Apple's iPad

[Wiglaf]

It gets funnier the 2nd time you see it.

[Asher]

THAT'S WHAT SHE SAID.

/rimjob

[Wiglaf]

You are a buffoon. I'd like to know why you are such a buffoon. You trash Mac laptops, yet you own them. You insist Playstation 3s won't have a hard drive, when they clearly have large ones. You criticize the iPad despite THE FACT THAT THE IPAD WILL REVOLUTIONIZE THE WAY PEOPLE READ THE NEW YORK TIMES. Sorry JON MILLER you can't do your coding on the device. For everyone else, it's better than a laptop because what laptop lets you get data for $15 a month? NO LAPTOP DOES -- SPRINTI F UP TO %60 A MONTH?? And let's get one thing straight.

[Theben]

I am amazed at how easily your innocuous posting at WPC destroyed their site. Great work.

It's in his nature to destroy. He is gay, after all.

[Imran Siddiqui]

[Vanguard]

no Flash

Lol. This should be considered a feature, not a drawback. Take my Flash, please. Hopefully Apple can get rid of pdfs too.

The other issue is the relative low resolution of the iPad : 1024x768.


The resolution makes it suck for movies (4:3) and eReader apps (low DPI).

Yes, it will not be as good as watching movies on an IMAX. On the other hand, let's compare its movie playback to that of a $490 Kindle.... oh, sorry.

Even compared to a netbook or cheap laptop the playback should be better because of the ips screen. Ok, I admit the iPad storage isn't great when you are talking movies. But neither is a netbook's. And a laptop would have a disk harddrive, which is slower.

The DPS of the iPad appears to be 137. The Kindle is 160. A significant difference. But not a particularly important one. The gain of anti-aliased fonts is probably just as important.

__________________________________________________ ________________________

Other purported shortfalls of the iPad:

Can't read in daylight: Yes, but e-ink can't be read at night. Personally, I think night is more important. You can always find some shade. But call this a draw.

no keyboard: Yes, it sucks. But the virtual keyboard is good enough to find stuff to read or watch, which is really what this thing is for.

There is a give and take here. The virtual keyboard is a little worse than a laptop keyboard. But multitouch is a heck of a lot better than a trackpad (mostly).

no multitasking: Bad. But I have to assume that OS 4.0 will introduce it. And when it does, the relatively powerful SoC should be able to do it easily.

[Asher]

I don't want to call your posts hysterical defense but they are certainly not reasoned.

The iPad will be "acceptable" for watching movies on, in what sense? On an airplane? On the couch (no one has a 'TV' device?) What's the use case here?

4:3 is awful. The Star Trek clip they showed was fitting..Star Trek is a 2.40:1 film and the iPad is a 1.33:1 display. You either lose more than half of the picture (cropping) or you introduce MASSIVE black bars on an already low-resolution display.

And let's talk sound -- you're going to LISTEN to movies based on tinny ultratiny integrated speakers? Or will you use earphones?

It's a bizarre case. I'm not even going to go over the rest of your stuff (like the claim that you can't read e-ink at night...do you not have 'light' devices on your planet?). Lots of silliness.

[DaShi]

Lol. This should be considered a feature, not a drawback. Take my Flash, please. Hopefully Apple can get rid of pdfs too.

I have my own problems with pdfs, but they are personal gripes. I deal with them because pdfs are common and essential. Flash is at least common enough to need it.

Even compared to a netbook or cheap laptop the playback should be better because of the ips screen. Ok, I admit the iPad storage isn't great when you are talking movies. But neither is a netbook's. And a laptop would have a disk harddrive, which is slower.

I have an old netbook with some 160 gig plus memory on it. I've got nearly 50 movies on it and still have a ton of space left over. In fact, I just used it for a movie night with some friends yesterday.

[Vanguard]

I don't want to call your posts hysterical defense but they are certainly not reasoned.

The iPad will be "acceptable" for watching movies on, in what sense? On an airplane? On the couch (no one has a 'TV' device?) What's the use case here?

Please don't misquote me. I did not say the iPad would be "acceptable" for watching movie. I don't think that.

I think watching movies on the iPad will be more than "acceptable"..... for a handheld device available at a reasonable price. And yes, you'll listen to it on headphones.

I mean WTF? Does your laptop have THX, dual subwoofers and a 50 inch plasma screen? This is a $500 portable media viewer/all-purpose reader. What do you expect, virtual reality?

Watching movies on any portable device is less than optimal. What is remarkable is that watching movies on the iPad will be slightly more optimal than the competition (due to the ips screen and relatively fast processor).

This is the secret of the iPad. It is slightly better at everything than the competition. It is just good enough at the price for everyone to buy one.


As for me being "irrational", let's do a thought experiment, shall we? And we'll use a few made-up quotes, since you like them.

Let's assume that instead of Steve Jobs unveiling the iPad the other day, that it was instead Jeff Bezos unveiling something called the Kindle "Inferno"---- with exactly the same specs and price as the iPad.

What would the reaction of the press and blogosphere been then? They would have been paroxysmal. They would have gushed about how huge an improvement in design, interface, usability, features and power it was---- and all for exactly the same price as the Kindle DX. Instead of being an anti-climax, it would have been huge:

"Amazon at one bold stroke has vaulted into the forefront of the digital age",

"A revolution in readers!",

"Amazon puts Apple to shame!",

"If previous Kindles sold millions, this will sell hundreds of millions."

These would have been the headlines.


Now let's suppose something else. Let's suppose that instead of Amazon it was Google that had shown a prototype of the Android "DataLore"---- with exactly the same features and price as the iPad. What would the reaction of the press and blogosphere have been then? That would have been epic.

"The speed! This is what portable web surfing should be like!"

"With this interface, Google has finally outdone Apple at its own game"

"Google brings the digital age to the masses."

"The price is as incredible as the hardware"

Wouldn't this be the reaction if either of Google or Amazon had released this product? You know it would.

I have my own problems with pdfs, but they are personal gripes. I deal with them because pdfs are common and essential. Flash is at least common enough to need it.

I did not mean to imply that you couldn't use pdfs on iPad. You can open them on the iPhone and I am sure it will be much faster and easier to read them on the iPad.

And, thankfully, you don't need flash.

[Asher]

I mean WTF? Does your laptop have THX, dual subwoofers and a 50 inch plasma screen? This is a $500 portable media viewer/all-purpose reader. What do you expect, virtual reality?

I expect an HDMI output so I have the option of using THX, dual subwoofers and a 50 inch plasma screen. a $500 portable media device should have that. There are netbooks cheaper than the iPad that come with HDMI support, and even output 1080p (not 720p max like the iPad...)

Watching movies on any portable device is less than optimal. What is remarkable is that watching movies on the iPad will be slightly more optimal than the competition (due to the ips screen and relatively fast processor).

The processor has **** all to do with video -- that's all done via the graphics chip. And no, the iPad is not more optimal at this than any netbook or laptop. The resolution is lower, the screen is the wrong aspect ratio, and it's capped at 720p with no real output mechanism to displays. That kills it for me. When I travel I bring my notebook. I can watch true HD content on the plane (1080p), then when I get to my destination I can simply look it up to a display and watch it on the bigger screen there. The iPad is far less acceptable for a portable media device than a notebook or netbook is in this case.

This is the secret of the iPad. It is slightly better at everything than the competition.

Name one thing it is better at. This is the sales pitch you are repeating, it's just not true.

Is it better at web surfing? 1024x768 resolution without any Flash/Silverlight support makes it a resounding 'no'.
Is it better at email? Limited function mail client with an awkward touchscreen keyboard, and how do you type on it? You need to rest it on your lap, I guess? No, it's not better here.
Is it better at movies? No, see above.
Is it better at music? No, it's way too huge.
Is it better at running random apps? No, the software library (compared to a netbook/notebook/desktop) is tiny and the device lacks multitasking.

What is it better at?

The failing of the iPad is it does a lot of things, but all of them are done in worse ways compared to other devices. And the main problem with that is everyone has the other devices already.

As for not needing Flash...do you ever use your iPod Touch or iPhone to surf the web? I do. You do need flash. Every now and then you run into a website that depends on it. It's not exactly rare.

[Theben]

I'm waiting for the IPed and IPud. I expect them to revolutionize... something.

[onodera]

Now that we know what iPad is like, Lenovo U1 no longer sounds like a completely ridiculous gadget. Both are still ridiculous gadgets, of course.

Asher, about reading at night. You might be simply trolling Vijay about switching on the lights, but being able to use the device with the lights OFF is an important feature in my book. That's why I haven't bought a e-ink device and am reading books on my PDA.

[Asher]

It is bad for your eyes to read computer screens (including phones) in darkness.

[Imran Siddiqui]

The failing of the iPad is it does a lot of things, but all of them are done in worse ways compared to other devices. And the main problem with that is everyone has the other devices already.

Bingo. To say it does ANYTHING better than the competition is laughable. It, instead of doing one thing really well, which was the original principle for the iPod, fyi, it does a bunch of things far less than optimal.

[MikeH]

Apparently it does do "UI experience" better than the competition.