Anyone buying an iPad 2?

[Hudson]

When I use an Ipad, magic happens. Rainbows suddenly appear, small people with high pitched voices emerge from nearby tuffets and begin singing in high pitched voices, and unicorns fly out of my butt.

I can download apps that let me fart in 144 different pitches. I can shake my Ipad gently and it tells me not only where to eat, but what to order and how to say "pozole" like I am a native New Mexican.

The iBand app takes my nervous finger tapping and turns it into a pitch-perfect timbale solo that I can immediately upload and sell on iTunes "world music" section.

I can access all my favorite apple forums where I can pedantically chide FNG's that don't know about the special easter egg messages that appear when you temporarily hold the power button and the volume switch. I feel secretly superior.

My favorite is when I can follow Engadget's live tweets of the new Ipad unveiling, as it happens. In real time. Like I am really there at the MacWorld conference. Only I'm not. But it feels like I am.

I feel warm and fuzzy inside when I hold my iphone-ipad-imac-ipod.

-Sent from my Verizon Wireless Iphone 4Gee.

Seriously, though. My wife wants one for nothing in particular. I have to agree, they are pretty cool for their intended use. No one buys an Ipad to do much more than consume information and media and for now, it's the coolest gadget going.

Android? Uhhh....not so much.

 

[jmdaniel]

When I use an Ipad, magic happens. Rainbows suddenly appear, small people with high pitched voices emerge from nearby tuffets and begin singing in high pitched voices, and unicorns fly out of my butt.

Of course, the app lines these unicorns up so that they fly out backwards? Oh, never mind, I forgot about the new iPad app, AnalTearRepair.

 

[Bounce]

I have a 27" iMac i5, an iPhone 3GS, and an iPod Touch.

I also have a Kindle 3 (3G+WiFi) and wouldn't swap it for a tablet-based ebook reader. My iPhone lets me surf when travelling (as does the Kindle in a limited way). The Kindle rocks with eInk, legibility, and battery life.

IMHO the iPad is a large iPhone with a bigger screen and no phone. I have an iPhone 4 which works as advertised. A laptop for heavy lifting and serious web surfing. A Netbook for travel to download videos from my Sony Handycam and pictures from my Nikon DSLR. I have a Kindle 3G to read with.

While the iPad would be great fun I can't download my vacation videos to it or pictures from my Nikon. I get headaches reading for long periods of time on LCD screens and my Kindle's e-ink is absolutely great to read on and the battery life is amazing.

I just can't find a good reason or excuse to justify an iPad2 considering the way I use my technology.

!!WARNING - Standing on soapbox now!! - Please stop reading if contrary opinion offends!

Concerning the iPad2 I had to laugh to myself. It is what the iPad1 should have been in the first place. I mean really, no camera on the original iPad. You can't think no one at Apple stopped and said "don't you think people will want a camera to take pictures and use for chatting, and how about an SD slot or USB port so images can be loaded to it"? Apple has planned obsolescence down to a science. Not a Apple hater as I love my iPhone and my son loves his iPhone and Macbook, just surprised that Apple intentionally leaves what seems to be key features off of a device yet everyone still can't wait to have it. If Microsoft had come to market with such a device we would have laughed it into the dustbin of history even if the operating system was rock solid. I do believe there is some "Apple is cool, whatever they produce is cool, therefore I must have one to be cool" regardless of the actual specifications. Imagine what Apple could give us if consumers demanded more before they drank the coolaid. Just saying.

!!off of soapbox!!

Still when the specs are right and the functionality is there I could see buying a tablet to replace the Netbook someday. Just not today!

good points. i glossed over my years with Windoze and support of windows workstations, servers, netware, and enterprise solutions. i just recently pushed my core 2 quad win7 (home brewed) pc to the corner of the office when i got the iMac and run win7 in VMware Fusion 3.

all that to say that i have some little experience with both. i quit carrying a laptop when i got my iPhone 3GS (unless i need to plug into a cisco switch to config/trouble shoot it). i can see where the increased screen size of an iPad would make some work easier, but then i'd be heading back toward the laptop-sized territory that i shed myself of 2 years ago without the work-required functions that current force me to use a laptop (serial port? nope. ethernet port? nope. any port at all? not really.)

i also agree that apple released the iPad 1 knowing they would need to upgrade to the things in the 2 shortly to keep their sales momentum going while they worked of a real upgrade of functionality and ability (3?). that's what they've always done with iPods, Touches, and phones. It's their marketing strategy.

i don't see them including an SD slot if it would take sales away from their more costly models by people buying at the base level and adding an SD card. why buy an 32Gb device at the extra cost when you can get an 8Gb model and buy cheap cards on the open market. even the new Windows phones that support SD cards do so in an odd way that only works with a few select cards, requires a reboot of the phone and a initialization of your data on the card where simply swapping for different music/photos isn't reasonable for the average user (under the battery compartment, OS install on the new card to a "blank" contact list, etc.).

as for the guy with IR control of his home theater stuff. how 80's. my home theater equipment is network enabled. i can control my stuff from any iOS (or OS X) machine including my gen 1 iPod Touch. it uses my home WiFi to reach out through my home gigabit ethernet. i laugh at line-of-site IR and the increased battery drain of that additional hardware! HA HA HA!

all that being said, i am waiting for some reviews of the not-yet-released HTC Thunderbolt phone.

 

[monkeyman]

Bounce -

My amps and pre amps are vacuum tube (surround processor is not valved). Adding network connections introduce electronic noise which I don't want. Having the IR receiver on them doesn't help but it isn't as bad as the internal network devices are for noise.

Vacuum tubes... How 1930's - 1950's!

David

-Monkeyman is drooling over his 6550's....

 

[jmdaniel]

These guys approve of this thread:

 

[Bounce]

Bounce -

My amps and pre amps are vacuum tube (surround processor is not valved). Adding network connections introduce electronic noise which I don't want. Having the IR receiver on them doesn't help but it isn't as bad as the internal network devices are for noise.

Vacuum tubes... How 1930's - 1950's!

David

-Monkeyman is drooling over his 6550's....

wish i had the cash for some Macintosh gear. i did score a set of sweet MG-1 Magnaplanar speakers this past year.

 

[Hudson]

Monkeyman, I did nearly write you off until you said the magic words, vacuum tubes. Hmmm. Mebbe there is hope for this guy after all.

Love me my EL34s, though I've owned and liked (if not loved) 6550 tubed amps.

Networks are not all bad. My music server is a Mac Mini, sending uncompressed music files (wav files burned from CD) to a highly modified Squeezebox, which outputs the bitstream to a tubed DAC (uses mil spec Raytheon miniature tubes in the output stage). It sounds a whole bunch cleaner than the very exotic CD transport that preceded it, and I don't experience any noise. Of course, the power supply to the Squeezebox and the DAC's power supply are so highly regulated and choked, it would surprise me to hear much of anything.

 

[jmdaniel]

All right, the rest of the story. Yesterday, I bought one of the new iMacs that were introduced last month. It will replace the 5-6 year old Dell desktop that I have. I first started checking them out when I was in the Apple store getting my iPad 2 pulled out of Recovery mode. Yep, bought both the iPad and iMac. The "i" I have decided to cull from the herd is the iPhone 3Gs, when my contract with AT&T runs out. I work out of the house, and it is a house with HORRIBLE cell coverage. AT&T has refused to do anything about that, besides "allowing" me to buy a femtocell. Nope. Your service sucks where I am at most of the day; I'm not going to pay you more money to make it suck less. When the contract is up, I will give AT&T the big finger and get a non smartphone on another provider. My iPad will do enough of my smartphone's stuff, and no more monthly $30 data plan to AT&T. I installed an OOMA box last month, and cancelled my landline, so AT&T will be getting no money from me anymore.

Why buy an iMac? Well, like I said, I work out of the house, so am tied to a desk most of the day. I use a KVM switch to flip back and forth between my work computer and home, (shhhh....), and wanted to upgrade in the home PC area. I think it will all work out well.

 

[painman]

We bought my wife the ipad 2 for her 50th birthday and have no complaints except she still uses her iphone and the ipad rarely comes out of the box.....go figure. PM. <><

 

[Bugnatr]

We bought my wife the ipad 2 for her 50th birthday and have no complaints except she still uses her iphone and the ipad rarely comes out of the box.....go figure. PM. <><

I did the same thing for my wife's 50th and she loves it. Really likes to read books on it, I like the light weight but prefer the bigger screen on my laptop.

 

[jmdaniel]

I sense a trend here. The iPad 2 was purchased with a gift card my wife gave me for my 50th!

 

[Bounce]

I don't have an iPad 1.5 but do have a Gen 1 iPod Touch (came free with my car), an iPhone 3Gs and an iMac 27" i5 from just last October (-1 gen on the iMac from current). My Win7 PC sits on the floor at the back of my den; unused since the iMac came on line. I run Win7 Pro 64 using VMWare's Fusion 3 (sandboxed so there's no reboot needed but so that Win7 is isolated from everything except the things I choose).

Upgraded the OEM 4Gb of RAM on the iMac to 8Gb from RAMJet.com for about half the price Apple asks.

Oh yeah, and I learned to avoid MacMall because they some cracker assed crazy crackers.

 

[jmdaniel]

Upgraded the OEM 4Gb of RAM on the iMac to 8Gb from RAMJet.com for about half the price Apple asks.

That was one of the useful things I learned when doing the research on this one. I also mentioned the (advertised) free printer and (unadvertised) Trackpad instead of the Magic Mouse that I learned about a few weeks back. Neither are advertised now, but both were thrown in after I mentioned them, including getting the Trackpad and the mouse. Not a bad deal, and I'm looking forward to saying buh-bye to my Dell PC.

 

[mferriter]

I picked up an Ipad-2 (verizon) about a month ago. Anyone interested in a lightly used and highly protected (ZAGG screen cover and leather case) Ipad-1 (3G AT&T). The only reason for the upgrade is because I can't get AT&T signal out here in the sticks - even Verizon is very weak.