Countdown: Apple Tablet- What is it? Will you want it? - Page 2

The chip seems impressive.

Can we change the nomenclature so the iPhone is now the "iPad Mini" and the tablet is the "iPad Maxi"?

The dimensions are disappointing. Why not 16:9?

I don't think film viewing is their primary concern with this one.

I heard that the frustration waiting in line for one is called iPMS.

(uh oh, here come the lightning bolts)

Brushes looks cool on this. Throw in a pen attachment and we could be talking.

If I didn't own a laptop, this would be cool, so far? Not impressed.

I'm waiting for the price and the wireless charges.

I books looks kinda great.

And here's the e-book reader, iBooks.

Isn't reading book son this thing just gonna cause eye strain?

Seems like the type is big enough and the resolution sharp enough for that not to be an issue.

Jobs said they're using ePub, but no word on DRM.

What about staring at a bright screen for hours at a time? Isn't that why all the other ereaders use e-ink?

Naaah. I'm just not geeking out over this. Which is good - I can't afford it right now anyway. It really does just seem like a giant iPod Touch. Plus, I'm not loving how it's so much bigger, yet the screen is unprotected. For some reason, that's just bugging me.

"You can add a reminder here that Andrew and Amy do not deserve ice cream."

USB syncing? What is this, 2003?

$14.99 a month for up to 250mb data, $29.99 for unlimited data, and free use of AT&T WiFi hotspots.

EDIT: And no contract.

Here comes the price.

Starts at $499

499 is a really cheap price for this...

$499. Holy shit.

Which is the 16gb model, but still.

$499. I think I'd just get a laptop. Maybe I'm a douche.

699 for 64 gigs.
Still cheap as fuck.

Sign me up for your club, then. $499 for this? No thanks.

Oh, but wait, that $499 is WiFi only. If you want 3G, it's $629.

You can get a 9-inch Netbook that does all of this for 200-300.

Yeah, not for me, thankfully.

But wait, there's a ... keyboard dock? Huh?

Those things are slow as molasses and crash easily.

And the screen is painfully small and not as clear. I've got one. It kinda sucks really.

My wife watches Netflix Insant movies in HD on her Dell Mini. Battery lasts a day, has never crashed.

I was curious about this thing as an ebook reader, now I guess it's time to look at the nook again.

It also appears there's no multitasking.

You can get a PC Laptop that does way more than that for $399. No I can't watch iTunes movies for 10 hours straight on a flight, but hey...didn't I just buy an iPhone or iPod Touch for that same purpose?

I mean, it doesn't even look that appealing, much less have the specs or software to make it sexy.

I'm a bit iffy about the whole thing too. Sure, it's nice and it's pretty cool, but it's nothing I need. I'm happy as heck with my iPhone and Macbook, and don't don't really need to be replacing any of them any time too soon. This would just be another nifty little gadget to have on top of all the rest, and that isn't something I need right now.

On a practical level, if I even was going to consider getting one, I think WiFi would be just fine for me when I consider the ways I'd actually use it.

As usual I think it's going to pay off to wait until the 2nd or 3rd gen models, by then it'll be jam-packed with more features, the bugs will be hopefully ironed out and there's always some sort of price drop. I have a MacBook Pro, iPhone and Kindle so I'm still not sure what I would really use it for, though.

It's a bigger iPhone that doesn't work as a phone.

Yeah, this isn't something you would normally whip out on the street or anything. I'm not sure 3G is necessary.

Upside: not as easy to drop in the toilet.
Downside: harder to hold one-handed.

Jobs: "Another thing we're excited about is that there's already 75 million people who know how to use this because of how many iPhones and iPod touches we've shipped."

And those 75 million people will want/need this because...?

...they want a more ostentatious display of their disposable income?

I'm really not understanding what they're going for with this. For the price you can buy both a Netbook and an iPod touch.

I've actually been wanting an e-Reader of some sort as opposed to a clunky netbook for travel. This thing does the job. It's 1.5 pounds, wi-fi and 3G capability. iPhone until now hasn't replaced by laptop (and probably won't), so I guess this is an interesting middle ground.

What OS do Netbooks use?

My partner's uses Windows XP.

I bought my netbook one year ago, and it is my primary system. No crashing, fast internet, and since I've expanded the memory, I can do all sorts of shit on it.

Edited: I have XP on mine. Ubuntu is a popular is popular as well.

I can't believe they expect people to pay for more data on this thing, they are monthly charging people to hell and back.

This isn't about software or hardware specs beyond the broad category of "good enough." Apple's design philosophy has nothing to do with hardware specs and everything to do with overall user experience, and this kind of device takes that approach to its extremes: Apple doesn't intend this as a full-fledged computer or netbook alternative for power users, but as more of a "casual computer" in the same way the wii is a "casual gaming" console (conveniently, "casual computing" includes gaming, which is very profitable).

So you'll never see photoshop on this kind of device, and if you've ever drooled over hardware specs or installed your own graphics card to play Crysis or some bullshit you can probably stay away. The tablet is a smart idea, though. Computers have gotten way too pointlessly complicated for casual use (do I really need all these .dll files, drivers, and registry patches just to surf the internet?) and 90% of computer use is casual (internet, email, basic word processing, light gaming, etc.).

I'd never buy one of these given my current financial situation (I'd spend the $500 on more ram or on an ssd, honestly), but if I had extra cash and travelled more, I'd definitely pick one up.

The google chrome OS offers a similar experience and should also be competitive. Apple has the edge up in terms of form factor (maybe) and certainly in terms of software/hardware integration and elegance. Google has the advantage w/r/t cloud computing, which is where everything is going (soon).

I'm also eyeing e-readers. Unfortunately I think this is priced too far apart to push the Kindle and Nook lower. I wasn't specifically interested in an Apple tablet so much as looking forward to competitive pressure.

So this is for people that have been looking for an eReader but don't use the Kindle software on their iPod Touch or iPhone? $500-700 for that? Seriously?