A New Week, A New iPad

This is, of course, written on my iPad. No editing has been done on a separate computer.

This is day five of owning this incredible device. Why so late? I gave it a month to decide whether or not one would fit into my life. I found myself borrowing my friend’s so often that I finally decided it was time.

The more I use and carry this device, the more I realize that it is the future of portable computing. There’s no heavy laptop that needs to unfold, it takes minimal space, is ultra-light, and best of all, it’s instant-on.

This is an entirely new device. Yet, at the same time it runs the iPhone OS we all know and love. It fills a different niche than laptops do, and most complaints or adversities come from people wanting it to be something it’s not.

Day to day, I hear some statements against iPad. Firstly, the statement of “I’ll wait for the second version.” This hardware is pretty sound. There’s no real ‘bugs’ that will be ‘worked out’ in the second version. Apple has been building this exact device in a smaller form for 3 years now, and they’ve had plenty of practice. If you’re waiting for features to be implemented in a later version, that’s a valid reason to. However, as history as taught us, it’s futile to wait for Apple to implement features before buying. I would say the most we’ll see is a camera. And you’ll most likely be waiting a year if you do wait.

As for the lack of USB ports and printing, it’s not a computer! Well, not in the traditional sense. This device mostly relies on the Internet and networking. Printing is dying off. As such, it’s not a laptop replacement for some mobile professionals. There are some apps that allow the use of networked printers.

This device is as thin as a USB port. Thus, I don’t expect it to have one. It would make it look and feel klutzy, like many a Windows machine. It doesn’t really even need it, as all the functionality you need is built in. It takes less time to email a document to yourself than it does to insert a flash drive. As for a camera, do we really need a camera in every circuit we have in the house? Soon even paperbacks and kitchen stoves will have a camera. Video chat would admittedly be neat, but for the moment there’s still the home computer to be used for it. Again, if you’re waiting for a camera you’ll be waiting a long time, which probably means you don’t really even need one.

Some of my favorite uses for it right now are email, streaming video (using Netflix, AirVideo, and ABC), playing games and reading the news. I’m also using it to view my exercise PDFs, and find it incredibly handy for that.

The battery is outrageous. It’s something I don’t even have to think about. It’s been unplugged and used frequently for 3 hours now, and it’s at 94%.

I also find that this has finally motivated me to get a new bag for daily carrying of the iPad and my food items. It’s made me rethink my entire day-to-day on-person cargo. My laptop backpack is absolutely huge and I want something very basic for this. Absolutely everywhere is out of stock on iPad and netbook bags/cases right now. It’s been hard to find one.

To sum it up, those are my findings so far. I’m definitely a fan, and can’t wait to see what other awesome apps are released for it!