Is the iPad Overpriced and Underspecced? What should it have...

[maclook]

My real disappointments are:
iPad Name - time will tell if it gets disassociated with tampons. when someone says "pen and pad", nobody thinks pen and tampon
No camera - boo, rev2 should def have this

Now regardless of these issues, this is a beautiful piece of hardware+software. People need to stop whining and realize that it is the first of its kind so it WILL take multiple years and revisions for it to become a truly remarkable gadget. The original iPhone was so barebones compared to what it is today. Just chillax and let the iPad soak up its potential
OLED screens - are you serious? i don't even think some of the people who are asking for it know why they want it. probably because of the extra letter.
Flash support - I say stick to your guns, Apple. With youtube and vimeo implementing html5, it shows that their "boycott" of flash is working for the better
Additional gestures - I haven't seen to much about this, but i thought gameloft mentioned a 3 finger gesture being used in their game
TV tuner - wtf...
Replaceable batteries - 10 hours is a lot but will have to wait for real world tests
16:9 - this thing isn't a dedicated widescreen movie screen

 

[Cinemagic]

No USB port.

You can get an app to enable file transfer. But if you did want to watch movies on this device, then you're going to be limited by the available onboard memory. Steve's way of juicing you for more money. But other than that, if you're going on a trip and want several movies, it would be nice to be able to put them on a USB flash drive and play them from that. After all, this is supposed to be a device for entertainment, right? If you're on a flight, then you can't pay Apple for an iTunes movie. It's a nice device designed to make Apple money at every opportunity and to prevent any free entertainment.

I love my Macbook Pro. The iPad had potential, but failed to live up to it.

 

[phobic99]

I can buy alot of newspapers or magazines for $500, alot more decent ones for $800 and they can be reused in kitty litter trays or to do something useful, like, say start a small fire.

Apple will realise (one day) that by making all this hype and then letting people down doesnt do anything positive for them.

This device lacks most of the things i was hoping it would have, and being in AU where im pretty sure no carrier has micro-sim cards its pretty moot.

You can't use the iPad in your kitty litter tray or light it on fire?

Ah well, will be interesting to see how this thing sells. 2010 will be the year of the tablet PC (again) so it'll be interesting to see every developers take on these things now that the technology has improved from the first tablet PCs.

No USB port.

You can get an app to enable file transfer. But if you did want to watch movies on this device, then you're going to be limited by the available onboard memory. Steve's way of juicing you for more money. But other than that, if you're going on a trip and want several movies, it would be nice to be able to put them on a USB flash drive and play them from that. After all, this is supposed to be a device for entertainment, right? If you're on a flight, then you can't pay Apple for an iTunes movie. It's a nice device designed to make Apple money at every opportunity and to prevent any free entertainment.

I love my Macbook Pro. The iPad had potential, but failed to live up to it.

I believe the reason for this is simply because they want iTunes to be your one stop shop for everything. Well obviously but having something as simple as a USB port would deter a lot of iTunes sales. The fact that you have to sync a device such as this is another dealbreaker IMO.

 

[scott99]

I think the original post pretty much nails it. This whole Apple event sucked, as well as the iPod Touch XL announced today (I don't care what ya call it, iPad, whatever, it's an iPod Touch XL). This so called Boy Genius, or whatever he calls himself was way off on the event. No iPhone OS 4.0 talk with multi-tasking, no cameras on the ipad (stupid name to boot). All the rumors were way off. As a book reader and limited internet device (using a phones operating system, no flash, no multitasking, I wouldn't even call it a computer, there are other tablets that are actually computers). I'd possible pay $100 for a non-3G version, that's about it.

Huge disappointment, and honestly, an embarrasement for Apple. It may be very popular, but seriously, my iPhone 3G, with my kindle app, does the same stuff, and with the camera and video camera apps, does a helluva lot more. The iPhone was way more evolutionary than this joke could ever hope to be.

 

[o2xygen]

talk about putting the cart before the horse! This project is BASS-ACKWARDS!

Why was the iphone special? Because it brought a computer/phone to my POCKET. It wasn't that it had more features than a laptop (other than phone), it was that those features were truly useful/portable.
Here we have none of that-- no more portability than a laptop, no more phone, you need an accessory for a keyboard, which a macbook already has bundled neatly in, you need an accessory for a camera which a macbook has, etc.

We like an iphone not because iphone os is BETTER than osx, but because that's all that could fit in a small device. Now we just have a clunky, severely crippled device that can do less than an iphone can, and WAY less than a macbook. I can't even skype with the damn thing!

Seriously, how could it have *POSSIBLY* taken SOOO long for someone to just hook up a bigger screen to an iphone? Where's the development? Where's the research? There's nothing new here, and certainly nothing groundbreaking... It's just a dumbed down iphone with none of the iphone advantages. Years and years and years working on this? Get real...

+1. Ditch this iPad crap

 

[nikko14]

there is a REASON the ipad/iphone do NOT support FLASH!

? I never said their will be flash, I said the hacker community will likely give us the same access to Hulu as they already have done on the iPhone. If you jailbreak your iPhone, you can install a Hulu type clone that will access and play video.

I don't expect native flash on either device and never stated that in my original post.

Apple WANTS you to ONLY buy/view/use apple related content via itunes..sure it sucks that you can NOT use flash sites but think of it from Apple's perspective...if you are watching FREE content on hulu, Apple is not making additional sales $$$... I LOVE apple and they could possibly the smartest company on the globe...do you honestly think they can't figure out how to implement flash on these devices? Its all about itunes revenue. Until apple finds a way to profit from free content on site like hulu, there will be no flash on anything apple.

 

[masmullin]

It uses LCD which is poor for reading.

 

[bossxii]

Apple WANTS you to ONLY buy/view/use apple related content via itunes..sure it sucks that you can NOT use flash sites but think of it from Apple's perspective...if you are watching FREE content on hulu, Apple is not making additional sales $$$... I LOVE apple and they could possibly the smartest company on the globe...do you honestly think they can't figure out how to implement flash on these devices? Its all about itunes revenue. Until apple finds a way to profit from free content on site like hulu, there will be no flash on anything apple.

Wow people need to slow down and read what others are posting once in a while.

I never said it would happen, should happen or will ever happen.

I stated (in response to the thread topic) I would have loved to have seen flash. Then responded to someone else that can't read, I never said iPhone or iPad would ever run flash natively but the HACKERS WILL IMPLEMENT THEIR HULU CLONE.

You clearly missed the entire reason I posted why Flash was the ONLY reason I was "disappointed". As this was the topic of the thread.

 

[dave1812dave]

It uses LCD which is poor for reading.

BALONEY!! I read on various LCD screens including large (23, 25.5) and on my Touch. They all work fine for reading. I've spent hours at a time reading on my Touch, as does my wife, with no ill effects or eye strain. You MUST be a Kindler, to claim LCD's are hard to read on. I've looked at a number of e-ink screens and despise them. The contrast is WAY too low, there's no color for magazines, photos, and worst of all, there's no backlight for reading in the dark, which I frequently do on my Touch.

 

[marksman]

1) It won't rock me to sleep at night
2) It does not look like my binkie
3) It does not taste like my binkie
4) It is too big for my little hands and eyes

 

[marksman]

NT1440, Read the ArsTechnica blog.

They reported that Nova, and several of the apps were actually running slower/choppier on the iPad than they run on their iPhone 3GSs.

Heck read Apple's own site. They advertize it being able to at maximum play MPEG4s at 640x480 resolution at 30 fps. The same as an iPhone 3GS, not even HD!

So yes, I'm fairly sure it's weaker than netbooks.

Every other hands on report I read said the device performed amazingly fast.

 

[masmullin]

BALONEY!! I read on various LCD screens including large (23, 25.5) and on my Touch. They all work fine for reading. I've spent hours at a time reading on my Touch, as does my wife, with no ill effects or eye strain. You MUST be a Kindler, to claim LCD's are hard to read on. I've looked at a number of e-ink screens and despise them. The contrast is WAY too low, there's no color for magazines, photos, and worst of all, there's no backlight for reading in the dark, which I frequently do on my Touch.

Lucky you... most of us get eye strain reading a book on a monitor (yes I tried, I didn't want to shell out $200 for my sony reader). I know *I* certainly get eye strain reading on a monitor, and thats why *I* think this is a disappointment.

 

[marksman]

I can buy alot of newspapers or magazines for $500,

I guess if you subscribe to free corporate mags and buy all your books at the discount bin at half price books you could.

Normal mags and first run books are going to eat up $500 pretty quickly.

 

[masmullin]

BALONEY!! I read on various LCD screens including large (23, 25.5) and on my Touch. They all work fine for reading. I've spent hours at a time reading on my Touch, as does my wife, with no ill effects or eye strain. You MUST be a Kindler, to claim LCD's are hard to read on. I've looked at a number of e-ink screens and despise them. The contrast is WAY too low, there's no color for magazines, photos, and worst of all, there's no backlight for reading in the dark, which I frequently do on my Touch.

For the record, i was hoping for a pixel Qi screen... supposedly terrific for reading and has a high refresh rate. eInk is too slow for the tiny attentionspans of most mac users.

 

[eetu]

Why don't moaners bother to read the specs (or think) before complaining? Some of the complains here are ridiculous.

 

[tjmrpm04]

no stylus to take notes

That is being released next year as an aluminum unibody device called the iTampon.

 

[wikoogle]

The iPod and the iPhone were actual significant leaps forward when they first came out. Everyone else followed them.

And this is why I bought both devices early on, and the reason why I, like everyone else, had high hopes that this device would do something innovative, or offer something new of value.

This thing however is like taking 3 steps back. There is so much this can't do that even the iPhone that's a fifth it's size can do, and there is nothing it can do that the iPhone can't.

Apple started the presentation by saying that for a Tablet to succeed, it has to some things better than both the iPhone 3GS and a Macbook Pro do.

Then he unveiled a product that utterly fails this test. There is nothing it does better than either device.

 

[Hankster]

No Flash support. This means the browser isn't a full REAL browser. Why did they do this?

 

[Yixian]

Wow, the nerd raging here is even worse than after a Sony or Nintendo event.. Were you guys honestly expecting Jobs to pull some clunky "regular OS with a touch screen" out of his ass?

Ok, no stylus is a bit of a disappointment, and frankly it could be sleeker than it is. And in terms of the event, it's disappointing to not get a good look at buying books and magazines on iTunes..

But it's more or less everything we wanted at about half the price we expected.

Whether it's a home run or not I'm not sure, maybe not Rev A, but it's definitely good to go, it will sell and sell well and a 3rd product category is born.

No Flash support. This means the browser isn't a full REAL browser. Why did they do this?

Flash may not be dead, but it's dying. Apple is going to push HTML5, so is Google, it's the inevitable future.. and it's a pretty good one at that.

 

[TAJones99]

All the I don't likes will stop as soon as you go to apple store and put one in you hands

 

[sinsin07]

Man I want one of these things, but after reading the OPs post, what would I be actually buying? Seems like like the old Apple RDF was spun a little to tight this time. When they said magical device, I thought I missed something, but apparently not. Boy this is going to be one giant thing to be synching. I as hoping for a little more indepenence. This seems like it's just a self serving apple credit card machine. They should have at least put in a coin slot for the kiddies.

Ah man, I hope when it come out there is
ore to this than what I'm hearing.

 

[dave1812dave]

Lucky you... most of us get eye strain reading a book on a monitor (yes I tried, I didn't want to shell out $200 for my sony reader). I know *I* certainly get eye strain reading on a monitor, and thats why *I* think this is a disappointment.

"Most"? Where did you get that stat from? CRT's cause eyestrain, but with the persistence of an LCD, I can't see how that technology should bother your eyes.

 

[Wild-Bill]

No front-facing camera for iChat
No Flash
Bezel a little to thick - makes it look awkward

 

[Chris Welch]

Original poster needs to work on his reading comprehension.

The Tech Specs page clearly indicates that the models with 3G will have Assisted GPS, the same that is found in the iPhone.

 

[paduck]

I can't take credit for this line, but Apple creates products that are very innovative, but miss a few essential features and are pricey. Yet we buy them.

This product is missing a few features, but not too many. Plenty to add for an iPad 2. Bear in mind that some of the missing features (camera, iChat) might be because the cellular infrastructure doesn't exist to support the expected use at this time. I'm sure there was a deal cut with AT&T and AT&T told Apple what they could go for with cheap 3G unlimited - and it wasn't video conferencing.

Too bad they didn't put a phone in it - especially via Bluetooth. I'm sure a VOIP program will show up soon.

Apple has a good product. It isn't ideal. I'm sure the engineers at Apple are trying to come up with a fairly priced version that does most of what is on the above list.

For a lot of people, this is a nice "computer" to have around the house. It isn't too small like the iPod Touch or too big and expensive like a laptop. The netbook form factor fits nicely in a backpack for travel. This is smaller (so therefore better). It does what I want on the road - web, email, movies, music, and games. At $499 (or $630 for the lowest 3G) these will sell well. And then all the apps will start flowing...