{"id":576,"date":"2010-04-08T20:59:19","date_gmt":"2010-04-09T01:59:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/boulter.com\/blog\/2010\/04\/08\/i-have-used-an-ipad-and-you-still-shouldnt-buy-one\/"},"modified":"2010-04-09T12:17:07","modified_gmt":"2010-04-09T17:17:07","slug":"i-have-used-an-ipad-and-you-still-shouldnt-buy-one","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/boulter.com\/blog\/2010\/04\/08\/i-have-used-an-ipad-and-you-still-shouldnt-buy-one\/","title":{"rendered":"I have used an iPad and you still shouldn’t buy one"},"content":{"rendered":"

Soon after the iPad was released, I wrote about how I thought Apple missed the mark with this product<\/a>. Not everyone agreed.<\/p>\n

Today I got to play with one for a few hours and I stand by my initial impressions. <\/p>\n

Reviewing my original comments:<\/strong><\/p>\n

10. It doesn’t replace your laptop or phone.<\/strong> Definitely true. There’s a lot you can’t do with an iPad (yet). In fact, the first thing you have to do when you turn it on is connect it to a computer. Clearly, it’s not something you could give to someone who doesn’t already own a computer.<\/p>\n

9. It doesn’t have a camera.<\/strong> I can’t understand why they didn’t include one. You can make calls with Skype on it, but it would be ideal as a video conferencing device.<\/p>\n

8. There’s no keyboard.<\/strong> Typing wasn’t hard, but it was slow. There’s no way I could use it for any type of serious work. It’s awkward to try to rest it somewhere while you peck away.<\/p>\n

7. The battery life isn’t great.<\/strong> In my couple of hours of use, the battery drained about 20%, so I believe Apple’s 10-hour estimate is accurate. Of course the battery life will degrade over time and you can’t replace it yourself.<\/p>\n

6. It doesn’t multitask.<\/strong> This will be fixed soon with iPad\/iPhone OS 4.0, but I was reminded of it as I tried to listen to NPR while I surfed the web.<\/p>\n

5. 3G Internet access is expensive.<\/strong> I tried the Wifi-only version, but I still wouldn’t pay the $130 premium and $14\/month.<\/p>\n

4. The screen resolution is relatively poor.<\/strong> The screen is pretty nice and bright, but I really could have used more pixels for viewing whole web pages.<\/p>\n

3. It’s twice as expensive as a Kindle.<\/strong> Yup.<\/p>\n

2. It doesn’t support Flash.<\/strong> It was annoying when I encountered sites that required Flash and they didn’t work. That said, the iPad’s hype has motivated a lot of sites (including Yahoo!) to build HTML5 versions of their video pages. Well played, Steve Jobs.<\/p>\n

1. You can’t run OS X software on it.<\/strong> There’s not a lot of apps built for the iPad, but I’m sure that will change quickly. That said, you’ll have to rebuy software you already have for your laptop or desktop. This $500 device might become a $700 or $800 device once you’ve got all the software you need.<\/p>\n

Other observations<\/strong><\/p>\n