What's Not To Like About New iPad? 617
Hugh Pickens writes "With 3 million sold over the last week what's not to like about the new iPad? Michelle Maltais at the LA Times does a good job of putting together a compendium of gripes about the new device, justified or otherwise. Most people thought that Siri on the new iPad was a gimme; instead it has a scaled back version — dictation. 'If you want Siri, buy an iPhone. Plain and simple.' The new iPad is a little heavier than the iPad 2, thanks to the better graphics processor and more powerful battery. At one-tenth of a pound heavier that really doesn't sound like much, but it can start to matter if you hold your iPad in one hand for long periods or have any kind of repetitive stress injury. Apps designed for Retina display can be up to five times bigger and it's not just a problem for owners of the new iPad. Legacy owners of the original and iPad 2 who have these apps get to feel the pain too, since updates aren't device specific." The list continues, below.
"The hot-selling device can reach up to 116 degrees during intensive use, according to a test by the Consumer Reports. PCWorld tested 43 tablets and found that the third-gen iPad takes the longest — almost six hours — to fully recharge its battery. You'll love the blistering speed of the 4G iPad, you won't love blowing through your monthly data allotment in just 24 hours if you use streaming video. A number of customers have been complaining on the Apple Support page about a weaker Wi-Fi connection that in some cases will hold a connection for only a few minutes. And last, whatever you do, don't drop the new iPad. From waist height, the damage to the third-gen iPad is fairly extensive. 'Only a small portion of the screen survived.'"
News... (Score:5, Insightful)
Everything is amazing [youtube.com]
Best Part is.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Note: I am not a tablet user.
Re:News... (Score:5, Insightful)
I have to agree with this.
They may have paid too much for their "how to bring more traffic to your blog by creating more drama when there is none" seminar paid by Cory "World's Most Annoying Self-Promotionist" Doctorow
The number of crap, negative and leading headlines, along with "the answer is no [wikipedia.org]" question headlines has really spiked since Malda left slashdot. Some PHB decided that they can further monetize Slashdot as a mainstream blog by destroying what little culture Slashdot has and alienating their core long time userbase. Good luck with that, assholes. I've already started looking for a replacement to Slashdot.
Re:Everything Is Amazing And Nobody Is Happy (Score:4, Insightful)
I didn't buy an iPad and I am quite happy.
Re:of any of these, only the battery thing means m (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:of any of these, only the battery thing means m (Score:5, Insightful)
Don't you sleep?
That's when my iPad's charge. I lay down at 12, 1, or 2AM, plug it in, pass out, and when I wake up it's charged and if it took an hour or six to charge I give no fucks. It's charged.
Re:Par for the course? (Score:2, Insightful)
No microphone headset or bt mouse profile
I just wish they would add bluetooth profiles to the iPad for microphone headsets and mice, although the latter I only want with RDP apps, although I think it might be handy if you were using a full-screen editor, too.
Of course there's no BT profile for BT microphone headsets and mice. This is consistent with Apple practice.
- A microphone headset would let you make private calls with VOIP apps, which might mean less calls on your iphone, or even not need your iphone at all if properly implemented.
- A mouse might allow development of apps which would require you to use your macbook less and/or not even buy a macbook in the first place.
Re:News... (Score:4, Insightful)
Unfortunately, almost everything else is worse than Slashdot. The articles are generally worthless, but the community is still worthwhile and every now and again something worth talking about actually comes up.
Let me know when it can compile. (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Coming Soon (Score:3, Insightful)
Except that nobody is buying android tablets because of their price point.
The $599.00 android tablets are $200.00 overpriced. You CAN NOT charge apple prices for non apple product unless it is 200% better than the apple product.
That is like Kia selling the new Optima for $86,500 and hoping you dont notice it's not a BMW.
Re:Par for the course? (Score:5, Insightful)
It kind of makes me wonder why no one has made a BT mouse adapter that plugs into the microphone port or the dock connector.
Because Apple won't allow it. If it doesn't fit with Apple's paradigm you don't get it, simple as that.
Note that I'm not trying to troll here, that is simply a fact. If you wanted an open platform you should have bought one.
Re:"1/10 of a pound" (Score:4, Insightful)
How many iPads equal the weight of an Osbourne 1?
Just curious... both are "portable", and advertised the fact heavily. But society's definition of "portable" sure has changed!
Re:Fragmentation (Score:5, Insightful)
Doesn't deserve the downvotes. Android is a nightmare for (game) developers. So many wildly varying specs, some missing major features (no FPU, no multi-touch!)
Compared to Windows it's a dream come true.
Re:Fragmentation (Score:5, Insightful)
When a developer targets an iPod touch, do you really think they're going to target the version 1 one which has less than 0.1% market share now? Or... Do you think they're going to target the 2 most recent generations, which covers every person who's bought one in the last 2 years? Effectively, to target iOS, you need to target an 800MHz ARM cortex A8, a PowerVR SGX 535, 512MB of RAM, and both 320x480pt and 1024x768pt. Once you've got that covered, you've got 97% of all users covered, and probably 99.9% of all users who are willing to pay for an app.
Re:Coming Soon (Score:5, Insightful)
A bigger screen? It's only 1280x800, so what's the point?
Re:Coming Soon (Score:2, Insightful)
You must have a 19" TV right? That 60" TV is 1080p too so what's the point?
Re:iFashion Accessories (Score:4, Insightful)
$60K - $10K for standard IRAs =
$50K - $10K for taxes (guesstimated) =
$40K - $12K for stated savings =
$28K - $12K for mortgage (guesstimated) =
$16K / 52weeks =
$300 / week to live on. Piece of cake, my mom and I each lived on $100/week while I was in Grad school, cars paid off, Ramen noodles for dinner, and that leaves you $5K/year "mad money" to take a vacation or two, replace the transmission that just fell out of your car, or whatever...
On the other hand, I know families living on $200K/year+ who are saving less money than you - they are the heat in the consumer driven economic engine, people like me and you are the sand in the gearbox.
Re:Coming Soon (Score:4, Insightful)
The $599.00 android tablets are $200.00 overpriced. You CAN NOT charge apple prices for non apple product unless it is 200% better than the apple product.
That'll be why Asus can't make their $599 android tablets fast enough to keep up with demand.
I'm not saying it's 200% better than the apple product, but they certainly can charge $599 and sell every unit they make the day it hits the shop.
Except that nobody is buying android tablets because of their price point.
Some people are buying android tablets because they're under $200. Some people would be buying android tablets at $599 if they could just find one in stock. Some people are buying android tablets at $400 because those tablets are meeting their needs.
Choice is a great thing, and you have no valid points.
That is like Kia selling the new Optima for $86,500 and hoping you dont notice it's not a BMW.
No, it's like BMW selling the new M6 for $86,500 and you buying a $90k Mercedes because of the marketing and proclaiming that BMWs are all shit, overpriced and nobody buys them.
Re:of any of these, only the battery thing means m (Score:4, Insightful)
Apple is paranoid that you'll using it for something they didn't specifically intend.
Which oddly didn't make it into the article's list of gripes, but continues to be the single biggest reason I refuse to buy one.
I want to be able to use my devices for whatever the fuck I want. I connect my phone as a USB device and copy files to/from it. I install software from websites. I visits sites that use Flash even.
Steve Jobs made a lot of money but he's dead now. Why is his monopolistic anti-competitiveness continuing to cripple Apple devices?
I Like Mine (Score:3, Insightful)
Mine works great. No complaints here. I see a lot of complaints from people that clearly don't have one. Your opinions have been noted and will be given the consideration merited. That is all.
Re:News... (Score:5, Insightful)
Louis CK's segment on that doesn't really apply here though, we're discussing the long, slow slide in to uselessness and obscurity through bad editorial management. It used to be that people would complain about the occasional duplicate story, but things have really gone down hill in the quality and headline department in the last year.
It's not like Slashdot or even tech blogs are a new thing, Slashdot is well over 10 years old at this point. We aren't complaining about slashdot's loading times, we're talking about editorial standards, which are something like 200+ years old (not sure how old The Times is, but I think daily publication started before 1800).
Slashdot needs a strong editorial guiding hand, and Malda did an excellent job of that for a decade, which is why the Washington Post was so eager to get him on their payroll. Slashdot was as big of a fish as this pond can really support (besides the more general Reddit type sites). Some PHB MBA saw Slashdot and, without understanding it's community or userbase thought, "we can apply some standard practices like shitty headlines to double click through rate on headlines and increase overall viewership" without thinking about how to retain their core userbase. I'm not sure what the term for this fallacy is, but it seems to happen a lot, and few companies are able to survive it and get back on track before the PHB destroys the company by alienating their core userbase.
Re:Made by Samsung (Score:4, Insightful)
Display, Processor, Chips, Battery, ...But hey, It has an Apple logo!
Actually, Apple has been desperately (and it look like, successfully) trying to become non-dependent upon the technology-thieves at Samsung for a couple of years now. The latest iPad is actually stands as a testament as to the lengths that Apple has gone to cut Samsung completely out of their supply chain.
Display: Designed by Apple. iFixit said it was "probably Samsung". No surprises there. Apple has used Samsung "glass" for years. However, leaked information [9to5mac.com] makes it seem more likely that Apple has turned to Sharp for the iPad 3 Retina display.
SoC (what you quaintly and incorrectly called the "Processor") : Designed by Apple, manufactured in Texas by Apple-owned Fab house, Intrinsity. In fact, Apple's Intrinsity is already the second-largest mobile SoC manufacturer, and ison track to pass Intel as the world's largest mobile chip fab [electronista.com].
Chips: Some are Apple-designed. Most are commodity. I think the iFixit teardown [ifixit.com] (See steps #15, 17 and 19) identified a number of manufacturers; Apple, TI, Broadcom, Fairchild, Qualcomm, Avago,Toshiba, Triquint, Skyworks... Hmmm. Let's see. What manufacturer's name is MISSING...?
Battery: Apple designed. No one else's battery comes close to size/capacity combination. Manufactured by Simplo Technology, with Dynapak International Technology as Apple's up-and-coming "preferred" source [cens.com].
But don't let facts disturb your delusions...
Re:Coming Soon (Score:2, Insightful)
Every other car like the.... Xoom?
Did they finally patch in working support for the SD card reader? The so called "killer feature" missing from the iPad that shipped broken on the Xoom.
Just curious :p
I agree though, the iPad should at least offer the option.
Re:News... (Score:4, Insightful)
re: paranoid? (Score:4, Insightful)
I can accept your opinion, but still can't say I agree with it myself.
I don't think "paranoia" factors in. That's just more Apple bashing. The fact is, Apple sells their products as part of an entire "user experience" you're supposed to get from them. That's one of the reasons you don't ever see Macs for sale at the local Wal-Mart or "Joe's Computer Shop" down the street in a strip mall. Apple is concerned with the sales experience you receive meeting certain minimum standards of theirs. Even the "unboxing" experience is thought out in advance, so you feel as though your new purchase is something important, valuable and "high end" in nature. As you use their products, they want them to work in the manner they designed too. If you call for technical support, the person on the other end of the line needs to know your product has certain menu options and runs everything a certain way - or else they can't give you the type of "step by step" support answers you might expect.
It's legitimate to disregard all of this as "meaningless" to you, or even to say in your opinion, it's not how a computer product should be sold. But it's part of the formula Apple has for their products - and it's a very successful one.
I'm technical enough so I never need to call Apple's help line ... and sure, there are times I wanted to do something with a product of theirs that's way outside the scope of what THEY intended for it. But usually, I can do that if I so desire (such as jailbreaking an iPhone or iPad) and all is good. 90% of the time though, I actually LIKE what they've done with a given product, and I'm fine with using it within those parameters they built it with. Apple is, by and large, pretty good with that stuff, IMO -- so I keep coming back to them.