What I think of the new Apple iPad
Yesterday the long awaited Apple tablet was announced. Its name is the iPad. From the photos it looks to me like and over size iPod Touch, so what is it really and what does it do?
As usual Mac nerds all over the world gathered the listen to what the Steveness has to say, those who were not fortunate enough to be there, were all sitting in front they computer screen, waiting. I was one of them, armed with twitter and a browser refresh button I was ready to be blown away.
Excitement builds up as tweets and updates came in saying Steve is on stage. Of course first was all the boring stuff about how much money Apple is making. Everybody there was for one thing and one thing only.
When Steve Jobs announced iPad as the name of the long awaited tablet-like device, I actually heard cries of pain and anguish as if a Manchester United fan just saw Liverpool scored a goal against them. Of course we are all adults here, at least I thought we were, iTampon jokes starts popping up.
So what does it do? Which market it’s going to take over? Everything.
You see, it has the iPhone/iPod Touch OS. It plays media like your iPod does. Someone tweeted “It’s like holding a HD screen in front of your face”
With the plethora of games on the iTunes store, this looks like a good enough portable gaming device. Sony PSP and Nintendo DS are way ahead, but they got to start watching their backs.
After that Steve announced the iBookstore. I think Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com’s CEO, must have put down his Kindle awhile and starts to pay close attention to the Apple announcement. Would Apple win the eBook market against Amazon? Only time would tell.
It was clear to me at this point of that this iPad is. It is a media oriented device that one use to consume media. It’s not a device where serious work is done. However it boggles my mind when they announce iWork. Do they want people to do serious work on it?
I still have no idea who this iPad is targeted to. If you already own a MacBook and an iPhone, are you still looking to buy an iPad? Tell us what you think.
By the way, the iPad comes with WiFi only and WiFi with 3G. Date of it’s availability in Malaysia will be announce later, keep reading MyMacBUZZ ya!
8 Comments
No.
i have an imac and no iphone…
i’ve been thinking of getting an ipod touch
but now, it seems that the ipad is a better choice…
we should leave the serious works for the macbook or imac
so it’s not a problem to me if the ipad can’t do the serious stuff
I have a MBP, and an iPhone 3GS. I was seriously considering getting the Apple tablet for my business trips where I don’t need to bring my MBP along.
However, after the announcement of the iPad, I’m having serious second thoughts. Two things that I find lacking…
1) No Camera for video conferencing. That’s a major blow and of course we all know that Apple is holding out on that option until 2nd Gen.
2) No multi-tasking. To me this is more of an issue than no camera. So if I want to download a video and the internet is slow (as is often the case in Malaysia), I can’t surf or listen to music. Of course this is a mere firmware fix so by the time the iPad is on the market, this could be a non-issue.
All in all, I think I’m gonna wait to play around with the iPad before ordering one through Apple Online Store.
Thanks for the input guys…
Yeah I’m pretty sure the 2nd gen would have a camera. But can up imagine how you gonna hold it up to take a picture?
I think target consumers are the education market. That’s why the price starts so low (for an Apple product). Also, this fits perfectly in the gap between phone and laptop. As expected, those looking for a notebook computer will still be using…. notebook computers. And those who want a smartphone will be using…. err smartphones.
I bought a HP netbook with the idea that we can use it to check email and browse the web and bring it around to house to do so easily but after the initial few days of use it became obvious that it is not fitting that role; screen is too small to be used on a desk, but keyboard gets in the way if you need carry it around or use it on a couch. The “miniaturized computer” is just not working out.
The iPad fits this niche perfectly. The 10 hour battery is more than enough. The only problem is no front facing camera for voip calls.
Would I buy it? Yes, of course. It would work great in the living room. Just prop it up and display our family photos like a photo frame, pick it up to search the web for information and retrieve emails!
Sometimes things come along that has such a novel elegant approach we just think why people hadn’t thought about it at all before?
Normal users don’t need more features anymore than cars need more than 4 wheels touching the ground (except for specialized requirements), they focus on reliability and driving feel, so why should computers be any different?
I was a bit reluctant to let my daughter play around with my iphone before but after a while she got so used to it and could just play with it. Then I sort of introduce her to a free preschool game on my macbook pro. She went straight to the screen to select the icons! I think keyboards are so not suitable for my kids of 4 and 5 years old. So YES I’m getting 2 iPads; one for adik and the other one for Kakak!
A 3G version would be nice except for the thought of being burdened with another dataplan. If we already have an iPhone and unlimited dataplan, can’t we just pop in the Simcard in the iPad? Of course we may miss some calls though.
i think it’s cool.. but here what i wrote on my blog.. haha.. =)
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