Damn Apple...

[eaf7s]

Seriously? Then too bad. If you'd read the entire thread, you'd have come upon the OP''s explanation of why she was initially upset. Although, even without the later clarification, the reason was kind of implicit in the OP, too. You shouldn't judge something unless you've read the whole thing.

Let the haters hate and let me be in my very happy six year long relationship haha.

I don't blame anyone for not reading the whole thing, it was very long...

 

[BigDukeSix]

I enjoyed your post very much! Thanks for sharing your thoughts.

 

[fattire357]

Road tested it today flying back to the UK. I've been reading PDFs and using Pages all day (interspersed with the occasional game of course) and I'm sitting pretty at 64%. I don't think I could ever go back lol.

That's the biggest part! I could never go for an Android tablet, cause at the end of the day, you want a tablet you can keep reading on.

I was looking at the Galaxy Nexus phone, and yeah, that's a phone and we are talking about tablets, but the total web browsing battery life is 3 hours under the most ideal conditions. That's absurd. You can't do anything with that.


The fact that I can use my iPad at work sporadically, every day, for at least 3-4 days before I'm like, darn I have to charge it, is really cool.

 

[matttye]

An iPad is something I always kinda wanted but couldn't justify buying..until my fianceé got one and I used it. It really is a brilliant experience I find myself using my iPad more than my pc now even while I'm at home in the same room as my pc.

 

[Angler]

Dude, I'd be furious if my husband bought me an extremely expensive gift without checking that it was something I wanted first. If you're trying to plan a future together, both people should be in on most buying decisions of that scale (unless you're very wealthy). And having spent much of our relationship long distance, I know how it feels to choose between a plane ticket and some other luxury.

I'm glad the OP did decide the iPad is worth it, but just because someone spends a lot of money on something doesn't mean you're obligated to fall all over yourself with appreciation if the gift was expensive but thoughtless. (In this case, it sounds like her boyfriend did correctly figure out that the iPad was a good match for her - if he'd instead spent that money on, say, a musical instrument she had no interest in learning would you still defend him?)

Or maybe you could be grateful that he surprised you and if you did not like it return it. Just another way of viewing it without being furious.

 

[Buildbright]

If my other half got mad for me buying something useful to help them in school...let's just say they would be getting mad at someone else the rest of their life. lol.

Seriously congrats and He sounds like a great guy be nice to him and remember the best way to say thank you is with lots of .... Well you know I mean.

 

[dgstan]

No mention of Facetime?

 

[Bchagey]

Good story! the iPad is a great and useful device

 

[eaf7s]

No mention of Facetime?

Still use Skype for the most part. Most friends & family on PC. It's unfortunate :-/

 

[Red 2]

Great read and I suspect it has elements that ring true for many of us. Have been there with the 'good grief, will she kill me?' type of purchase.

I also thought the iPad on release was a glorified iPod Touch , waste of money and why would I need one when I already had an iPhone etc.

Was however extremely lucky to be given an iPad 2 and have never looked back, am now a total convert and just need MS Office ( yes, I know!) to allow complete work compatabilty. A lot of humble pie was eaten as the iPad became my most valued 'gadget'. And that of my wife and children.

Also trading in for a '3' and also have the blessing of the original gift provider.

Wrote a review for a family website describing the iPad as a true gamechanger and it was/still is. Dammit, the final stage of my Appleification will hopefully soon be complete when the 5 yr old family PC gets replaced by the yet to be released new Mac.

Good luck to eaf7 and her boyfriend......

 

[EIGHTYTHREE]

WARNING: a long love letter!

I've always been a pretty militant iPad detractor. A huge Apple fan to be sure, but I never understood why someone with a laptop and an iPhone would see any value whatsoever in a slightly larger version of their phone and a slightly more useless version of their laptop. A bit of a novelty factor, perhaps, but overall I really just saw them as giant money pits.

I live, study, and work in Bristol, England, (and have for three years) but I am originally from Louisville, Kentucky and that is where my boyfriend of forever lives and works (for Apple). Needless to say, I am constantly on the go and as a student working on a dissertation, I'm always lugging around hundreds of pages of articles over which I pore for hours on end with a highlighter in one hand (and typically a bourbon neat in the other). Between binders full of scientific journal articles and my 13" MBP, it goes without saying that my bag gets pretty hefty at times and my shoulder often suffers for it.

Long story short, I was fairly furious when my boyfriend surprised me with an iPad as an early gift for our 6th Valentine's Day together. I am home for the week and kind of broke the bank getting here so the idea of spending god knows what (I really don't know what - it's a 16GB white AT&T version but he had his discount and some old gift cards) seemed like the biggest money pit on the planet. Until I used it for five minutes.

I've got iTunes Match and am all set up in the cloud between my phone and computer. Five minutes of in-store setup over wifi and I almost had the entire device tailored perfectly to my normal specifications. I bought a PDF reader/editor in the store and ported almost a hundred to-be-read articles over just to test the viability of using it for work. I'd always detested the idea of not having paper in hand. I won't miss it for a second. It has honestly revolutionized the way that I work overnight. Sorting and searching the documents is a breeze; highlighting and marking them up is just plain fun. Maybe it's just new-device puppy love but I am actually having fun writing papers that normally make me want to swallow battery acid. Pages and Numbers for the iPad are incredibly easy and intuitive, and I can honestly say that I haven't missed the tactile keyboard for a second. What used to weigh my bag down around ten pounds now weighs barely more than a paperweight.

And that's just the boring stuff. While text and curved edges feel a bit **** when I've grown used to the 4S retina display, the colors and contrast are brilliant. Games and video look fantastic and the battery does not seem worse off for it--I've been watching television on it, playing games, surfing the Internet, and (grr) working on it on and off for 16 hours and it's only at 49%. I can't find enough nice words for it.

As cheesy as it sounds, Steve Jobs was not exaggerating when he dubbed the iPad an entirely new "experience." There is something infinitely more pleasing about browsing websites and working in general on this thing than my MBP. Naturally, its limited functionality keeps it from being a computer replacement, but I am going to seriously consider ditching the laptop and going desktop with the iPad as my only portable device. When coupled with iTunes match and functions such as home sharing, air play, match, and of course the crazy spectrum of apps that do everything from keeping me organized to connected to entertained, it's pretty much the whole package in the perfect size and format (I can't stress enough how pleasing navigating a tablet so perfectly responsive and intuitive as this is) for anyone on the go. I won't even go into how many ways it's a more pleasant experience than the other tablets. Perhaps it's just that--an experience rather than a tablet device.

Consider me a convert. If you're on the fence, take the leap. I can't imagine anyone regretting it. I can't wait for the 3 announcement so I can make the upgrade and [hopefully] get to take advantage of a display and processor more fully living up to the potential. I'm so excited to see where this takes us in the coming years.

I did read it all but my 1st statement will be off topic. Im from Louisville Ky and just wanted to throw u a shout out and let let you know Lville Basketball heading to Big East finals Sat night.....now back to topic, what you just wrote was a great piece. Here's what i take away from the many websites i read.... people always complain about everything thats newly released. I love new tech, no matter who makes it. So when someone finds the perfect device let me know. If its not apple the conversation is " they need to be more like apple, they need to do "this" like Apple, they need to this "that" like apple, but when companies make something thats even remotely resembles Apple, then its dissed and called an Apple clone and an Apple (product) wannabe.WTF can't have it both ways...like I said I love new tech and new gadgets and so like you I'm also excited where each new tech release takes us.

Its funny... if all these know-it-alls that comment on forums know what a perfect product should be then why don't they go ahead and make it already so we can quit arguing....just saying.