Report: iPad to keep tablet lead until next year

lovely device but i returned mine

I bought my iPad partly due to the glowing review from Jon Honeyball, he really did portray accurately some of the iPad more endearing qualities.

Unfortunately after buying one, I myself found it very hard to fall in love with it. I loved the screen, and it was a perfect gadget for consuming digital media, in my case comics, books, photos.

But alas i just could not see myself paying that high a price for a device that is still flawed in many areas. I returned it on the 13th day after purchase.

I don't miss it.

By saqib_ on 25 Aug 2010

Amazing how many stooges Microsoft has posting on various fora and comment boards these days, all saying pretty much the same thing, pushing the same tired FUD messages.

Clearly the iPad is good in itself, but it is when you use your creativity and add the apps you want to personalise it into a tool you can use for your precise needs.

I use mine for work 90% of the time. The only leisure app I use is the weather app. The rest of the time I use it with financial software during the course of my job.

In meeting's it's unubtrusive, effective, quiet, fast, and the battery lasts for ages. I last charged it one week ago and it still shows 76% battery left.

I never thought any device could be so amazing to use.

By SwissMac on 25 Aug 2010

How can anyone with the word "Mac" in their name complain about other companies' stooges?

And how dare anyone post on a forum that isn't 100% adoration about Macs, i-things and Jobs? Shame on you saqib.

By Phoomeister on 26 Aug 2010

oh dear

I love "reports" like this, as bad as the XXX(car, book, film... you decide) of the year being announced in February.

Perhaps the BlackPad ore one of the others will be 2x the machine and half the price of what is a glorified ipod? Maybe it will come with 90% of the stuff you actually need already embeded.... but no, we will settle for more speculation and praise for the glorious perfection thet is supposedly apple....


And No I dont want one... I already have an iphone, & quite honestly I am bored with it after 6 months.

By mikeos on 26 Aug 2010

@mikeos, iSuppli's predictions are based on research from component manufacturers as well as other market research. Thus they may be considering the fact that Apple own a significant proportion of the manufacturing capacity for the processors and displays used in these types of devices. You tend to notice when someone sets up a manufacturing plant capable of making 10m tablets a year.
However it is just (well) informed speculation.
Given that any device that was going to sell in significant numbers by Christmas would have to have been launched by now, it's unlikely a volume competitor is going to emerge before the middle of 2011.

By milliganp on 26 Aug 2010

I'm a Windows user and have been for many years. But I love the iPad! It probably gets used as much as my desktop - but for different things. My Win XP netbook now sadly goes unused unless I'm away from home and have a lot of typing to do. The iPad is not something you'd want to do lots of typing on!

By cyberindie on 26 Aug 2010

@SwissMac

I'm no microsoft stooge, and i find it petty for you to make a comment like that. I think your love of things Apple may be clouding your judgement.

I do love my iPhone it's like my right hand, apple did an amazing job on it.

I'm sure many people love their iPads, but for me it was not meant to be, maybe in the future.

By saqib_ on 26 Aug 2010

I agree with cyberindie, while typing is relatively easy on the iPad - and I can type very quickly on it, I find the iPad best used with apps that are already created and add productivity to the work I'm doing with a few finger swipes and the occasional bit of text to add someone's name perhaps.

I'd only ever develop an app for the iPad on a computer. But even a laptop is hard to hold and use standing up because of the leverage exerted by the weight of the screen on the rest of the laptop you are holding with one hand while trying to operate with the other and an iPad is a lot easier to use and type on in such a scenario.

It's great for field sales forces for one example. All they need type in is quantities of products ordered and select product types and you don't need a 4Gb laptop for that!

If you must have a keyboard for away from home moments, the iPad can use any Bluetooth keyboard, but I've never needed that, the onscreen keyboard is plenty good enough for my needs (looking at charts, manipulating them, checking financial stats, looking up data via VPN to the company intranet etc).

Oh, and the Mac in my username is not there because of any brand loyalty, I was using it for years before I switched away from PCs.

By SwissMac on 26 Aug 2010

Private iPad apps

Please excuse what might be a silly question. One of the negatives of the whole iPad/pod/phone experience is that apple tightly controls everything that gets to the device. Is there a mechanism for developing "private" apps that could target vertical applications or specific business sectors?

By milliganp on 27 Aug 2010

I believe so, because I keep reading this is possible on various tech following websites, but I have no idea how to do it myself. I think if you download the iOS SDK it asks what you want to use the software for, and IIRC one of the options was "for internal use only" or similar wording. I've not done it myself so I can't confirm this, but I know companies like Mercedes Benz (at least in the US) have their own app for setting up finance for people while they are still sitting in the test drive vehicle... nothing like catching them while they're hot!

By SwissMac on 27 Aug 2010

@saqib The reason I mentioned MS stooge was because when people repeat the FUD that Microsoft puts out, point for point, it does make it look like that person has some incentive to push the MS message, which is inaccurate: the iPad's use is not restricted just to "media" or looking at pretty pictures, although it covers these areas too. Half the Fortune 500 companies haven't got them to entertain their staff, but to get profitable work out of them.

By SwissMac on 27 Aug 2010