sensitive controls in that HUGE bezel - timeline scrub, volume up/down, scroll / game controls, etc.
The whole point of the bezel is that it isn't touch sensative. Otherwise there would be no way to hold the device.
I'm quite astonished at the attitude to the iPad. I seem to remember the lack of enthusiasm for the iPod Touch when it was first released but I took a gamble on it and thought why not. After apps started getting released and now seeing how good the iTouch is (screening movies from my computer from anywhere in the world) I reckon this will take that concept on to a completely new level once we get more and more high end apps. The general ability of the device will be astonishing in a couple of years but I'll probably get one this year as a device like this fits the needs I currently have.
In terms of who will buy this I think it makes most students needs for a laptop completely irrelevant as you can do all the functions you need to write essays, look at pdf files etc but you can also use the device as an entertainment device. It also has flexibility for the needs of business with easy use for presentations with the vga output dongle as just two markets to exploit at the moment.
The flexibility and usability of the device looks completely unique, it wasn't designed for tech geeks to design things on but is ideal as an output device for information held on other devices, watching videos, communicating and networking and entertaining the family through games etc.
The talk of the A4 processor also takes things to new levels, its like a car company building that builds all the parts to function together instead of using a customer engine. It allows everything to be built to increase usability and for the processor to work to the needs of the device directly. I don't think this can be underestimated.
I'm sure people would want extra features on this device and I agree that multi tasking would be a great feature (even just a couple of tasks) but for the quality of the software built in to a hardware device that is so easy to use I'm not complaining much about that as I'm sure it will come in the summer. The other concern for myself is the quality of the speakers, I wouldn't want to have to use headphones to listen to music or watch films all the time, I'd just get frustrated with that, so I hope the speakers are of a high quality.
Essentially I think there is more to this device than the abuse it is receiving!
I agree with you. A 27" iMac in the dorm and the iPad in class.
I lecture in physics at a local university. Hopefully, I now won't need to lug my MBP into class. (There is apparently a dock with VGA output. The room server runs windows and employs Powerpoint and so I use my own system to circumvent the dinosaur era! I know - there is plenty in physics teaching that doesn't require a computer at all but I find one helpful! \) The students don't need one either. Currently, they print the notes that I have prepared for them, the iPad should obviate that need, especially once we get live content such as Mathematica Player on board.
I'm quite excited about iWork on the iPad. This is the thin edge of the wedge. Software vendors will have noted this feature for sure. I'd like to know more about the A4, more specifically, how much room Apple has to improve performance without sacrificing battery life.
I quite like and admire Bill Gates and think he was right on this one, tablets are the way to go (at least until we ourselves are rewired).
I'm quite astonished at the attitude to the iPad. I seem to remember the lack of enthusiasm for the iPod Touch when it was first released but I took a gamble on it and thought why not. After apps started getting released and now seeing how good the iTouch is (screening movies from my computer from anywhere in the world) I reckon this will take that concept on to a completely new level once we get more and more high end apps. The general ability of the device will be astonishing in a couple of years but I'll probably get one this year as a device like this fits the needs I currently have.
In terms of who will buy this I think it makes most students needs for a laptop completely irrelevant as you can do all the functions you need to write essays, look at pdf files etc but you can also use the device as an entertainment device. It also has flexibility for the needs of business with easy use for presentations with the vga output dongle as just two markets to exploit at the moment.
The flexibility and usability of the device looks completely unique, it wasn't designed for tech geeks to design things on but is ideal as an output device for information held on other devices, watching videos, communicating and networking and entertaining the family through games etc.
The talk of the A4 processor also takes things to new levels, its like a car company building that builds all the parts to function together instead of using a customer engine. It allows everything to be built to increase usability and for the processor to work to the needs of the device directly. I don't think this can be underestimated.
I'm sure people would want extra features on this device and I agree that multi tasking would be a great feature (even just a couple of tasks) but for the quality of the software built in to a hardware device that is so easy to use I'm not complaining much about that as I'm sure it will come in the summer. The other concern for myself is the quality of the speakers, I wouldn't want to have to use headphones to listen to music or watch films all the time, I'd just get frustrated with that, so I hope the speakers are of a high quality.
Essentially I think there is more to this device than the abuse it is receiving!
nice post
my 3 cts >> multi tasking in todays form is a battery killer and slows every thing down
apple wants a fast simple housewife proof device . people want what todays chips can't give us >>yet
if you want 5 things open and running at full speed at once then a MBP is for you
yet in the back ground all apple product multi task .. they also multi thread , in the dark thou
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.
Yep. Apple may have jumped the shark with this one...
awesome tablet device, I can easily see myself buying the 32gb wifi version and it be great for college, completely replace what most people use netbooks for. you can get pages, calendar, buying the books u need and read them on the device, research things on the web, copy and paste to ur document, all this while listening to ur music collection or radio through pandora. its the perfect student companion, and like someone said above if u want to multitask or do somekind of serious work i can use my 15 mbp, the point of the tablet is that for most activities u really dont need all the raw power in the mbp with 4gb of ram, the tablet has enough and is much easier to carry around and use than a laptop which needs to boot and is more comfortable on a table or something.
the only reason i wont buy one immediately is that iphone os 4.0 is 5 months away, and since the tablet runs glorified iphone os and apps, it only makes sense to wait a couple of more months for perfection.
that said, apple should cut the premium of wifi vs 3g, i mean its cheaper to buy a 64gb wifi than a 32gb 3G???? at least make them cost the same and cap the device price at 799
Comments
Portable computing is still in its infancy and with the introduction of the ipad along with the iphone, ipod touch and the app store, apple is now the dominant player in this industry. They offer more compelling products in different segments of the market and are also creating new ones.
Today's event and the CES (Ballmer holding up a hp tablet for a second and not demonstrating a thing on it, what a joke!) proves that everyone is just waiting for and reacting to what Apple does. Wonder what dell is going to do with their pathetic 5in tablet without the benefit of the app store behind it?
★ 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/
The real big picture is its an expensive device and can't multitask at all. You can't listen to Pandora while using Pages. Thats not a downside thats a total joke. No multitasking at all.
Based on your earlier predictions this was going to be the start of slate computing taking over notebooks.
•It's not light. It feels pretty weighty in your hand.
•The screen is stunning, and it's 1024 x 768. Feels just like a huge iPhone in your hands.
•The speed of the CPU is something to be marveled at. It is blazingly fast from what we can tell. Webpages loaded up super fast, and scrolling was without a hiccup. Moving into and out of apps was a breeze. Everything flew.
•There's no multitasking at all. It's a real disappointment. All this power and very little you can do with it at once. No multitasking means no streaming Pandora when you're working in Pages... you can figure it out. It's a real setback for this device.
•The ebook implementation is about as close as you can get to reading without a stack of bound paper in your hand. The visual stuff really helps flesh out the experience. It may be just for show, but it counts here.
•No camera. None, nada. Zip. No video conferencing here folks. Hell, it doesn't have an SMS app!•It's running iPhone OS 3.2.
•The keyboard is good, not great. Not quite as responsive as it looked in the demos.
•No Flash confirmed. So Hulu is out for you, folks!
Not exactly innovative.
This product may be great for what it is aimed for (entertainement black holes) but it seems to be designed almost as an App Store's extension and that makes Apple's greedy/totalitarian/populist evolution only more obvious...
OK - thank you, Comrade?
Yes - try reading an LCD screen in direct sunlight vs e-ink.
Not to mention the price difference between the Kindle and the iPad.
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.
You're right if the iPad were meant to be a true computing tablet, but it isn't. When you think of it as a premium Kindle, then Apple hasn't really "stripped-down" the device at all. Instead, Apple has done what it has conventionally done --take an existing product and then pimp it out.
I do agree with you that it is a needless device for most of us. Kindle loving upper-middle-class wasps will love this thing, but I am not neither upper-middle-class nor a wasp.
Not exactly innovative.
The iPad's key innovation is its ability to continue exciting fanboys and those addicted to consumption.
The real big picture is its an expensive device and can't multitask at all. You can't listen to Pandora while using Pages. Thats not a downside thats a total joke. No multitasking at all.
Based on your earlier predictions this was going to be the start of slate computing taking over notebooks.
?It's not light. It feels pretty weighty in your hand.
?The screen is stunning, and it's 1024 x 768. Feels just like a huge iPhone in your hands.
?The speed of the CPU is something to be marveled at. It is blazingly fast from what we can tell. Webpages loaded up super fast, and scrolling was without a hiccup. Moving into and out of apps was a breeze. Everything flew.
?There's no multitasking at all. It's a real disappointment. All this power and very little you can do with it at once. No multitasking means no streaming Pandora when you're working in Pages... you can figure it out. It's a real setback for this device.
?The ebook implementation is about as close as you can get to reading without a stack of bound paper in your hand. The visual stuff really helps flesh out the experience. It may be just for show, but it counts here.
?No camera. None, nada. Zip. No video conferencing here folks. Hell, it doesn't have an SMS app!?It's running iPhone OS 3.2.
?The keyboard is good, not great. Not quite as responsive as it looked in the demos.
?No Flash confirmed. So Hulu is out for you, folks!
Not exactly innovative.
I'm slowly getting over my disappointment.
It's easier if you look at it like it's the iPad beta... which it totally is. Even the most devout of Apple fans will admit to you it's lacking the features it needs to be a truly useful device.
At a minimum it needs a software update... iPhone OS 4.0, multi-tasking, Flash, document management, a plug-in model for Safari and a driver framework. This could come in March\\April but I doubt it.
I think the iPad will be like the iPod\\iPhone in that a second generation will be released and it will be released soon (i.e. this time next year). Faster CPU\\GPU, camera, more inputs\\outputs (HDMI!!!), proximity screen and any other gadgets Apple can come up with along with another OS update.
Just like iPod\\iPhone everyone will dump their beta iPads without a second thought for the real iPad.
That said, the iPad was still somewhat of a rushed release. The market will be flooded with eReaders and tablets over the next 12 months and Apple simply couldn't afford to hang around and do nothing. They needed to get in and mark their territory in the new market. I think the Gen1 iPad, regardless of its faults, will do that.
Actually the iPad should be great for viewing outdoors.
Unlike OLEDs which are impossible to view in direct sunlight, the iPad has an LED-backlit display like the Macbooks glossy display units
Most notably, LED-backlit displays are being used commercially in outdoor display and digital signage units. Images on traditional, matte or worse OLED displays tend to be washed out under sunlight and ambient light conditions. The brighter the display, the better contrast the screen will have under those conditions.
I have a Samsung phone with an AMOLED screen. It is no more washed out in sunlight than an LCD screened device powered by small batteries. It is not 'impossible' to view in sunlight. I was using mine recently when skiing to take movies and photos.
You don't suppose those commercial screens could be mains powered, using Something like 10 or more Cree EZbright LEDs pulling a full amp each? Those commercial units are not powered by a piddling little 25 wh battery. They are four times brighter than a typical LCD TV so probably need upwards of 600w to light them.
Got any other stupid comparisons, like comparing a naval search light to a battery powered flashlight maybe?
In terms of who will buy this I think it makes most students needs for a laptop completely irrelevant as you can do all the functions you need to write essays, look at pdf files etc but you can also use the device as an entertainment device. It also has flexibility for the needs of business with easy use for presentations with the vga output dongle as just two markets to exploit at the moment.
The flexibility and usability of the device looks completely unique, it wasn't designed for tech geeks to design things on but is ideal as an output device for information held on other devices, watching videos, communicating and networking and entertaining the family through games etc.
The talk of the A4 processor also takes things to new levels, its like a car company building that builds all the parts to function together instead of using a customer engine. It allows everything to be built to increase usability and for the processor to work to the needs of the device directly. I don't think this can be underestimated.
I'm sure people would want extra features on this device and I agree that multi tasking would be a great feature (even just a couple of tasks) but for the quality of the software built in to a hardware device that is so easy to use I'm not complaining much about that as I'm sure it will come in the summer. The other concern for myself is the quality of the speakers, I wouldn't want to have to use headphones to listen to music or watch films all the time, I'd just get frustrated with that, so I hope the speakers are of a high quality.
Essentially I think there is more to this device than the abuse it is receiving!
Thank god for all the geniuses at this forum......
Yes, THANK GOD for the geniuses that have been so kind to inform me today of how stupid and wasteful this and all Apple products are!!!
No kidding!! People get so upset with Apple products. If you don't want it, don't buy it. But don't tell me I shouldn't.
Guess again. This is a razor and blades sales strategy.
Nail -> Head.
i'm going to wait for the iMaxiPad.
seriously though, they could have included some touch sensitive controls in that HUGE bezel - timeline scrub, volume up/down, scroll / game controls, etc.
The whole point of the bezel is that it isn't touch sensative. Otherwise there would be no way to hold the device.
I'm quite astonished at the attitude to the iPad. I seem to remember the lack of enthusiasm for the iPod Touch when it was first released but I took a gamble on it and thought why not. After apps started getting released and now seeing how good the iTouch is (screening movies from my computer from anywhere in the world) I reckon this will take that concept on to a completely new level once we get more and more high end apps. The general ability of the device will be astonishing in a couple of years but I'll probably get one this year as a device like this fits the needs I currently have.
In terms of who will buy this I think it makes most students needs for a laptop completely irrelevant as you can do all the functions you need to write essays, look at pdf files etc but you can also use the device as an entertainment device. It also has flexibility for the needs of business with easy use for presentations with the vga output dongle as just two markets to exploit at the moment.
The flexibility and usability of the device looks completely unique, it wasn't designed for tech geeks to design things on but is ideal as an output device for information held on other devices, watching videos, communicating and networking and entertaining the family through games etc.
The talk of the A4 processor also takes things to new levels, its like a car company building that builds all the parts to function together instead of using a customer engine. It allows everything to be built to increase usability and for the processor to work to the needs of the device directly. I don't think this can be underestimated.
I'm sure people would want extra features on this device and I agree that multi tasking would be a great feature (even just a couple of tasks) but for the quality of the software built in to a hardware device that is so easy to use I'm not complaining much about that as I'm sure it will come in the summer. The other concern for myself is the quality of the speakers, I wouldn't want to have to use headphones to listen to music or watch films all the time, I'd just get frustrated with that, so I hope the speakers are of a high quality.
Essentially I think there is more to this device than the abuse it is receiving!
I agree with you. A 27" iMac in the dorm and the iPad in class.
I lecture in physics at a local university. Hopefully, I now won't need to lug my MBP into class. (There is apparently a dock with VGA output. The room server runs windows and employs Powerpoint and so I use my own system to circumvent the dinosaur era! I know - there is plenty in physics teaching that doesn't require a computer at all but I find one helpful!
I'm quite excited about iWork on the iPad. This is the thin edge of the wedge. Software vendors will have noted this feature for sure. I'd like to know more about the A4, more specifically, how much room Apple has to improve performance without sacrificing battery life.
I quite like and admire Bill Gates and think he was right on this one, tablets are the way to go (at least until we ourselves are rewired).
I'm quite astonished at the attitude to the iPad. I seem to remember the lack of enthusiasm for the iPod Touch when it was first released but I took a gamble on it and thought why not. After apps started getting released and now seeing how good the iTouch is (screening movies from my computer from anywhere in the world) I reckon this will take that concept on to a completely new level once we get more and more high end apps. The general ability of the device will be astonishing in a couple of years but I'll probably get one this year as a device like this fits the needs I currently have.
In terms of who will buy this I think it makes most students needs for a laptop completely irrelevant as you can do all the functions you need to write essays, look at pdf files etc but you can also use the device as an entertainment device. It also has flexibility for the needs of business with easy use for presentations with the vga output dongle as just two markets to exploit at the moment.
The flexibility and usability of the device looks completely unique, it wasn't designed for tech geeks to design things on but is ideal as an output device for information held on other devices, watching videos, communicating and networking and entertaining the family through games etc.
The talk of the A4 processor also takes things to new levels, its like a car company building that builds all the parts to function together instead of using a customer engine. It allows everything to be built to increase usability and for the processor to work to the needs of the device directly. I don't think this can be underestimated.
I'm sure people would want extra features on this device and I agree that multi tasking would be a great feature (even just a couple of tasks) but for the quality of the software built in to a hardware device that is so easy to use I'm not complaining much about that as I'm sure it will come in the summer. The other concern for myself is the quality of the speakers, I wouldn't want to have to use headphones to listen to music or watch films all the time, I'd just get frustrated with that, so I hope the speakers are of a high quality.
Essentially I think there is more to this device than the abuse it is receiving!
nice post
my 3 cts >> multi tasking in todays form is a battery killer and slows every thing down
apple wants a fast simple housewife proof device . people want what todays chips can't give us >>yet
if you want 5 things open and running at full speed at once then a MBP is for you
yet in the back ground all apple product multi task .. they also multi thread , in the dark thou
peace 9
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.
Yep. Apple may have jumped the shark with this one...
the only reason i wont buy one immediately is that iphone os 4.0 is 5 months away, and since the tablet runs glorified iphone os and apps, it only makes sense to wait a couple of more months for perfection.
that said, apple should cut the premium of wifi vs 3g, i mean its cheaper to buy a 64gb wifi than a 32gb 3G???? at least make them cost the same and cap the device price at 799