So what are you guys thinking about the iPad?

[Flybye]

I think its funny how Star Trek has had hand held devices like this for 20 something years in their shows. And I even told myself a while back "we need something like this." Apple finally made it happen.

I am still not sure if I like the entire paperless book thing, though, as I like having a library. But this thing is great for being able to get net access from anywhere around the house. Is the iPod Touch convenient enough to browse the internet with for a few hours? No. Do you really want to lug your laptop everywhere around your house? No. The iPad is the perfect gap filler. Small enough to have anywhere for quick and easy net access and not too big to be inconvenient. Would I use it in place of the Touch outside the house? No as it does not easily fit in your pocket.

And what about computing power? Think about it, when was the last time most people used all of the computing power of their laptop/computer? Most people never do. You guys know the average person uses maybe 1/1000th of the computational power their computers are capable of. Everyone's computer is capable of doing extreme calculations (at different levels of performance of course) from simple physics to calculating a satellite's trajectory through the universe. Computers laugh at doing simple things like taxes, watching videos and coasting the internet. This is where the iPad comes in. It will do everything for the average user and the power users will use it for when they don't need their power tools. It is the gap filler of the computing world.

And this is exactly how I do it now. I have my 600+w consuming PC gaming machine turned on only when I game, and I use my lightweight Mac Mini (both hooked up to the 24"CRT) for the rest of my regular tasks. I can finally throw away my 6 year old Dell Laptop that ALL I use for is surfing and emailing before bedtime and replace it with the iPad.

Yeah, all the haters are like "They pioneered nothing new," but guess what? Apple made it work for me with how I want to use it in a sleek and hassle free package. I can use it for last minute (which is always 30-60 minutes for me) reading just before I go to bed, lend it to people when they come over so they do not blotch up my computer to just check their emails, keep around the kitchen for recipe reading for the girl, etc. I can even easily use it to view my pictures remotely since I am sure someone will make an app for it to view your network files just like how they have one for the iPhone.

[Synthohol]

Originally Posted by Flybye

I can finally throw away my 6 year old Dell Laptop that ALL I use for is surfing and emailing before bedtime and replace it with the iPad.

send it to Wacky, i'm sure he would pay the postage!!!

[Flybye]

Throw away was a strong word. LOL.

HD is bad on it and I have been wondering about a Netbook. This old thing runs hot as hell and have been wanting something that runs cooler. Might still get the HD for it and have it as a backup.

[DCMan]

Originally Posted by Flybye

Is the iPod Touch convenient enough to browse the internet with for a few hours? No.

Hang on... According to the marketing disciples of Stevejobbianity, I thought the iPhone WAS convenient enough to browse the internet for a while on and that was one of its major selling points!?

For me, its just another thing from apple - and I'm bored with them, to be honest.. Not saying its not a good device - it probably is. But I'm just bored with the whole thing from Apple releasing something which is "the best in the world", bashing every single PC user/machine for having slow and clunky software when in reality it doesnt etc etc.. Their marketing campaigns and the attitude of 99% of their users just puts such a bad taste in my mouth, that its completely put me off buying one, ever..

[WackyComputer]

Gimmie back my laptop! You trashed it, it's mine fair an' square!

[Cabal]

it can't multitask for that reason alone I've lost interest in it.

[Player0]

iTab is a much better name for this.

Does the iPad have a phone? I can't be bothered to read much on it. It looks like a big iPhone or at least iPod touch. This is a good thing, the iPhone is great, I use it all the time when I'm not home to check the internet, watch videos, read, play games, take notes, etc.

A bigger version of that? Sure! Why not. But it had better address the following issues:

1.) iPhone needs more storage. 20x more.
2.) iPhone needs more battery. 10x more.

If the iPad doesn't have phone in it, then it looses a lot of reason for me to want it, traveling without wifi access.

It'd be nice to have something slightly bigger than an iPhone to carry around to meetings, actually 'write' notes on, something cheap enough to kinda throw around. Battery life is key here. Laptops are too fragile, too bulky, and smart phones are too slow, too inconvenient to do real work on.

So it has SOME promise. I suspect it's going to fall short on battery, speed, storage, and flexibility.

It CAN multitask. Apple chooses not to allow it in MOST cases, and for good reasons. Battery life. Wasted cycles are bad. But the iPhone *does* multitask. You can call and surf at the same time. You can receive IMs from other messages. And most applications save states so switching from one to another isn't all that 'shocking'. More ram would help, and the iPad should be better at such things.

[Player0]

Okay, you can get it with 64MB flash (a bit small still), has 1000mhz A4 processor, probably ARM based, 2x as fast as an iphone probably, maybe a bit more cause of its GPU abilities. Will have a 3G variant (and inevitably 4G soon). The iPad keyboard dock is great.

10 hours (year, as if) battery life while actually using the thing, i wish this were more honestly. Make it a bit thicker, charge $50 more, give it 20 hours, at least 2-3 days of use without having to hook a wire too it. A week would be nice.

10 hours wont last a work day im sure. Or a long boring meeting.

And an EXTERNAL USB or MEMORY STICK port. It's not like SD cards take up a lot of space. Let me stick a 128M external USB stick on it or something. I guess thats a huge problem with me. Its thick enough for a usb port.

[arigr]

its all still in the air till it hits the market... no telling what we're gonna see

[Kill-Switch]

It's just an iPod touch in steroids, period. It has no phone capabilities, has no camera! and if you want 3G access you have to pay a further $130 plus a $30 p/m data plan. It's storage space is pretty much the same as the iPods already out. It can't multitask in the true sense of the word, and Apple in their arrogance will not implement flash support. The pricing curve is pathetic, $500 for the base 16gb version, $600 for the 32gb version ... $100 more for 16gb! are you f'ing serious!? Then their's connectivity, you actually have to have an adaptor to use any kind of connectivity option, including USB!! Seriously I know they wanted to make this thing slim and sleek, but adding a few extra millimeters to allow for USB connectivity wouldn't have killed them. No, now you must buy an adaptor, which knowing Apple will cost many times more than it's worth.

I actually do like the look of it (can't fault Apple on that I suppose) and do believe it has it's place somewhere in the market, but I'm not a big Apple fan, they sell cheap products with their name on them and charge a premium for it. Their reluctance to allow personal freedom on their devices borders is ludicrous, so they sell locked down devices and make you jump through their hoops to use them. I've lost count of the numerous times the wife has updated the itunes software only for it to say it can't sync with her iPhone so she must reset the phone completely and loose everything on it!! When that happens there is no way you can just hook the phone up to a PC and backup your data, or just pull your MP3s off.

Either way Apple fans will lap this up as if lives depend on it, they'll sing it's praises as if it's perfection incarnated and they slam, damn, flame and outright ignore anyone who says otherwise.

[Flybye]

Originally Posted by DCMan

Hang on... According to the marketing disciples of Stevejobbianity, I thought the iPhone WAS convenient enough to browse the internet for a while on and that was one of its major selling points!? ....

LOL..it IS! But my meaning of a while is to look up something important and not be there constantly trying to view things on that little tiny screen.

[DCMan]

Originally Posted by Kill-Switch

When that happens there is no way you can just hook the phone up to a PC and backup your data, or just pull your MP3s off.

Agree with pretty much everything.. Although there is a way to do that if you look hard enough!

[WackyComputer]

If money didn't matter I think it would be pretty cool to have.

[Kill-Switch]

Originally Posted by DCMan

Agree with pretty much everything.. Although there is a way to do that if you look hard enough!

Indeed there is, we did find some software (which you have to buy) that is reported as being able to replace the iTunes software. We did try some free software, but our results with them weren't too promising. So I suppose you can do that, but my point was out of the box you can't do that and must buy 3rd party software, or resort to more extreme measures to do what you should be able to do anyway.

[DCMan]

Yeah, agreed..

[arigr]

but wait!! don't buy it yet!! (not that you can) you may be able to get the unavailable at a better price http://www.pcworld.com/businesscente...rilliance.html

[Kopfschuss88]

yeah! only 3 easy payments of too the f*** much ~_~