Thats what the macbook is for buddy. If Apple offered something like that it would be a 1000 bucks, and then everyone would cry out foul. The macbooks are small enough to be carried around.
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Apple Tablet Media Event Today: 'Come See Our Latest Creation'
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The market (i.e. "people") will make the ultimate decision based on sales numbers. I think you'll be surprised.
Probably from all those newly-homeless people (from mortgage resets and subsequent foreclosures) trying to get out of the cold.
It doesn't look good right now.
You forgot to mention Apple products.
A real revolutionary device? Like a magic carpet you can fly on? I don't think Apple introduces computers for the average geek like you and me. They have a broader vision and market in mind that is not limited to you and me. They want to capture segments of the market never tapped into before. I am tired of the me-me attitude of some individuals here.
We all might own something like this in the future, but I'm pretty sure it won't be this. I have to think that if Apple had announced their own Lenovo U1 kind of thing, like an Arrandale-based MBP with detachable iPad screen, there would be a stampede of orders right now.
To put all your physical media onto it perhaps? Why buy all that music again when you can just rip and sync?
Granted you can't do that if you don't have another computer, but the point I was making was that if you didn't have a another computer, why would not be able to sync with something you don't have be a problem?
The iPad will work just fine if you don't have a computer, it's only you won't be able to do some of the things you would have been able to do if you did have a computer!
Yeah, except that everyone here wants the same thing... lolI don't think Apple introduces computers for the average geek like you and me. They have a broader vision and market in mind that is not limited to you and me. They want to capture segments of the market never tapped into before. I am tired of the me-me attitude of some individuals here.
That's why Apple made this thing called the Multi-touch trackpad, so that scrolling is flicking with your finger.
The laptop screen is also higher res, so it's not the wrong shape, it just means you can view pages side by side vs 1 page at a time. Much more efficient.
Not to mention the iPad is an atrocious notes taking device. A laptop is far superior in that arena. And you spend much more time in class taking notes than reading ebooks.
God damn, when will people realize that Flash is simply the application with which one controls playback of H.264 content?! Flash is necessary to play/pause/fast forward/etc content but by no means is it necessary to decode video. Hulu, at one point, was working on a native application to play their content (which leads me to believe their content is already encoded in H.264). Ever wonder how YouTube videos play on your iPhone? It has dedicated hardware for it. Flash is NOT necessary unless you want crappy animated things (eg: crappy web-games and advertisements). It is NOT necessary for video playback. Content providers need to just offer a link to the H.264 content and let the iPhone do the decoding.
So people without computers don't have large CD collections ? Because CDs only work on computers right, they never sold these things called CD players... I guess you could always repurchase your entire music collection...
Seriously, the iPad isn't really as useful as a single computer. You still need a real one to manage your media efficiently.
I know it's pompous of me to say so, but I think Steve Jobs made a mistake when he presented it as "the middle ground" between an iPhone/iPT and a laptop. Because if you use an iPhone/iPT and a laptop (as a portable device) in your daily life, what does the iPad bring to the table that the other two don't? Nothing that I can see. If it's a matter of just screen size for tasks like surfing/reading/emailing/watching video, the laptop covers that nicely.
I can see a use for it because I don't really use the portability of my laptop. It spends 99% of it's life on a desk connected to an external display, keyboard and mouse. And the handful of things I do use it "in the field" for - watching videos, surfing the web, email and basic note-taking - I can do with the iPad and spend less money and suffer less complexity.
So, again solely in my opinion, it should have been offered exactly as it is - a larger iPhone/iPT for people who don't want or don't need a laptop, pushing how the larger display and form factor make surfing/reading/emailing easier and also make movies/tv shows more appealing to watch than doing these tasks on an iPhone/iPT.
Most people realistically would not compare an iPhone / iPT to a laptop, both because it's too small and because Apple didn't suggest it. But they are doing so with the iPad because Apple placed that seed in the minds. And Apple should not have done that, IMO.
Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!
All I'm saying is that you don't NEED another computer to own/use an iPad. It's not like a classic iPod where it was a completely useless unless you had a computer. Sure, you can't rip your CD collection to it without a computer, but that's not the same as HAVING to have a computer to use it is it?
"Hey, how you getting on with your new iPad? "
"Great, except I can't sync it with my computer"
"How come? Anyway, I didn't think you had a computer?"
"I think that may be the problem"
I have to be honest with myself.
I barely use the capabilities of my laptop. I use it to surf the web, check e-mail, and such... and that is about it.
And frankly, that is a waste of all that equipment, and money.
At work, I use my workstation desktop Mac... and it stays at work.
At home, I don't want to work. I barely even want to acknowledge that I have a job...
I love the easy functionality of my iPhone. As a phone it is ridiculously intuitive to use and manage. (and mine is just a 1st gen, running the latest software, and about 60 apps... most of which I barely use, but are kind of fun.)
But the iPhone is too small to be my evening forum posting and news reading entertainment.
The laptop is big, heavy-ish, and frequently is tethered by it's power cord, but it is a nice experience. But what does that experience cost...
And when I leave home on a trip... the cables, and cords, and stuff... all has to come along. and is not online until I find a wifi network.
an iPad, however... could replace my laptop. It won't replace everyone's laptop, though... some people use theirs much more in-depth than I happen to do.
It could show me the web content I want to see in the evenings. It would stay online for a passenger in the car, or a map, not to mention be a portable video player for them... it would go with a minimum of cabling, such as a dock cable and AC adapter. (which my iPhone also requires on a trip already)
With a non-portable central machine at my home, a desktop, or a home-theater integrated mac doing the heavier lifting, I could definitely see an easy touch-based interface being the "front end" of my at-home computer use.
Things it needs:
1: Camera dongle. A video/still camera, possibly with an LED light/flash, maybe even infra-red illuminator... Unplug when not needed. They could even make the camera head swivel 180 degrees, for objective use or video call/chat. Or it could be dual-headed.
2: GPS antenna. The case back is aluminum... not great for radio waves anyway... a GPS receiver dongle in plastic, with an integrated antenna would not need to be big... and all of the sudden... you have iPhone-like behavior. iPhone is probably the preferred size for portable GPS device behavior, anyway... and not everyone perhaps would want a GPS in their iPad, just for around-the-house use. Maybe if it has a 30-pin pass-thru, the GPS and camera dongles could co-operate and provide an augmented reality system.
3: An aftermarket stylus, or finger tip point, for more precise graphical use. draw-on tablet peripherals are going toward underlying display... this has similar appeal, and will be seen by people as a digital sketchbook. Brushes already shows that Apple is thinking along the same lines.
4: VNC, or Apple-official screen sharing app. This device is actually big enough to work as a temporary control device for a remote computer. VNC already exists as an iPhone app... so it is already largely in place. Apple could perhaps even do better, as a companion to their "Remote" iTunes control app.
5: most important:
Imagination.
There are all sorts of places to take this tech. It may not be as well featured as it could be, it may not be perfect. Hardly anything ever is... But that doesn't mean there is no potential worth exploring.
Frankly, I would love to get ahold of an iPad and the recently demo'd Parrott quad-copter that flies by app-control. If it was great on an iPhone... imagine it on an iPad. There's your camera, right there... a UAV!
Honestly... if it isn't for you... there is something else that is right for you, and it very well could be a laptop, or an iPhone, or an iPod, or some other company's product.
But as for failure... I don't think it will be, even if it isn't a brand new concept. iPhone/iPodTouch can only be introduced as a new concept once. Scaling it up can't possibly live up to that gestalt shift.
What might fail, is the iPod Touch... caught in limbo between the iPad, and the iPod Nano with a camera....
I could see the iPod Touch and Nano fusing into one multi-touch product... camera equipped, multi-touch screen, iPhone/iPad OS, but smaller than iPhone by a slight amount, OLED screen, longer battery life, and all the more portable... like the nano's shape already is.
Drop the classic. Leave the shuffle tiny and screen-less... and then you would have just the iPod, the hybridization of current Nano, and current iPT... with the tech updates expected... flash capacity, screen and camera resolution updates, and such. Maybe even dock-able with the iPad, connector to connector, to slave the camera to the iPad, or sync/share the data files.
I barely use the capabilities of my laptop. I use it to surf the web, check e-mail, and such... and that is about it.
And frankly, that is a waste of all that equipment, and money.
At work, I use my workstation desktop Mac... and it stays at work.
At home, I don't want to work. I barely even want to acknowledge that I have a job...
I love the easy functionality of my iPhone. As a phone it is ridiculously intuitive to use and manage. (and mine is just a 1st gen, running the latest software, and about 60 apps... most of which I barely use, but are kind of fun.)
But the iPhone is too small to be my evening forum posting and news reading entertainment.
The laptop is big, heavy-ish, and frequently is tethered by it's power cord, but it is a nice experience. But what does that experience cost...
And when I leave home on a trip... the cables, and cords, and stuff... all has to come along. and is not online until I find a wifi network.
an iPad, however... could replace my laptop. It won't replace everyone's laptop, though... some people use theirs much more in-depth than I happen to do.
It could show me the web content I want to see in the evenings. It would stay online for a passenger in the car, or a map, not to mention be a portable video player for them... it would go with a minimum of cabling, such as a dock cable and AC adapter. (which my iPhone also requires on a trip already)
With a non-portable central machine at my home, a desktop, or a home-theater integrated mac doing the heavier lifting, I could definitely see an easy touch-based interface being the "front end" of my at-home computer use.
Things it needs:
1: Camera dongle. A video/still camera, possibly with an LED light/flash, maybe even infra-red illuminator... Unplug when not needed. They could even make the camera head swivel 180 degrees, for objective use or video call/chat. Or it could be dual-headed.
2: GPS antenna. The case back is aluminum... not great for radio waves anyway... a GPS receiver dongle in plastic, with an integrated antenna would not need to be big... and all of the sudden... you have iPhone-like behavior. iPhone is probably the preferred size for portable GPS device behavior, anyway... and not everyone perhaps would want a GPS in their iPad, just for around-the-house use. Maybe if it has a 30-pin pass-thru, the GPS and camera dongles could co-operate and provide an augmented reality system.
3: An aftermarket stylus, or finger tip point, for more precise graphical use. draw-on tablet peripherals are going toward underlying display... this has similar appeal, and will be seen by people as a digital sketchbook. Brushes already shows that Apple is thinking along the same lines.
4: VNC, or Apple-official screen sharing app. This device is actually big enough to work as a temporary control device for a remote computer. VNC already exists as an iPhone app... so it is already largely in place. Apple could perhaps even do better, as a companion to their "Remote" iTunes control app.
5: most important:
Imagination.
There are all sorts of places to take this tech. It may not be as well featured as it could be, it may not be perfect. Hardly anything ever is... But that doesn't mean there is no potential worth exploring.
Frankly, I would love to get ahold of an iPad and the recently demo'd Parrott quad-copter that flies by app-control. If it was great on an iPhone... imagine it on an iPad. There's your camera, right there... a UAV!
Honestly... if it isn't for you... there is something else that is right for you, and it very well could be a laptop, or an iPhone, or an iPod, or some other company's product.
But as for failure... I don't think it will be, even if it isn't a brand new concept. iPhone/iPodTouch can only be introduced as a new concept once. Scaling it up can't possibly live up to that gestalt shift.
What might fail, is the iPod Touch... caught in limbo between the iPad, and the iPod Nano with a camera....
I could see the iPod Touch and Nano fusing into one multi-touch product... camera equipped, multi-touch screen, iPhone/iPad OS, but smaller than iPhone by a slight amount, OLED screen, longer battery life, and all the more portable... like the nano's shape already is.
Drop the classic. Leave the shuffle tiny and screen-less... and then you would have just the iPod, the hybridization of current Nano, and current iPT... with the tech updates expected... flash capacity, screen and camera resolution updates, and such. Maybe even dock-able with the iPad, connector to connector, to slave the camera to the iPad, or sync/share the data files.
Anybody in the year 2010 who maintains a large CD collection yet doesn't have a computer has already demonstrated that they couldn't care less about "managing their media", and never will.
How are you going to back up your data? It doesn't even have a USB port. And I wouldn't trust that it will never need to be reset to factory defaults and have everything reloaded.
Now that is a little scary. It still feels like a companion device rather than a standalone one.
Anyone remember Palm's Foleo?
Look, yes, I really do understand how it's ideal to have a "proper" computer to use your iPad in tandem with - I was just responding to an earlier post that (without wading back to find it again) seemed to suggest that there was no point having an iPad if you didn't have a computer to sync it with.
I bet there will be many of these things sold that never get connected to a computer
The latest iteration of the
TV was billed this way too, no computer necessary. Suppose you could have an iPod touch without a computer too. Seems that more and more Apple is expecting people to purchase content directly to gadgets with great potential for data loss. Hope they're rethinking their store re-download policy for media (they're doing apps just right), or perhaps developing a "backup to cloud" system.If they really want to position the iPad as a Kindle alternative, this is essential. Mom & Pop will not be happy if they lose their eBooks in a system crash.
The same can be said of iPad. With a 10 hours battery life, you're going to have to drag the power cord along. And it won't be online until you find a wifi network (unless you subscribe to a 3G data plan, which you can do from a laptop also, with a free USB stick usually included vs iPad's 130$ markup).
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