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Spacemanvic wrote:

ajefferism wrote:Wow, looks like a lot of Apple haters in this forum topic.

Sorry no. I do have and like my iPhone. I just think that the iPad is a miss gadget wise and a non starter price-point wise when I can get more capable netbooks now and more capable data pads later. I might even want to get an iPad when it hits third gen and gets the kinks out. Its called subjective criticism.

I will admit though that I am not an apple fashionista. Those fanbois take koolaid drinking to new levels....

My bad. Replace all "Apple hater" references with "iPad hater" references. I can see why some people would wait to purchase... in a year or two, it'll be $3-400 bucks (remember how iPhone went down $100 a month or two after launch?) and it'll have all the extra bells and whistles that people think it needs. But since last year ive been thinking about getting a netbook and when the iPad was announced at first I was underwhelmed... no OSX? its just a big iphone? But then I realized, it would be so much slower with a big OS and I really dont want to do WORK on a netbook/tablet. I do graphic design/web design work and I wouldn't even want to do work on a regular laptop if I could do it on a big desktop screen. It sorta clicked with me that I just wanted something that I could quick check my email/websurf etc etc while sitting on my couch watching tv or at a friends house. The streamlined touchbased interface just seems ideal for that.

Android tablets will be out to give Apple competition and users a choice. Honestly though, I dont think shoehorning Windows OS/Mac OS onto a touch screen is an option. My sister has that IBM touchscreen laptop and it just stinks trying to click on icons in windows, its not designed for it.

Bottom line, if all your looking for is someplace to keep your rules PDFs a tablet seems ideal, its quicker and paging through and reading PDFs is better with the screen orientation and touchscreen interface. But if you want to do something like use Army Builder or see yourself doing a lot of typing etc, netbook/laptop may be your best bet.

I love the idea of the iPad but I just couldn't see me needing one, really ever. Same goes for netbooks. Or even laptops. I think it's a cool enough gadget, but if I got one I'd love it for 2 weeks and then forget all about it.

gadgets are just getting out of hand now. Blow $300 on the next big thing, pay like $50 a month to be able to use it, then in a year throw it away and buy the next big thing.

ajefferism wrote:Wow, looks like a lot of Apple haters in this forum topic.

I got an iPad because I don't have a laptop and I just wanted something to check email, websurf, youtube etc. I use it when playing 40k and LOVE IT. There's a great PDF viewer called GoodReader that I dumped all my codexes, rule books expansions to. You can make your own bookmarks in these pdfs so it makes finding the rules a lot easier (you all know how disorganized 40k codexes and rulebooks are).

Thing is, you could do that on your iphone.

Except the iphone makes calls.

And has a camera.

And is substantially cheaper.

Why the ipad doesn't make calls I have no idea, the 3G version has all of the hardware that would be required. As it is there's no good reason for a smart phone user to get one since it doesn't replace your phone. It also doesn't replace your laptop since it doesn't run real apps.

Doesn't matter if you're a mac user or not. I haven't bought one of the current android tablets for the same reason. When they're also phones and powerfull enough to replace my netbook then I'm all over one (probably a small one - 5" or maybe 7")

Scott-S6 wrote:

ajefferism wrote:Wow, looks like a lot of Apple haters in this forum topic.

I got an iPad because I don't have a laptop and I just wanted something to check email, websurf, youtube etc. I use it when playing 40k and LOVE IT. There's a great PDF viewer called GoodReader that I dumped all my codexes, rule books expansions to. You can make your own bookmarks in these pdfs so it makes finding the rules a lot easier (you all know how disorganized 40k codexes and rulebooks are).

Thing is, you could do that on your iphone.

Except the iphone makes calls.

And has a camera.

And is substantially cheaper.

Why the ipad doesn't make calls I have no idea, the 3G version has all of the hardware that would be required. As it is there's no good reason for a smart phone user to get one since it doesn't replace your phone. It also doesn't replace your laptop since it doesn't run real apps.

Doesn't matter if you're a mac user or not. I haven't bought one of the current android tablets for the same reason. When they're also phones and powerfull enough to replace my netbook then I'm all over one (probably a small one - 5" or maybe 7")

Hmmm I'd feel pretty stupid trying to hold a tablet up to my ear and try to call some one.... Don't think that'll happen on any tablet... ever. You'll probably be able use a skype app but phone calls? no.

The camera is another issue... I could see a WEBCAM on the iPad but, again, i'd feel pretty stupid holding up my tablet taking pictures of people with a regular camera setup.

Sorry, I have a phone that can read PDFs and a using a tablet is SO much easier to read. The text isn't tiny and you dont have to constantly scale or scroll to read the thing. Tablet/netbook wins that argument I'm afraid. Screen size DOES make a difference.

BTW here are some other things an iPad/ Tablet/netbook WONT do: make your bed, do your dishes, brush your teeth, wipe your ass.

The iPhone has a very tiny screen, though. Imagine only being able to view gaming books through a 5 inch by 3 inch 'window' that you'd have to constantly scroll to see the content. The iPad solves that problem a lot better by being nearly big enough to view even big technical books (and RPG books) a page at a time. I think you can do so at maybe 90%, which is certainly doable for PDFs created from the original layout files (I.E. where the text is saved as text, not an image).

I may try this... When I make a personal weight-loss goal I am planning to get an iPod Touch, which can also view PDFs, etc.

Skype on ipad could possibly work? No clue.

Wondering why there isn't a skype phone device with 3g/4g function.

That would >>> cell phones unless... you are in a 3g deadzone!

ha... idk.

iPad fail is as epic as the psp.

I would enjoy using one as a gaming peripheral, and I think I would get a lot of mileage out of it. I don't like taking my macbook to stores with me for rules reference and army builder, but I do out of a certain necessity. The ipad is a rather powerful, long lasting, good looking solution to the problem that outperforms competition like the archos tablets by miles. Most critisism of it as a platform that is inferior to a netbook comes from a lack of actual use of the device. It opens and navigates PDFs far faster and far more legibly than comparable netbooks, and it does so for significantly longer on a charge while doing so without having to sit down.

It's just a better solution to the issue than a netbook. While it does certainly lack utility in other regards as a gaming peripheral alone it's certainly a better accompaniment to a tournament or convention floor than a laptop.

Hmmm I'd feel pretty stupid trying to hold a tablet up to my ear and try to call some one.... Don't think that'll happen on any tablet... ever. You'll probably be able use a skype app but phone calls? no.

I think thats why they make bluetooth headsets.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

RogueMarket wrote:Skype on ipad could possibly work? No clue.

Wondering why there isn't a skype phone device with 3g/4g function.

That would >>> cell phones unless... you are in a 3g deadzone!

ha... idk.

iPad fail is as epic as the psp.

Skype was a major demo of iphone os 4, which for the ipad debuts in the fall and for the iphone the summer. It's coming, though you'll have to jailbreak if you want it now.

Its just..500$+ for convenience of a pdf library... for wargaming...

idk.

Price just needs to drop...

The possibilities are there - its just not yet there.

The carriers don't like the idea of a 3g device that allows people to make calls that are billed as data, since these devices generally have an unlimited data plan anyway.

i think it's far too early to refer to it as a failure, as it seems to be interesting to a lot of people. I'd love one for use for PDFs and such: a Netbook is too unwieldy (I don't need to deal with the keyboard part of the laptop for this) but the iPad is too expensive for my tastes.

RogueMarket wrote:Its just..500$+ for convenience of a pdf library... for wargaming...

idk.

Price just needs to drop...

The possibilities are there - its just not yet there.

It can do a lot more you know. It's got a few good games up already that it plays fairly well (try that on a netbook) it's a great online web browsing experience (except the missing flash, but again, netbooks kind blow at running flash and those are it's competition), and it has a fairly large range of utility applications as well. It hasn't hit its stride, but it's a first generation product that is largely driven by a development community that hasn't quite kicked into gear yet. It's certainly sold well enough, so it's not like it's just going to fade away. It just needs a few months and probably one hardware revision and price drop to become a device that everyone will want.

People usually whine that GW products are expensive, but the iPad is even more so for a luxury product.

I can tolerate not having an RTS game on a fragile retina-burning device. Instead, if I had to spend $600, I'd buy an Amazon Kindle, start a new 40k army, and buy something from Forge World. That would collectively help my game, hobbying, and eBook satisfaction much more than an iPad ever would.

Hell, I could buy a small laptop that plays DoWII for the same price as an iPad. That way, I can play DoWII AND the tabletop RTS program that the OP suggested instead of having to bog myself through Apple's unsatisfactory Apple Store.

People usually whine that GW products are expensive, but the iPad is even more so for a luxury product.

Thats arguable. It has utility and a multitude of uses, GW products do not.

Actually I picked up an iPad for gaming reasons as well. I can finally ditch the laptop I was using for this purpose (which always needed to be plugged in cause my gaming sessions can easily exceed 5 hours). I have all my D&D, 40k/Fantasy, Dark Heresy, and other sourcebooks in PDF on it (Last I checked when counting all my versions of D&D and not just the newer one this came to around 40GB of matieral ). Works great, lighter and less hassle for me.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Actually I should mention the people who say its just a scaled back iPhone that is bigger are correct, but at the same time incorrect in assuming that that is bad. I have been waiting for something other than the iphone because I don't need a cellphone. So having to get a contract and all that crap was pointless to me. What I want/need is something like the iPad and Apple has identified that there is a large market for such a device and filled that whole. Will it be a classic hit like the ipod was? Who knows, but I am glad they finally brought all the features I wanted together in the perfect form factor.

Even more exciting is where will they take this products future revisions? I am an owner of the original Mac only 5GB iPod and seeing all the versions/flavours/features that are their in the ipod market now it makes me wonder what the next 5 years will bring for the iPad form factor and handheld computing in general.

Generally speaking, I am admittedly anti-Apple ( I hate the limitations they impose on me). But the prospect of having a digital note pad with all of my reference manuals (army books, rule books, ect) as well as the ability to surf the web has me wanting an ipad pretty bad.

Sign me up as a future iPad customer as well (as soon as it is available in Sweden).

A virtual notebook, photo viewer, web surfer, work tool and gaming utility in one - filling the gap between phone and laptop.

Having a virtual rulebook/codex that "just works" is really tempting
(compared to having a WinPad with short battery life, long startup and shutdown times, BSOD-problems, antivirus programs, and the feel of a plastic fragile DELL brick etc.).

Obviously the iPad will become a success.
It outperforms all current competition just as the iPod/iPhone (except for creating stuff - where a real computer is way better).

I was really interested in an iPad as I use a mac at home and I have an iPhone which I get a lot of use out of. My main excitement as a UK user would be to read e-books as the kindle hasn't had good coverage over here. I have the 3G iPhone and am waiting for a new version this summer. The event at Apple HQ this last week mentioned the next iPhone OS will have books just like the iPad so I don't need one for that. Pricewise it's very expensive for a first version of a device which I am sure will improve in time. At that point i may be in a position to get one. But right now I'd rather save the cash towards a car as I'm learning to drive right now and as I said I will be upgrading my phone this summer so I wont be getting both.

The price is ridiculous for the hardware you get. If it didn't have the Apple logo, nobody would give it a second glance (of course, the same is true of most of their products.)

In a few months I'll be able to get a much faster tablet with a real OS and some USB ports for the same price and probably squeeze in a dedicated e-ink reader to boot.

lord_blackfang wrote:The price is ridiculous for the hardware you get. If it didn't have the Apple logo, nobody would give it a second glance (of course, the same is true of most of their products.)

In a few months I'll be able to get a much faster tablet with a real OS and some USB ports for the same price and probably squeeze in a dedicated e-ink reader to boot.

Comparable archos tablets have floated around 500 dollars for years, some going above, and most tablet PCs clock in at around or above two grand. Try not to let reality get in the way of anti apple rants. As for a real OS, what? Like windows 7? HP is a tablet coming out using it shortly and it looks like it's just windows seven on a touch tablet. Windows seven is not a touch based operating system, and attempting to navigate solely by touch kind of sucks on it. Perhaps you meant android? Because the android OS is so much more legitimate than the Iphone OS. As for the usb port, what are you plugging into it exactly? It can wirelessly sync to most computers so you would have to lack itunes in order to be unable to use it as a storage medium, and I own a flash thumb drive so I'm not sure when I or really most people would run into an issue.

I guess you can't upload directly from your camera too it. I suppose that is a bit of an annoyance.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAl28d6tbko&feature=player_embedded



There is, to my understanding:

Android OS and Chrome OS

I htink Chrome OS is targetting netbooks/tablets.


Microsoft is working on the M$ phone that has xbox live functionality. If M$ can port XBL games it will GG the ipad.

Then again PSP phone is rumoured too...


My experiences however with 3g sucks... its slow for what needs to be done imo.

If they had a 4g unit.. then might reconsider.

4g and wimax is coming steadfast no doubt.

RogueMarket wrote:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAl28d6tbko&feature=player_embedded



There is, to my understanding:

Android OS and Chrome OS

I htink Chrome OS is targetting netbooks/tablets.


Microsoft is working on the M$ phone that has xbox live functionality. If M$ can port XBL games it will GG the ipad.

Then again PSP phone is rumoured too...


My experiences however with 3g sucks... its slow for what needs to be done imo.

If they had a 4g unit.. then might reconsider.

4g and wimax is coming steadfast no doubt.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNozKsh7PHY

Balance wrote:The carriers don't like the idea of a 3g device that allows people to make calls that are billed as data, since these devices generally have an unlimited data plan anyway.

The carriers are working hard to move everyone's call over to data so that they don't have to bill by call. Recording all of your calls and pricing them costs an absolute fortune. We're only a few years away from seeing this (monopolies won't them them do it until the maority of them are in a position to do so - British Telecom tried to do that with landlines years ago and was firmly bitch-slapped)


Automatically Appended Next Post:

kendoka wrote:
It outperforms all current competition just as the iPod/iPhone (except for creating stuff - where a real computer is way better).

There are tablets already on the market that outperform it for less. The Nvidia Tegra 2 1.6GHz tablets coming out in August outperform it enormously. Plus they have cameras and phones and usb ports and replaceable batteries, etc....

Warboss Narznok wrote:

RogueMarket wrote:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lAl28d6tbko&feature=player_embedded



There is, to my understanding:

Android OS and Chrome OS

I htink Chrome OS is targetting netbooks/tablets.


Microsoft is working on the M$ phone that has xbox live functionality. If M$ can port XBL games it will GG the ipad.

Then again PSP phone is rumoured too...


My experiences however with 3g sucks... its slow for what needs to be done imo.

If they had a 4g unit.. then might reconsider.

4g and wimax is coming steadfast no doubt.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pNozKsh7PHY

hahaha it blendzzzz!

ShumaGorath wrote:
Comparable archos tablets have floated around 500 dollars for years, some going above, and most tablet PCs clock in at around or above two grand. Try not to let reality get in the way of anti apple rants. As for a real OS, what? Like windows 7? HP is a tablet coming out using it shortly and it looks like it's just windows seven on a touch tablet. Windows seven is not a touch based operating system, and attempting to navigate solely by touch kind of sucks on it. Perhaps you meant android? Because the android OS is so much more legitimate than the Iphone OS. As for the usb port, what are you plugging into it exactly? It can wirelessly sync to most computers so you would have to lack itunes in order to be unable to use it as a storage medium, and I own a flash thumb drive so I'm not sure when I or really most people would run into an issue.

I guess you can't upload directly from your camera too it. I suppose that is a bit of an annoyance.

Don't let ignorance get in the way of Apple fanboyism
The only thing the iPad is good for is driving competitors' prices down. For that I am grateful

RogueMarket wrote:
Microsoft is working on the M$ phone that has xbox live functionality. If M$ can port XBL games it will GG the ipad.

If it weren't for the fact that a phone and a tablet computer occupy different markets.

I think the big problem is that people see that it runs the same OS that the iphone does so people just end up calling them the same. The idea behind a tablet and a phone are two different concepts. People are looking at this and asking "why isn't this a giant iphone" and then accuse it of having less features than the iphone. A tablet has more appeal to certain types of people and less to others. For doctors/nurses doing hospital work would find a touch screen tablet highly useful in being able to access information quickly. A business person may find that a tablet is easier to work with because of it's extreme portability. For someone who wants casual computing, they may look to a netbook, or even an iPad because it is trying to bridge those gaps between casual computing and netbook.

If you want to know why it should run off the iphone OS, it's because it's the best suited for it. Shoehorning Windows 7/Vista onto netbooks is a horrible idea because netbooks are designed around minimalistic hardware, usually 1GHz processor, typically no more than 1GB of RAM, intel GMA GPU, These are full fledged OSes and you're basically trying to run them on severely outdated hardware. Apple designed a new RISC processor just for it's ipads that has an integrated GPU and will have a huge amount of power at it's disposal compared to the iphone and can most certainly outperform netbooks. This doesn't automatically make it an iphone though, you wouldn't say a windows tablet is a full fledged computer just because it runs windows.

As for the continued lack of flash, it's not about "closed" environments. Apple uses open standards. Flash is not an open standard, it's very much closed and owned by Adobe. Adobe's flash has had a bad track record on OSX accounting for most of it's crashes and problems. Apple doesn't want such a crucial part of their device to be subject to another company when they can't patch it. This is why they push HTML 5 so much. They want Adobe out of the way.

When all is said and done, I say wait 6 months and see what the next gen has. It'll probably get a webcam and various other things and any kinks worked out. Or if you can't wait that long, wait for iphone OS 4 for the multitasking.

If you had to, I'd prefer this one to Apple.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/German-tablet-PC-sets-out-to-apf-890973130.html?x=0&.v=7

Surtur wrote:

RogueMarket wrote:
Microsoft is working on the M$ phone that has xbox live functionality. If M$ can port XBL games it will GG the ipad.

If it weren't for the fact that a phone and a tablet computer occupy different markets.

I think the big problem is that people see that it runs the same OS that the iphone does so people just end up calling them the same. The idea behind a tablet and a phone are two different concepts. People are looking at this and asking "why isn't this a giant iphone" and then accuse it of having less features than the iphone. A tablet has more appeal to certain types of people and less to others. For doctors/nurses doing hospital work would find a touch screen tablet highly useful in being able to access information quickly. A business person may find that a tablet is easier to work with because of it's extreme portability. For someone who wants casual computing, they may look to a netbook, or even an iPad because it is trying to bridge those gaps between casual computing and netbook.

If you want to know why it should run off the iphone OS, it's because it's the best suited for it. Shoehorning Windows 7/Vista onto netbooks is a horrible idea because netbooks are designed around minimalistic hardware, usually 1GHz processor, typically no more than 1GB of RAM, intel GMA GPU, These are full fledged OSes and you're basically trying to run them on severely outdated hardware. Apple designed a new RISC processor just for it's ipads that has an integrated GPU and will have a huge amount of power at it's disposal compared to the iphone and can most certainly outperform netbooks. This doesn't automatically make it an iphone though, you wouldn't say a windows tablet is a full fledged computer just because it runs windows.

As for the continued lack of flash, it's not about "closed" environments. Apple uses open standards. Flash is not an open standard, it's very much closed and owned by Adobe. Adobe's flash has had a bad track record on OSX accounting for most of it's crashes and problems. Apple doesn't want such a crucial part of their device to be subject to another company when they can't patch it. This is why they push HTML 5 so much. They want Adobe out of the way.

When all is said and done, I say wait 6 months and see what the next gen has. It'll probably get a webcam and various other things and any kinks worked out. Or if you can't wait that long, wait for iphone OS 4 for the multitasking.

Yeah - all good points here I can't agree any less.

I just meant to bash the first gen i know it could have been better... its just apple's way of moolah machine racking.
Just like the iphone.
I waited till the 3gs and glad i did so.
Its a nice phone. the 2g... eh.. hah.

HTML5 is the future def.

lord_blackfang wrote:

ShumaGorath wrote:
Comparable archos tablets have floated around 500 dollars for years, some going above, and most tablet PCs clock in at around or above two grand. Try not to let reality get in the way of anti apple rants. As for a real OS, what? Like windows 7? HP is a tablet coming out using it shortly and it looks like it's just windows seven on a touch tablet. Windows seven is not a touch based operating system, and attempting to navigate solely by touch kind of sucks on it. Perhaps you meant android? Because the android OS is so much more legitimate than the Iphone OS. As for the usb port, what are you plugging into it exactly? It can wirelessly sync to most computers so you would have to lack itunes in order to be unable to use it as a storage medium, and I own a flash thumb drive so I'm not sure when I or really most people would run into an issue.

I guess you can't upload directly from your camera too it. I suppose that is a bit of an annoyance.

Don't let ignorance get in the way of Apple fanboyism
The only thing the iPad is good for is driving competitors' prices down. For that I am grateful

Didn't you just say the price was ridiculous? Now you're saying it's driving the markets prices down? I mean, I know your trolling and all, but at least be consistent here.

RogueMarket wrote:

Yeah - all good points here I can't agree any less.

I just meant to bash the first gen i know it could have been better... its just apple's way of moolah machine racking.
Just like the iphone.
I waited till the 3gs and glad i did so.
Its a nice phone. the 2g... eh.. hah.

HTML5 is the future def.

It wasn't really directed at you, more of everyone who has posted so far since there's been a lot posted and I disagree with many points that have been made.

Either way good points all across.

I see potential in tablets, I just expecting too much from the 1st gen possibly =/.

And i will admit i wrote something very closed minded. iPad is more than just gaming - its multi purpose.

The larger screen size, and greater specs than iphone/touch creates greater opportunities for stronger apps.
Which is a good thing.

We just waiting to see things pick up.

Much like the ps3, its a super machine, took a while to speed up.

Software / apps heavily define a device and apple has the largest library and its just going to grow more.

I wish game devs would learn how to program for the PS3. It's sad to see an awesome processor be bogged down by companies that seem to have no interest in learning a new device.