From a long time the technology world has been buzzing about a tablet that mighty Apple is about to launch. We have already seen a number of mock ups and concept art that has generated our interest in this tablet. We have a number of tablet computers that we have seen from a number of companies that work fairly well with number of applications however everyone was very interested in watching the tablet that Apple is working on. After the immense success of various iPods and iPhone expectations were very high and finally on Jan 27, 2010 at the MacWorld 2010 Steve Jobs presented the new device from Apple and its name is iPad. After talking to a number of people about the iPad I got mixed reactions and I felt that it all depends on what someone expected from Apple. Some people expected it to be a tablet with a full blown OS and all the features of a Mac computer are very disappointed. It will not be wrong to say that iPad is mainly a giant iPhone and it pretty much works like one. Moreover it makes more business sense for Apple to have such a device so that they can exploit the already setup business model they developed from iPods and iPhone by just expanding it for the iPad. Yes I am talking about the Apple's App Store here. If Apple would have worked on devices which is a full computer, first of all its price would have been higher, which means that Apple will loose the kind of reach that they have with iPod and iPhone pricing. Secondly there is no revenue that they will get once the computer has been sold. On the other hand with iPad Apple earns money multiple times on the same product:
- On sale of the product
- On data plan that users get from AT&T
- On apps that users buy from the AppStore
That's a lot of cash that Apple or any business would not like to leave and they went for the iPad while keeping these revenue models in their mind.
Technical Specifications of the iPad
iPad is a very sleek device that has a screen size of 9.7 inches with a gorgeous LED-backlit glossy widescreen multi-touch display. iPad has a rechargeable lithium-polymer battery that gives a 10 hours of surfing the web on Wi-Fi, watching video or listening to music and over a month of standby time. Our favorite.. you can charge it via USB. It comes with a accelerometer and ambient light sensor. For connectivity it has Wi-Fi 802.11a/b/g/n and Bluetooth 2.1+EDR technology. iPad is powered with a 1GHz Apple A4 custom designed micro-chip.
How iPad will change things
There is no doubt that iPad is a neat device. Now it also depends on what type of person you are and what you can use it for. There is definitely scope for it and it might change the way people work in certain industries. A small example would be photographers. Its very expensive for them to get a good portfolio made and this device would be great as a ePortfolio that you can carry with you. Same utility will be for designers and web developers; it makes it very easy to do a small presentation when you are meeting a potential client and have less time.
This device has the potential to change the way print media industry works as well. We all have been debating that the print media like newspapers and magazines are dying. iPad can be the platform that revives them and the possibilities are endless. The New York Times already showed the app they have been working on and it looks great. We are sure that all other newspaper and magazine publishers are working on releasing their apps. Amazon's Kindle will face a very tough competition from the iPad. We think, to be honest, Kindle has no comparison with the iPad and it is only a matter of time before it dies. We haven't had our hands on the iPad, however it seems like that reading on a iPad will be a great experience.
iPad is not a very compact device like a cell phone and neither its a full computer. According to Steve Jobs it stands somewhere in between those two.
What Disappoints us
There are things that disappoint us and it disappointed a lot of you. So the first and the biggest disappointment is. "No Multitasking". Just like the iPhone you cant multitask on it and its a big drawback for a computing device. Blackberry has it in their phones, come on Apple how hard it could be for you to have multitasking on the iPad. Apple designed a custom chip for it and I am sure its far more difficult than designing a multitasking OS for the iPad. Secondly there is no flash support on the browser and just like iPhone you need the YouTube app to see the YouTube videos. It was funny when Steve Jobs was on The New York Times website giving a iPad's browsing experience demo and we saw the familiar flash error on the browser. There are no USB ports on the device to connect other devices and it is a big drawback. I cant connect any of the normal accessories which we can use with a normal PC or a MAC computer. Well I guess in this case we have to buy a the special "iPad Accessories".
Conclusion
Apple has a very creative team lead by the legendary Steve Jobs and the tech world has a lot of respect for the company and its team. What disappoints us is that what Microsoft has been criticized for years and where Apple was different they are doing similar things by keeping the technology proprietary and controlling everything. Hopefully Apple will not make the same mistakes and turn into an evil corporation. We will be watching this device closely and will get you the updates and a special review once it is released.
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