I think there is nothing the Onion can do to make the iPad funnier...

Don't get me wrong - I played Broken Sword on the DS and it was great.

This could be so much better.

That was really funny, but only because (as a commenter pointed out) they made that clip two years ago

How would that be different than playing it on any existing Tablet?

Well, I would expect nobody has an existing tablet. I don't know of anyone who owns one. I do however know folk (myself included) who have played it on the iPhone/iPod Touch and enjoyed it thoroughly. Playing it and new games like it on a larger screen should be an absolute pleasure.

Yes, but for the price, you could get a PS3.

Of course, the iPad has games on it.

Heh, it's obvious that Apple has already convinced some people here that they absolutely need a device that they previously never had any desire or need for.

Well I know that I've been thinking about getting such a device for quite some time, and this is the first one I like the look of. Or do I have to find the thread where I moaned about being fed up with all the physical DVDs and books I have to haul around and find places for?

I have a tablet. Gaming is OK, but I still prefer my mouse. It's a fun alternative, especially for shooters (strikers 1945 anyone?), but not anything particularly grand.



Having a tablet for reading is great and all, but nothing really... different.

I got a tablet because I like to jot down notes and random scribbles. Everything else you guys mentioned just isn't that different on a tablet.

Hell, I don't get "ebook" readers in general. A netbook can read PDFs and the like just fine. What's the hubub about?

I do hope it doesn't hurt DS sales, I love that handheld to death.

Echoing Detty: I've been on the lookout for something that will do e-books and generally allow for sedantry activities like reading a paper, doing a crossword, checking massassi and all that.

You can even trawl through my chats with Matty re: multitasking - I'm by and large a "one thing at a time" bloke. Trying to do too many things at once stresses me out.

The hubub with eBook readers is e-ink. It's incredibly easy on the eyes (basically looks the same as normal ink on paper), so eye-strain isn't really a problem for people like it is on LCDs for lots of people. It also consumes very little power because e-ink holds its state without requiring any power to do so. The only time a significant amount power is used is when the state changes, like when you're navigating menus or turning pages. There's a tiny amount of idle power consumption, but it's incredibly miniscule. That's why you can get days, weeks, hell, even a month or so out of a single charge in some cases.

I have a Kindle and love it. Going from it to something like the iPad to try and read books on would be a serious downgrade in my opinion.

It won't even touch DS sales.

For every good iPhone/iPad game, there are literally a thousand bad ones. A larger touchscreen is not going to make any virtual joysticks better. The larger weight and size means you're not going to feel like throwing it around as much, meaning less accelerometer action.

In addition, for the price, and the lack of real portability (pocketability), it's going to be mostly relegated to home use. Which, if I'm going to be at home, I think I'll stick to my consoles which cost less, have better controls, and much more excellent games. Or play my PC with perfect controls and awesome multiplayer action.

Both Engadget and Ars had VERY good articles featuring thoughts from most of their editors on it, and made a lot of good points. Apple was successful at making a product that sits between laptop and phone. Unfortunately, no one is convinced that we need such a thing. In order for the iPad to have been truly a success, for it to really excite people, it needed to at least make irrelevant one of those devices. It did no such thing. Instead Apple is trying to convince us that we need a whole new category in ADDITION to our existing ones.

Also, Detty, what's your point with DVDs? You're going to have to rip every DVD and encode it in mp4 h264 in order to even watch it in the first place. I'd rather take my ZuneHD along which I know has a better looking screen and still can output 720p.

Also, Martyn: you never listen to Pandora while working? Cause you can't on the iPad/iPhone.

Would annoy me not being able to multi task. Quite often while checking the web I need to use calculator for something.. or copy/paste something into a text file quickly.. maybe i'll have to print it ou--.. hmm i'll just give up and go watch a dv---:(

Seriously, I am apathetic about everything apple do but this is almost annoying in the fact that it's an obvious over-hyped product designed to make money from fan boys because steve jobs tells them they need it.

The practical applications for this product are so minimal. What are you sacrificing portability for to get this instead of a smartphone? or what are you sacrificing (a lot of) functionality for to make this better than a notebook/laptop?

Matty: yeah, the Ars one in particular was excellent - getting all the different viewpoints from the different editors.

And no, I don't listen to internet radio while I'm working as it happens - I'm set in my ways and I'm happy with music from my library; let's face it who here can honestly say they've even listened to every song in their library at least once?

Also, I wouldn't be using it for work, it'll probably live on the bookshelf (out of impending babby Martyn's squidgy reach) and be there for Izzy and I to just pick up and grab for "oh I'll just check my email" or "did Dave reply to yet on facebook about next friday" and for me in particular to wind down after work with a book (it may surprise you all to hear I'm a bit of a bookworm). As much as I love printed books, the pull of an e-reader is too much to resist now...

EDIT: Spelling. durrrr.

Uhm, me? I have 14,000 songs and I've listened to every one. I generally don't put stuff in my library of music unless I intend on listening to it.

But even then, you've never been faced with an issue where you need two applications to do what you're trying to do? You may be working on a single task, but many, many tasks require multiple applications.

But again, it's not tasks I would see myself using it for (hence my as yet undocumented apathy towards the tablet versions of iWork), it's leisurely activities; things I want to take slowly and take pleasure in.

I do take your point though, especially if anyone was considering it for "work".

This thing is not meant for geeks, it's meant for biddies.

I think I'll wait for the x86 copycats. We will probably see Atom based tablets for < $500 within a year.

An RTS could be fun on one!

I see what you did there <.<

get back to work slacker!

I might have purchased one if it could be used with a stylus specifically for handwriting recognition and as an art tablet. It'd be sick if it could connect as a peripheral to a mac / pc as an art tablet... Draw on it on the go, and then sync with your favorite drawing app on the larger machine via bluetooth. But instead it's a giant iPod touch... Failure.

Know what would be cool to solve the keyboard problem? Add on of those laser keyboards into it. You prop it up on the stand, and then it shoots out the laser keyboard.

If you did that, and then made it a normal OS (also adding in a stylus) it would be pretty dope.

Umm, how in the world would that solve the problem? That's just taking one flat surface, touch-based keyboard and replacing it with another flat surface, touch-based keyboard...

but it would at least mean you could have the screen standing up, and the keyboard horizontal.

The plan was to sell all my books and dvds and buy the digital versions in the correct formats, then just transfer the ones I wanted from my computer as I needed them.

Generally I only listen to music at work to drown out the hustle and bustle of the office, given the choice I prefer silence. It's also a VERY small selection of music that I can tolerate whilst working, most of which is ambient noise like rainforests (which conveniently, I have an app for).

Just get an X200t

That's what I was going on, thanks. If you really desire not to have a normal laptop, but want more options for a fake keyboard..

I've just thought of an argument against multitasking that may or may not only apply to me. I am really bad at keeping the number of apps I have running on my computer to a minimum. I generally have several dozen tabs open across multiple browsers, along with photoshop, thunderbird, itunes, spotify, tweetie and whatever else. This generally means that sometimes I have to wait about 5 minutes for disk access to stop just so I can check my email or load a webpage. So a device which makes it literally impossible for me to get into this mess will do wonders for me when I just want to check a single site or my email.

If I had a laptop as well as my desktop I'd just have two computers that I let get into this mess.

Heh damn Detty. That's pretty bad.

I can see why geeks (read, people like us) are like LE GASP! NO MULTITASKING == FAIL! but frankly I'm not bothered. I don't want to do loads of stuff at once. As long as the notification stuff is tidy, I suspect it will work fine for me.

What exactly does no multitasking mean in terms of the iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad? I can run a soulseek download in the background while browsing Safari on the iPod touch ... isn't that multitasking?

Only Apple apps are capable of actually multitasking. That's why you can listen to music and run an app, but not listen to Pandora and run an app. Apple has restricted all of those APIs to their own software and won't let anyone else touch them.

Also, I have absolutely no trouble with keeping my stuff organized on my phone. I don't have a bazillion things running at once on it like I often do my PC, but I also do use it for more than one thing at a time quite often (Pandora + GPS being the most common).

So don't use it. The iPhone OS doesn't let you multitask. With Android or webOS, you can multitask as much or as little as you want.

For the person or persons that mentioned that I couldn't use my existing PDF eBook library with the iPad, it appears that it's relatively simply to convert PDF to ePub. Sony's "The Daily Edition" is only $100 less than the iPad & it has far less functionality. The Nook looks to be a great eBook reader but it doesn't do much else. I like the idea of reading a book & checking my email on the same device while I'm in bed or while I'm on vacation without having to carry around a laptop. I also don't really want an iPhone or similar device because I never use the telephone & the screen size is too small. Whether or not it's Apple, Sony or whoever, I think that there's a market for this type of product. It's probably not a market as large as that of smart phones & netbooks/laptops, but I do believe it's there. Oh, & I like the keyboard stand although I wish it was compatible with my existing bluetooth keyboard.

Question is, will it let you open non-DRMed epubs, cause Apple's iPad uses DRMed epubs (the only ones of their kind).

I hope there's a way to disable notifications when you're reading a book.

Matty - (subjective) it sounded like they were smug about the open-nes of the epub format, so I suspect they'll work.

Note: I will not be buying it if I have to pay a fortune for ebooks. I'll gladly pay, but I don't want to be botty-raped for it.