The Microsft RT tablets (Surface, VivoTab RT, etc) are starting to roll out. The final versions of OS and Office are still being worked on, and lot of bugs will be fixed over time (key fix got rolled out last night). But I believe we now have a much better performance baseline of what we can expect out of MS Office.
I have no wish to start a flame war, or get into a very lengthy debate as to the relevancy of MS Office. For my use, I have deemed that almost seamless (or near enough) compatibility with various MS Office files is important. I have bought three separate packages for iOS that . . . sort of work. But not really. And I have decided (at least so far) that the iOS ecosystem provides me the best combination of compatibility and applications that meet my needs.
The hardware requirements of iOS and Microsoft RT (or various Android or Blackberry OSes) are definitely different. But the needs of MS Office for very high single threaded performance (currently) is a major bummer. Pretty much everything not the iPhone 5 or the fourth generation iPad may be of real limited use (if MS Office is needed/desired) given what I am reading. I am still going to buy an iPad mini (probably two, actually) given my desire to use it as a book reader, too; but I think whenever MS Office does get released for iOS next year, I will be disappointed. I think those of us in iOS-land have been relatively spoiled with the typical performance of certain Tier1 apps (which an vary quite a bit more in Android land). It seems both Apple and Microsoft have and will continue to take a heavier hand in all this.
My guess--either MS Office just will not come to those "older" devices or major functionality (key functions in Excel, PowerPoint, and Visio are what I am worried about) will not be ported over (for at least those devices). Not the end of the world, but . . .
So if you are getting one more for work use rather than eReader use, and the extra weight over time is no issue for you, the get fourth generation iPad for a $170 more. It should be worth it. If a portable iOS device much larger than an iPod touch has been your dream for a while (one of mine, I admit), here is to hoping you do not need/desire seamless MS Office functionality. Or here is to being patient for another year or so until Apple decides to put the A6 in the iPad mini.
I have no wish to start a flame war, or get into a very lengthy debate as to the relevancy of MS Office. For my use, I have deemed that almost seamless (or near enough) compatibility with various MS Office files is important. I have bought three separate packages for iOS that . . . sort of work. But not really. And I have decided (at least so far) that the iOS ecosystem provides me the best combination of compatibility and applications that meet my needs.
The hardware requirements of iOS and Microsoft RT (or various Android or Blackberry OSes) are definitely different. But the needs of MS Office for very high single threaded performance (currently) is a major bummer. Pretty much everything not the iPhone 5 or the fourth generation iPad may be of real limited use (if MS Office is needed/desired) given what I am reading. I am still going to buy an iPad mini (probably two, actually) given my desire to use it as a book reader, too; but I think whenever MS Office does get released for iOS next year, I will be disappointed. I think those of us in iOS-land have been relatively spoiled with the typical performance of certain Tier1 apps (which an vary quite a bit more in Android land). It seems both Apple and Microsoft have and will continue to take a heavier hand in all this.
My guess--either MS Office just will not come to those "older" devices or major functionality (key functions in Excel, PowerPoint, and Visio are what I am worried about) will not be ported over (for at least those devices). Not the end of the world, but . . .
So if you are getting one more for work use rather than eReader use, and the extra weight over time is no issue for you, the get fourth generation iPad for a $170 more. It should be worth it. If a portable iOS device much larger than an iPod touch has been your dream for a while (one of mine, I admit), here is to hoping you do not need/desire seamless MS Office functionality. Or here is to being patient for another year or so until Apple decides to put the A6 in the iPad mini.