http://i.engadget.com/2010/01/27/liv...reation-event/
Printable View
I personally think an IPS display is impressive but it's just a big iphone. No need for it really, far less practical than a net top for typing on the go for instance.
I think it looks retarded, kinda like an obese and weirdly large iphone
Not impressed. A big iPhone in most respects, down to the OS.
And the name?
http://cache.gawker.com/assets/image...dda58/340x.jpg
...
Video coming soon: http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/27/a...irst-hands-on/
But seriously, no multitasking and no flash! Not that I was going to buy it anyway.
More Apple iShovelware.
Nexus, Blackberry, iPhone, Netbook, Laptop - acceptable.
iPad neither one nor the other.
It won't fit in your pocket neither is it functional enough to be a serious contender.
Not for me.
No, i will just pass on this icrap, as it been said million times: no flash, no multitask, no sd, no camera, no gps=no interest!
first impression, I think it sucks that they just created another devise to suck money outta us and what the heck is an A4 chip. Why recreate the wheel? or are they just wanting to profit more?
would have been nice if it was just a normal osx ipad, would have been way more impressed than just simply enlarging an iphone to force us to pay more for apps.
but that's just from me watching their presentation.. might go crazy once they are in store but really skeptical right now.
I can't believe it, no gps, no camera, no multitasking!
This has been available in Unix since 1969 FFS!
It's like a bigger and less useful iPod touch
Anyone who buys this should just go ahead and have a frontal lobotomy because they're not using all of their brain anyway
I'm happy - Apple have made it very easy for me not to choose the iPad and go with a proper slate PC based on atom/ion2 later this year.
/blush's at coming into an Apple forum for the first time without intending to throw pooh at the weird Apple lovers.
/cough
/blush
My mother in law loves Sair's iPod Touch but it's too small to see properly for her. She doesn't want a laptop in her living room, it's too slow and slouchy, with boot times, etc.
This could be the total kiddy for her. I mean.. it's gonna have a web browser, will be lightning fast to do stuff like an iPod Touch does, have loads of useful apps that work 1000 times faster than going on line with a Vista/W7 lappy.... and it'll fit in the magazine rack or slide under the sofa easily.
If an iPodTouch were larger, she'd use one. This is larger than an iPodTouch. I see this bad boy selling pretty well to the 50-70 year old market.
How are you supposed to hold this thing while you're using it? Cos with the iTouch, you grip round the edges, but this thing is 9", no-one has hands big enough to grip round one of these. Do you just rest it in your hand and hope it doesn't slip? Do you have to rest it on a table? I just don't understand it tbh.
Jobs has been out of the picture for the best part of a year and he has this piece of rubbish to launch when he gets back. I don't envy him :P
A bit like this?
http://www.blogcdn.com/www.engadget....12_600x400.jpg
My handspan is about the same (9 and a bit). I even cut out a piece of cardboard to the exact size of the iPad and there is no way I could comfortably hold an iPad, the edges wouldn't be anywhere near as grippy as cardboard.
Yeah, again, loads of grip on the iPad :\. One slight knock and that things gonna hit the floor, cos the metal on the back and the glossy screen cover aren't exactly the easiest things to grip.
it just looks so stupid and it will cost a fortune!
I have just thought of one good use for it. A giant new controller for my sonos setup. The iPhone software is good and this will cost about the same as a dedicated touch sonos controller. Not that I can afford either at present!
That about sums up my impressions. It'll be a heavily-marketed, supposedly fashionable "must-have" icon because it's Apple and they're cool, right? But in fact it's over-designed solution lacking a real problem.
It might be a sign of things to come. It might hint at where we'll be in 10 years or whatever. But it rather reminds me of the very early cellular phones, when they were basically a full-size domestic handset connected to a transceiver and batter pack the size and weight of several house bricks. And it's similarly over-priced. Well, those bricks evolved fairly rapidly into small, convenient and highly portable devices that are now so commonplace it's hard to remember what life was like without them.
Just maybe this shows the future of computer devices. But I still wonder. It's far too big to be easily portable, and from what I can see, lacking in usability for a fixed device. Does it give enough advantage over a conventional laptop? Or is it just several available technologies bundled together and gift-wrapped with glitzy marketing and presentation.
I'm not sure I'd have a real use for it if someone gave me one and I sure don't see me buying one, and most certainly not at anything like $500-$800, which probably means £500-£800 by the time we get offered them.
iPointless ?
i think you'd use it on your lap... like a laptop?
could make some sense as an educational product if that price wasn't so high
textbook, workbook, email, portable, decent battery life, single process OS to keep you concentrating on what your supposed to be doing
With Google and others starting to steal Apple's thunder in the smartphone market, and the iPad likely (if there is any sense left in the universe) to be a flop, what are Apple going to do to turn things around? Or are they just going to rest on their laurels and rely on iTunes and their AppStore?
It doesn't really fit in to any niche that I think I could use it for really, though I'd probably have to use one first before making my mind up.
Doesn't mean I don't irrationally want NICE SHINY THING though :)
Plus, I could pretend I'm on Star Trek.
I'm taking bets at £399 for the bog standard one (and £349 education pricing).
In addition to this, I don't think it could have been anything else other than a mild let-down, after all the hype for ages.
Still want one though.
And in education that would fail instantly. You couldn't do a single process OS for education. It would fail instantly if you were doing your work and then you had to refer to the text book/ebook again for notes so you would have to close down what you are doing go read the book, make notes on paper and then re-open your work to type that up etc.
The education board at the uni here have already deemed it unsuitable for class use so I doubt we will see them around the campus in any significant numbers. No doubt there will be review models on our doorstep soon from the suppliers of the uni so we will see what it can do when the time arrives.
I wonder if something as simple as an OS update will allow this?
Seems a bit short-sighted for Apple to release the initial one without the functionality, but I wouldn't be surprised if iPhone OS 4 could deal with that (in fact, i'm sure i remember reading a rumour about that somewhere)
Freudian slip? ;)
My notepad (I mean, a real paper spiral-bound one!) at work is 9" diagonally and has an aspect ratio of pretty much bang on 16:10, so if they could make a 9" version with minimal bezel, it would be as easy to hold as a notepad, and I can manage a notepad. That would mean I could comfortably grip it round each edge and type on an onscreen keyboard, or write on it with a stylus / pen (although trying that with a notepad it only really works if you rest your hand on the "screen", so that might be an issue on a capacitiative touchscreen ;) ).
But the bezels on this thing are *huge*, so that's not going to be an option.
Frankly, I find this device significantly less interesting than the MSI Dual Screen notebooks that were shown at CES this year...
Lets hope someone releases an etch-a-sketch app for it....it's crying out for it :p
Why would anyone want an etch-a-sketch app when you can just draw straight onto the surface?
The whole funky thing with etch-a-sketch is that you get the tactile feedback from twiddling your knobs - it wouldn't be the same on a touchscreen...
hmmm, how long 'til *that* gets sig-quoted out of context? ;)
Worth a giggle:
http://www.b3ta.com/challenge/ipad/
(Some content may be unsuitable for work/small people)
TBH I just seen this as another example of how tablets are great for some specialised jobs but why they constantly fail to gain mass market appeal. For me personally i either need the portability of my ipod touch/ smart phone for stuff like email, music, odd website for checking things or the functionality of a laptop. Dont get me wrong the ipad looks like a great toy but, for me, theres no use for it.
It seems to really meet my needs. My laptop is years old, heavy, hot and slow but I haven't been impressed with any recent PC laptops and Macbooks are slightly too expensive for me. Browsing the web while sitting on the sofa is okay with my iPod Touch, but can be frustrating at times because it's too small for longer browsing sessions. The iPad just seems to fit my needs perfectly.
I'm very disinterested in the iPad.
I can't see it being a good eBook reader, certainly not as good as a dedicated eBook reader device. Sure, the iPad will have a shiny OLED screen but I *HATE* reading big blocks of text off a screen that is backlit, it makes my eyes sore pretty quickly. For eBooks I've got an iRiver Story which has a bog standard eInk screen and it's absolutely bloody fantastic for reading books.
That has just gone around work here damn fast after someone wanted to know what I was laughing at....
Of them all, 1 of them is pure win imo:
http://s1.b3ta.com/host/creative/127...79/blutack.jpg
http://community.winsupersite.com/bl...s-an-idud.aspx
http://www.neowin.net/news/is-the-ipad-apple039s-ifail
Is pretty much the feeling across the web. It is 'iFail' an 'iDud' if you will. Apart from one or two sheep (baaaaaa) I don't expect this to take over, and I will buy an iPod if it does :D
so it doesnt even work as a giant gps
booo
The only thing that can redeem this iPad is good apps but since it is so restrictive, it will just look nice somewhere in your house.
Its an oversized iphone. It will sell as it has an apple logo. No doubt the fans will buy it.
I could see the point in this if it had some new revolutionary features and was actually different to the iPod Touch in any way except its size.
This is Apples PSP Go.
If I had money to burn, sure, I'd get one to sit in my living room. I wonder how long it will be until you can jailbreak them? No doubt they will come with that pesky boot loader that apple have started shipping with iPhone's to stop jailbreakers..
I dont understand what its for.
A much better product wouldve been if theyd bought up a load of Acer 1820 PTZ Covertible tablets, painted them white, stamped an apple and iPad on them and then marked them up by £200.
Then at least theyd be giving the fanboys a real computer.
Loving the Blu-Tac comparison.
Also found this pic earlier and chuckled.
http://cache.gawker.com/assets/image...962ff/340x.jpg
Its an ebook reader, made to compete with the kindle and the latest Asus one (whos name i can't remember).
For that purpose it will be very good - finally one that has enough power to do things like turn pages quickly and have something crazy like a backlight (sony: take note!), and I bet the iBookstore will work really well, as iTunes does.
It will also work well for browsing the web - thats one thing I use my HP TX2 for in tablet mode as you don't need a keyboard when you have multitouch/gestures etc for browsing the net.
However that is about it really - apple have really missed a trick here i think, they are missing a key feature..a stylus! Adding stylus input would mean it could be a proper note taking device (with an apple version of Microsofts amazing OneNote) which a device like the iPad is perfectly suitable for and it could also work well for graphics design then, allowing it to double up as a graphics tablet. This *can* be done with multi touch capacitive screens - the HP TX2 or Dell XT/2 range proves this (thanks to n-trigg) and that would make the iPad so much more appealing..would have a purpose other than reading ebooks then. I predict this will happen eventually but until then...I won't be going near one. I suppose I should be grateful that Apple have messed this one up as it saves me £500!
This will sell by the bucketload for a while though as Apple will do a great job with the marketing, and heck if they really do a good job with ebooks it may well be justified for that market, but as a tablet or "Pad" computer? No its pants.
edit: oh and I forgot the last big thing they made a mistake on - it's not widescreen...and with 1024x768 resolution it's not going to be the best for video playback..they A4 cpu (which is suspiciously like the Snapdragon in specs isnt it? 1ghz arm with built in GPU...) can cope with 720p so I hear..so surely they missed a trick there too? Crazy..
I'm sure things I will say have already been covered, I cba to read the whole thread, the whole iPad thing is already doing my head in but I have to add my 2pence...
Essentially as people have said it's a big iPod Touch, In a bewildering size, with huge limitations...
- No Flash - How can this be expected to compete with other tablet PCs if it can't offer a FULL browsing experience backed up by flash and HTML 5? Any other Win7 or ChromeOS tablet on the horizon has flash enabled, as it's specification that should be standard for sure. I mean for Christ's sake, even my Android phone has Flash lite, and will get upgraded to Flash 10.1 like alot of Android phones.
- No Camera - Come on, surely you wan't to be able to conference or skype with your tablet...
- No Multi-Tasking - Now what the hell is this about, I would expect some multi-tasking capabilities with this "magical" 1ghz A4 CPU. If I had a tablet PC i'd imagine listening to music whilst working on a word document, or maybe streaming media to my TV using a DLNA program (such as Twonky), whilst maybe reading a new feed or browsing the net on the tablet.
- No Customising - Like with the iPhone/Touch there is a complete lack of customisation to make things the way you want. You are tied into Apples way of doing things and presenting things...
To me Apple have missed out on some crucial things here, and although obviously the Apple-blinded elitists will embrace this with open arms, I will be giving it a wide birth in favour of a Chrome OS or Android (or both) tablet.....
Think I'll stop there before I get more angry!
Ben
That is something I hadn't even thought about to be honest, having never actually used an iPod Touch or iPhone. So you can only run one thing at a time, without even having music in the background? You can't use it to read a book, change to a notepad app and write some quick notes then change back without actually exiting out of each app first? That's absurd, that would totally do my head in.
It doesn't even sound the least bit practical in my mind, how can you do anything meaningful with no multi-tasking? I mean, I could understand if you couldn't run 2 intensive apps at the same time for the obvious knock in performance, but not even being able to play music in the background... come on. The iPhone, iPod Touch and now the iPad have all evolved from the iPod, so they have their roots in a music player, yet can't even do that.
Quite amazed at that to be honest.
I dont think even as an e-book reader it holds up well im afraid.
The kindle et al have the "ink" screens that don't tire your eyes as much as conventional screens when reading, well in my experience anyway.
Plus of course apple being apple, books have to be bought through them in their format?
It supports the ePub open ebook format, and others too I think so compared to most dedicated readers it fairs quite well I think.
Ref the multitasking - I am 99% sure that it *will* let you play music in the background on the assumption that it works like the current iPhoneOS - as you can be playing music in the background with the iPhone (or could on my old 2G one anyway), and once jailbroken it was very simple to background processes like SSH etc..but you could not say run 2 apps from the App store at the same time, or safari and also the contacts application.
Still doesn't make it in the slightest bit useful though - oh and I had to laugh when I read that the iWork suite will be available..laughable on a device with no keyboard and no stylus lol.
http://images.apple.com/ipad/specs/i...1_20100127.jpg
official accessory :)
I know you can get accessories for it - but doesn't that defeat the point..? Its like those snap-in keyboard you could add to old erricsson phones to give them a qwerty keyboard - not usable on the move at all and doubles the size of the device...
I agree, I don't think there is a lot of point either, I was just stating the fact there there is a keyboard for it.
It would make sense if it was a stripped down OSX instead of the iPhone OS with nobs on.
Yes aside from two things:
1. apple will use their own ebook format that's completely proprietary and only for apple (yay, we really need more fragmentation in the ebook market!)
2. they can keep there 1024x768 lcd frankly - my e-book e-ink screen pisses all over that for reading
Really? Every ebook forum/blog I've looked at is chuffed to bits that Apple is using bog-standard ePub, same as everyone else apart from Amazon.
I can foresee some DRM aggravation, but then that's hardly new - I had all sorts of fun getting a DRM'd ePub from WHSmith onto my PRS-505.
For us lucky few who already have decent e-readers, decent laptops and decent phones I think this new gizmo has limited appeal (e.g. it might make a decent fist of map/diagram heavy books - a lot of those just don't work on my reader) but if it goes anywhere I think it will be as a compromise 'good enough' e-reader/websurfing/email/to-do-list gizmo, rather than as a 'category killer'.
Right now, I think it's too early to call, no-one knows enough about the thing. As usual, most of the instant commentary on the intertubes is from people who can't even manage to read a spec sheet or a press release. When these things finally hit the street, then some of the negatives people are bleating about will turn out to be non-issues, and some real arse-achers no-one has spotted are bound to emerge.
Next iPhone or Next Newton? Place your bets :juggle:
imagine it with a spash proof cover, 1000 recies with videos, and a kitchen.
It's be the dog's knob for that.
/still bemused by self at defending an Apple product that I'l never own.. but feel a bit sorry for the gadget as I've not had a go yet
To jump into the eReader argument - I actually *really* dislike e-Ink screens. Why? Because they completely blank out before rendering the next page of text, and I find it really distracting. And I suspect I'm not the only one who finds that. As long as the back light is sensibly adjustable for ambient lighting conditions, I've never found it to be a problem - one of my favourite apps on my HTC Magic is the Aldiko ebook reader, and I've never had any problems reading on it. And of course having a conventional screen and graphics processing means you can have funky page turning effects (if you like that sort of thing ;) ).
its not even an extended iphone, its a huge ipod touch if its the wifi only version. what a let down
Thing is we were expecting something on the scale of the first iPod or iMac and we got the next AppleTV. Thats why there is such a back lash.
As a strategic move, it maybe a good one. A foot in the door so to speak. It is kind of a Microsoft-ish move, chucking something out that looks rather underbaked to just get in a market.
I think Mr fry has it about right.
iPad 1.0 is a beautiful design that will make people start to think about what they would do with the device. iPad 3.0 will be the one to buy.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology...fry-apple-ipad
A good read - and a great guy as always - but there's a heck of a lot of holes in there. Let's face it, it's going to be 500 quid in the UK and that's a chunk of money compared to a netbook (which is easily in reach of many) and i'm guessing we'll see tables from other manus at 300 quid or so to boot. Personally, I want a full fat w7 tablet - but I can see android/arm/tegra2 tablets being cheaper and pretty darn good really. Given the amount of android gush we have in the mobile market right now it could well be a thorn in apple's side - W7 not so much due to higher price of entry (there's no arm version of 7 so forget tegra2, think atom/ion2). I could blow 2-3 hundred on a tablet but 5? Probably not, especially with all the limitations of version 1.0. I agree, version 3.0 might be the second coming but we're months away from 1.0 right now so it's completely irrelevant to me.
I don't really want a 'big mobile phone without the phone' - what I want is a netbook with a touchscreen and no physical keyboard. Whether my wants align with the masses, no idea - probably not - but then we've seen how netbooks with linux frustrated people to the point where windows suddenly took over. People will pick up a tablet and think 'computer' because it's big(er than a phone) and hence it'll get similar judgements thrown against it (perhaps).
I'm going to play with one IRL at the apple store (just like I do with all new toys) but as slick as it might be i really doubt i'll be reaching for my credit card. Roll on version 3.0 and the competition.
MSI are talking about releasing their dual-screen netbooks @ $299 - $499, and they have 2 touchscreens, so I think youi're probably right
Then you want an Archos 9 tabletPC :D
And you're not the only one - that's exactly what I want too, pretty much. I just might hold off until a few more manufacturers have them at retail though ;)
Ooooh that Archos is very nice.
Much better looking than the ipad and more usefull by the looks of it
As much as I love Stephen Fry, I don't think this is a valid arguement. It's not like its a genre defining device like the iPod was. There are already tablets out there that do far more than this piece of crap, and have been for quite a few years. There is no technical reasons to limit the functionality specs (such as lack of camera, flash, sd slot etc.), It's just that Apple thinks that they know best what we want, and yet they clearly haven't got a clue.
They are mearly stifling technology, deliberately holding it back so that they CAN do a iPadS version 2 & 3.. and go.... "WOW, look at the new iPad, it has a CAMERA!!!!!"
I think if I here too much more about this glorified sanitary towel, I may cry.
Ben
so close but has 3 things wrong:
1. no dual core atom
2. no nvidia ion 2 chipset (worse, it's intel)
3. resistive screen
:(
I've just watched this video of the ipad running and i have to say nice job with the UI apple that's very slick:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/8484823.stm
So whilst it underwhelms in many ways that's a very polished UI there. Immediately I see it'd be a poor e-book reader and it's obviously the wrong ratio for HD video in it's "native resolution" (i giggled when he said that). Ah but i'd so like silverlight and flash support and.. er.. quite a few other things (damn). I'm starting to think the "PC" version needs an accelerometer though and i can also see it'd be pretty easy to mimick apple's UI layer in silverlight/wpf.
Hate to think how much their gonna charge for the Keyboard Dock thingy :-S
I'd say £60? £70?
Its Apple, it cant be far wrong
Didn't anyone else get the impression from this:http://www.blogcdn.com/www.engadget....010/01/top.jpg
that they'd go with the digital art angle? They could have given it one of those new resistive multitouch screens that are sensitive enough to use with a paint brush and it would have made this the ultimate sketchpad. The Wacom Cintiqs are great for drawing but they're just peripherals so not portable. Some tablet PCs do it too but they are still bulky. I reckon Apple missed an opportunity to expand into (yet) another market. Surely every digital artist would have bitten their hand off?
too right, they totally should have gone for the keyboardless macbook angle, rather than the giant ipod touch.
unlike apple to miss the mark like this, could be critical for them as well, especially seeing as more and more people are buying into the shiny whiteness at the minute. this slip up could cost them quite a bit!
... :)