Dungeon Master Forum

Today, Apple launched their much hyped and rumoured tablet computer. Only it's not, it's just a big iPhone with all the same restrictions (no multitasking being the main failure point). Could this be the first screw up in the recent run of successes?

Oh, and those silly boys called it the iPad too. One imagines there were no ladies on the naming committee.

Marketing blurb says:

"It's hard to believe we could fit so many great ideas into something so thin."

Actually, what's hard to believe is why all the useful stuff was left out. Muppets! Seriously, who on earth is this aimed at? Not professional creators that's for sure. It's completely underpowered and underspecified as a personal computer, so it simply doesn't fill anykind of serious computing requirement. I guess it's just for content consumers, rather than creators.

http://www.apple.com/ipad/

And of course the problem that people from around here won't even be able to make a distinction between iPods and iPads.

http://www.hulu.com/watch/4171/saturday ... super-fans

yeah, I saw it updating live with all the comments and screens earlier today.. it's less portable than an Ipod and less powerfull than a laptop.. and very expensive.. I say FAIL.

LOL, it looks like an iPhone for giants!

I agree with you, Gambit and Cows - I don't believe in a success of this thing.

It looks like an attempt for a "third way". But the "third / compromise way" is not always the best. I would definitely not buy this, because I would have no use for it. Some things cannot be combined, and sometimes you just need two things and not a compromise one - you cannot combine a bike and a car and expect that the result will have advantages of both.

indeed... sinclair c5, need we say more!

Soph - That video says it won't work outside the US - what's it about?

did a quick search for the laptop mini's which is probably their competing market.

PC mini:
Screen Size: 10.1"
HDD Size: 160Gb
Memory : 1gb
Processor: 1.6ghz
webcam: yes
wifi: yes
bluetooth: no
battery life 5hrs

cost: $299

mac ipad:
Screen Size: 9.7"
HDD Size: 16Gb
Memory : ?
Processor: 1ghz
webcam: no
wifi: yes
bluetooth: yes
battery life: 10hrs

cost: $499

now, I have no idea if the ipad is multi threaded, it doesn't say..it just says low power cpu. so, near as I can tell it's slower. They don't say on their website how much ram it has, it has 1/10 the HD space.. oh, but it's solid state the battery will last twice as long. and it has bluetooth. Oh, and no webcam to go with it's nice wifi connection. it's smaller, but has no protecting lid either.. where as the laptop mini's come with a folding ability, and yet are still small and light. Also they have a keyboard.. a real one. Though you can buy one for the ipad.. ie more cost. Sure it's a touch screen.. however, having used touch screens.. it's more a gimic to me than anything else. unless you throw photoshop on there, I won't care I don't need greasy finger hands all over my screen

However, I now know who's pushing for this digital back up that you get with new movies these days.. because it's the ONLY way you will see it on this thing. There is nothing but a usb input on it...oh.. and that's a custom cable by the way.. so if you lose it.. you'll need to buy it again..

but.. you know what.. people will buy it. They will because it's new.. and because they are apple fanatics.. and to them having one is a status point. It's not going to make their life better, or easier.. it's just bragging rights.




moo

It's a comedy bit with a bunch of people speaking in a (for comic effect, exaggerated) dialect that fails to make a very clear distinction between the vowel in "pod" and the vowel in "pad."

I believe it can all be summed up by this guy.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NLjmnXJ8cJE

Ipad vs Stone Tablet

Ipad vs ...

Cows, the iPad also has a G3 cellular version, like the iPhone, so it's much more portable than any other laptop as it's not restricted to WiFi spots. This is about the only thing that makes it interesting, in my opinion.

I meant not as portable because of the fact it's larger than say an iphone. and for 3G you're adding another $200 bucks.. to buy a 3G for your laptop is less than $150.. so again they gouge you .. BUT they try to make up for that in the long run by allowing you a cheaper monthly plan..

Hopefully the size of it will stop nerds getting them out in pubs and putting them on the bar in the hope that people gawp.

Sorry, this thread should have died but...

Im tempted to get one, The ipad that is and not the stone

I bought one yesterday. I have to say, I had been warming up to it for a while (or I wouldn't have bought one, obviously) but after I got it home and played with it for a while, that's what really convinced me how useful this is going to be-- by all the use I got out of it in just a short time, never mind going forward.

Gambit37 wrote:what's hard to believe is why all the useful stuff was left out

I'm not sure where you get that. Fine, there's no camera, but do you really want to be hauling out your iPad every time you want to take a picture, anyway? To me, it's already very useful. You can browse the web from wherever, and do it on a screen that is much bigger and more comfortable than an iPod Touch/iPhone's. The whole "it's just a big, powerful iPod Touch" thing has some truth, but considering how much you can do on those platforms-- and how much they are sometimes hampered by a small screen-- is that really such a bad thing? I was able to sit on my couch reading a pdf, in much more comfort than I could've done sitting at my PC. It felt more like actual reading, instead of staring at a computer screen. It's a great platform for watching tv or movies, too. I can also carry on a casual IM conversation without having to feel glued to my PC, which is something else I liked to do with my iPod Touch, but now I can do it with an actual keyboard.

Gambit37 wrote:I guess it's just for content consumers, rather than creators

While I'll certainly agree there's a consumer focus to the thing, as there probably would have to be, considering how greatly creators are outnumbered by consumers, I also think that to say that there isn't a whole lot of creative potential on the iPad is misleading. With the optional keyboard add-on, the iPad was very comfortable and enjoyable for me to lie in bed and write, more writing than I have done in a long time, I think. There are a wide variety of drawing and sketching programs, too, which are great if you have a stylus. I haven't gotten much past doodling, but I am not a professional artist nor am I using the most high-end app (just something free) nor is my improvised stylus particularly high quality. I've seen some other pictures posted that are great. About the only people who are really left out in the cold at the moment are developers. I'm not terribly happy about that, either, but the technology is still new, and I believe there's a large difference between a complete lack of creative potential and simply not being suited for one certain creative task at the moment.

cowsmanaut wrote:It's not going to make their life better, or easier

In my case, it already has.

Good thing it's expensive, as someone who does not own an iphone (and has no plans to) but does like everything Sophia mentioned, it actually sounds like a good idea... damn...

@Sophia: My original comments were based on the little info available back in January. Having seen more info now on how it could be used and the kind of apps coming out, it does seem a better product than I originally thought. I like the idea of lounging around with a keyboard-less device to do email, read books, watch videos etc. I think it's probably a perfect device for the non-techy mainstream consumers who just want to do the basics and not have a bloody great PC or hefty laptop to worry about.

I still have two main gripes though: it's proprietary and it's too expensive. You can currently buy netbooks and laptops that can do so much more at half the price. For me then, who is always looking at the dev potential of any tool at the best possible rate of cost vs. performance, the iPad is still too restrictive to be useful. It's a lifestyle product, not a viable dev tool -- and that's great for people looking for that; I'm just not the target audience really.

That said: if money was no object, I would probably buy one

Gambit37 wrote:I still have two main gripes though: it's proprietary and it's too expensive. You can currently buy netbooks and laptops that can do so much more at half the price.

It's more expensive in the UK, so this may push the "half price" point up, but I'd really like to see a specific example of one of these half price netbooks and laptops that does so much more. I just don't see it. Most of the time, those cheap notebooks/netbooks are using a regular old OS that severely lags on their less powerful CPU. Granted, this gives them their greater flexibility, but Apple didn't just throw OSX on the iPad for a reason. It introduces some limitations, but it makes the device blazing fast for what you do want to do. By comparison, a laptop/netbook whatever takes time to boot up, takes time to load applications, takes time to deal with the spyware you'll probably end up getting at some point...and have heat issues all over the place, too. You either take a further speed hit from using a hard drive, or you lose any cost savings by going all solid-state, too.

Gambit37 wrote:It's a lifestyle product, not a viable dev tool

As for this one, yeah, I have to agree there. It's definitely not suited for development at this point, though I will say that as the ability to control your desktop remotely matures on the iPad, there could be some interesting potential for using it as a very comfortable "terminal" for your real computer. I've already had fun with VNC...

Don't mention VNC! I used to happily use it until my new computer, I still haven't figured out how to get passed win 7 security (mostly through laziness) so I can actually remote access my desktop, and very rarely go grab stuff from my laptop

Sophia, the point for me is that you do not get what you pay for with apple products. They limit you in every way possible and the throw something flashy overtop and hope you buy in. Sandie just got a notebook that's a nice thin 10inch machine with a full set of windows for just $300. It's got a nice fast processor, webcam, multi touch, etc. She could switch to a 32gb solid state drive for $90 and still be cheaper than the ipad... by almost half. or she could reach the price of the ipad by buying a 120gb SSD... and she'll still have the extra 160gb hd to go along with it.. so.. not even close to even..

http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/ ... CatId=3988
this one is cheaper than we paid, and has 3G too... (must check to see if she has it.. going to feel ripped off now .. not that she'll pay to use it anyway.. )
She can do development on it, comes with the keyboard already, still has the multitouch though not directly on the screen (though I prefer it that way as it means less smudging of the screen).. and she can also watch anything she likes on those lovely websites devoted to flash based video players.

So while I'm sure you're going to deny that you've wasted money.. I'm quite certain you have. You're many justifications against a PC based device have all been deflated. Including claims for spyware and virus.. since there are a number of very good and very free softwares for that... and I have not had a virus or spyware on any of my PCs for at least a 2 or more years.. and the one i did get was due to me doing something I knew was risky in the first place... and was clean for about 4 years before that. So, as long as you don't do anything stupid, you can avoid such things quite easily, and even easier if you get one of those decent antivirus/spyware softwares for the fabulous price of ... free. Based on the technical specs of the ipad vs a cost compared PC alternative I see NOTHING that goes in the favor of the ipad... and as soon as you strip flash from it.. it's just retarded..

and just in case there was any doubt.. here's a multitouch screen based one.. and still less expensive than the ipad
http://www.amazon.com/Lenovo-0651-37U-1 ... pd_cp_pc_3

cowsmanaut wrote:Sophia, the point for me is that you do not get what you pay for with apple products.

Apple is more expensive, sure. If you just want a cheap netbook with certain raw specs, fine, go nuts. However, ultimately, the world runs on usability, not on specs. I can tell you right now, the iPad's screen is just as large, and it's beautiful IPS screen instead of the rather uninspiring TN panel that almost every netbook or notebook in existence has. The device is half the thickness and half the weight. It doesn't get hot, ever. (this one was a huge deal to me personally because I'd always been frustrated with the heat when I tried to use notebooks in the past) It starts up instantly, no boot-up time, ever. It switches from app to app in seconds-- I'll concede the multitasking issue, but when it's that fast, you barely notice, seriously. You can curl up in bed with it and browse and read and write and play games and whatever else, and do it all on a nicely responsive touch screen running an operating system that is designed specifically for that method of input, not to mention never having to worry about running out of battery because the thing lasts 10 hours. What's the use of multi touch if the thing is just running Windows, rather than an OS that is specifically designed for touch screens? Do you really think those normal Windows apps even perform anything above the barest standard of usability on a netbook? What's the big deal about "flash video" when you can watch YouTube in HD, and most of the other major media outlets have iPad apps as well?

cowsmanaut wrote:So while I'm sure you're going to deny that you've wasted money.. I'm quite certain you have.

And while I'm sure you're going to assert that I have, I'm quite certain that I haven't. Generally speaking PC makers offer a product and say "here's what's in it, here's how much that stuff costs," but Apple says "here's what it can do, here's what we think that's worth to you." If the things I've mentioned don't matter to you, that's fine, enjoy your netbook, but they do matter to me and they matter to a lot of other people, so don't act like what you value is some universal constant. It's not just good marketing on Apple's part, as much as the naysayers would like to believe... there is added value here, but it's value that PC makers conveniently omit from their spec sheets.

I'm sold! New job to pay for one, here I come!

SOPHIA HAS AN IPAD!
SOPHIA HAS AN IPAD!
SOPHIA HA...

Did you know they put user DNA on that things?

Now you are infected.

Slowly, yet steady you will loose your knack for coding.

Visual Basic will frighten you!

You come across a flash animation and wonder how he did it.

Clueless you will look at an empty XLS sheet.

And finally: closed source projects actually make sense.

HAVE FUN!

ok, first off, I have a Laptop which can play Crysis and it doesn't get all that hot, and the one part that get's warm is blown off to the side of it. As for Sandie's notepad it' barely warm.. The atom processor is low power consumption and thus has people claiming 8-10hrs battery life for it. However it all depends what you do with it. Friend who purchased the macbook claiming 10hrs batter found it lasted 3hrs or less if you were doing anything 3D with it.. So battery a non-issue.

As for usability there has been no issue with her ability to use it, it's small and very light and she has so far taken it everywhere.. She has worked on her studies, watched videos, played video games, listened to music... and there has never been once where she had to complain about her inability to perform any task she wished. While she is very unlikely to ever take any computer to bed, she prefers real books to read in bed. I have taken my laptop to bed many times before and the minimal gestures I need to do on a tiny touch pad are again a non-issue.. so much more so on a tiny notebook with multitouch... and despite what you may think, the windows 7 platform is completely multitouch ready and very responsive. She experienced no slowdown. she can zoom and scroll at ease.. in fact Microsoft had been using multitouch for longer than apple (expensive commercial devices not windows specifically) and seems to have been planned to be a part of windows 7 to begin with.

having it start up instantly.. again, if she wanted an SSD she could have it load in seconds, we've got a windows server with SSD drives in it that loads lightning fast. however, i find that I just let my laptop go into sleep mode and I have it up and running in less than a second so I'm not sure where the complaint is..

as for the big deal about flash, is that a VERY large number of major websites use flash as a basis for their web interface. Including the newyork times which Steve jobs went to in his little display only to see the little error about the plugin not being installed. He's trying to control everything by brute force alone. No 3rd party applications or hardware in apple products. Their motto seems to be "You have no choice, but what colour it comes in" The applications themselves I'm told are rather expensive for what you get also. Which is another reason why flash is good.. it's free, and leads to a LOT of free games.. many of which we've posted here in the "cool things you found on the web"..

To me the Ipad is seriously wasted potential and at a high cost.

so let's look at that list again..
expensive
no standard ports
not a development tool
no flash which means crippled web browsing and no flash games
very little storage space which means deleting things and re-downloading them again if you want people to see it again.
touch screen means smudges screen.. clean it often.
Expensive apps and only those you could have had on an Iphone or Ipod touch for cheaper..
No multitasking
no camera (means no skype video calls)
no keyboard (and no rubber stoppers on the backside to make screen typing possible on any solid surface)
did you really need a larger Iphone that's not a phone and has no camera and costs more money?....

so benefits over a notebook?
heat? oh wait.. nope
faster boot? nope, can get an SSD and still be cheaper or you can just leave it booted and not even worry about it like I do.
Can carry it to bed? well I don't see how it's less akward or more comfortable than a small notebook
10hrs battery? many of the notebooks are claiming the same thing.. and your battery is not changeable.. it's part of the device itself..
suitable multi touch interface? have you even tried windows 7 with multitouch?
people will think it looks cooler than a notebook... this one I'll give you.
has motion controller built in.. ok, kinda neat.. but little more than a gimic than a practical tool.

... get an Iphone.. not an Ipad.. it's more portable and does all the same things plus has a decent camera..

cowsmanaut wrote:a VERY large number of major websites use flash as a basis for their web interface

I'd disagree with this assertion. The whole Web Standards movement was about getting people to develop sites with open standards. Once people understood this, Flash was very quickly dropped as a primary interface development tool.

The main issue is that Flash is primarily used for Video distribution now: nearly every site showing video uses a Flash based system. Some sites have already successfully upgraded their players to be built in HTML5. YouTube for example will serve HTML5 video to browsers that support it, and automatically server Flash video to browsers that don't yet understand HTML5. In the main though, it's still Flash that powers video on most sites and this is the big problem with Apple's mobile products: those sites can't be fully experienced.

cowsmanaut wrote:people will think it looks cooler than a notebook... this one I'll give you.

That's the main reason Apple are successful: Style. Their products appeal to a particular mindset. I think their products are gorgeous, but they don't quite work for me because I have more of a "hacker mentality" when it comes to my computing needs.

Here's the thing: PC manufacturers love to claim all sorts of battery life figures, but the key word there is claim. You're right in that the batteries of most netbooks and netbooks will run down if you're doing anything intense with it, like, say, trying to watch an HD video, that a typical netbook's CPU will struggle to even play without looking choppy. The iPad gives you 10 hours of whatever, that includes just about 10 hours of HD video. The real battery-killer on the iPad has nothing to do with CPU load, but is instead having the backlight on its beautiful IPS panel turned up too high. I'll concede that the typical netbook's TN panel probably doesn't suffer from this "problem" because it looks inferior no matter what you do.

When I was talking about Windows apps not running well on a netbook, I was referring to those high-power Windows apps that people love to gloat won't run on an iPad. You can work on studies, watch videos, play games, and listen to music just fine on an iPad, too. Better, in my opinion, but that's a subjective aspect of user experience, and see my note on subjectivity below. What you can't do on the iPad is run something like Photoshop or Visual C++, however, practically speaking, the Atom processor won't give you acceptable performance trying to run these high-power applications either. The "not a dev tool" criticism of the iPad applies equally to netbooks, practically speaking.

The rest of it is all subjective. I can subjectively say Flash isn't all that important to me and only once in the large amount of browsing I've done on the iPad did the lack of Flash even bother me... but that's just my opinion. You say "doesn't get all that hot," but I've read benchmarks of netbooks under heavy load (i.e., the aforementioned HD video) getting up to 45C and up, and to me that's too hot. To you, maybe not, but it's subjective-- I also like that the iPad doesn't have a whirring fan to keep itself this cool. It's a question of what you value. You call the motion controller a gimmick, I say that it allows you to actually rotate the iPad and view it from any direction, offering a significant enhancement in user experience. Add that to the fact that the iPad is half as thick, weighs half as much, and has a big responsive touchscreen, and I'd tell you I see quite well how a netbook is more awkward and less comfortable. Because, see, you call a touchscreen a disadvantage, but I hate trackpads and I love the iPad's touchscreen.

As I said before, don't assume what you personally value is some sort of universal constant. It isn't.

Please refrain from even more compelling reasons for having an iPad -- at least until I have a new job anyway!

Actually, probably enough has been said in this disucssion full stop. It's too easy to open the door to 'apple teh suxorz/apples is teh rulez' type interjections, and it's always harder to justify smacking that down when it's people in red that have started the discussion.

*meh. I'm furrily drunk&stoned. I still think it is fun to read.*

This is about money. What I get for the money I spend.
Money is your time. Time you spend to get it. Lifetime.
Now 600 bucks are something I spend to cover my fixed cost for a month.
I won't give this covered month away for something I already have - in whatever form (surfing, listening to music, watching vids).

However:
Computers are mighty. They make things possible. Things you want. Things that go beyond your mere self. They enhance the world and you.
Hey, someone might actually go right ahead and buy one of those things.

Let's look at this:

Apple produces a nutritious product. Consumable for everyone.
People who have never touched a keyboard or a mouse. Lots of them.
It is part of this:

- someone who could manually built a computer from tubes or transistors
- someone who can code that thing hex
- someone who can do Assembler (or disassemble)
- someone who can do C
- someone who can do POWERPOINT

If you save your picture in *.jpg, you don't have to know anything about that algorithm creating that compressed image.
It just happens.
Because someone already did it.

You're on the lucky side as a user (or coder):
A C# coder doesn't have to know anything about processors.
And me, as a dumb user can take advantage of aaaaall the stuff someone much more clever than me already found out about.

And I know nothing about FLASH.

The sad part is:
It's not even fair. Watch a coder working. It looks like he writes a letter to his (or her) mom. In a foreign language.

Look at what the POWERPOINT guy (!yay him. He IS Mophus!) can do: all those colors!

Mightily impressive.

Now ain't life a pain?