The Apple iPad - Anand's Analysis
by Anand Lal Shimpi on January 27, 2010 5:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Smartphones
- Mobile
Will it Work...Literally
Today my issue with the iPhone (and netbooks for that matter) is that they are very limited when it comes to productivity. I don’t have a good solution if I need the performance, usability and capabilities of my notebook, but want something lighter to carry around with me. You could always get a CULV notebook or from Apple something like the MacBook Air, but that’s still a notebook. There is no perfect blend of notebook functionality with smartphone portability. If the iPad can achieve that, at least in the same manner that the iPhone did for smartphones, then I will consider it worth the hype.
Achieving that goal requires a delicate balance of the right UI, the right hardware (including ergonomics) and the right functionality.
The UI looks clean and snappy. Apple’s biggest omission here appears to be multitasking support. One of the most frustrating things about using an iPhone is its inability to do two serious tasks at once. Email + Web browsing, Pandora + anything. You get the point. This is perhaps a temporary issue. The iPad runs iPhone OS 3.2 as of today. The next major release of the iPhone OS, version 4.0, is expected to add multitasking support. This could presumably make its way onto the iPad later this year (or early 2011?).
Yeah that looks super comfortable...
The hardware looks good. It remains to be seen whether or not it’s actually comfortable to hold a 1.5 lbs tablet while you type on it. Although Apple has a couple of accessories that look to address that issue:
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The software keyboard looks like it could work well, if it’s combined with the same sort of predictive trickery that the iPhone uses. I’ve been asking for the sort of tablet the Enterprise crew (Star Trek, not the server market) carried around. The iPad’s interface, at least what I’ve seen of it, has the most potential to deliver that sort of experience. The iPad UI could be something that feels like it was made in 2010, not 2002.
The functionality is also a big unknown. When the iPhone first launched its killer apps were the ones that Apple made for it. While the App Store is far more mature now, the iPad will need some key functionality for it to be a productivity device.
Porting iWork ($9.99 per app) to the iPad was necessary. The fact that Apple did this right off the bat indicates that at least someone over there knows that the market for a $500 - $900 toy is slim. But we need more. We need things like Photoshop for the iPad. Dare I say that we even need a port of Microsoft Office?
At CES everyone talked about tablets and eReaders being huge at the show. I saw a lot of neat devices, but nothing I’d want to go out and buy. The iPad is the first one I’ve seen with potential. And much like the iPhone before it, whether you like it or not is irrelevant - it will at least pave the way for other companies to emulate and improve upon the design.
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- Thursday, January 28, 2010 - link
Just another revenue stream by zonkie, 17 hours agoWhat Apple is doing with the iPad is pretty smart.LOL
asH
zonkie - Friday, January 29, 2010 - link
It's smart because they've created another item that makes you purchase things you wouldn't normally AND you have to do it from them.ltcommanderdata - Thursday, January 28, 2010 - link
http://www.brightsideofnews.com/News.aspx?id=1117&...">http://www.brightsideofnews.com/News.aspx?id=1117&...It'd be great to find out more about the iPad's GPU. Bright Side of News is reporting that it might be an ARM Mali 50-Series which doesn't make much sense seeing that the Mali-55 is only an OpenGL ES 1.1 part. Given Apple's prior experience and financial backing, a PowerVR SGX chip is most likely, probably the often rumoured SGX 545.
And I wonder how much RAM the iPad has. 512MB seems reasonable, although given the extra room and low RAM prices, 1GB is quite doable.
Anand Lal Shimpi - Thursday, January 28, 2010 - link
I seriously doubt it is the ARM Mali. From what I've heard it's nearly 100% that the iPad uses a PowerVR SGX. Remember Apple owns nearly 10% of Imagination Technologies. To not use one of their cores seems hypocritical :)Take care,
Anand
Mike1111 - Thursday, January 28, 2010 - link
512MB sounds right. Especially since there's no multitasking.ltcommanderdata - Thursday, January 28, 2010 - link
Personally, I think multitasking is still coming with iPhone OS 4.0. With the new accounting rules, hopefully major OS updates will be free for the iPad just like they are with the iPhone.synaesthetic - Wednesday, January 27, 2010 - link
I really thought this thing was 80% useless at first.I didn't expect it to have support for rendered soft subtitles, which already killed the device in my eyes as a media player.
But no support for the MKV container format?
No support for h.264 decoding above the median profile? And I'm guessing it won't support AVC encodes with more than 8 or so reference frames, either...
I'm convinced now that the iPad is 100% useless. But of course Apple will sell a bajillion of them.
sprockkets - Thursday, January 28, 2010 - link
Matroska is only used by open source nuts and that's it. The rest of the world uses the official standard mp4 container.The only advantage of HP vs. MP is 8x8 transform and nothing else. It buys you very little in quality/file size. I've tested it myself.
Limitations of # of reference frames should not exist; ie all devices should support the maximum 16 supported by MPEG4-AVC.
Besides, where do people get those nice 1080p mkv files from, eh? At least unlike some other ppl I know in the smaller form factors (that's you Cowon), Apple supports H.264 from top to bottom.
OCedHrt - Wednesday, January 27, 2010 - link
I'm very interested in some kind of linux variant OS for this kind of hardware running on the Sony X series. It's the same weight and thickness with a larger screen and faster(?) processor and also has a multi-touch display. Just that it is not in a tablet form.Candide08 - Wednesday, January 27, 2010 - link
The Apple tablet does not multi-task. This is a serious flaw.It also does not plat flash on the web another serious flaw.
Add in a lack or removable media and I wonder about the usefulness of this device.
The OS and multi-touch interface are the strong points for this and the iPhone, but need to be developed to really be revolutionary.