iPad is a great interface and form factor, and has great battery life
I got an iPad on Saturday, and spent about 25 hours straight putting it through the paces (my family was also part of the test team).
The speed and user interface along with the apps are stunning. It is light and fast, the battery lasts over 10 hours between recharges (as Apple claimed it would).
I have over 130 apps, 477 photos, 14 movies, and 664 songs loaded on it. I believe that the way the apps and content work together with the interface and consistent standards they all follow sets a new bar for HCI. For example, you can hit the home button any time on ANY app, and it saves where you were automatically. The concept of save & close is gone for the most part. The multi touch interface on a larger screen, as well as the gestures and “fake physical momentum” of the controls and the accelerometers really improve the way you interact with a computing device. Also with the low power consumption processor, that also processes the UI lightning fast, sets a standard for 10 hours between charges, others will be hard pressed to beat. Not sure why anyone would consider other eReaders over this.
Remember when you used your first mouse to interact with a computer rather than typing commands, this is one of those moments?…it started with the iPhone, but this has taken it to a new level.
The good:
- Speed,
- fantastic screen,
- user interface,
- all your iTunes content and iPhone apps just work, and work well (unusual in the computer world).
- Set up was seamless and simple.
- The apps and interfaces are just one level of quality above ANYTHING else out there.
- Very stable, did not crash once since its arrived.
The issues:
- I purchased a 32 Gig unit since that is what my iPhone is, and I don’t plan on carrying the iPad around, so I figured I didn’t need as much storage. This was a mistake… why?… because it turns out that the iPad specific apps are MUCH larger than the iPhone/iTouch apps. Its true that you can just use the iPhone apps, they really work well, but the higher res ofthe iPad apps are really impressive. I would say the average iPhone app is <100MB, the average iPad app seems to be closer to 1Gig. If I was buying again, I would get the 64Gigversion.
- To fit the apps, I have had to delete a lot of my movies that came over from iTunes.iPad lets you use old entry methods if you must
- The iPhone screen gets covered with fingerprints, but its fast to wipe it off, its a bit more constant work with the iPad because of its size. Expect to spend a lot of time trying to look through a cloudy fingerprint covered screen, or spend a lot of time wiping. This is especially true if you are sharing it withyour kids.
- The iPad apps cost a LOT more than the iPhone apps did. An average iPhone app is $0.99 – $10, the iPad apps run from $4.99-$15.99, and more of them are in the $10-15 range.
- Seems stupid not to have included a video camera on the front for video teleconf. Would be a great Skype tablet.
- Lots of web sites don’t work because of the lack of flash support, also seems stupid for something that is intended to be a web browsing and media tool.
- It seems like everyone with a web site needs to build a custom app to present their web page instead of using the browser. This does allow them to have a richer user experience than you get with the browser, but what a mess having the IT folks of every company needing to maintain an app for every customer OS to access their web sites. And since browsers are the main focus of defense against cyber attacks on the client, having an app for every companies web site opens up a whole new security issue that I don’t believe most organizations are ready for.
All in all, I have to admit that I like it a lot, even with these short comings. I don’t think its something I would carry around with me, its too big, and the iPhone is the thing to use for that. But as a device whose home base is the kitchen table where anyone can pick it up and walk around the house using… its a hit! Its beautiful, fun, fast, impressive, and VERY easy to use. I am sure the iPad 2 will address the short comings in a year. This is a great foundation to build on. And, more diversity in computing platforms is good for everyone!
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