In the last 17 days that the iPad has been available from Apple, I have had a countless number of conversations about it with others. All of these conversations ended in exactly the same way… No one wanted one and no one could find a good use for one. It just seemed like a big waste of money. The general consensus was that the iPad was a bloated, over sized, and over priced iPod Touch or iPhone. Well, as always, I wanted to give the new technology a fair shake.. So on Saturday I went to the local BestBuy to check one out.
That was a huge mistake. After getting 10 minutes of time in front of the new device, it was very clear to me… I had to have one of these! Yes folks.. I am weak! Put something shiny in front of me to play with and I must have one! Funny thing was that one of the other employee’s I had previously had a conversation about the iPad with was also at BestBuy, playing with an iPad. She agreed that after getting a few minutes with the device, she wanted one too. Immediately we checked with one of the sales reps working in the store and of course.. they are out of stock.
After spending a couple of days trying to source one from multiple retail outlets and CraigsList, I gave up and ordered one online direct from Apple. Then last night, I stumbled across a “In Stock” notification on Best Buy’s website. I made some calls to verify stock and drove across town only to have them sold out when I got there 20 minutes later. I had that location check the stock at some other locations and was able to secure one over the phone at another location, which they weren’t supposed to do. This is one of those times when you are thankful that not all employee’s follow “company policy” all of the time.
So now I have one. A shiny new iPad wifi edition with 64GB of storage. After getting a chance to use it off and on for the last 24 hours, here is how it actually breaks down in all the categories that actually matter:
Look and Feel
The device is no different then a iPod touch or a iPhone in this regard. The operating systems are almost exactly the same and all of the buttons are located in the same spots. The screen on the iPad certainly is larger and there is no way your going to fit it into your pocket. With that in mind, looking at the online specs you might get the impression that the screen is too large. That is not the case. Once the iPad is in your hands, it’s easy to hold on to and seems as if it’s just the perfect size.
Weight
The iPad weighs in at a minor 1.5 pounds. This is great when compared to a laptop or a net book. It’s not too heavy but certainly has enough weight to it that you don’t feel like you are going to snap the device in half. The 17″ laptop I normally carry around is about 7.5 pounds, so this is a huge improvement over that.
Screen
The screen resolution on the iPad is nothing short of amazing. When reading a book or watching a movie the picture is just incredible. I could easily see using the iPad to watch a movie or read a book during a flight or a commute (when you’re not the one driving). The picture while watching Disney/Pixar’s Cars looks just as good as it does on Blu-Ray on my Sony Bravia 52″ Television.
Applications
When looking online at Apple’s site, I got the impression that the iWorks applications were going to be included with the iPad. This is not the case, they are available for you to purchase in the iTunes Application Store, but they didn’t come loaded on the device. The applications that do come default on the device are Safari (a web browser), Email, Contacts, Calendar, iPod, Videos, Pictures, Notes, and YouTube. These are exactly the same applications that come loaded on the iPod touch when I purchased that. In the iTunes store there are many applications available for the iPad, many of which are free. The paid applications mainly cost between 5.99 and 9.99 for good quality programs. There are some applications that have not yet made a iPad compatible version, however the iPod/iPhone versions do seem to run on the newer device. The only problem with these programs is that they open in a iPod sized window and don’t make use of the nice large screen you just paid for. There is an option to blow them up to nearly full screen but typically they don’t look good when this is done. With that in mind every one of the apps I really wanted to use today had an iPad version except FaceBook, hopefully they will get that fixed sooner then later.
Book Reading
This deserves its own section as this will be a major use for this device. Apple has come up with it’s own iBooks app (free to download) that you can use to purchase books from the iBooks store at reduced rates. Amazon, the largest book dealer on the planet, also has a Kindle application for the iPad to use with their Kindle book store. After using both of these applications for a minor period of time, I like the iBooks app more. The main reason I like it more because it has more eye candy built into the app. The Kindle application by comparison seems very plain, however Amazon’s ebooks are cheaper and they have a much larger selection of books available. These are the things that really matter. I just wish Amazon would add a bit more eye candy to the app so there won’t be any way that Apple can gain any ground on them in this category. There is also a Marvel comic book application available for those of us that aren’t into novels… these also look amazing on the string.
Ease of Use
The iPad interface is extremely easy to get comfortable with and use. I could easily see the most novice of users, or even my mother, being able to use it with ease after just a few minutes of playing with it. (Side Note: isn’t it amazing how quick us tech/geek guys are to throw our mothers under the bus when it comes to technology? My mother has a Droid and a data plan and plays on FB while at the tire store. There’s something wrong with that picture too.) While each application may be a little different, they all pretty much share a similar look. Also since the entire system is controlled by the full touch screen.. moving around on the iPad is a breeze.
Pitfalls
Well.. it can’t all be great can it? There are a few downfalls that I have found while using the iPad. Here is a little combined list of the pitfalls of the iPad, some of which I have found and some which others have complained about.
- No Flash: Not really a problem for me personally yet, but no.. there is no flash support on the browser. Most people will probably not run into a problem with this but almost everyone needs to bring it up as a pitfall. Apple has pretty much made it clear that they won’t be fixing flash on the device.
- No Back side Camera: Thats right, there is no camera on the back of the iPad. This means you are not going to be taking pictures of your friends using the device. This isn’t really a problem for me as I can’t realistically see holding up the iPad to take a picture. It’s a little large for that.
- No Front side Camera: This one does actually kinda suck. Apple it would have been nice to have a webcam type camera on the front of the iPad to use for video conferencing over the web. This is really the only use I could see of a front side camera, but video conferencing on the iPad would have been fun to play with.
- No Multi-Tasking: This ones a little tricky. It works.. and Doesn’t. The iPad wont let you run two apps at once. You can run one app and then close it and open another. That’s it. Many people complain about this because they want to listen to the Pandora (online radio) app and browse the web at the same time, or something similar. Well you can listen to music (via the iPOD app) and browse the web at the same time. So it seems as if your using two Apple apps you can multi-task but you can’t if the apps come from a third party. This is said to be getting fixed in the next operating system upgrade due out later in the year.
- Weird Wifi: Many users, including myself, have had some problems with slower wifi connections or some quirky wifi issues while using the device. I was able to fix my issues by changing the channel my wifi router used to broadcast it’s signal. Many users however are complaining that a device at this price level (that was specifically built to use wifi) shouldn’t have ANY problems with wifi. While I kind of agree with them, Apple has already acknowledged the problem with the wifi and has stated they will be releasing a fix for it.
Bottom Line
In the end.. after one day I give the iPad a big thumbs up. It’s fun to play with and extremely easy to use. There certainly is a place in the market for such a device. I can also see it having some very practical uses. If your going to pick one up, I would suggest you also invest in some screen covers and a carrying case for it. After shelling out that kind of cash the last thing you want to do is scratch the screen or drop it and crack the casing.
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