Apple iPad, worth getting?
Like everybody else I’ve seen all the press around the iPad. Apple in general is pretty good at making simple clean systems. I use the iPhone and love it, the iPad for the most part seems like a big iPhone. I am getting older so the bigger screen would be nice, but beyond that what are the advantages?
Apple shows there tech specs on their site, and overall it seems OK. Nothing too ground breaking for me, but it is pretty and seems very clean and slick. I think Apple made a good choice by making it’s OS more like the iPhone rather than a full on Mac OS X system.
In this space, this type of device is better if it’s clean, simple, and easy to use. Following the iPhone way of doing things I think they will accomplish that. With the good, you also have to deal with all the annoying iPhone way of doing things as well.
To me the most annoying thing about the iPhone is iTunes. iTunes is clunky, slow and just sucks up all the resources and speed out of a system when I tell it to do anything. It’s had this problem on my Windows and Mac machines. I think it’s just a piece of crap software and wish there was some way I could sync without using it.
Hopefully the iPad will allow for some other sync options other than iTunes, similar to what the iPod allows. This I’m sure will have to be one of those wait and see things.
The screen is 9.7 inches and has a resolution of 1024×768, which is about 720p if you were comparing it to a TV. For me I think I would use a iPad as a news/email/web reader and to view video’s and such. I think it would be great to have a couple of those for my kids on a long car ride to keep them busy with games, books, and video’s.
If you had the idea of using this as your “computer” your going to be disappointed. Your not going to be able to have the screen, keyboard, or apps that you could on a normal Mac or Windows PC. There also doesn’t seem to be any USB, SDCard or any other way to link up to the iPad besides the default sync cable.
All in all I think this device will do OK for Apple, but I’m not in any rush to get one. I’d use it I’m sure if somebody gave one to me, but it’s not something to me that is a “must have”. I’d love to hear some feedback if you get one, let me know how you like it.
