PS3 has also only 256M RAM, but it handles the most graphics intensive games very well. It's pretty up to the developers to make the best use of the limited hardware.
Got a tip for us?
Let us know
Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
iPad Tech Specs: Cortex A8, 256MB Ram, PowerVR SGX 535
- Thread starter MacRumors
- Start date
- Sort by reaction score
PS3 has also only 256M RAM, but it handles the most graphics intensive games very well. It's pretty up to the developers to make the best use of the limited hardware.
...and I was writing about software problems, not hardware (read my post). I don't "fix" PCs and I don't "fix" Macs... I use them and figuring out why a PC has decided to stop doing something it was doing just fine and I haven't added other applications or done a thing to the OS.
Yeah, the battery life is impressive. No touch screen and it's still a clamshell laptop. Would be interesting see what the real world battery life is.
But, we are discussing tablet type things here with customized touch interfaces so I don't see the relevancy.
Speed is bit dissapponting but if I can get my tasks done I don't care. Give me good vnc app so I can control my windows and Linux servers. Give me good mail app, fairly good browser and a word processor and I am golden. I can already do 70 percent of my tasks on my iPhone. I think the ipad can bring that to 90 percent.
Well, there are netbook with touchscreen interfaces too. Besides, the bigger the screen, the less attractive the touch aspect of it is and there are very few applications that really benefit from the touch aspect (like piano emulators). I was just arguing that iPad is not making any revolution as some are trying to claim. It wll clearly be useful in some scenarios (so far, the couch seems to be the consensus).
$1300 which is about as much as iPad will cost when accounting for all the necessary accessories
But seriously, it's not the point. You are not arguing that netbooks costing $300 are better solution than iPad, or do you?
I'm pretty sure it will. Whether you think its a great device or a crappy one.
Shoot, I almost bought a 16Gb WiFi one for $500 just for the hell of it. I don't need one, and $500 for a college student isn't pocket change, but I really almost bought one just so I could say that I had an iPad when it first came out.
You'd be a chick magnet (or guy magnet) at Starbucks - for sure.
Say no more....
No, it won't be *obsolete* for a few weeks - when the Windows slates hit the market.
Really, how many people consider a few mm of thickness as the deciding factor in a purchase?
At least a Microsoft (nice touch on the dollar sign, brainiac) netbook would have a freakin' CALCULATOR!!!!!!!!
I will go on record: Slates will _fail_. Where fail is defined as not selling more than 1/10th the amount iPads will.
This conjecture is based on all previous MS attempts at tablets (some of which I've owned and used for years). They are _not_ general consumer devices that will make millions of people go out and pick them up.
Feel free to post this post all over the place in the event I am wrong.
bought my ipad yesterday, and i must say this forum depressed me...until i used it and realized that what all the haters say doesn't matter bc it does everything i want it to do. sure 512 would have been nice, but i'm not really suffering from 256, and neither will most people. i dropped 599 for a 32 and 40 for the case plus tax of course, which is a lot of money for me since i'm a junior in college preparing to go get my J.D. after next year, but for school this thing is going to be great. i'm not trying to replace my laptop, bc i just want something very portable that i can carry in my backpack and get a full day's use out of to view pdfs and word documents, surf the web, listen to music, etc. i'm not sure what kind of hardcore computing people were planning to do on this, but this thing is as responsive as my macbook pro for the stuff i care about. i saw a link for 42 reasons why a netbook is better, and i kind of laughed. unless you have a desktop, having a netbook is as useless as anything i can think of. the things honestly are crap and i'd never even think about getting one...i'd just take my macbook pro along because whats a couple pounds and a few inches of screen size? the ipad is a different kind of device, and the reason why it should kill netbooks is bc of that. it offers something more portable than a netbook that can serve a slightly different purpose than a laptop, instead of just being a miniature piece of crap laptop. the only thing i'm not sure about is multitasking in 4.0. i'm in finance right now, so i'm not exactly an engineer or technical computer guy (just an enthusiast), but could apple not change the software to incorporate virtual ram to help out multitasking? thinking about apple in a corporate sense, it just wouldn't make any sense to put out a device incapable of handling an OS a few months out when they have to be testing the OS on it already. it would be so much worse than the debacle with the original iPhone's drop in price, bc instead of the price model failing, the whole first generation of the device would be a failure. if they have any plans to turn the ipad into a decade long success like the ipod, they won't get away with crippling it months after the original release. their stock would plummet and so would brand loyalty if potentially millions of people were screwed over for that much cash.
Its not just the thickness but the nice aluminum back and bright screen. Its hard to put an exact price on how much the look and feel of any product are worth but I would probably shell out at least $100 more for the Apple look than the cheap plastic of most netbooks and PCs. If Im going to use a product for the next two years, I'd like it to look classy.
If you turn down the brightness and adjust the thing to black out the screen everything you pause between keystrokes, you get UP TO 3.5 hours of use with the standard battery. If you put in the Extended Battery, and practice the same battery saving options, you get the 14 hours, but then the weight hits the moon.
The Sony Vario is a great computer, but it's an also-ran in the world of laptops and represents the best that can be done with the OLD paradigm.
So, as I said (third time now), the iPad is designed to maximize both power consumption and portability bulk. Somehow you can't seem to understand plain English so I put it in bold this time.
You know, most of the time a computer with windows on it crashes, it's because the user did something remarkably stupid on it
And most computer users do remarkably stupid things (the problem is between the chair and the keyboard) from time to time, but instead of blaming themselves, usually blame the computer. That's part of Apple's magic, they make it harder for typical users to do something stupid enough that they have to blame somebody else, like Apple, instead of themselves.
I already have Acer Aspire One
replaced my dead battery - 512Mb RAM iBookG4. To upgrade the RAM and buy a new battery needs ~$300 so I thought I'd go with Aspire One. (btw, it cracked my brain. Will never go that direction again)Sure it can do more, but IMO sometimes for everyday use we only need a simple something like iPad. Stay connected on the kitchen, on the road, or some other places without the need of "laptop" form factor.
Ask non-geeky people do they like to carry around a netbook or an iPad? (and also tell them the iPad is only 1GHz Cortex 8 with 256Mb of RAM)
If, whatever reason it will fail then let it fail (like MBA, what a joke). Indeed iPad is very crippled! But the true difference is in the easiest access to do something simple.
No, I am not a customer for apple products. Not as long as I can find alternatives that give me more for less cash, and if wanting to spend my money somewhat efficiently makes me a share cropper than so be it
The PS3 actually have 256MB FOR THE VIDEO ALONE. And another 256MB, if I'm right. That makes 512MB. Having said that, the PS3 does not multitask and hasn't got a camera.
Jesus do I have to spell everything out? Fixing PCs incorporates software and hardware. Its not my experience that PCs just "stop working", and that is experience with hundreds of PCs. Usually its the user has done something they shouldn't.
Apple intention = tablet MBP?? not really...think about it a little more
Everyone is commenting on the iPad as though Apple contacted them saying: "Yes, we have seen the demand for a tablet macbook pro computer and will provide it!"
Thats not the message guys. If you stop, take a deep breath from the angst and hype that so easily clouds and think about how Apple (Steve) works you'll get a better idea of what its about.
They're thinking revolution from the ground up, that is, from the simple users and when the timing is right, they'll think about the pros.
The point?
The iPad is the barebones computer that the everyman joe really uses a computer for: email, internet browsing, media for fun, apps/games.
In a way what it lacks in flexibility it makes up for in practicality: Most of us have macbooks and macbook pros that we really don't quite "need". Yes we do end up finding roles for our laptops to play in our lives and it certainly is convenient but I would wager that a large percentage of the new mac users don't use their machines for 80% of what they're capable of.
The iPad steps into the direction of addressing this, and i'd argue in the long run potentially simplifying people's lives:
*It's relatively low priced (answering the demand for cheaper Mac computing option)
*As I stated previously its the bare bones of computing 'needs': email, communication, web browsing, text reading, typing? (remains to be seen how effective it is over a physical keyboard)
*It has an accessible and simple GUI (even more so than typical apple products) - with 1 app function at a time (which i think actually can help with slowing down peoples fast paced multitasking lives)
*** Ultimately what you have is a computer that does the 'essential' things that 100% of all users do, at a lower price, thats easy to learn and i'd say even master. It taps into markets that are potentially untappable - i.e. older generation thats not computer savy. Those who want the essentials of computing without the extra stuff (price tag)
The point is: Stop trying to conform it into the macbook pro tablet we mac fanatics have been drooling over, thats not what it is...perhaps in the future Apple will address the demand but for now I really think its just trying a different approach to opening up new markets.
I'd say it has potential to start shifting things to change but we'll have to see how it performs, and what niche it eventually carves out for itself.
Everyone is commenting on the iPad as though Apple contacted them saying: "Yes, we have seen the demand for a tablet macbook pro computer and will provide it!"
Thats not the message guys. If you stop, take a deep breath from the angst and hype that so easily clouds and think about how Apple (Steve) works you'll get a better idea of what its about.
They're thinking revolution from the ground up, that is, from the simple users and when the timing is right, they'll think about the pros.
The point?
The iPad is the barebones computer that the everyman joe really uses a computer for: email, internet browsing, media for fun, apps/games.
In a way what it lacks in flexibility it makes up for in practicality: Most of us have macbooks and macbook pros that we really don't quite "need". Yes we do end up finding roles for our laptops to play in our lives and it certainly is convenient but I would wager that a large percentage of the new mac users don't use their machines for 80% of what they're capable of.
The iPad steps into the direction of addressing this, and i'd argue in the long run potentially simplifying people's lives:
*It's relatively low priced (answering the demand for cheaper Mac computing option)
*As I stated previously its the bare bones of computing 'needs': email, communication, web browsing, text reading, typing? (remains to be seen how effective it is over a physical keyboard)
*It has an accessible and simple GUI (even more so than typical apple products) - with 1 app function at a time (which i think actually can help with slowing down peoples fast paced multitasking lives)
*** Ultimately what you have is a computer that does the 'essential' things that 100% of all users do, at a lower price, thats easy to learn and i'd say even master. It taps into markets that are potentially untappable - i.e. older generation thats not computer savy. Those who want the essentials of computing without the extra stuff (price tag)
The point is: Stop trying to conform it into the macbook pro tablet we mac fanatics have been drooling over, thats not what it is...perhaps in the future Apple will address the demand but for now I really think its just trying a different approach to opening up new markets.
I'd say it has potential to start shifting things to change but we'll have to see how it performs, and what niche it eventually carves out for itself.
Don't worry. I'm on it.
Took me all but 5 minutes to whip this up. Oh, no need to thank me. It was my pleasure.
Attachments
Hi,
Maybe this has been brought up in the past 23 pages of discussion, but is there any reason why the iPad couldn't ACCESS RAM from the 16, 32, or 64 gigs that it has as storage? System 7 or 8 had virtual memory that used the hdd, but given that the iPad is all memory on a stick it wouldn't slow down things that much.
Maybe I am completely misunderstanding this.
Also, I never buy the first generation of anything and the magical iPad will have to wait until the bugs are ironed out a bit before I'll bite. But I will bite.
s.
Maybe this has been brought up in the past 23 pages of discussion, but is there any reason why the iPad couldn't ACCESS RAM from the 16, 32, or 64 gigs that it has as storage? System 7 or 8 had virtual memory that used the hdd, but given that the iPad is all memory on a stick it wouldn't slow down things that much.
Maybe I am completely misunderstanding this.
Also, I never buy the first generation of anything and the magical iPad will have to wait until the bugs are ironed out a bit before I'll bite. But I will bite.
s.
The Sony Vario X costs $1300 or more... but Lilo has mixed the weight specs and battery life specs for two different batteries. The standard Battery will run the Vario for 3.5 hours tops if one cripples the computer to get maximum use. Keep in mind that the iPad will go 10 hours, straight out, with the sound and video running full time...no sleep modes or screen darkening.
The whole deal is that there is, at present, a maximum power density that the best batteries can do, so the only solutions to have extended portability is to (a) consume less power, or (b) add to the bulk/weight of the portable product.
The old paradigm is hitting the wall about where Apple's new paradigm is starting out.
The MBA is all but a complete failure for Apple. What does Apple call failures again? Oh, yeah... a "HOBBY"! hahahaha
Enjoy your Apple TV. Oops, I mean iPad.
Much like how there's a reason there's no camera on an iPod Touch. lol Gotta love this "grand" company, eh? heh