For starter, forgive me to post something really geeky whether it’s been attributed to me or not but if you feel like this is too much for you, please just skip this post.
As finally, Apple has announced the iPad, an apple tablet from the iPhone which has long been anticipated and rumored way way back from 2004, I can say the wait is over. Everyone now has clear vision about what the future apple device - not so future, that is in 60 days-is gonna be like. Steve Jobs himself announces the what so called “magical device”. Really? I think it’s not so magical for a device as huge as 9.7″ coming with no multitasking since it’s running the same OS as Iphone and it costs as much as $400 for it’s lowest end that has only Wi-fi connection.
At weeks before, at CES, it was announced that Lenovo is going to release a tablet-notebook Hybrid which is called Lenovo idea Pad u1. The idea is very revolutionary. Basically you have a combo of notebook and a tablet hybrid on a single device. The screen can be attached which makes it a core2Duo notebook (hopefully will get updated to Core i3 in the final product) and de-attached which then turns it to be a 1Ghz Snapdragon 16GB Solid State Drive tablet. The concept is really cool, you are in the middle browsing some sites, working at a document or even watching a movie then something comes up, what you do is just de-attach the screen, the browser in the tablet will open the last site you were browsing on, or you can continue your work or even your movie.
The problem is that it comes with a proprietary operating system invented with Lenovo. What can be the pain is the operating system. The early demo shows it’s sluggish and buggy and we may not see the real unit until Q2. But imagine, if this device is released, I suppose lots of custom firmware would show up and I suppose it’s just waiting until Android is ported to the tablet. Can you imagine a device running dual mode Android and Windows 7? With price around $999, this device can prove to be really worthy. Again, not everyone needs another notebook.
When it comes to OSX and Android mobile tablet, I guess I would prefer the latter. Android can do multitasking which is essential for a device with such a huge screen, you would want to be able to browse while IM-ing, reading some ebooks and typing some emails which you can’t do with your Iphone without putting the other apps to sleep first. OK it’s true that Iphone got over 100,000 thousand apps currently residing in Apple Appstore. Android will catches up pretty soon though since many more device coming in and the fact it’s more not controlled unlike the Apple tyranny who can drop any app.
In conclusion, I’m quite pessimistic about the future of iPad and would opt for other device if that is possible. iPad really needs tons of improvements and by the way it looks, it gives the impression to me that it’s just a Rev. A product which will soon be replaced by a much complete product. But who knows? Every apple major release is always disputed with pro and cons. Ipad may prove to be successful in the market *guess I’m still not buying it though*.
The Avenue