It’s clicked over a day now. I have had this little device for 24 hours and while I still refuse to use the world magical, “cool” and “slick” have slipped out with regular frequency.
To answer the first question I know people are asking, yes, it absolutely IS just a big iPod Touch. Now whether that is a good or bad thing is up to the beholder, but in the last day I have found that many applications GREATLY benefit from more screen real estate. The news apps are absolutely stunning. Big thumbs up to old favorites to reinvent themselves for this device. (Yes, I am talking about you Yahoo! and AOL)
Form Factor
This thing is just bout the perfect size. Any smaller and it would be less differentiated from an actual iPod Touch, any bigger and it would lose it’s ultra light, super portable feeling. I bought the Apple case for it and so far I am pretty unimpressed with it. It feels pretty flimsy and definitely sucks the grace out of the appearance.
The speakers are super tinny sounding as you might expect. They are fine for watching some video with but I wouldn’t dare use them to listen to music. That is nothing some good headphones won’t cure of course.
Usability
This thing is surprisingly typable. I have tried several times to touch type with any speed and while it works ok, I find that my other fingers barely touch the screen causing a massive 10 car pileup of letters. I was surprised to find that holding it with one hand and typing with the other is surprisingly quick and comfortable.
The touch as you would expect is incredibly accurate and responsive. This device benefits from speed to spare it feels. Any time I do something it’s immediate, it doesn’t seem to lag a bit like the iPhone and iPod Touch do when launching apps, etc.
The screen lock switch is already my best friend. Like the iPhone and iPod Touch, the sensors get a bit confused when you lay it down, which I found myself doing when using it to read in bed. The lock keeps it stuck in one position and works great.
Apps
It’s felt kind of like Christmas the last few days. There are new apps appearing all of the time. So far I have installed about 30, only a couple of which were paid (Pages and Numbers for example) Some of the highlight apps have been the Yahoo! Entertainment I mentioned earlier, USA Today, Netflix, IMDB, Epicurious, Adobe Ideas, Wikipanion, Craigsphone, Weatherbug, National Geographic World Atlas and Weatherbug. There are obviously tons more to download, but those are the ones I have really dug so far.
Kindle Killer?
On this one I have to say absolutely no. The Kindle app is one of the first I installed, and while I am probably going to take the iPad when I travel and read on it for the sake of carrying one less device, when I have access to my Kindle, I will read on the Kindle. The backlit bright screen doesn’t feel as good to read on. Reversing the text makes it better, but it’s not even close to the Kindle screen.
Netbook Killer?
The jury is still out on this one, but I will tell you an insight I did have about this topic yesterday. The iPad has one really strong thing in it’s corner. The iPad has total control of it’s ecosystem. It’s impermeable to feature creep, and it has a vice grip on what it can be used for. These restrictions actually become strengths as it keeps the device’s intent in focus and ensures you always have a pleasurable experience with it. In other words, it sets your expectations so you don’t try to do more than it’s intended to do.
A netbook on the other hand, looks and feels like a laptop. It acts like a laptop, it can even run all the software a laptop can run. The only problem is that the performance is anemic, the keyboard is uncomfortable, and the screen is just way too small. That means you might (and I did) often try to run software that it just wasn’t designed to run, and that will result in a poor user experience. That leaves you with a bad taste in your mouth, even though it’s not really the device’s fault.
The limitations actually become strengths in this battle. That being said, the iPad is by all means a media consumption device. Even with Pages, Numbers and Keynote, you aren’t going to want to do anything that requires much typing or complexity, it’s just designed to view stuff, not make stuff.
A netbook on the other hand is decent at writing long emails, blogs, etc. It’s smaller, less comfortable and somewhat weak, but you can still use it for those things.
Final Thoughts
Obviously I love the thing. I haven’t been able to keep my hands off of the thing. My wife got one yesterday also and has had the same impression. It’s a gorgeous device, it’s super fast and very fun to use. My final word, there are alot of things you could spend $500 on that you wouldn’t like near as much. If you are a gadget lover, a real internet media connoisseur or want a laptop or netbook just to watch/read/listen to content, you might want to reconsider, that’s what this device was born to do.
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Great review, I completely feel the same way. I’m still keeping my Kindle for reading but on it’s own the iPad is an all-around cool device. The one thing I noticed right away was how I would take it to the sofa or table without thinking about it. I think the iPad is great for casual consuming without the formality that the netbook brings.
This is really a great review. IPads are really cool and we just need sometime to learn how this works and in time when we get used to it, we will enjoy having it.
I think this was the first to see the gadgets a little far behind the best-selling products at this gadget. I also see there are some advantages of IPad, but for now I can not buy IPad, and still use the younger brother of the IPad , it is IPhone