From my experience with the iPad 1, the browsing is kind of slow (not sure about the iPad 2). If it's just for web browsing and not the convenience of having a portable iOS device, I would get something with a desktop OS. An 11" Macbook Air sounds good.
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All I need is a web browser. Ipad or touchpad???
- Thread starter kashyap02004
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From my experience with the iPad 1, the browsing is kind of slow (not sure about the iPad 2). If it's just for web browsing and not the convenience of having a portable iOS device, I would get something with a desktop OS. An 11" Macbook Air sounds good.
Chromebook, maybe? Should cost as much as the iPad and it might give you a similar-to-laptop browsing experience. Just thinking different.
He said he already has a laptop, meaning he doesn't want anything that will allow him to feel like he's carrying a laptop.
iPads best, but since all u want is a browser, the Touchpads where it's at.
is the op sure about this? all they want to do is browse the web? no email. no downloading PDFs. no downloading powerpoints. no file uploads. no sending links to friends. no uploading pictures to sites like facebook. really?
well, i never buy unsupported tech devices (software updates are crucial these days), but i suppose you could get a dead-end piece of technology like the touchpad then. 250 dollars is a lot of money to spend on browsing the web, if you ask me. a tablet can be so much more interesting!
well, i never buy unsupported tech devices (software updates are crucial these days), but i suppose you could get a dead-end piece of technology like the touchpad then. 250 dollars is a lot of money to spend on browsing the web, if you ask me. a tablet can be so much more interesting!
I purchased one of the $99 firesale TouchPads, and for $99 it's ok, but I probably wouldn't repurchase for $250. The browser is somewhat slow, tends to "checkerboard" a lot, and is blurry for a second or so after pinching to zoom in/out. And I even had preware installed with the over clocking patch. It will play flash games pretty well once you adjust to how the player works (double tap to interact with the flash app) then pinch to zoom out to interact eith thr page as normal. I played scrabble on Facebook with some patience.
Edit: I just remembered that devs are currently hacking the touchpad for android. Given enough time, with android it would be a killer device (android on rooted nook color works great.)
Edit: I just remembered that devs are currently hacking the touchpad for android. Given enough time, with android it would be a killer device (android on rooted nook color works great.)
think this through very carefully. i know the cheaper product can be very enticing, but think of what you're giving up. the touchpad will have nothing near the polish and smoothness that you've come to expect from apple products. and while that doesn't seem like a huge deal when all you want is a portable web browser, it is i promise you. the second any part of the experience or interface lags you're going to absolutely hate using the product.
not to mention with iOS 5 you'll have reading list /book marks that will sync automatically back and forth between your macbook pro and ipad/iphone with no effort on your part built right into safari.
don't cheap out, you'll end up paying for it in the long run. if price is a big issue to you, get a refurb iPad 1 (thats what i did, as i already have a macbook pro too) and i have regretted nothing.
you might think all you're looking for is a web browser, but just wait until you get it. you'll be using it more and more. soon enough it'll be your preferred go to quick device and you'll have more apps than you ever thought you would.
its as smooth as your macbook pro but never gets warm and the battery will last you a week on one charge.
if you want a tablet, there is no such thing as a tablet market. there is an iPad market, and there are good reason for that.
good luck
not to mention with iOS 5 you'll have reading list /book marks that will sync automatically back and forth between your macbook pro and ipad/iphone with no effort on your part built right into safari.
don't cheap out, you'll end up paying for it in the long run. if price is a big issue to you, get a refurb iPad 1 (thats what i did, as i already have a macbook pro too) and i have regretted nothing.
you might think all you're looking for is a web browser, but just wait until you get it. you'll be using it more and more. soon enough it'll be your preferred go to quick device and you'll have more apps than you ever thought you would.
its as smooth as your macbook pro but never gets warm and the battery will last you a week on one charge.
if you want a tablet, there is no such thing as a tablet market. there is an iPad market, and there are good reason for that.
good luck
I love the iPad, but I'm going to tell you to go with a Touchpad. Flash works extremely well on it too.
It's perfectly capable for browsing the web. In fact, it'll be better because it has flash since so many elements of the web are flash-based.
It's perfectly capable for browsing the web. In fact, it'll be better because it has flash since so many elements of the web are flash-based.
If all you want is a browser the touchpad is fine. It browsers the web beautifully- I picked one up for my mom. Be warned though, browsing the web is a gateway drug on tablets. You'll likely find yourself wanting more.
Really? My brother, who owns one, mentioned that there's still certain things you can't access; it's not perfect. Also, he's aggravated by the fact that it has memory leakage issues; this has resulted in him having to restart, even though he closes all the cards when asked to. He's used his roommate's ipad and for him, it's that much better. Unlike me, he's not a mac fan, if that makes any difference. He can't even tell the mac notebooks apart from one another.
I guess it depends on the sort of browsing the OP wants to do.
I guess it depends on the sort of browsing the OP wants to do.
the question to me is not 500 iPad vs 250 TP. The question is whether the OP will pay another 500 later if he acquires the TP now.
I think what the op will realize later on is that a tablet is so convenient that he will start doing more stuff on it like streaming video, email, little games, and then he will find out there are many diffent apps to play with.
Seriously, I will take the TP if it's 99 but for 250?? I would rather pay the difference. If you have micro center around, they were selling iPad 2 for 449. Also, I'd rather have a refurbished iPad 1 for that price than an obsoleted product but that's just me.
I think what the op will realize later on is that a tablet is so convenient that he will start doing more stuff on it like streaming video, email, little games, and then he will find out there are many diffent apps to play with.
Seriously, I will take the TP if it's 99 but for 250?? I would rather pay the difference. If you have micro center around, they were selling iPad 2 for 449. Also, I'd rather have a refurbished iPad 1 for that price than an obsoleted product but that's just me.
I never did manage to snag a $99 Touchpad, but tested it at Office Depot and completely disagree as far as video quality. And trust me, I'd love nothing more than for iSwifter to be great since I actually own an iPad. Granted, this is with relatively high bandwidth requiring vids (of figure skating to boot so need to be smooth). It's possible that iSwifter performs better with different material. But for me, there wasn't a comparison. Same with the Playbook btw.
That said, if you don't want Flash the best investment is likely a refurb/used first gen iPad for all the extra apps on top.
Surprised nobody else mentions it here. From what I gather Touchpad has probably the worst performing browser among the major tablets with the latest hardware. If the OP is really all about saving money, I'd rather wait for something like the upcoming Archos Android tablets with the OMAP chip or even one of those low end Tegra2 Android tablets as they all likely will outperform the Touchpad in browsing stuff.
My opinion is that you don't buy a mobile device to browse Flash unless you're really desperate or need to access *ahem* streaming sites that aren't available in another format. I'm still scratching my head whenever I read someone claim how great Flash is on Playbook. Maybe the one I'm using hates me and intentionally makes Flash run slower.
You may be right, I just stating my experience of using both the ipad2 and a touchpad 32gb that I did some tweak to optimize speed and ram for a month side by side eveyrday, from testing YouTube and several flash heavy site, touchpad browser was having either buffering issue or slow responses on flash games website. It get to the point i thought my touchpad was bad, went to precentral.net forum and noticed a lot of people are having issue as well, when tested side by side with Iswifter, Iswifter delivers faster response...
I love webos's card feature but since I'm using ios5 on my ipad2, I didn't think touchpad can compare well when using both with flash based website and others, I do also considered that iPad 2 is faster than the touchpad based on my own Benchmark.
Maybe I am used of using the ipad2, but at the end I like ipad2 more than the touchpad, in fact the Lenovo tablet was better than the touchpad. BUT, if you ONLY need it for web browsing, touchpad is cheaper, but if you would like to use it more than browsing, invest on an ipad2