What the hell are you supposed to do with something that’s too big to put in your pocket and too small to replace your laptop? That’s what I’ve wondered for months now, caught up in the swirl of rumors over Apple’s mysterious God Tablet. Well, I’ve seen the thing, and I think I’ve figured it out.
The iPad is for making stuff funner.
Almost all of what I do on my battered white plastic MacBook is email, blog, surf, and listen to music — things the iPad would seem to do better, or at least make funner. The laptop’s aging (and non-LED backlit) screen is too dim for looking at pictures — or for reading comfortably. Even with my reading glasses on, I find myself hitting COMMAND+ to jack up the text size on most websites.
Sure, I could buy a bigger, brighter, newer MacBook Pro — but I don’t want a bigger laptop. I don’t want to trade in a five or six pound computer for an even bigger one. I don’t want to curl up on the sofa (or in bed) with something bigger and heftier than necessary. What I want is, something funner for doing fun stuff.
iPad seems to fit the bill. The screen is bright, and even at 9.7 inches, has nearly the resolution of the 13-inch MacBook screen (and higher resolution than most any 11-inch netbook or even many 13-15 inch Windows machines). And it’s LED-backlit, so it should be easier on my aging eyes. Also, DPI is vital to your eye comfort and fatigue. Higher pixel density is in most ways more important than screen size — and iPad’s got it.
Battery life will get you through the day, the iWork apps look usable (and way funner), you can get no-contract 3G if you want it, and it’s hands-down the best thing I’ve seen for portable video or showing off pictures.
And for most of what we do on computers now, the ancient window & desktop metaphor is just tired and old. What I’ve seen of the iPad GUI… well, to be honest I really want to lick it. (That’s not a typo.)
Is the iPad the God Tablet, the game changer, the device You Must Own Now? Well, no. But it’s an affordable way to make some fun stuff funner. And for the bottom-end $500 model, that’s a pretty good deal. Keep it for a couple years, and you’re talking about spending five bucks a week to take some drudgery out of a bunch of everyday tasks, and add some sparkle, too. And I suspect I’ll get an extra year or two out of my MacBook, which damn near pays for the iPad entirely. Buy it the day it comes out? Nah — it’s not that exciting. But it’s good enough not to wait for V2.0 next year.
So I like pretty much everything about the iPad.
Well, pretty much everything but the name.
ONE MORE THING: There’s no Flash in the web browser? And people are complaining? That’s like getting upset when you’re told that your new car won’t come equipped with a toothless vagrant who sits in the backseat, screaming at you.
The name is somewhat tough to love, but what else were they going to use? iProd?
I find myself liking it much more when I say it, immediately followed by “Zune”.
I cant help but notice that the commentary about it today isnt “look what it does” like when you first saw the iphone, but lots of lists about what it doesnt do.
Like:
1. No camera.
2. No adobe flash.( what? a media device that doesnt play hulu or slingbox?).
3. Poor ergonomics. Seriously. When you need two hands to hold on to it, it needs a old school device called a “handle” or a “Grip”.( I have the same complaint about the KindleDX) You buy an Ipad, its this gorgeous device and the first thing you are going to do is wrap it in plastic and neoprene casing because if you drop it, you’re just gonna cry. I’m pretty sure that lovely touchscreen is not exactly Milspec. But if you go and cover up all that beauty, whats the sense in that? But whats the sense of watching your compute platform for the umpteenth time.
4. No USB? How do I upload my photos from my non-bluetooth camera or do I have to buy one of those now too.
5. No SD? see above.
I don’t hate it,but I don’t see the point either. Its too big to carry like a Iphone/Itouch, its not really up to the job for being anything other than a media viewer (unless its something that uses Flash, which is, oh just about everything ) and in all cases, the ergonomics are just wrong. Its a good start but it misses the mark on several levels.
I don’t think its going to impact the Kindle at all, unless its to make even more people finally decide to buy a Kindle.
I agree with Steve though, V2.0 will rock. I think this souffle just needs to go back into the over for a bit longer.
( Full disclosure: Kindle,Iphone,Netbook owner. )
I think there are 3 main problems with the ipad, besides its name.
Size
I think the size is still an issue. It lacks the iphone’s portability/pocket storage, so its reduced size from a conventional laptop is only a modest advantage. Its large enough that carrying it with you on the go will still require a specialized carrier like a courier bag. Its too large for most purses, so the size reduction isn’t really that big of a utility. Its size is also enough that I think its use will have to be static, I don’t see people walking while using like you do the iphone.
Multiprocess
I’ve seen it reported from multiple sources that the operating system does not allow multiple apps to run at once. I don’t know why they’d choose to retard the performance like that, but if that is a long-term situation that severely limits the usefulness. Most users I know, especially remote users, are heavy multi-taskers. Anything that reduces that capability is a no-go.
Usb support
The lack of USB support is another big problem for me. I realize there is a special Apple interface that will allow accessories, but what this tells me is that I will have to buy everything specific for MAC, I can’t retask any existing tech. This is the same stupid Mac-centric thinking that has held them back in the past.
I think the biggest problem is this doesn’t do anything that other systems already do. Being neither fish nor fowl, it doesn’t replace the laptop or the iphone, so users will have to take this on top of those other devices. So the $650 price tag for the baseline model w/ 3D access is going to be on top of the existing (expensive) iphone contract.
What they got right. The display is amazing. I have not heard one person complain or give it anything but the highest marks. Also the battery: I heard an online review that had it listed at 10 hours of video usage. That’s going to be a huge development. I think this is a major step towards the future of mobile computing, but I don’t think this is it. What I’d really like to see is a modest price drop on a business model. A wireless tablet configured for light duty on a production floor or customer interaction would be pretty neat. We’ve seen the tablet used this way in sci-fi like the original Star Trek and the Battlestar Gallactica as paper replacement. I’d love to see call center managers carry their interface with them, or car salesmen with a tablet keyed with their sales support. I’d also love to see this model configured as a multimedia hub. Give it the capacity to stream movies to my HDTV big screen, and to interface with my home stereo system and now it really does serve a unique purpose, its mobility inside the home is much better than a laptop since that removes the need for travel storage.
Form factor of a notebook. OS from a cell phone. ‘Nuff said.
I’d take the exact opposite… Hello, Nokia
The Onion Nails It: http://www.theonion.com/content/news_briefs/frantic_steve_jobs_stays_up
I’ve been thinking a lot about where the iPad fits in. At first glance, it is just a bigger iPod Touch. I think that ‘bigger’ is a big deal however.
The way I see it, the computer market, or at least Apple’s market, can be roughly split across two major (though admittedly overlapping) lines; content producers and content consumers. Producers are those who use their computers as tools, and it matters a great deal to them how they get information in to the system. For these people peripherals (notably including keyboards), expandability, and all the other technical specs are still of primary importance. For consumers though, what really distinguishes computers is their output – audio and, most importantly, the display. We can see this system across Apple’s lineup. On the producer side we see the MacBook and the Mac Pro – systems clearly targeted at producers. On the consumer side we see Apple tending to minimize everything but the display. We have the iPod/iPhone, the iMac and the AppleTV. Sure there are other significant technology differences between these devices, but these tend to leap frog over one another in time (maybe not the ATV so much, but that’s another rant). The persistent differentiating feature of this lineup is the display size.
This brings us to the iPad. Apple seems to be targeting this at the consumer side of the market. They are probably right to do so; in the broadest sense, the number of information consumers is at least an order of magnitude greater than the number of producers. On the other hand, most information consumption today is still through traditional media like print and TV. It’s no coincidence that this thing is roughly the size of almost every book and magazine published. We know people really like the book/magazine format for reading. It shows just enough information for a focused task, but no more. The iPod is easy to carry around, but most people find it too small as an e-reader (for good reason). A desktop (both physical and metaphorical) lacks portability, but lets you keep several tasks open at once for quick cross reference. A TV or movie screen is really good for passive consumption, but too big to mentally organize. I am suggesting that there exists a series of cognitive size thresholds for information consumption, and that Apple is probably aware of this. The iPad form factor is a convenient package that seems to be built deeply in to our human nature for certain tasks.
What’s new about the iPad is not the function – it’s the medium. Apple wants to capture book size niche in information consumption with new digital technology. I think the only real question is whether today’s technology is really ready. That is a combination of whether the experience at least as – if not more – satisfactory, and if the cost is acceptable. Does the iPad really deliver on this promise? From what I have heard I think the display, as good as it is, is marginal. It’s certainly not print quality. The cost is also intimidating; I can buy a lot of books for $500-$900 (and I still have to pay almost as much for most digital books anyway). Still, the iPad is much more than just an e-book reader. It applies that same undeniably preferred cognitive form factor preference to a whole new set of experiences, particularly games and video. All together, I think that’s good enough. I don’t think anyone except Apple could overcome the deficiencies today, but I am convinced it would happen someday soon regardless. The Apple brand just means that more people are going to seriously consider this, and be willing to live with some early compromises.
I’ll wait for the implant. No need for a screen or mechanical input device. Firewall it on both sides to protect the tech from the net and the user from the tech. Absolutely portable and theft-proof.
C’mon, Apple — hop to it.
Mauther has it right; the lack of multitasking is unacceptable, at least at those prices.
Stephen may decry the “ancient” desktop metaphor, but I don’t hear him complaining about how a car radio works, or where the controls for the wipers, lights, etc, are. Or that the gear progression on a stick-shift is the same everywhere.
Not to mention the interface for a stereo/home theater amp, a washer/dryer, or a stove. They all have extraordinarily consistent interfaces (across brands, even) and have been around for decades. That’s what happens when you have an effective & useful interface.
A netbook is smaller and cheaper, even if you have to use (yuck) Windoze.
A point not yet mentioned here: the iPad isn’t widescreen. It’s a flipping 4:3 screen. Congratulations, Apple, you just reinvented the CRT.
I suppose I’m the wrong market for Apple’s stuff, since I loathe that dinky little brushed-aluminum thingy they call a keyboard now. Sorry, Stephen, I know you love it to death but that thing is just too tiny for me.
Dunno; if the iPad had multi-tasking & a widescreen format, I’d say it would be an intriguing buy, if you have the $$$ lying around.
Casey –
Your email and syncs and downloads and updates and alerts still run in the background (as on iPhone) — and for a device such as this, especially when trying to conserve juice, what the hell else do you need to multitask?
This is a serious question. My freakin’ iPhone uses a much slower processor, and even it switches between apps so quickly I barely have time to look up from it.
Your complaints, really, remind me of certain audiophilic morons who bitch that a $150 iPod nano — which puts thousands of songs in your pocket — fails to replicate the harmonics of their particular favorite symphony hall when playing Mahler #1.
There are a few features that I’m disappointed in, but for this device version 2.0 will be a software download for an OS update. I’m okay with that.
I wouldn’t call it full on lust, but I do see something that I actaully want. And, yes, I’ll be buying one.
It is, however, another step in the splintering of family time and entertainment. The days where families actually sat together and were entertained together–by a radio, by a tv, by a movie–are truly dead. Now, the TV is on, but my wife is on the laptop and I’m sitting and reading my RSS reader either on my iPhone or on my laptop. The iPad, ridiculously pad name and all, gives me a device more portable than a netbook, more capable than a smart phone, and entertaining as hell.
I want it. I’m going to buy it. And I wonder if it’s particularly good for my marriage…
David, my friend — it’ll be fine for your marriage. If, that is, you buy two.
Stephen,
Correct me if I’m wrong, but the only way to watch PJTV, for which I pay $5 a month, would be through the Flash player. Android is supposed to be getting Flash ‘soon’, and then I’ll be able to watch PJTV on my Droid. I can’t wait. (Another gripe I have with both iPhone and Android is no java-machine within the browser (at least for now), meaning standard web-based java apps, which include media-players, such as the one on PJTV, and games, don’t work in the browsers. I presume, for now, this holds true for the iPad. The one thing I would like to be able to do with alternative internet devices is play certain java-based internet games, and only netbooks can do that so far.)
And speaking of the multitasking Droid, sure all the basic stuff Apple has decided to build in DOES multitask, but any third-party apps you like better than the built-ins apparently won’t. On my Droid, I listen to Pandora, Slacker, or Last.FM while driving down the road as Google Navigator gives me turn-by-turn directions to my destination, and an app called Trapster warns me of any user-spotted speed-traps. With a swipe or a long-press and click, I can switch over to a Doppler-radar overlay to see when I’m going to hit weather, see if my wife is going to beat me home using Google Latitude, or, of course, take a phone call, during which Pandora pauses and Google Navigator continues to issue turn-by-turn, ensuring I don’t lose my way. Once the call is finished, Pandora automatically resumes playing. Now is the Apple experience all that worse? No, and I’m sure Apple will, slowly, answer these deficiencies. But multitasking does offer real advantages, especially for programs that don’t start-up quickly due to the necessity to download a good bit of data first, such as the doppler-radar overlay. Having it running in the background allows for quickly switching to it instead of re-opening it. And since the built-ins in Android can be replaced as the user desires with 3rd-party alternatives, the hidden services required for those replacements, system-level programs you never actually see, are free to run and support things like media players, alt text entry programs, games, or whatever. (My most common use of non-driving multitasking is listening to internet radio while reading e-books in a reader I got from the Android marketplace.) And finally, in the iPad’s case, the screen is actually big enough to have multiple apps visible on screen at once, if the OS allows it. So a legitimate gripe is that you can’t monitor Twitter and AIM, post to your blog or compile your Week In Blogs, and listen to Pandora all at once. How cool would that be?
IPad:
To be fair to some complaints on the sizes offered, if it’s popular, there will be an explosion in wearable accessories to carry the thing, although I still can’t help laughing at a friend of mine who routinely wears a shoulder holster to carry his Palm. Personally, I kind of envy Jack Bauer’s over-the-shoulder man-bag, but only because it is invariably loaded with guns, reloads, espionage equipment, and explosive devices.
On the other hand, since I already have a laptop and a Droid smartphone with an EXTREMELY nice 480×854 reading screen, there is zero chance that I will buy an iPad (or Kindle variant for that matter). There’s just no niche left unfilled in my case, and I expect that is true for many others.
Oh yeah, I just remembered that companies have already beat Apple at announcing Android-based iPad alternatives, such as the Archos 7:
http://www.buzzbox.com/raffaella/MobileMania/preview/archos_7_android_tablet_leaked-featuring_webcam_for_video_chat_a/?id=364333
To Jaycephus,
You can watch some Pajamasmedia clips on their YouTube channel through the YouTube app on the Droid now I believe. That’s what I do on my Eris and it works great. Just “subscribe” to the Pajamasmedia channel – http://www.youtube.com/user/Pajamasmedia – in YouTube and you can find them easy on your phone that way.
Stephen, if it does that stuff in the background, fair enough. Sounds like it covers the key tasks.
And, yes, I have to cop to a bit of that audiophile ‘tude.
At least, I don’t see the point of listening to 128kbps rips when I can listen to (say) 320kbps instead, even if that means fewer songs. Or maybe it’s one of those placebo effects were I just think it sounds better.
…But then I’ve already admitted to being a troglodyte in certain respects, and hardly on the radar as far as Apple marketing is concerned.
For what it’s worth, Neptunus Lex thinks the iPad would make a great electronic flight bag.
A netbook is smaller and cheaper, even if you have to use (yuck) Windoze.
You don’t have to. Chances are, Ubuntu will be just as easy to install, and perhaps even easier to use if you compare it with Vista/7.
This is very true, Max.
After looking at the comment thread again, I think I may be bashing the iPad for the wrong reasons.
An analogy: an auto fan starts complaining about the Honda Civic, an otherwise sterling vehicle. The engine’s too small, it doesn’t deliver enough torque to pull a large boat or trailer, and the suspension sucks when you try to pull said large boat along the interstate.
This, of course, begs the question whether the Civic is the optimal vehicle for such tasks. It was originally designed to deliver fuel efficiency & reliability to a single adult driver. If you want to haul large trailer loads you want at least a V-8 truck, although I would lean more towards a diesel, myself, for the torque.
And if you’re a parent who needs to transport the local team of 8-year-old soccer hooligans, an SUV or minivan is better than a truck, or even a Civic station wagon.
Point being that there’s a wide variety of needs out there for vehicles; hence a wide variety of vehicles. One size (or design) does not fit all. In a similar vein, one laptop/netbook/digital pad design will not satisfy all requirements.
#9:
What’s important here is that iPhone applications will run on the iPad. That means that all those app will be running in an environment for which they weren’t intended (larger screen). So the app developers (and I’m one of those guys) will have to tweak their apps to get that part right.
Then, once that’s done, I expect to see some limited background tasking (things like downloads, notifications, etc.). Once again, this will require developers to make changes to their applications to make them work with the new features.
This is an incremental approach. You isolate the changes and get them right before you head off onto the next change.The “I want it all now!” approach will have multiple changes getting in each others way, and the user experience will suffer.
Those who’ve been paying attention see this has happened already in Apple’s approach to the iPhone/iPod touch/ SDK 3.0, etc. Those who haven’t been paying attention are the same people who aren’t going to buy it because it still doesn’t have Flash.
Also, the iPad is perfect for reading websites like this as a substitute for taking that magazine to the toilet. Netbooks may be cheaper, but why do I need that keyboard balanced on my knees? (And most are only cheaper until you factor more than initial purchase price.)
(USB: I’ll leave it as an exercise for the student why not having a standard USB connector is a positive. Ask for big company IT dept. for help if you get stuck.)