Apple iPad announced [Archive]

rpg.314

27-Jan-2010, 19:47

I don't know... 1.5 lbs., 10 hour battery and impressive gaming capability (it appears) with Qwerty word processing, powerpoint (or whatever apple calls theirs)...

If this thing had a forward facing camera and Skype I'd ditch my laptop and take it for international travel. Alas, it appears it does not.

It's a new product category, so will take time to take off. If you ask me, the netbooks we see today are dead in 3 years since world+dog is gonna make iPad clones. :smile:

Seems like a merger of kindle and netbooks. If it came with a cover on the other side to protect the touchscreen, it'd be cool.

Apple A4 chip, hmm, where are the first 3 chips? :wink:

I am quite sure it's a cortex A9, probably dual core as it has to run bigger apps. SGX 535 at the minimum to run 3D on a larger screen.

Mize

27-Jan-2010, 19:48

Tweaked ARM, right?

Mize

27-Jan-2010, 19:50

Most importantly they priced it at $499 which means it's almost an impulse buy for gadget geeks.
I predict apple sells many.

They just need a camera and skype :(

pcchen

27-Jan-2010, 19:50

Mize

27-Jan-2010, 19:52

For me I would see it as a wifi email, movies, games and skype device - which is about all I use my laptop for when I'm overseas as the days are shot with customers, etc. Right now I take a book, ipod for movies/music and a laptop for email/skype (my phone has email but 3G in China is $$$). So I could ditch a bunch and take an "iMaxiPad" and my phone if only it had skype!

Pressure

27-Jan-2010, 19:53

I use my iPhone to read e-books, newspapers, etc. frequently, so this looks not that bad. The price is also not bad either, althought the 3G option seems to be a little pricy.

The keyboard dock is also a nice touch. It's probably necessary for many if they want to use iWork on it.

I thought they were a bit stingy on the 3G prices too. I don't see why they have to be a $130 premium.

In fact, right now I cannot quite say if I am disappointed or hyped about this product at all. Guess I will have to try it out first before forming a meaningful opinion.

Wishmaster

27-Jan-2010, 19:53

rpg.314

27-Jan-2010, 19:55

Grall

27-Jan-2010, 20:03

Most importantly they priced it at $499 which means it's almost an impulse buy for gadget geeks.
499 is only for the crappest version - and storage is of course not expandable; you'd think Apple would have heard of SD card slots, but of course they have - they're just too smart to actually go and stick one in their devices. "Smart" in the most sinister aspect of the word that is, because they rather want you to pay through the nose for the more expensive versions of their non-expandable hardware.

So yea, while $500 is cheap for Apple, it isn't particulary cheap for what you get for your money - a closed system that can't run any standard apps or games, can't run any standard OSes, can't do what you want, locked in tight with Apple DRM, has anemic custom CPU, and a price tag that quickly stomps northward into stoopid territory for the more capacious versions (particulary if you also want 3G)...

So this is Apple at their finest. Custom control freak hardware AND expensive. Business as usual from Cupertino.

But yea, apart from that, the thing's intriguing. Looks nice too, although I feel the bezel is a bit too large. Maybe it's needed for ergonomics though, so you don't make a lot of unwanted key presses while simply shifting the unit in your hands...

They just need a camera and skype :(
Yea, I really REALLY expected a (forward-facing) camera. What is it with Apple and their hate of video conferencing with their 3G hardware? :P

obonicus

27-Jan-2010, 20:04

It's a new product category, so will take time to take off. If you ask me, the netbooks we see today are dead in 3 years since world+dog is gonna make iPad clones. :smile:

Only if it's successful. The Macbook Air didn't kill off netbooks.

Scott_Arm

27-Jan-2010, 20:10

I don't understand this thing. You need a PC to sync to, so what's the point of the keyboard doc? You need the keyboard doc to make good use of a word processor in iWork, but if you already have a PC ....

I know the virtual keyboard is much bigger, but that's actually worse than the iPhone. With the iPhone you can hold in both hands and type with your thumbs. Slow, but it works. With this, you have to sit and type like a full keyboard, so you'd have to put it on a table, or put it in your lap. That means you're hunched over the thing. Wouldn't want to type in my lap either. Oh, and looks like you can't multitask, so how productive would iWork really be?

eReader is nice, but it's no kindle (screen wise). For doing a lot of reading, there's nothing better than paper. E-paper is second. Matted LCD is a distant third. Glossy LCD is a long shot in fourth.

I guess it would be nice for movies on the plane/bus/train, and might be nice to carry around the office or at home, but you still need regular computer. Might be nicer if you were in a mansion and it took you forever to walk from one end to the other to get to your PC.

I'm sure it'll sell ok, but I think it needs to be more powerful to really be a huge revolution in the computing world. If this thing had the power of an iMac and had the functionality of a desktop, then I could understand why it would be so popular. You'd basically have a portable touchscreen display running a full PC OS, but with the ability to dock with a keyboard, mouse and other peripherals.

Mize

27-Jan-2010, 20:18

Well that's just it Scott. For me, a 20-30 hour transit is common (1-2 times per month). Something like this with a camera for Skype would be perfect for me for these trips. If you're not an air-travel warrior it's hard to see the point.

Also, a $200 Tegra might be nice, but there's no tablet interface half as nice as the single-tasking (why do you think the battery lasts so long on this thing :) ) iPad/iPhone for fingers - yet.

Maybe a Tegra with Droid 3.0 and forward facing camera...

As to the limits on Flash, yes, typical Apple. But then again their job is to make money and 3.8 Billion last quarter says they're good at it.

[Edit: one final thought - finger-based tablet = lots of dropped and cracked IPS panels]

Wishmaster

27-Jan-2010, 20:19

Tim

27-Jan-2010, 20:20

It's a new product category, so will take time to take off. If you ask me, the netbooks we see today are dead in 3 years since world+dog is gonna make iPad clones. :smile:

How is this a different product category than something like the Archos internet tablets or other android based tablets?

Seems like a merger of kindle and netbooks. If it came with a cover on the other side to protect the touchscreen, it'd be cool.

Anything with a LCD display is going to be sub-optimal as an eReader, and anything without a physical keyboard is not going to match a netbook.

The iPad is reasonable priced, but with an iPhone and a ultra portable laptop I see little use for the iPad. The iPad has an advantage compared to eReaders that it not a one trick pony, but on the other hand it does not do much really well (to be fair it does most thing better than an iPhone, but as long as it does not fit in my pocket, that does not really matter).

Apple A4 chip, hmm, where are the first 3 chips? :wink:

I am quite sure it's a cortex A9, probably dual core as it has to run bigger apps. SGX 535 at the minimum to run 3D on a larger screen.

I agree

pcchen

27-Jan-2010, 20:20

I'm sure it'll sell ok, but I think it needs to be more powerful to really be a huge revolution in the computing world. If this thing had the power of an iMac and had the functionality of a desktop, then I could understand why it would be so popular. You'd basically have a portable touchscreen display running a full PC OS, but with the ability to dock with a keyboard, mouse and other peripherals.

I do hope it to be powerful but I'm not holding my breadth :) You really can't expect too much from a 1GHz ARM core. My biggest problem with my iPhone is, well, it's being too slow on many occasions.

Multi-tasking wise, I think if it's able to quickly switch between applications it'd be fine (the background applications don't need to be running). Although this would require a pretty big amount of main memory.

flynn

27-Jan-2010, 20:22

I will definitely get one. Already started working on my 3D engine for the iPod/Iphone and want to play with this hardware as well.

Many days when I come from work I just browse a couple of web sites and read a bit, could do it sitting on my couch using this instead of the Mac Pro.

Pressure

27-Jan-2010, 20:25

I'd still prefer 200$ tegra2 tablet with bluetooth keyboard. Besides almost 1000$ for 64gb version with 3g is just too much IMO.

EDIT:
Don't see it becoming gaming machine. No hardware keys, only touchscreen(huge screen which is a downside cause your fingers will have to travel a lot when controlling) and have ever imagined playing anything on something so big while sitting on couch? Don't think so...

In regards to gaming, the iPad could be huge with real-time strategy and roleplaying games. I could easily see Square Enix release the whole Final Fantasy franchise (after all, Final Fantasy I and II are already coming for the iPhone) on this device or Warcraft / Starcraft / Diablo from Blizzard.

frogblast

27-Jan-2010, 20:25

I'd still prefer 200$ tegra2 tablet with bluetooth keyboard. Besides almost 1000$ for 64gb version with 3g is just too much IMO.

Bluetooth keyboards are supported.

What $200 tegra2 tablet are you referring to?

pcchen

27-Jan-2010, 20:26

Beta SDK is already out

http://www.apple.com/ipad/sdk/

Scott_Arm

27-Jan-2010, 20:37

I do hope it to be powerful but I'm not holding my breadth :) You really can't expect too much from a 1GHz ARM core. My biggest problem with my iPhone is, well, it's being too slow on many occasions.

Multi-tasking wise, I think if it's able to quickly switch between applications it'd be fine (the background applications don't need to be running). Although this would require a pretty big amount of main memory.

My understanding is multitasking is out. It's like the iPhone - no background apps. To me that is the biggest blow in making this thing useful. How can you really use productivity apps like iWork without being able to run all the apps at the same time, or have a web browser open in the background?

I guess I can see this being useful the more I think about it. It just isn't useful for me. If you want to sit on the sofa and read, or watch a movie in the yard, it's definitely more comfortable than the iPod or iPhone. Or if you're at work it would be easier to drag to the board room than your laptop. But I couldn't see doing any heavy work on it with iWork. It seems more like a tool for taking notes, running a slide show etc, not a tool that you'd use for heavy work. I'd still prefer the iMac scenario I was describing, but I guess battery life would be the issue.

Vincent

27-Jan-2010, 20:39

Actually, I prefer e-paper to tablet pc.

The paradox is that-

1. e-paper so thin that built-in 3.5G configuration is implausible ! )

2. Tablet PC is over weight that normally E-Reader stand cannot support.

3. The Good connection speed between hardware and server.

4. The Digitial-Rights management :sad:

suryad

27-Jan-2010, 20:52

Most importantly they priced it at $499 which means it's almost an impulse buy for gadget geeks.
I predict apple sells many.

They just need a camera and skype :(

I am not so sure about that. It would be an impulse buy if it was at least a hundred bucks cheaper at least to me.

Mike11

27-Jan-2010, 20:52

I think the Apple A4 SoC is just a custom Cortex-A8@1GHz. Even Apple would have mentioned it if it's a dual-core. I mean with the iPhone 3GS they didn't mentioned the type or clock speed of the CPU, and here they mentioned the SoC and the clock speed, but not that it's gonna be one of the first available mobile dual-core CPUs for consumers? No way! Plus without multitasking there's no real need for a dual-core CPU.

I congratulate Apple for the introduction of a new device category (at least to the masses). And I have great hopes for tablets in the future. But this is why I'm disappointed in this years iPad:

Display:
- Low resolution (9.7" 1024x768 132ppi), no HD (720p), even lower ppi than iPhone (3.5" 480x320 163ppi), no comparison to Motorola Droid's ppi (3.7" 854x480 265ppi), Nexus One (800x480) or even Kindle DX (9.7" 1200 x 824, 150 ppi)
- No advanced display technology (Pixel Qi etc.)
- No digital TV-Out (Micro-HDMI, Mini DisplayPort etc.)
- For a modern device weird display ratio (4:3), IMHO iPhone's ratio (3:2) would have made more sense
- Glossy

Storage:
- Only 64GB. Last years iPod touch has already 64GB, iPhone 32GB. I'm sure only a few months after the iPad comes out we'll see 64GB iPhones and 128GB iPod touches.

GPS:
- No GPS in WiFi only model

Sound:
- No stereo speakers (Seriously? On top, just opposite to the bottom one would have been so easy. I mean there's no camera and no telephone speaker up there as in the iPhone, there's got to be room there for a second speaker. I mean there are even tiny dumb phones out there with "decent" stereo speakers, e.g. from Nokia and Samsung).

Battery and Power:
- Only "up to" 10 hours of WiFi surfing (comparable to the iPhone)

Size and weight:
- Bezel too big
- Too thick (0.5"), thicker than iPhone and iPod touch
- Too heavy (1.5 pounds)

Camera:
- No camera, not even a low-resolution front facing one for video conferencing

OS:
- No multitasking, notifications etc.
- Just iPhone OS 3.2?

Mize

27-Jan-2010, 20:58

Makes me want a product like it but better... :(
Any word on the HP Slate availability or links to a good Android tablet with Skype :) ?

DemoCoder

27-Jan-2010, 21:00

Vincent

27-Jan-2010, 21:01

http://www.wired.com/images_blogs/gadgetlab/2010/01/apple_bashful_with_stylus-blog.jpg:wink:

Vincent

27-Jan-2010, 21:04

Acert93

27-Jan-2010, 21:15

Oddly, the only thing I don't like about my Acer 1410 ($399, and new models have dual core Core 2 processors, mine is a Core Solo which is peppy enough sans Flash) is I wish the screen rotated into a portrait mode for easier writing--and the iPad has that. But that aside, my Acer1410 has a 250GB HDD, 1.4GHz Core processor, 2GB memory, solid GPU for the mobile space, a 1366x768 11.4" display, full sized keyboard, 3 USB, HDMI, VGA, SD slot, forward facing web cam, WiFi and ethernet, and so on. It came with Windows 7 to boot and run my entire library of software.

If these smaller netbook makers can get with the program and do more convertibles and screen rotation to portrait mode and "bundle" Amazon and other readers out of the box--and pitch it as a "netbook eReader"--I think these devices could totally sweep this market. I am sure Apple will do fine based on name and marketing but I don't see this devise as a good value, at least for anything I could think of being useful. Then again I wouldn't buy a Kindle for similar reasons and people love those...

Pressure

27-Jan-2010, 21:16

Although I understand the shortcomings, I can see where it would excel. This is truly inspired by Jef Raskin.

He said that an information appliance would be a computing device with one single purpose—like a toaster makes toast, and a microwave oven heats up food. This gadget would be so easy to use that anyone would be able to grab it, and start playing with it right away, without any training whatsoever. It would have the right number of buttons, in the right position, with the right software. In fact, an information appliance—which was always networked—would be so easy to use that it would become invisible to the user, just part of his or her daily life (source (http://i.gizmodo.com/5452501/the-apple-tablet-interface-must-be-like-this)).

Which pretty much boils down to the current iPhone OS and now the iPad. The iPad is a computer my mom could learn to use pretty easily and cover all her needs.

Mike11

27-Jan-2010, 21:19

no 3g/GPS (only $800 version has 3g for $30/mo and unclear it has GPS).
The 3G version has GPS! Plus it starts at $629, you don't have to sign a contract and it's unlocked:
Assisted GPS (Wi-Fi + 3G model)
http://www.apple.com/ipad/specs/

Rys

27-Jan-2010, 21:21

my Acer1410 has a 250GB HDD, 1.4GHz Core processor, 2GB memory, solid GPU for the mobile space, a 1366x768 11.4" display, full sized keyboard, 3 USB, HDMI, VGA, SD slot, forward facing web cam, WiFi and ethernet, and so on. It came with Windows 7 to boot and run my entire library of software.
You forgot to tell us how long the battery lasts, or how easy it is to rotate the screen into portrait mode to read with, or how much it weighs :razz:

Tim

27-Jan-2010, 21:27

Which pretty much boils down to the current iPhone OS and now the iPad. The iPad is a computer my mom could learn to use pretty easily and cover all her needs.

But it is not a computer, it needs to synced with a computer.

Rys

27-Jan-2010, 21:34

Does it need to? If you've got no media to put on it, I'd argue you don't. And if you do, a friend could help you out I guess. Ongoing, it doesn't need a computer after that.

Mike11

27-Jan-2010, 21:35

ChromeOS based netbooks and tablets will blow this away in performance and battery. This was really a letdown, essentially a huge iPod, no camera, no SD card port, no multitasking, no 3g/GPS (only $800 version has 3g for $30/mo and unclear it has GPS).

The Kindle is 1/2 the size/weight and has 72 times the battery performance, and is easier on the eyes when reading, and cheaper.

This was a pretty disappointing launch. Look, you'll soon be able to buy Dual core Atom/Dual Core Cortex A9 Nvidia Tegra2s on Netbooks/Tablets for much less cost and run the operating system of your choice.
Devices like the Notion Ink Adam will blow the iPad out of the water in terms of hardware specs (really big time). But software is another thing and usually Apple's strength, but what they showed with the iPad wasn't quite as promising as everyone expected. Quite a let down actually. I could live with the iPad's mediocre hardware if the software would have been fantastic, but this? E.g. no multitasking, and you can only run one iPhone app at once, even unmodified/unscaled? A dashboard like view with multiple apps would have made more sense for facebook etc. I mean even Palm's Pre smartphone can show multiple live apps at the same time...

Mize

27-Jan-2010, 21:41

So far I've only found one tablet with Skype...nokia 810...boo

Seriously I'd buy a wifi only ipad for long plane rides and international-to-family comms if it had skype.

pcchen

27-Jan-2010, 21:48

So far I've only found one tablet with Skype...nokia 810...boo

Seriously I'd buy a wifi only ipad for long plane rides and international-to-family comms if it had skype.

In theory, if it's able to run any iPhone app it should be able to run Skype (it has a microphone).

Acert93

27-Jan-2010, 21:50

You forgot to tell us how long the battery lasts, or how easy it is to rotate the screen into portrait mode to read with, or how much it weighs :razz:

3lbs, 1.2" 'thin', LED back lit. Battery life is 6hrs with most media although I have gotten over 8 with just typing away in Word.

So it is heavier, but has a Keyboard and a ton of extra features/performance. Not saying they are equal competitors, only that if this was the convertible version (soon to be released) or, better, had a rotating screen, the iPad would have nothing of interest to me. But I don't believe I am the target audiance by any means. When I read (I scan my own books with a book scanner) I take a lot of notes in Zotero with the intent of academic writing.

Mize

27-Jan-2010, 21:54

In theory, if it's able to run any iPhone app it should be able to run Skype (it has a microphone).

Skype (for me) means video.

When you're away for a week at a time on a regular basis it's nice to see the wife and kids, not just chat. I will be ironing a shirt in Shanghai while they're at dinner chatting with me or I'm winding down for bed in Tokyo as they're having bfast, etc. Video is nice.

Mize

27-Jan-2010, 21:55

You scan your own books?
Damn. I hope you don't read anything with too many pages!

Scott_Arm

27-Jan-2010, 21:55

They need to differentiate the functionality from the touch and iphone a bit more. It just seems too much like a big touch.

Malo

27-Jan-2010, 21:56

Hmmm, my wife has been bugging me to get an e-reader device for the last year or so and I was really glad the seemingly better configured Nook came out but wanted to see what Apple had to offer as well. Guess I'll probably be going with the Nook after seeing this. Different device class really.

Mize

27-Jan-2010, 21:57

ooooh! Me like Archos 9...webcam, skype, W7...maybe not enough umph for games?

Vincent

27-Jan-2010, 22:01

3lbs, 1.2" 'thin', LED back lit. Battery life is 6hrs with most media although I have gotten over 8 with just typing away in Word.

So it is heavier, but has a Keyboard and a ton of extra features/performance. Not saying they are equal competitors, only that if this was the convertible version (soon to be released) or, better, had a rotating screen, the iPad would have nothing of interest to me. But I don't believe I am the target audiance by any means. When I read (I scan my own books with a book scanner) I take a lot of notes in Zotero with the intent of academic writing.

Btw

Mendeley Desktop also can offer you the similar capability as in Zotero. ( although it crashes often--> backup is necessary when facilitating bug-unresolved mendeley desktop )

Entropy

27-Jan-2010, 22:13

Does it need to? If you've got no media to put on it, I'd argue you don't. And if you do, a friend could help you out I guess. Ongoing, it doesn't need a computer after that.

Exactly.
This isn't a device that tries to do everything. As Pressure said, it's an information and media appliance.
Of course there will be software that will allow it to do tons of things that lie outside its immediate scope, but if you have a very particular need, you are likely to find other devices that cater better to that need.

Yes, I have a wishlist as long as my arm for "neat stuff" that I would like to see in it.
But for $499, this does one hell of a lot of things right, not the least of which is battery life.
Nobody knows if there is a market for this thing between the iPod Touch and iPhone, and the small portable computers on the other. We'll see. But they shipped just under 9 million iPhones and 21 million iPods last quarter, so compared to just about any other entry in this market they have a HUGE advantage in terms of application support and user base. Add their deals with content providers ensuring that not only is an application development and distribution infrastructure already in place, but also content and and a content distribution model.

If the iPad doesn't succeed, no other tablet computer will.
It would mean that the utility/form factor/battery life/price balance just isn't there.
Yet.

Vincent

27-Jan-2010, 22:23

Exactly.
This isn't a device that tries to do everything. As Pressure said, it's an information and media appliance.
Of course there will be software that will allow it to do tons of things that lie outside its immediate scope, but if you have a very particular need, you are likely to find other devices that cater better to that need.

Yes, I have a wishlist as long as my arm for "neat stuff" that I would like to see in it.
But for $499, this does one hell of a lot of things right, not the least of which is battery life.
Nobody knows if there is a market for this thing between the iPod Touch and iPhone, and the small portable computers on the other. We'll see. But they shipped just under 9 million iPhones and 21 million iPods last quarter, so compared to just about any other entry in this market they have a HUGE advantage in terms of application support and user base. Add their deals with content providers ensuring that not only is an application development and distribution infrastructure already in place, but also content and and a content distribution model.

If the iPad doesn't succeed, no other tablet computer will.
It would mean that the utility/form factor/battery life/price balance just isn't there.
Yet.

Other factors should be considered as well.

The truth is that many e-books are distributed and shared without authors' and publishers' knowing. I always do the preview via google book or ebrary. ( Everyone can access

to John Benjamin's publications without adding the pre-paid credit on ebrary's ereader !:grin:) Many students can snag it,paste it, and combine all the files as the pdf.

DemoCoder

27-Jan-2010, 22:28

darkblu

27-Jan-2010, 22:36

HP Slate running windows 7 is better choice than this ipad. It runs full desktop OS, has multitouch screen and you can pair it with standard wired keyboard. Everything at similar price if not smaller(not sure about this one).
i've seen this mentioned a few times today, and it baffles me each time: why would something that runs a desktop os be a better choice for a handheld?

Vincent

27-Jan-2010, 22:43

pcchen

27-Jan-2010, 22:45

Vincent

27-Jan-2010, 22:57

It has a microphone, but since it can't multitask you will have to stare at the Skype screen talking and can't do any other things at the same time. That's pretty stupid IMHO.

Also people will have to buy into additional microphone for noise-isolation.

Etymotic's hf2 comes with expensive prices

Blazkowicz

27-Jan-2010, 23:08

It has a microphone, but since it can't multitask you will have to stare at the Skype screen talking and can't do any other things at the same time. That's pretty stupid IMHO.

rofl :lol:

well I hope this, er, computer will bring some light on Norhtec and Xcore86 products.
the Norhtec Info Pad looks the same but uses concepts such as connectors for peripherals, networking and storage, and an operating system.
it's planned for release at $300.
http://xcore86.com/site/node/16

Mize

27-Jan-2010, 23:18

meh...ubuntu isn't geared for touchscreen so much and the webcam is a USB option...wtf?

Rys

27-Jan-2010, 23:19

Carl B

27-Jan-2010, 23:29

The iPad's not for me, but that doesn't mean it won't sell.

If my girlfriends starts contemplating a purchase after swearing she will never go the e-reader route, well... I'll take it as a sign.

brain_stew

27-Jan-2010, 23:44

It's a new product category, so will take time to take off. If you ask me, the netbooks we see today are dead in 3 years since world+dog is gonna make iPad clones. :smile:

Seems like a merger of kindle and netbooks. If it came with a cover on the other side to protect the touchscreen, it'd be cool.

Apple A4 chip, hmm, where are the first 3 chips? :wink:

I am quite sure it's a cortex A9, probably dual core as it has to run bigger apps. SGX 535 at the minimum to run 3D on a larger screen.

Its running the exact same OS and applications as an iPhone and it doesn't even have multitasking support. I'd say dual core is far from certain, unlikely even and Anandtech seem to agree, they'd have been pimping it if it was dual core as its something easy for consumers to understand.

What they've delivered is a just a big ass ipod Touch, pretty damn disappointing if you ask me.

Entropy

28-Jan-2010, 00:03

Well, are we certain that Apple won't allow multitasking in the future? It's a software limit after all, and since their main competitors offer it to good effect, it wouldn't surprise me if it showed up at some point when they've figured out the switching mechanics/mobile Expose/whatever.

As far as I have seen it described, the reason Apple doesn't provide access to multitasking is basically scheduling.
This is an always ready, always connected device. They want to ensure a smooth and predictable user experience to the same market that downloaded 1 billion apps last quarter. And that's not trivial with the necessary limits that power consumption dictates for memory and processor performance.
That the tech-savvy could probably manage the situation by figuring out what (combination of) apps were leeching resources or causing hickups isn't enough - the device has to work, and work well, for any customer.

It's a pretty thorny problem when you don't have an excess of memory and processor resources to throw at it. How do you prioritize, how do you block apps form causing problems, while still of course providing sufficiently good performance for all processes?

It's not an essential feature, so until the geese are in line we won't get it. That's the kind of company Apple is, and it causes those of us who are more technically minded to gnash our teeth every so often. But at some point, someone (Steve ;)) is going to put his foot down and say "this is working well enough", and then it's there. The major software hurdles that had to be dealt with for consumer computer operating systems isn't a problem with the iPhone OS.

Entropy

28-Jan-2010, 00:09

Its running the exact same OS and applications as an iPhone and it doesn't even have multitasking support. I'd say dual core is far from certain, unlikely even and Anandtech seem to agree, they'd have been pimping it if it was dual core as its something easy for consumers to understand.

What they've delivered is a just a big ass ipod Touch, pretty damn disappointing if you ask me.

The sales numbers for the iPod Touch and the iPhone combined are positively staggering.
Apparently, a awful lot of people feel that they provide value.
How many will like the balance of features the iPad offers?

Mike11

28-Jan-2010, 00:28

Well, are we certain that Apple won't allow multitasking in the future? It's a software limit after all, and since their main competitors offer it to good effect, it wouldn't surprise me if it showed up at some point when they've figured out the switching mechanics/mobile Expose/whatever.
Possible, yes. But we have to judge the iPad as announced, not with some speculative unannounced abilities that may come in the far future.

I mean it took Apple 2 years to implement some very basic features like copy and paste or MMS in the iPhone, while competitors had these features for years and years and Apple was the underdog at the time. And everyone was sure that Apple just HAD to implement these features in the next minor .x update.
People are only really demanding multitasking since 2009 (in smartphones) and judging by that a multitasking iPhone OS may only come in 2011 and only for 2010/2011 devices. Maybe because Apple wants to wait until they can use dual-core CPUs in their SoCs without running into battery problems (<40nm SoC won't be ready until 2011).

Ah well, I personally just can't get over the fact that a 2010 10" high-end tablet wouldn't have at least a 720p HD resolution and/or digital out (especially one as media heavy with an iTunes client)? And just a 132 ppi TFT for a device that you most likely will hold closer to your eyes than a notebook and that should be used as an ereader...

For me this is also an indication that we won't see a higher resolution screen in this years iPhone (iPad 9.7" with 1024x768 and than just 3 months later an iPhone 3.5" with 800x480 or something like that? No way!).

Entropy

28-Jan-2010, 00:39

Ah well, I personally just can't get over the fact that a 2010 10" high-end tablet wouldn't have at least a 720p HD resolution and/or digital out.

You're forgetting the dock connector that can do quite a bit.
Here's what Apple provide out of the gate (with prices):
There’s a new VGA to Dock Connector Adapter ($29) for attaching the iPad to a projector or monitor. A Camera Accessory Kit ($29) that comes with a USB adapter and a SD card reader in one package, two separate pieces, to let the iPad import photos from a camera or card. The Keyboard Dock ($69) with a normal keyboard grafted on to the front of a plastic dock. A standard Dock ($29) with audio and dock connector ports on the back. And an Apple case ($39) made from plastic and microfiber, with a front flap that folds backwards to serve as a stand. Finally, there’s a new 10W power adapter that is included with the iPad or sold separately for $29; it uses a Dock Connector but obviously supplies more power than a typical USB port.
I've no idea just what resolutions the video out will support, nor what Apples policies will be for third parties making various dock devices.

pcchen

28-Jan-2010, 00:47

I've no idea just what resolutions the video out will support, nor what Apples policies will be for third parties making various dock devices.

Apparently if you use the VGA dock the output resolution is 1024x768 (the same as the panel). You get 576p/480p when using component cables, and 576i/480i when using composite cables.

Mike11

28-Jan-2010, 00:59

Apparently if you use the VGA dock the output resolution is 1024x768 (the same as the panel). You get 576p/480p when using component cables, and 576i/480i when using composite cables.
Yup, no digital, no HD. Only 1024x768 analog VGA.

brain_stew

28-Jan-2010, 01:05

The sales numbers for the iPod Touch and the iPhone combined are positively staggering.
Apparently, a awful lot of people feel that they provide value.
How many will like the balance of features the iPad offers?

I wasn't questioning the appeal of the Ipod Touch and Iphone but the fact that they can fit into your pocket is a rather large part of their appeal. This device is also around ~3x as expensive as an Ipod Touch.

Mize

28-Jan-2010, 01:23

Is anyone else thinking they hobbled this thing to prevent cannibalizing MacBook sales?
It could have been SO much more.

darkblu

28-Jan-2010, 01:40

Is anyone else thinking they hobbled this thing to prevent cannibalizing MacBook sales?
well, duh! : )

It could have been SO much more.
it could have been many things, but it's pretty much what apple want it to be - a device that the computer-non-savvy demographic could buy into. also, as with every CE device, apple have to ensure that the customer will buy the next model 2 years down the road.

Blazkowicz

28-Jan-2010, 02:00

Yup, no digital, no HD. Only 1024x768 analog VGA.

but VGA is good quality and what you use for projector. max res is because of the clone mode.

i've seen this mentioned a few times today, and it baffles me each time: why would something that runs a desktop os be a better choice for a handheld?

every tablet and every netbook on the market uses a dekstop OS, so maybe it works.

It seems like Apple want you to only use the App Store, and have the tablet be a slave of another computer running itunes.
You can't even plug a USB drive in it ffs.
that's the "appliance" device concept. It is really intriguing to see it in such a big form factor (except for kindles, etc.)
People demand flexibility : netbooks failed as an appliance (poor linux distro + slow flash), but people bought them en masse as real computers (windows + hard drive).

But they will buy whatever crap no matter what, as well (photoframes, etc.) so I don't doubt the iPad will sell. it will also sell as a toy (people that don't want to get an iphone with soul sucking subscription, but want to press their thumbs on shiny squares)

darkblu

28-Jan-2010, 02:28

every tablet and every netbook on the market uses a dekstop OS, so maybe it works.
it does? ah, yes, the large, booming tabletPC market. ..no, wait, i still don't get it. and netbooks? - the proverbial touch-interface devices.. (last time i used one it was a sub-notebook notebook, plain and simple). it's exactly this line of thinking 'hey, we can throw desktop shit at anything, as long as it compiles!' that has helped the tabletpc, pocketpc and winme on phones have this resounding success with the masses that we witness today /deep sarcasm

let's not fool ourselves - what works in niche markets (tabletPC, pocketPC, etc) does not necessarily work with the mass consumer. heck, it may not be even sufficient that the consumer were tech-savvy to expect them to put up with 'experimental' software on their CE devices. mass market CE devices either meet a purpose, and they meet it well, or their 'geek-hip' factor means squat with Jon Doe.

But they will buy whatever crap no matter what, as well (photoframes, etc.) so I don't doubt the iPad will sell. it will also sell as a toy (people that don't want to get an iphone with soul sucking subscription, but want to press their thumbs on shiny squares)
yes, it's the dumb market's fault. why did i not see that coming..

warmi

28-Jan-2010, 03:31

OK ... so it is Cortex 9 + Mali-50.

Don't know anything about Mali-50 and how it compares to SGX series GPUs.

Blazkowicz

28-Jan-2010, 03:36

this is tablet and netbook sized, not PDA and phone sized.
tablets are a PC with some note-taking software. that's all. What are you going to invent? it's a niche item already, perhaps made for the sake of it.

thanks for understanding that a netbook is a laptop. they even make machines that are both tablet and netbook (i.e. laptop). thus with zero reason to not run a desktop OS.

Mike11

28-Jan-2010, 04:08

OK ... so it is Cortex 9 + Mali-50.

Don't know anything about Mali-50 and how it compares to SGX series GPUs.
What? Mali-50? Where does that come from? Link please!

warmi

28-Jan-2010, 04:21

What? Mali-50? Where does that come from? Link please!

That's all I got.

http://www.brightsideofnews.com/news/2010/1/27/apple-a4-soc-unveiled---its-an-arm-cpu-and-the-gpu!.aspx

rpg.314

28-Jan-2010, 04:39

Its running the exact same OS and applications as an iPhone and it doesn't even have multitasking support. I'd say dual core is far from certain, unlikely even and Anandtech seem to agree, they'd have been pimping it if it was dual core as its something easy for consumers to understand.

What they've delivered is a just a big ass ipod Touch, pretty damn disappointing if you ask me.

After sleeping over it for a night, my mind seems to agree that is a single core chip. :)

rpg.314

28-Jan-2010, 04:46

OK ... so it is Cortex 9 + Mali-50.

Don't know anything about Mali-50 and how it compares to SGX series GPUs.

Mali IP in iPad. :shock::shock::shock:

I thought Apple was firmly in IMG camp. Or may be Theo is talking out of his ass all over again.

warmi

28-Jan-2010, 04:53

Mali IP in iPad. :shock::shock::shock:

I thought Apple was firmly in IMG camp. Or may be Theo is talking out of his ass all over again.

Perhaps ..... especially given that what they claim regarding Apple using Mali-50 doesn't make much sense since Mali-55 is a fixed point GLES 1.x only GPU.

rpg.314

28-Jan-2010, 05:27

Perhaps ..... especially given that what they claim regarding Apple using Mali-50 doesn't make much sense since Mali-55 is a fixed point GLES 1.x only GPU.

Thanks Theo for your latest bit of journalism. :cool:

Ailuros

28-Jan-2010, 06:33

Thanks Theo for your latest bit of journalism. :cool:

I don't know yet what kind of graphics IP the iSlate SoC incorporates. But it could very well be that the SoC has Mali IP integrated and BSN just linked to the wrong IP core. We'll find out sooner or later.

Laurent06

28-Jan-2010, 07:35

That's all I got.

http://www.brightsideofnews.com/news/2010/1/27/apple-a4-soc-unveiled---its-an-arm-cpu-and-the-gpu!.aspx

Typical brightsideofnews bullshit :) They claim things without anything to back their claims.

Let's wait for hackers to get their hands on the device to have the definitive answer, but I'm ready to bet a beer that BSN has it all wrong.

Ailuros

28-Jan-2010, 08:16

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_A4

ROFL ok open online encyclopedia yadda yadda. 545 doesn't sound that likely either IMO. If then something closer to that: http://www.anandtech.com/tradeshows/showdoc.aspx?i=3719&p=2

nutball

28-Jan-2010, 08:56

You know how it is when you watch a movie and at the end feel ... that that movie was made solely to get you to go see the sequel? That's how I feel about this. There are enough "WTF?" choices and omissions to make me think that the iPad 2 will be what we should have seen announced yesterday.

Simon F

28-Jan-2010, 10:02

That's all I got.

http://www.brightsideofnews.com/news/2010/1/27/apple-a4-soc-unveiled---its-an-arm-cpu-and-the-gpu!.aspx
Brightsideofnews is saying that? Well, that confirms it. :roll:

Seriously though - Mali 50? Given that ARM (http://www.arm.com/products/multimedia/graphics/mali_hardware.html) only describe a Mali 55 (least powerful), 200, and a 400 (most powerful), and given that the 55 possibly has approximately the same ball-park performance as an MBX-lite, why would you have a phone (3GS) that is many times more powerful than a tablet?

Disclaimer: I'm as curious as anyone to know what is in the A4, because I honestly do not know.

Entropy

28-Jan-2010, 10:06

I wasn't questioning the appeal of the Ipod Touch and Iphone but the fact that they can fit into your pocket is a rather large part of their appeal.

Yup, so it depends on what you would use the iPod Touch for.
The iPad by virtue of its size and speed alone greatly extends the capabilities for by example photo and film viewing, web browsing, mail communication and reading text. It also gives new capabilities in terms of inputting text and other data. It does this by compromising portability. (In terms of size, not battery life.)
So for those who might have wanted an iTouch for doing the things above but found the small screen impractical, this is perfect. (Personally, I've been using pen based pocket computers for a decade, so I'm clearly not the target demographic since I have so heavily prioritized portability.)

It's clear that people here mostly look at the iPad as a downward extension of desktop computing. I'd argue that it is just as relevant to see it as a device that extends from phones. What did you find your cell phone impractical or useless for, and does the iPad address those issues? When looked at from the desktop computing perspektive the iPad seems rigidly controlled and lacking in extensibility. When looked at from the phone side however or for that matter handheld gaming systems, its better than par.

People who criticize the iPad for being "a large iPod Touch" fail to acknowledge that to a lot of people the iPod Touch is one hell of a lot more attractive platform to extend from than the desktop PC.

N00b

28-Jan-2010, 10:47

People who criticize the iPad for being "a large iPod Touch" fail to acknowledge that to a lot of people the iPod Touch is one hell of a lot more attractive platform to extend from than the desktop PC.Why is that? In the past PC technology has always scaled down (like Desktop -> Notebook -> Subnotebook -> Netbook) but mobile/gadget plattforms never scaled up. Anyone using a Symbian desktop?

Naptime

28-Jan-2010, 11:36

Simon F

28-Jan-2010, 11:39

Grall

28-Jan-2010, 11:49

Excuse my ignorance, but what is the underlying video format of flash?
Mpeg4 or some variant thereof innit?

Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.

28-Jan-2010, 11:58

There's an interesting post over at the BBC website by someone who basically says that the Ipad isn't that great. It could have been better, but it was rushed to market for one simple reason. Apple have moved into the book/newspaper publishing area with the Ipad as a large reader, and they need to get in there first to control the market and become the online place to go and shop the same as they did with Itunes and the Ipod. It is basically an upscaled phone, expensive and limited, but it's for those people that consume content, and this form factor is the one for reading e-books with, as well as watching movies or listening to music.

Naptime

28-Jan-2010, 12:05

Excuse my ignorance, but what is the underlying video format of flash?

h.263, VP6 and h.264 for the newer stuff, I think.

Ailuros

28-Jan-2010, 12:17

Excuse my ignorance, but what is the underlying video format of flash?

Your what? :lol: Excuse the OT but I just spilled my coffee over my desk...

Simon F

28-Jan-2010, 12:21

h.263, VP6 and h.264 for the newer stuff, I think.
I should imagine that h.263 and h.264 would be no problem as it's likely there's dedicated hardware for those**, but I've not heard of VP6 before (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VP6).

[* Since the iphone probably has dedicated video decode (http://www.appleinsider.com/articles/08/04/30/apples_bionic_arm_to_muscle_advanced_gaming_graphi cs_into_iphones.html)]

Your what? :lol: Excuse the OT but I just spilled my coffee over my desk...
Hey don't blame me!

Mike11

28-Jan-2010, 12:24

If the Ipad is supposed to be among other things used to casually surf the web from the couch, why doesn't this thing have flash support?? Youtube support is nice and all, but how about supporting the other 90 percent of video content on the web!
Well, people want flash mostly because of streaming videos and games. But, at least in the future, streaming video really should be done via HTML5 (which iPad supports). Plus if you live outside the US it's a smaller issue (since there's far less official TV content online, no Hulu etc. available) and alternative video portals like vimeo already start to beta test html5 video. And I can understand that Apple doesn't want flash games/apps to circumvent their app store. It's just not in their interest.

Mize

28-Jan-2010, 12:38

Why is that? In the past PC technology has always scaled down (like Desktop -> Notebook -> Subnotebook -> Netbook) but mobile/gadget plattforms never scaled up. Anyone using a Symbian desktop?

Faulty logic as the iPhone os is a scaled down OSX.
Windows 7 is scaled up 3.1, DOS, etc.
To argue tech scales one way is absurd. i3, ChromeOS? Android?

(i3 down, Chrome up, Android down, etc.)

Urian

28-Jan-2010, 12:39

Are you sure that the CPU is an ARM Processor? I doubt it.

Ailuros

28-Jan-2010, 12:41

I should imagine that h.263 and h.264 would be no problem as it's likely there's dedicated hardware for those**, but I've not heard of VP6 before (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/VP6).

Hey don't blame me!

You're a liar either way; compare your link to mine. (http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=515)

Simon F

28-Jan-2010, 12:50

You're a liar either way; compare your link to mine. (http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=515)
I find that accusation somewhat offensive! I don't read all the press releases and I don't work in the video processing group.

Admittedly I did do some some entropy decode research for VXD, but that was years ago now (and I'm still having therapy for being exposed to CABAC :) ).

Are you sure that the CPU is an ARM Processor? I doubt it.
Errr....So you are proposing they have an ARM emulator to run the iPhone apps?

Mize

28-Jan-2010, 12:56

Errr....So you are proposing they have an ARM emulator to run the iPhone apps?

That A4 silicon that Apple invented is simply that magical. Watch out Intel!

Simon F

28-Jan-2010, 13:07

That A4 silicon that Apple invented is simply that magical. Watch out Intel!
Magical? Then it's probably not silicon. I bet it's a new process based on wafers of "eye of newt and toe of frog"

Ailuros

28-Jan-2010, 13:09

I find that accusation somewhat offensive! I don't read all the press releases and I don't work in the video processing group.

Admittedly I did do some some entropy decode research for VXD, but that was years ago now (and I'm still having therapy for being exposed to CABAC :) ).

I forgot the necessary smiley I guess to make the joke a bit clearer ;)

Errr....So you are proposing they have an ARM emulator to run the iPhone apps?

With a gun pointed at my head I'd say a higher clocked 535 than in the 3GS, but I've been so many times wrong in the past that it's completely useless. I never understood why they needed something with 2 TMUs for a smartphone really.

Mize

28-Jan-2010, 13:12

Well we know it's magical. Steve said so.
A4 is actually the fastest cpu/gpu/gpgpu on the planet! I saw that it benchmarks F.A.S.T. at infinitely higher fps than an i7/tri-sli rig!

Scott_Arm

28-Jan-2010, 14:49

I just got a mail from Apple that reads "Our most advanced technology in a magical and revolutionary device at an unbelievable price."

Mike11

28-Jan-2010, 14:51

You're a liar either way; compare your link to mine. (http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=515)

If Google finally gets to buy On2 maybe VP6/7/8 will become more widespread (unless Google has other plans with this acquisition, like just wanting the talent for something else/new etc., Apple & PA Semi style).

Mize

28-Jan-2010, 15:16

I just got a mail from Apple that reads "Our most advanced technology in a magical and revolutionary device at an unbelievable price."

See! Told ya it was magical!

Scott_Arm

28-Jan-2010, 15:27

I'll wait and see how the 2nd gen turns out. There is an article on Ars where one of the writers/editors said could make the best portable comic book reader. I can see that. It does have a colour screen, so it would be better for comics/magazines and textbooks than an e-ink reader. E-ink still wins by a landslide when you're talking about novels and literature.

I guess we'll see how people use this thing when it's actually available. The "large" screen may be enough to change UI functionality for lending itself to different applications than the iPod Touch.

Mariner

28-Jan-2010, 15:32

Has anybody watched a video of the presentation of the iPad? I'm wondering if any more concrete facts slipped out around the side of Steve's Reality Distortion Field... ;)

Entropy

28-Jan-2010, 15:35

It is basically an upscaled phone, expensive and limited, but it's for those people that consume content, and this form factor is the one for reading e-books with, as well as watching movies or listening to music.

And that describes how large a part of the market today? 98%?
When I started in computing, introductory courses in their use were all programming. Usage of a computer implied that you programmed it to do whatever task you needed done. This changed with the personal computer revolution, and somewhere around the end of the 80s, the norm had definitely changed to most people using ready-made applications such as WordStar, Lotus 1-2-3, and so on to perform mostly administrative tasks.
Today, computer use centers on consuming already created content, but the desktop OSs don't really reflect that, rather it is functionality that is tacked on just like any other application.

The iPod Touch and iPad however, are organised with media content consumption as the core. Listening to music, watching films or photos, browsing the web, playing a game, even reading books and papers - all of these are a tap of your finger away, on a device that is always on, always connected and eminently portable. And quick and easy ways off getting all kinds of commercial content to the device is available out of the box.

Note the difference vs Apples OSX Macintosh products. They come with software for organising and editing the photos you take, the movies you shoot, it comes with software for making music and possibly web pages. For a nominal fee, Apple supplies software for writing, making presentations and even crunching numbers. For a somewhat less nominal fee, they provide professional versions of their creative software, web tools et cetera. The Mac platform is centered around creation, and the iPod/Phone around consumption.

Now look at sales numbers - last quarter Apple sold 3.36 million Macs and 30 million iPods and iPhones.
Between looking at those sales numbers and licking your finger and sticking it into the wind to see where the public is heading, how would you design an iPad? As a shrink and redesign of a personal computer, or as a more capable media player and web browser?

Scott_Arm

28-Jan-2010, 15:45

But the iPod Touch and iPhone can do all of the same things, and in a more portable form factor. I'm not going to listen to music on an iPad while riding on public transit (bus, subway). I'm not going to get an iPad dock for my car. I might bring it on the train or plane to watch a movie. It seems like a device that's good for carrying around the office, or around the home, so you can consume your content without sitting at your desk, or dragging the laptop around. But it doesn't seem like a good device to bring with you when you're going out somewhere. If I own a PC, and an iPhone or iPod Touch, how useful is it to own an iPad? If I already own a laptop and an iPhone or iPod Touch, how useful is it to own an iPad? To me, the device is ALMOST something I'd look into.

Edit: Basically they're saying this occupies the space between laptop and smart phone, but it really doesn't. It's almost identical in feature to smart phone, with little to no overlap to the laptop space, in terms of functionality. People will find uses for it, but it's not what I was looking for.

Mize

28-Jan-2010, 15:49

But the iPod Touch and iPhone can do all of the same things, and in a more portable form factor. I'm not going to listen to music on an iPad while riding on public transit (bus, subway). I'm not going to get an iPad dock for my car. I might bring it on the train or plane to watch a movie. It seems like a device that's good for carrying around the office, or around the home, so you can consume your content without sitting at your desk, or dragging the laptop around. But it doesn't seem like a good device to bring with you when you're going out somewhere. If I own a PC, and an iPhone or iPod Touch, how useful is it to own an iPad? If I already own a laptop and an iPhone or iPod Touch, how useful is it to own an iPad? To me, the device is ALMOST something I'd look into.

Clearly you don't spend much time on international flights :) Yes, I watched many seasons of Sopranos or BSG on and Ipod Touch, but a bigger screen would have been nice. As I've said, they are video-skype only short of letting me leave my laptop and Ipod home for my trips to Asia. Shame.

If you look at the closest competition - say the Archos 9 - it gets half the battery life and is too weak for any gaming.

Mize

28-Jan-2010, 15:57

In all seriousness, the international road warriors of the world would love a properly done "Ipad"

Two years ago I toted this on every trip:
1x GSM phone for China, Thailand, etc. with email
1x phone charger
1x 3G phone for Japan
1x phone charger
1x PSP to kill time on the flights
1x PSP charger
1x iPod color to listen to music or watch vids on a tiny screen
1x usb cable to charge ipod
1x laptop for email/skype once I got there
1x laptop charger
2x books to read
(and of course noise canceling headphones)

Today is better:
1x UMTS phone that works everywhere with wifi and email
1x phone charger
1x Ipod Touch for vids and tunes and games on the plane
1x usb cable to charge
1x laptop
1x laptop charger
2x books to read

With a good slate/pad whatever I could get down to:
1x UMTS smartphone
1x slate
1x charger + usb to charge phone

That's a HUGE drop in weight and hassle.

Like I said, Apple missed the mark...and nobody else seems close either :(

Entropy

28-Jan-2010, 15:57

But the iPod Touch and iPhone can do all of the same things, and in a more portable form factor. I'm not going to listen to music on an iPad while riding on public transit (bus, subway). I'm not going to get an iPad dock for my car. I might bring it on the train or plane to watch a movie. It seems like a device that's good for carrying around the office, or around the home, so you can consume your content without sitting at your desk, or dragging the laptop around. But it doesn't seem like a good device to bring with you when you're going out somewhere. If I own a PC, and an iPhone or iPod Touch, how useful is it to own an iPad? If I already own a laptop and an iPhone or iPod Touch, how useful is it to own an iPad? To me, the device is ALMOST something I'd look into.

True, and as I already indicated, for me the iPhone is the preferable form factor. However, if I had a greater interest in movies/shows or in books, that balance would have shifted. (Indeed, the improved browsing and pdf-viewing alone may make the sale as it is.) Or if you sometimes input a lot of text, or whatever else that actually benefits from the increased screen real estate or computing horsepower.

My main point was that Apple knew exactly what they were doing when they designed the iPad as a more capable iPod, rather than a touch interface Mac.

N00b

28-Jan-2010, 16:19

Faulty logic as the iPhone os is a scaled down OSX.
Windows 7 is scaled up 3.1, DOS, etc.
To argue tech scales one way is absurd. i3, ChromeOS? Android?

(i3 down, Chrome up, Android down, etc.)I think you misunderstood me here. When I say "scale down" I mean that PC technology* has found it's way into increasingly smaller devices because those devices either got more powerful with time or feature sets have been slightly reduced. (*I know that PC technology is a bad expression to begin with, but I cannot think of a better.)

ChromeOS and Android are actually examples of just that. They are just customized Linux plattforms. They allows you to port desktop Linux applications to an Android phone with little effort, as long as features are supported, and vice versa.

iPhone OS on the other hand is not customized OSX. It's an OS of its own, that has a similar kernel as OSX and implements a subset of the OSX APIs and even shares some source code with OSX, but it's not just a customized OSX. And that means it cannot just burrow a feature from OSX easily, while Android can burrow from linux, because it is linux. You may say that this is not important, but look how long it took Apple to implement Copy-and-Paste on the iPhone.

And iPhone OS will have a limited life span. I'm pretty sure the next, next-next or any future macbook will not run iPhone OS, but the next-next-next-iPhone may very well run a full blown OSX. By that time owners of iPhone OS based devices will be fucked because they (probably) will be unable to run the new OSX applications.

I could easily go on here for a while, but I guess you catch my drift.

Oh, and by the way: Windows 7 is not a scaled up 3.1 or DOS. It's an ancestor of VMS, which was a minicomputer OS. :wink:

Scott_Arm

28-Jan-2010, 16:22

I guess because I'm a heavy music consumer, the iPod Touch seems like a better product to me. I can put it in my pocket and walk down the street with it, go to the mall, go to the gym, listen at work. I can't carry an iPad with me to listen to music. The iPad would definitely be better for video, but if you're at home you generally have a TV that would be better suited, most times (maybe you have a shared tv and want to watch something your spouse doesn't want to watch). I'm not going to be watching movies at work, so that's a no go at the office. I'm not going to watch videos when I'm out, and if I go to a friends place they're likely to have their own setup, so no reason to bring my iPad. I can see it being useful for travel, like you suggested. Sitting on the train, in an airport, at the hotel, or the passenger seat of a car.

Is this thing good enough to bring to a meeting, or a classroom for taking notes? I'm doubting it, but we'll see. Hunching over a device lying flat on a table to type just doesn't seem convenient or comfortable.

Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.

28-Jan-2010, 16:27

Now look at sales numbers - last quarter Apple sold 3.36 million Macs and 30 million iPods and iPhones.
Between looking at those sales numbers and licking your finger and sticking it into the wind to see where the public is heading, how would you design an iPad? As a shrink and redesign of a personal computer, or as a more capable media player and web browser?

Yes, that was the point. It's not a PC, it's an early entry into the book/multimedia market with the intention of Apple being first past the post and in control of the media sales of the market. It's a new form-factor for consuming electronic media - all DRM'd to the Itunes store.

Note that it's a way for consuming media, not for creating it. PC's and Macs will still be needed for that.

Mize

28-Jan-2010, 16:28

Oh, and by the way: Windows 7 is not a scaled up 3.1 or DOS. It's an ancestor of VMS, which was a minicomputer OS. :wink:

LOL. I hated VMS. No, actually I loathed VMS. Actually had a professor who bought a VAXstation when he could have bought a DECstation that would have run circles around it all with beautiful Unix.

I understand your point and I guess I didn't understand how little OSX is in the iphone OS. I figured the iphone OS was to OSX as android was to linux...but then there's a good example :) Linux in it's early derivatives was nothing like it is today - it scaled up to being Un*x effectively.

But anyway, engadget has a snippet on an MSI Tegra2 Android tablet coming out in the 2nd half...I can hope.

rpg.314

28-Jan-2010, 16:30

If you want to look at the use cases for iPad, don't think iPod X or iPhone. Think netbook. IOW, think of it as apple's version of netbooks done right.

Mize

28-Jan-2010, 16:37

If you want to look at the use cases for iPad, don't think iPod X or iPhone. Think netbook. IOW, think of it as apple's version of netbooks done right.

Except all netbooks can do video skype :)

Entropy

28-Jan-2010, 16:45

Note that it's a way for consuming media, not for creating it. PC's and Macs will still be needed for that.

Needed is a big word. Independent app developers may supply a lot of functionality, some of course depending on how accessible the dock connector will be for extending the hardware capabilities of the system. But Apple is definitely not pitching it as a general creative tool, no.

warmi

28-Jan-2010, 16:57

iPhone OS on the other hand is not customized OSX. It's an OS of its own, that has a similar kernel as OSX and implements a subset of the OSX APIs and even shares some source code with OSX, but it's not just a customized OSX. And that means it cannot just burrow a feature from OSX easily, while Android can burrow from linux, because it is linux. You may say that this is not important, but look how long it took Apple to implement Copy-and-Paste on the iPhone.

That's just semantics .... a large part of what you refer to as OS X is essentially an equivalent of X Windows/framebuffer + GUI libraries on Linux.

You can easily run POSIX layer apps on a jailbroken iPhone (including SSH,Apache etc) just as you could run them on your Mac so in that regard it is no different than your average embedded Linux platform.

If you want to talk about GUI and not being able to run OS X apps on the iPhone then it is no different than with embedded Linux – you can’t run generic X based apps on a Linux device without the X Window system ( there are quite a few of them) nor you would be able to run QT embedded based apps on a Linux device based on X/GTK combo etc ..etc..

MfA

28-Jan-2010, 17:07

Netbooks in their popular form at the moment are basically fully capable (if slightly slow) windows machines. This doesn't compete with that, it competes with the original form of netbooks ... the EeePC type netbooks, but those have pretty much died out.

Tablets do make a lot more sense for the eeePC level hardware, cheap and long battery life and because of the lack of keyboard people are more easily convinced to stick to stuff which runs well on that format (of course this being Apple cheap doesn't enter into it for the consumer).

My ideal netbook\tablet would have a detachable keyboard with it's own battery pack and a tablet which could be attached to it in either screen inside or screen outside orientation. So if you do screen inside you have a netbook, if you do screen outside you have a thick tablet with longer battery life, if you detach the tablet you have a thin tablet with normal battery life. Like Touchbook.

All in all, I'm disappointed ... I thought Apple was going to push the boundaries a bit technologically as well not just trying to push the boundaries of the height of their margins :/ (Which are ridiculous.)

Urian

28-Jan-2010, 17:09

Bouncing Zabaglione Bros.

28-Jan-2010, 17:10

Needed is a big word. Independent app developers may supply a lot of functionality, some of course depending on how accessible the dock connector will be for extending the hardware capabilities of the system. But Apple is definitely not pitching it as a general creative tool, no.

LOL! I bet those "independent app developers" arn't developing their apps on the Ipad!

rpg.314

28-Jan-2010, 17:19

Except all netbooks can do video skype :)

Yes. Like has been pointed out earlier, seems like a rushed out device to me. They probably didn't have the time to do it right.

MfA

28-Jan-2010, 17:31

That's dangerous though for a company as image driven as Apple. Could they really afford to put out a say Fusion or Lincroft/Pinetrail based tablet next year around the same price? I could see them market an Arm and x86 based tablet at the same time in two price ranges ... but the present iPad would have to come down in price at a huge speed to create room for the x86 one (selling a tablet for say 1200$ would seem a bit ambitious even for Apple) and Apple fans do like to brag about resale values ...

loekf

28-Jan-2010, 18:19

After sleeping over it for a night, my mind seems to agree that is a single core chip. :)

Not quite... latest rumours talk about a 45nm SoC with:

4 x Cortex A9 MP clocked at 1 GHz each. 1.3 GHz is possible, but Apple decided to lower the clock to maximize battery life and to minimize the risk on thermal issues

Mali 50 GPU

Integrated SDRAM controller, flash i/f, LCD controller and I/O interfaces

So basically it's a custom design application engine like the Tegra (2), OMAP, Snapdragon etc. What's new though is that Apple decided to throw in four Cortex A9 cores. Most competitor's devices currently have two.

warmi

28-Jan-2010, 18:41

Mali 50 GPU
.

Assuming it is Mali in the first place ( which I now doubt) it must be something other than Mali-5X since these chips are GLES 1.x only and their beta SDK clearly states support for GLES 2.x

corduroygt

28-Jan-2010, 19:27

It's way too big, I'd have been interested if it was quad-iphone sized with 7" screen, but this is simply too big. An internet tablet without flash means iFail to me.

Pressure

28-Jan-2010, 19:27

Not quite... latest rumours talk about a 45nm SoC with:

4 x Cortex A9 MP clocked at 1 GHz each. 1.3 GHz is possible, but Apple decided to lower the clock to maximize battery life and to minimize the risk on thermal issues

Mali 50 GPU

Integrated SDRAM controller, flash i/f, LCD controller and I/O interfaces

So basically it's a custom design application engine like the Tegra (2), OMAP, Snapdragon etc. What's new though is that Apple decided to throw in four Cortex A9 cores. Most competitor's devices currently have two.

If that is really the case, it screams multitasking...

But it would make more sense if it used the newest from Imagination Technologies like the PowerVR SGX545.

Ailuros

28-Jan-2010, 19:27

Assuming it is Mali in the first place ( which I now doubt) it must be something other than Mali-5X since these chips are GLES 1.x only and their beta SDK clearly states support for GLES 2.x

Unless it's clocked at some completely idiotic frequency that thing is clock for clock even slower than the iPhone3G GPU. If it should be ARM IP then it's a Mali 200 or higher.

If that is really the case, it screams multitasking...

But it would make more sense if it used the newest from Imagination Technologies like the PowerVR SGX545.

If Apple doesn't need DX10.1/OGL3.2 compliance it's an idiotic investment in terms of die area, power consumption and in extension performance. In order to drive higher resolutions a GPU needs mostly fillrates; here the 545 has as many TMUs as a 535. Since the 545 has twice the ALUs, Z/stencil units and all the necessary featureset for DX10.1 you're probably at a 2:1 difference in die area between the 545 and the 535.

Now if they don't need 10.1 (which I don't think they really need for something like the iPad and especially the OS it's running) then why not save a healthy amount of die area and a 535 at much higher frequencies than the iPhone3GS instead? We all could of course be completely wrong, but I wouldn't say myself that the 3GS actually needed a 535, meaning that any sort of weird decision shouldn't surprise me either.

Once we're there why not go for a multi-core config instead: http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=497

Entropy

28-Jan-2010, 19:39

LOL! I bet those "independent app developers" arn't developing their apps on the Ipad!

You'd be surprised what tools some people use to develop software. :) (Besides the young whippersnappers of today don't know how good they have it - in MY days, people thought terminals were an awesome step up from punchcards.)
But no, I was thinking more in the line of certain kinds of music creation software, to use the iPad as a quick movie cutting station, word processing obviously (I've written parts of professional texts on Palm Pilots!), various kinds of compositing and sketchwork, it could probably be made into a pretty good data logger/grapher for field work, hmm any computing task in the field given the weight/battery life/screen quality...
With as large a base of developers as the App Store has, I'm rather confident that the iPad will soon make you coffee in the morning, while playing a cheerful ditty and displaying something suitably motivating to bolster the morale the troops. I'd buy it in a flash. :)

Pressure

28-Jan-2010, 19:44

If Apple doesn't need DX10.1/OGL3.2 compliance it's an idiotic investment in terms of die area, power consumption and in extension performance. In order to drive higher resolutions a GPU needs mostly fillrates; here the 545 has as many TMUs as a 535. Since the 545 has twice the ALUs, Z/stencil units and all the necessary featureset for DX10.1 you're probably at a 2:1 difference in die area between the 545 and the 535.

Once we're there why not go for a multi-core config instead: http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=497

Basically I just meant something from Img Tech but I understand your point :)

I just took the newest IP as an example.

darkblu

28-Jan-2010, 19:57

so aside from PAsemi's A9 derivative in the role of the CPU, we have not idea whatsoever of the ipad SoC?

loekf

28-Jan-2010, 20:56

If that is really the case, it screams multitasking...

But it would make more sense if it used the newest from Imagination Technologies like the PowerVR SGX545.

The source is:

http://www.brightsideofnews.com/news/2010/1/27/apple-a4-soc-unveiled---its-an-arm-cpu-and-the-gpu!.aspx

Not sure if this is a reliable website.

MfA

28-Jan-2010, 21:14

Not sure if this is a reliable website.
I'm going to go with what Darkblu says (and just to state the obvious, we don't even know if the 4 relates to the number of CPU cores).

Arwin

28-Jan-2010, 21:35

I can add to this discussion the simple fact that when my wife saw the iPad 'infomercial', she said, "this is what I want, forget about the eBook reader". This is partly thanks to being very impressed with the iPod Touch.

Xmas

28-Jan-2010, 22:50

Devices like the Notion Ink Adam will blow the iPad out of the water in terms of hardware specs (really big time).
Which aspects would you consider most important in terms of hardware in a tablet: SoC, memory, storage, connectivity, screen, input technology, camera, dimensions, weight, battery life, etc.? I can see areas where other tablets could well be superior, but on the whole I don't see any of the announced tablets being that much better than the iPad. Just curious, not arguing against your opinion. :)

I think the hardware is pretty solid. Ok, the bezel is too wide, and it's still too heavy. A USB port, extensible storage, and a digital video output would have been nice, but I can live without them. No, I see the iPad's shortcomings mostly in software. Still no multitasking, an oddly unispired way of running iPhone apps, still very locked-in. I expected something more innovative than the large on-screen keyboard, and interestingly some of the fan-made/fake iTablet interface concepts were a lot more daring and appealing than what Apple showed yesterday.

And, in my view the most important point: When I'm on the move I have my phone with me anyway, and at home I need no 3G or GPS. So why not let the iPad connect to an iPhone via Bluetooth to get a 3G connection and GPS data, transfer photos and sync other stuff, or even let you read SMS and receive calls directly on the tablet if you happen to hold it? A bit like using it as an extension of the iPhone.

I still see the iPad as an important step forward, but it's a flawed product, pretty much like the first iPhone at launch. The timing is also curious. There can be little doubt that summer will bring a new iPhone, and equally little doubt that it will be accompanied with a significant software update. So the iPad will start selling in the March/April timeframe, possibly later in some countries, and just three months later it will likely get a major software overhaul.

Arwin

28-Jan-2010, 22:55

I still see the iPad as an important step forward, but it's a flawed product, pretty much like the first iPhone at launch. The timing is also curious. There can be little doubt that summer will bring a new iPhone, and equally little doubt that it will be accompanied with a significant software update. So the iPad will start selling in the March/April timeframe, possibly later in some countries, and just three months later it will likely get a major software overhaul.

Yes, I think the rumors about the 4.0 version of the Firmware may well be as true as the rumours about the 'iSlate' have been. But we'll see. Apple isn't typically a company that hurries things. ;)

Mize

28-Jan-2010, 23:00

Xmas

28-Jan-2010, 23:53

Yes, I think the rumors about the 4.0 version of the Firmware may well be as true as the rumours about the 'iSlate' have been. But we'll see. Apple isn't typically a company that hurries things. ;)
Well, this isn't really hurrying. I don't know what the next major version of iPhone OS will bring, but a release in Summer along with a new iPhone is just their regular schedule, like the three times before.

brain_stew

29-Jan-2010, 00:21

Yup, so it depends on what you would use the iPod Touch for.
The iPad by virtue of its size and speed alone greatly extends the capabilities for by example photo and film viewing, web browsing, mail communication and reading text. It also gives new capabilities in terms of inputting text and other data. It does this by compromising portability. (In terms of size, not battery life.)

The problem is it lacks a whole host of basic functionality to be useful for those sort of tasks. No flash, no multitasking, no USB host, no SD slot, no hybrid frontlit/backlit display, no camera, crappy codec support, no HDMI out, you name one potential suited usage case and this thing is lacking some serious basic functionality to make it useful for them potential usage cases. The form factor is potentially great for photo viewing, ebook reading, video conferencing, VOIP, video playing and web browsing, yet what Apple has delivered is simply not upto the task off delivering a decent experience for any of them tasks.

I'm with the others, this is a seriously gimped "product 1.0" (just like the original iPhone), the actual real device won't be launching for a year or more as Apple know their followers will lap up the original revision no matter how terrible it is (and this thing is pretty damn terrible) and "ipad 2.0" will be such a major leap that they'll feel compelled to upgrade just when everyone else starts to take the device seriously.

As for the SOC, would a Mali core affect compatability with existing iphone apps/games or is the development platform suitably high level enough for that not to be an issue? Either way, if by some chance it does use a Mali core its obviously not the one BSON specified, as there's already a move towards OpenGL ES 2.0. beginning in the development community and its in Apple's interest to hurry that along (got to push that upgrade cycle). Once native games are running on the thing surely the 1024x768 resolution necessitates a decent increase in graphics grunt unless Apple want some games and applications to actually perform worse than they do on a 3GS?

MfA

29-Jan-2010, 01:02

Is it known for certain it won't have a (micro-)SD slot?

I guess it makes sense since it's Apple ... but ugh.

tirminyl

29-Jan-2010, 01:07

I may pick one up. I never looked at notebooks because they just didn't interest me. I didn't want a mini pc. My laptop, which I am looking to give to my sister, doesn't get any use. All I need is something to read books, surf the web, check email, and watch videos. Something portable around the house, at work, at the library or a friends house. This just may be it.

A problem for me is the lack of multi-tasking and notifications. I don't need 50 apps running at once but would like to have at least a limit of 3. One thing I hate is having to close an app to respond to an email or IM only to have to completely re-launch the previous app I was in, possibly starting from the beginning. Also, the pop-up notifications are extremely annoying. Just throw everything in a notification bar so I can see what alerts I have without having to scroll through several pages. So much screen real-estate and no use with multi-tasking, notification bar, or desktop widgets.

I am still proudly rocking the 1st gen iPhone because the software updates have been great and have yet to present me with an need to upgrade. Hopefully, future software updates will bring this device to life and solve some of my issues.

Is it known for certain it won't have a (micro-)SD slot?

I guess it makes sense since it's Apple ... but ugh.

Yeah, no SD slot. It even uses mini-sim card no other company (currently) uses locking you to AT&T for data.

tangey

29-Jan-2010, 01:23

what we need is some kind soul who is an apple developer to access the beta sdk for the ipad and tell us what it saysabout graphics. the sdk for the original iphone specifically mentioned mbx by name.

warmi

29-Jan-2010, 02:02

Ailuros

29-Jan-2010, 06:54

Well BSN removed the Mali55 claim and made it simply Mali. They seem to be quite certain that both the CPU and GPU IP are from ARM. Quite interesting if it's true.

***edit: Anand's article for the iPad: http://www.anandtech.com/gadgets/showdoc.aspx?i=3729

Laurent06

29-Jan-2010, 09:21

BSN is just a rumour mill, I really can't see how anyone can trust them.

1. "We were told that the ARM licensed its CPU and GPU technology to Apple."
2. They removed the reference to "Mali 50 series" since it was so obviously wrong, without even making it clear they made that change.

I read so many junk on that site, that I'm close to thinking that if they claim something, then it's wrong, which would be stupid of course :grin:

roninja

29-Jan-2010, 09:55

http://www.iphonealley.com/node/2863

Apple Licenses Rights To Design ARM Processor? Now perhaps Mali was thrown in for free...but soon after there was this...

http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=392

this company has now concluded a new multi-year, multi-use license agreement which gives it access to Imagination's wide range of current and future POWERVR graphics and video IP cores. As a result of this new agreement, it is expected that Imagination's IP cores will feature in a number of new SoCs to be used in this company's future products.

All things being equal why trade away from your core suppliers and take a risk with unproven technologiy in real silicon. deFacto is the way forward in my mind.

Entropy

29-Jan-2010, 10:48

Is it known for certain it won't have a (micro-)SD slot?

I guess it makes sense since it's Apple ... but ugh.

As I wrote earlier in this thread:
There’s a new VGA to Dock Connector Adapter ($29) for attaching the iPad to a projector or monitor. A Camera Accessory Kit ($29) that comes with a USB adapter and a SD card reader in one package, two separate pieces, to let the iPad import photos from a camera or card. The Keyboard Dock ($69) with a normal keyboard grafted on to the front of a plastic dock. A standard Dock ($29) with audio and dock connector ports on the back. And an Apple case ($39) made from plastic and microfiber, with a front flap that folds backwards to serve as a stand. Finally, there’s a new 10W power adapter that is included with the iPad or sold separately for $29; it uses a Dock Connector but obviously supplies more power than a typical USB port.

note particularly " A Camera Accessory Kit ($29) that comes with a USB adapter and a SD card reader in one package, two separate pieces, to let the iPad import photos from a camera or card.

Laa-Yosh

29-Jan-2010, 12:58

Flash is a resource hog, seriously, sometimes the browser eats up as many resources on my computer as a game did a few years ago because of all the animated ad crap. It's also - AFAIK - completely owned and controlled by Adobe. So, in some ways, the web would be better off without it.

But there's another reason for the lack of support... Apple doesn't want the iPad/iPhone users to have access to all those free / ad-supported games and other applications that could compete with the applications they are trying to sell them.
So in some way, Apple is actually interested in Flash going on, because if all those free apps would run without it, they would have to do something else to close off their platforms from them...

Laa-Yosh

29-Jan-2010, 12:59

As for the size, to me it is one of the big disadvantages of the iPhone, being just too small for reasonable browsing and typing emails... 10" on the other hand seems to be enough. The iPad seems to be the best travel companion CE device for the average user.

wco81

29-Jan-2010, 14:05

As I wrote earlier in this thread:

note particularly " A Camera Accessory Kit ($29) that comes with a USB adapter and a SD card reader in one package, two separate pieces, to let the iPad import photos from a camera or card.

You sure it's one piece that has USB and SD card slot? I thought there were two separate adaptors, either one with USB or one with SD card slot.

It's one thing not to make the ports and slots built-in.

But why all these different types of docks and adaptors, each costing $30 and more? Nickel and diming.

It would be easier to take if there was a dock with all the ports and make it an affordable $50 or so. That's what the keyboard dock should have, although that flat keyboard is not good.

As usual, the rumors and the mock ups are way ahead of the reality.

Arwin

29-Jan-2010, 15:31

You sure it's one piece that has USB and SD card slot? I thought there were two separate adaptors, either one with USB or one with SD card slot.

Two separate pieces, sold as one package.

wco81

29-Jan-2010, 15:46

Okay, that's not so bad. But the USB and SD will probably be limited to loading photo content, not used to say expand the storage.

Hopefully some third-parties will come out with more attractive docks, like USB, SD and video out in one with built-in keyboard or additional USB ports for keyboards. and it holds the device up.

IOW, like a big dock for subnotebooks.

Actually, what they should do is enable streaming from a computer on the same Wifi network, like they do with AppleTV. Then storage wouldn't be nearly the concern.

And I don't know if a 32 GB model is worth $100 more when all other components are the same, not even faster processors, which is how Apple differentiates their Mac SKUs, not just by storage but RAM, CPU, GPU, screen size, etc.

With streaming, more people might be inclined to get the cheapest SKU.

Mize

29-Jan-2010, 16:27

Well, the iPad has me ready to buy...an Archos 7 Android when it comes out in March.

:)

infinity4

29-Jan-2010, 18:53

So is it just me that wanted a Macbook or iMac with touch screen?

nutball

29-Jan-2010, 19:20

So is it just me that wanted a Macbook or iMac with touch screen?

Probably not, but I think it may explain why there's so much Appley-flavoured geek angst on the Internets right now. Worries such as ... it hasn't got a DVD drive, there's not enough storage and so on. In other words, it's a cut-down computer that's been cut-down too much.

To my mind it's a grown-up media consumption and communications device that hasn't grown-up enough.

tirminyl

29-Jan-2010, 21:32

So is it just me that wanted a Macbook or iMac with touch screen?

Oh, so you wanted a Modbook? :grin:

Citrous

30-Jan-2010, 08:57

I'm eyeing the HP Slate and Notion Ink Adam.... more so the latter as it has that bitchin Pixel Qi screen. I wish someone would put that screen in a tablet that runs Win7 like the Slate. iPad is for people who are either rich, lazy, or ignorant IMHO.

rpg.314

30-Jan-2010, 09:21

iPad is for people who are either rich, lazy, or ignorant IMHO.

Aren't all apple products?:lol:

/runs and hides

Entropy

30-Jan-2010, 09:40

So is it just me that wanted a Macbook or iMac with touch screen?
Think it through - the reason to run the regular MacOS would presumably be to run regular OSX applications. But those applications were never meant to be run on a slate, they were meant to use keyboard and mouse (and typically more screen real estate).

You're asking for a bad user experience.
So the system would presumably provide kludges for being able to navigate and input data in current apps. And where would that leave future software - should it use a keyboard/mouse interface, or a gesture interface or try to cater to both?
No, Apple understands that the interface paradigms aren't interchangeable. They already provide small portable MacOS systems to run MacOS apps. You could wish for something smaller and lighter than the MacBook Air, but a tablet isn't it. A tablet is another kind of interface paradigm. Trying to make MacOS and its applications run via touch on a small tablet is simply not a good idea, particularly not when Apple already has what is arguably the best touch interface in the industry in somewhat different class of devices, and can leverage that and its legions of developers immediately.

If you're asking for an actual iMac with a touch interface, forcing you to not only shift your hands away from the keyboard to the mouse, but also up and waving around on the screen you try to work on - then YES you're the only one wishing for that kind of ergonomic disaster. :)

Shifty Geezer

30-Jan-2010, 10:09

Anyone know what the Apple A4 processor they designed really is?

flynn

30-Jan-2010, 10:49

Aren't all apple products?:lol:

/runs and hides

I know you're kidding by I've heard that from many people in the past. I have 17 computers at home, 6 of which are Macs. When I got my Mac Pro this coworker starts questioning my "geekiness", so I invite him to see the computer room in my apartment and there it is: my Sun Fire 4800, among my SGI and Sun workstations, my RS/6000 and my VAX. The guy didn't even say a word and has never questioned my technical background again.

Many people use Macs because it's the best tool for them. I personally wouldn't touch Windows with a 10 ft pole but respect people who choose to use it.

To go back on topic I'm a bit disappointed with the iPad but will get one anyway to play with the 3D hardware and browse the web from the couch/take it on plane trips and so on.

INKster

30-Jan-2010, 12:52

Is there anything out there that conclusively declares the "Apple A4" SoC as a Cortex A9 and not an ARM Cortex A8 ?
Engadget said something about it containing a Mali 50 class GPU and, to my understanding, that's actually the lowest spec'ed eGPU in ARM's current arsenal.

fehu

30-Jan-2010, 14:37

Many people use Macs because it's the best tool for them. I personally wouldn't touch Windows with a 10 ft pole but respect people who choose to use it.

oh god...

Blazkowicz

30-Jan-2010, 16:50

If you're asking for an actual iMac with a touch interface, forcing you to not only shift your hands away from the keyboard to the mouse, but also up and waving around on the screen you try to work on - then YES you're the only one wishing for that kind of ergonomic disaster. :)

I thought mac were all the rage for music, arts etc. a few years ago?

imagine using your fingers to tune virtual mixers, equalizers and stuff, plus using your computer (desktop or laptop or tablet) as a lighting console. even adding more touch screens when needed, on USB or video + USB, or networked ones, or using your iPad as a touch screen for the main computer.

What an ergonomic disaster that would be!

Entropy

30-Jan-2010, 19:58

I thought mac were all the rage for music, arts etc. a few years ago?

imagine using your fingers to tune virtual mixers, equalizers and stuff, plus using your computer (desktop or laptop or tablet) as a lighting console. even adding more touch screens when needed, on USB or video + USB, or networked ones, or using your iPad as a touch screen for the main computer.

What an ergonomic disaster that would be!
I have to agree that a DJ app would seem to fit awesomely.
There's over a hundred thousand registered developers for the App Store, and I can't imagine that most who are active aren't thinking hard about how their apps could benefit from the added capabilities of the iPad, or trying to come up with new application areas that couldn't really be exploited on the smaller systems. It's virgin territory, whoever comes up with something original and compelling effectively has the market to themselves - for a while.

MfA

31-Jan-2010, 00:17

MfA

31-Jan-2010, 00:37

thop

31-Jan-2010, 01:11

I know you're kidding by I've heard that from many people in the past. I have 17 computers at home, 6 of which are Macs. When I got my Mac Pro this coworker starts questioning my "geekiness", so I invite him to see the computer room in my apartment and there it is: my Sun Fire 4800, among my SGI and Sun workstations, my RS/6000 and my VAX. The guy didn't even say a word and has never questioned my technical background again.

To go back on topic I'm a bit disappointed with the iPad but will get one anyway to play with the 3D hardware and browse the web from the couch/take it on plane trips and so on.
You are firmly seated in the "rich" category then.

Lazy8s

31-Jan-2010, 08:25

Ailuros

31-Jan-2010, 10:20

The time frame of development for the iPad makes a 250-MHz SGX535 or 540 with a Cortex-A8 the logical choice.

Support for the wide variety of general purpose apps maintained by iPhone OS is enough to meet the need of functionality for the mass market, so a desktop OS with its manual file and folder management is unnecessary and overcomplicated.

Controllable multitasking is a feature abused more often than utilized, so support for fast closing and reopening of state-saved apps, push notifications from inactive apps, a clipboard, and iPod music runnable in the background combines into a decent trade-off of functionality for the savings in performance and power.

There's a far more important factor for chosing especially the 535 at a higher frequency than in the 3GS: http://www.semiaccurate.com/2010/01/29/ipad-too-cheap/ What would it cost Apple to reuse the 535 in terms of licensing fees? Zero, nada, zilk. It doesn't have to be the 535 at any price but cost must have played a very important role in the A4 development IMO.

Arwin

31-Jan-2010, 10:47

Anyone know what the Apple A4 processor they designed really is?

All I've done so far is read some of the specs in the new 3.2 beta SDK that has specific features for the iPad, and one thing that stood out to me quite a bit is that you can in fact start multiple threads from your application. It doesn't mean that you can boot up several applications at the same time, but it does seem increasingly likely that this functionality will appear in 4.0 eventually. It does also seem to me to make it more than likely that there's a multi-core processor in there, and I wouldn't be surprised if it is indeed quad-core. We'll find out soon enough though - if I had a Mac available right now I could download the 3.2 beta SDK and run the iPad emulator, so so could others. While I'm not sure how reliable that would be for determining performance, I'm guessing it should be possible to figure it out.

Other things I noticed in the SDK is, well, that there hasn't been that much added to it just yet. ;) But notable for the iPad is that handling orientation changes are now required, there are a few more views (and ways to handle screen sizes - where it is notable that you can use an external display, in which case you should be able to handle 1280x720 as well as 1024x768), you are now free to design your own variations of pop-up keyboard type controls, there's the obvious split-container view, and there are a TONNE more text-handling features (fonts, size handling, etc.).

Interesting comment I heard on a podcast was that Adobe has just a week ago released an application that allows you to quickly convert a Flash application (like a game) to a well-performing version on the iPod/iPhone. I presume that refers to technology like promoted here:

http://tv.adobe.com/watch/flash-platform-in-action/chroma-circuit-game-for-the-iphone-using-flash/

Also and that most websites are looking at getting rid of Flash for playing back video in favor of HTML5. I'm not sure how true this is, but apparently services like Hulu are looking to this in the medium-to-short term. That seems in line with the html5 beta that's started on youtube:

http://www.funkyspacemonkey.com/youtube-beta-html5-replace-current-flash-player

If this is the beginning of the end for Flash used for movies and such then ... woohoo! :)

Personally, I'm a big fan of Android's setup, but right now I'd still recommend the iPhone and family to most of my friends and family, simply because most people I know don't actually multi-task. As for alternative devices - sure, netbooks and and such are good and cheap, but for most the excellent multitouch and the ease of use of things like the basic user interface, the app-store and so on are actually the first selling points. Everything else follows that, at a distance. At least that's my experience so far.

Again, my personal preference is towards something like Android, but right now the limitations on installing applications on the limited main memory, requiring separate development and consumer configured phones and the dreadful performance of the device emulators make it so that the iPhone even has big plusses on the development side of things for me, something which after being shocked by basically having to buy an Intel Mac for development I never really expected.

idsn6

31-Jan-2010, 10:58

You've always been able to multithread on iPhone OS.

Pressure

31-Jan-2010, 13:17

The problem is not the touch based interface ... it's combining it with a vertical display in front of you. Would you position physical mixers, equalizers and stuff vertically?

I don't quite understand this. It does have an accelerometer built-in, so you can tilt the screen at will and it will change orientation.

This is nearly 3 years old by now, so I don't see how this can surprise you. I suppose you have tried using an iPhone or iPod Touch.

Blazkowicz

31-Jan-2010, 21:11

position fake music hardware vertically, as on a 19" rack? maybe :)
I'm no musician btw, but I've seen it. programs such as Reason. an endless vertical stack of elements, with scrolling.

but you were maybe thinking about the sequencer kind of use.

BTW I consider Ipad to have great hardware : using an IPS display especially is a good move (but that's linked to using it with every possible orientation.)
only the DRM, lack of connectors, and SD slot make it entirely avoidable.

Cheezdoodles

31-Jan-2010, 22:35

Can i do this with ipad?

- Use a pen and draw nice graphs and formulas in my schoolnotes, and be able to type notes? Can i send them to my Windows pc and use it?

If so im gonna buy one.

Big shame it doesn't come with a proper OS thought.

However, maybe il just buy a proper windows based clone at some later point ;)

wco81

31-Jan-2010, 22:56

No handwriting or stylus support in the OS. Not sure it can be added by third-party.

Yeah probably go with Windows tablet for what you're thinking of.

ARM SOC and OS optimized for mobile use probably helps them hit the cost and battery target that a full OS would not.

MfA

31-Jan-2010, 23:36

I don't quite understand this. It does have an accelerometer built-in, so you can tilt the screen at will and it will change orientation.
Do pay attention to context please ... this was not about the iPad, this was about using a touch interface on the iMac.

"If you're asking for an actual iMac with a touch interface, forcing you to not only shift your hands away from the keyboard to the mouse, but also up and waving around on the screen you try to work on - then YES you're the only one wishing for that kind of ergonomic disaster."

Xmas

01-Feb-2010, 00:57

I'm just curious ... if Apple had a macbook pro 11" which could fold it's screen over the keyboard to go into tablet form. Twice the weight and thickness, but nearly the same battery life and all the creature comforts of a real laptop (large storage, no need to transcode to 720P30, all your desktop applications, no hoop jumping required to connect it to other hardware).

Would any of you still be interested in the iPad? Because for those of us not tied to OSX that's what we can get right now.
Actually, yes.

For one, I think the iPad is already quite heavy for a handheld device. But more importantly, a convertible tablet PC capable of running generic, desktop-targeted PC software simply wouldn't draw the same amount of developer interest. If you can use it as a normal laptop, why bother designing a new UI? It would therefore - most of the time - remain a somewhat fancy, low-performance, generic PC. I guess a Mac tablet/convertible would have a more prominent position within the Mac lineup, but it still wouldn't get as much software specifically written for it as the handheld console that is the iPad.

MfA

01-Feb-2010, 01:19

Developer interest? Who cares. It needs to display recipes in the kitchen, websites on the couch and porn/movies in bed or on the road ... that covers about 99% of the uses.

Pressure

01-Feb-2010, 07:48

Do pay attention to context please ... this was not about the iPad, this was about using a touch interface on the iMac.

"If you're asking for an actual iMac with a touch interface, forcing you to not only shift your hands away from the keyboard to the mouse, but also up and waving around on the screen you try to work on - then YES you're the only one wishing for that kind of ergonomic disaster."

In that case I humbly apologize for my assumptions.

mboeller

01-Feb-2010, 08:18

Developer interest? Who cares. It needs to display recipes in the kitchen, websites on the couch and porn/movies in bed or on the road ... that covers about 99% of the uses.

so without Flash it covers only 25% of the market?

mboeller

01-Feb-2010, 08:21

Actually, yes.

....But more importantly, a convertible tablet PC capable of running generic,....

I still would prefer something like that: http://www.alwaysinnovating.com/home/index.htm

Think of the keyboard as some form of "big" Docking station (with built in HDD, etc..)

Xmas

01-Feb-2010, 12:41

Developer interest? Who cares.
It seems lots of people downloading Apps from the App Store do. But I just answered your question from my point of view. I care. If I'm using a tablet, I want it to be designed solely as a tablet. I want it to run software made for a tablet. Software made with touch and accelerometer control, a specific screen size, and the hardware capabilities and limitations of the platform in mind. Not software made for a PC, with possibly some touch features added as an afterthought.

Ask yourself: why do people still buy consoles when you can get much higher-spec'ed HTPCs? It's certainly not just price.

I still would prefer something like that: http://www.alwaysinnovating.com/home/index.htm
It's an interesting concept, but watching the first video and seeing how the guy pushes the mouse pointer around with the trackpad or scrolls through a webpage is just painful.

Sxotty

01-Feb-2010, 13:06

Think about this. No background apps mean you can't run say, Pandora, or Listen, or some other streaming radio app in the background while doing other things. You can't have Twitter, or instant messenger running while even doing something as simple as checking email or editing a calendar entry.

Does it even have a microphone? I'm wondering if even *audio* chat is possible.

As you know Apple has a really strong following such mundane concerns about functionality are somewhat irrelevant :)

Seriously though eventually there will be a backlash against apple. It usually happens with huge corporations as they grow and forget about the customer. It will be good to get more competition though so there is a bit more innovation.

And Xmas if you want something designed just for a tablet you will have to wait since this is something designed for a phone :).

It is simple, companies try to make money. Before the iPhone there were many other phones. The market already existed.

If the tablet market takes off like crazy someone may enter it and do a far better job, but while the market is undefined and unknown businesses that are risk averse will dabble in the market with cobbled together crap (even if it has a shiny case).

Mike11

01-Feb-2010, 19:34

Arwin

01-Feb-2010, 20:24

It seems lots of people downloading Apps from the App Store do. But I just answered your question from my point of view. I care. If I'm using a tablet, I want it to be designed solely as a tablet. I want it to run software made for a tablet. Software made with touch and accelerometer control.

This. With emphasis.

Ailuros

02-Feb-2010, 06:51

http://www.xbitlabs.com/news/multimedia/display/20100201155249_Sony_Emergence_of_Apple_iPad_Will_H elp_Sales_of_PlayStation_Portable.html

Hmmmmm.....:!:

Pressure

02-Feb-2010, 08:16

How do you guys think the iPad will change the iPhone OS release cycle? Assuming Apple wants to release new iPads every year in March/April (imho would make sense since Apple would have a new iPhone OS device every three months: iPad in March, iPhone in June and iPod touch in September).

Right now the new iPhone OS beta comes out three months before the new iPhone is released. But since the iPad is also based on the iPhone OS, are they gonna release the iPad with an iPhone OS version that gets updated just three months later? Would be a little strange to release new iPad hardware and a few days later or earlier show the new beta OS... and it would seriously slow down the adoption rate of new OS versions on the iPad...

Thoughts?

I strongly believe that they down the road will differ on so many points, that there will be separate release cycles for the iPhone / iPod Touch and the iPad. The current iPhone OS is simply the starting foundation of the iPad OS.

The iPad does not have the same limitations in the design, as the severely space contrained iPhone and iPod Touch and will therefore become more powerful at a faster rate. Both in terms of technology and software used.

MfA

02-Feb-2010, 09:58

Hmmmmm.....:!:
I agree with Sony ... more casual gamers means more people who might become "real" gamers and look for a platform with higher production values (this is assuming the iPad won't see games with high production values, but at least in the short term that seems like a safe bet).

Rys

02-Feb-2010, 12:22

wco81

02-Feb-2010, 12:33

Well, if games for iPad remain much cheaper than PSP games, they have to get a lot of casuals to convert.

PSP is a fading system though.

Pressure

02-Feb-2010, 12:45

wco81

02-Feb-2010, 12:52

I thought the demo of the shooter game was kind of interesting. They let you position the D-pad where you wanted. While still not as ergonomic as physical controls, there are some controllers which don't fit for some hands.

They also had a gesture perform auto-targeting for multiple targets or something like that.

Ailuros

02-Feb-2010, 13:04

There are already a reasonable amount of iPhone games with high production value, unless you're limiting that term to describe the kind of AAA titles you'd see on a PSP. They'll move to the iPad by default (and developers have two months of lead time to polish or improve for the form factor). So the platform definitely won't be full of them, but they'll be there from day zero.

I agree with the general sentiment though, since the PSP is a better device for gaming (non-touchscreen controls are key here IMHO), so I can see some small proportion of gamers wanting to migrate to something a bit better, after experiencing mobile gaming on Apple's devices.

Well SONY isn't obviously thinking just about today but rather with longer term aspects too in mind. If someone would convince me that SONY has no plans whatsoever to release a playstation portable succesor the picture would look completely different.

Have in mind that the iPad, most likely, is more capable hardware-wise than the aging PSP. I agree that it is held back in certain aspects in regards to control but it will be much better for Real Time Strategy, Adventure and Roleplaying games thanks to the multitouch technology implemented in the iPad, not to mention the larger screen.

Considering the above the iPad won't establish itself within days as another mobile gaming platfrom from it's availability but it'll take a reasonable amount of time as with any other device. Now I can't obviously know when Sony plans to release it's next generation handheld, but I have the impression that SONY has it very well in the back of its mind when making statements like above. Under that light let's not just yet talk about hw or device form factor aspects. Chances are high you'll have the very same graphics IP in the latter too (which if true is another point why Apple is aiding unintentionally SONY's own mobile gaming space) but several times more powerful than the one in the iPad.

wco81

02-Feb-2010, 13:12

They may be planning but is there room for a portable gaming device with $40 games?

Nintendo will be able to sell first-party games at that price but 99 cents games at the App. Store may upset the portable/mobile market somewhat.

Sure the PSP games are deeper than most iPhone games are (and iPad games are likely to be). But if smart phones can provide a good enough gaming experience on the go, is there room in the market for 2 dedicated gaming devices?

PSP sold well but software sales weren't that great, was it? And in 2 years, iPhone/iPod Touch passed the total sales of PSP in 5 years.

iPad presents the potential for more than "good enough" games but they would no longer be mobile or portable. In that case, iPad would be competing against home consoles too.

If the collection of features offered by the iPad offered a good enough gaming experience, that may hurt PSP or PSP2, especially if iPad sees the same kind of pricing that iPhone has shown.

Pressure

02-Feb-2010, 14:22

Considering the above the iPad won't establish itself within days as another mobile gaming platfrom from it's availability but it'll take a reasonable amount of time as with any other device. Now I can't obviously know when Sony plans to release it's next generation handheld, but I have the impression that SONY has it very well in the back of its mind when making statements like above. Under that light let's not just yet talk about hw or device form factor aspects. Chances are high you'll have the very same graphics IP in the latter too (which if true is another point why Apple is aiding unintentionally SONY's own mobile gaming space) but several times more powerful than the one in the iPad.

Indeed, I can see the point. Down the road it will help Sony on the reason alone that the iPhone, iPod Touch and the iPad are not exclusively a gaming / movie platform. Being more powerful have shown not to necessarily mean anything. Just look at the Wii, Xbox360 and Playstation 3 sales numbers.

Right off the bat the iPad will have access to over 144,000 applications from the App Store, many of which are games. However, most of them will not be optimized for the larger screen real-estate of the iPad.
Apple is heavily involved, whether they want to or not, in the gaming sector.

As far as I know, casual gaming is a far larger market than dedicated handheld gaming (or what we call the handheld market in which the PSP resides).

Square Enix have announced they are releasing Final Fantasy I and II for Apple mobile devices. This will only gain traction from now on.

The future in the handheld gaming (or handheld in general) have only gotten more interesting with the likes of the Sony PSP and the Apple iPhone / iPod Touch and now the iPad.

infinity4

02-Feb-2010, 15:17

Think it through - the reason to run the regular MacOS would presumably be to run regular OSX applications. But those applications were never meant to be run on a slate, they were meant to use keyboard and mouse (and typically more screen real estate).

You're asking for a bad user experience.
So the system would presumably provide kludges for being able to navigate and input data in current apps. And where would that leave future software - should it use a keyboard/mouse interface, or a gesture interface or try to cater to both?
No, Apple understands that the interface paradigms aren't interchangeable. They already provide small portable MacOS systems to run MacOS apps. You could wish for something smaller and lighter than the MacBook Air, but a tablet isn't it. A tablet is another kind of interface paradigm. Trying to make MacOS and its applications run via touch on a small tablet is simply not a good idea, particularly not when Apple already has what is arguably the best touch interface in the industry in somewhat different class of devices, and can leverage that and its legions of developers immediately.

If you're asking for an actual iMac with a touch interface, forcing you to not only shift your hands away from the keyboard to the mouse, but also up and waving around on the screen you try to work on - then YES you're the only one wishing for that kind of ergonomic disaster. :)

I was thinking of touch screen + keyboard and not use the mouse at all. Of course, new applications need to be developed, but so what?

N00b

02-Feb-2010, 16:16

I wonder if the iPad is really such an attractive gaming plattform. It's too large to carry around all the time for casual gaming (unlike iPhone, PSP, NDS). When at home why not use a real console? I realize that people use their mobile gaming devices at home, but will the iPad be ergonomic enough for prolonged gaming sessions?

Rys

02-Feb-2010, 17:25

Arwin

02-Feb-2010, 19:13

In no way does the iPad compete with the PSP or the DS as much as the iPod/iPhone does imho, so the discussion on whether or not the iPad competes with these two is almost irrelevant. The iPod definitely will compete with the DS as much as the PSP ... I can see it for myself - I'll now never need a DS probably, because my 21 month old kid is already perfectly capable of browing to the page that contains the app he wants, boot it up, and play (already some really great applications out there for him). It's all kinds of amazing to me, honestly, but it's clear that the intuitiveness of the touch interface is not limited to bringing in the non-gamers, women and elderly.

On the other end, the iPod for me is fast becoming my primary podcast device, over the PSP, and also internet and the youtube app are finding a lot of use over here. Same for stuff like watching photos, although here I'm always using the social network clients rather than put any actual fotos on the device. And definitely, there are some fun games on this too. Games that tailor specifically to the device and its touch interface are great, and there are a few games here that my wife enjoys too, which was previously limited to a tiny bit of Lumines and LocoRoco.

However, there are a lot of big games on the PSP that so far no iPhone game seems to get close to. It's really DS type games more than anything, like Civilization for instance, that are seeing strong competition in their iPod/iPhone versions. And adding to that, an application on the iPod/iPhone that has as intensive use of 3D as its PSP counterparts, even if for the 3GS versions they can actually get close to the detail and in some aspects even look better, they drain the battery like mad. Half an hour of intensive 3D stuff kills its charge. Even the worst PSP battery gets six times that. Besides that I'm also finding that the video quality of my 2004 PSP is still better than that of the iPod (PSP is bigger, wider, and also looks great at any angle), and for me personally being able to lock the keys without locking the screen is essential if I want my kid to be able to watch a movie or some kids cartoon on it ;) (Has better sound too) And again, the PSP is a 2004 device. It will have its own successor eventually as well, I reckon.

Now enter the iPad. The iPad doesn't even begin to be anywhere near the size of something like a DS or PSP, so it's totally not the same kind of device we're talking about here. The iPad is a competitor to notebooks, laptops and netbooks more than anything else. I've personally always been enthusiastic about the Tablet PC, which was announced ages ago, but which has taken forever to reach an acceptable price-range, and as a result progress in user interface design has been incredibly slow as well.

Enter Apple, who have basically redesigned the UI framework for OS/X to run on a multi-touch device like the iPod/iPhone. They did a great job in designing a user interface for the iPod, and I think it's very well suited to scale up to something like the iPad. It will be a great device for all sorts of things, but for each category it competes in, it's all about the dedicated software and the ease of use of both the UI and the service side of things (App Store, iTunes, etc.)

In my mind there is no quesiton that it will have great games. But it will expand the market as much as anything else, that much is clear. I think it will bring about a great rethink about user interface design brought to larger computers and even desktops, and I think it will be an awesome device for a lot of people who are now struggeling with various forms of laptops. I really feel it will be perfect for me and my wife - I can see us sitting together on the couch leaning against each other, each using an iPad rather than sitting together behind a desk as we do now.

wco81

02-Feb-2010, 19:40

I think price and sheer volume of cheap or free games trump graphics capability. PSP software sales isn't that great, is it? And if developers have to spend money to exploit great graphics and production values, that means $40 games, encroaching on console game territory.

There probably won't be an instant conversion of those 99 cents and free iPod games to the bigger form factor. Can there be enough money to bother converting or re-designing, re-thinking the interface given the larger screen and the possibility of using more multitouch, maybe from both hands?

Unless they devote a lot of screen real estate to serve up ads or something.

There may also be some attempts to use the larger screen to go further with graphics than games have on the iPhone. But games seem to have a ceiling of $9.99 so how far will developers go given that market reality?

Apple should try to cut a deal to get the next Starcraft ported to this thing.

Entropy

02-Feb-2010, 20:55

I was thinking of touch screen + keyboard and not use the mouse at all. Of course, new applications need to be developed, but so what?

Touch screen + keyboard is precisely what the iPad + keyboard offers, with the keyboard being light, detachable, and cheap. Particularly since you are OK with new apps needing to be developed.
I don't really get it - it seems you want exactly what for instance the new iWork suite for the iPad offers.
(Which, if I had been a student again, would have been awesome. The media and browsing prowess of the iPad combined with a keyboard when taking notes and writing lab reports. I would have so gotten the chicks! ;) )

MfA

02-Feb-2010, 22:13

infinity4

02-Feb-2010, 22:15

Touch screen + keyboard is precisely what the iPad + keyboard offers, with the keyboard being light, detachable, and cheap. Particularly since you are OK with new apps needing to be developed.
I don't really get it - it seems you want exactly what for instance the new iWork suite for the iPad offers.
(Which, if I had been a student again, would have been awesome. The media and browsing prowess of the iPad combined with a keyboard when taking notes and writing lab reports. I would have so gotten the chicks! ;) )

Well, to be more specific, I wanted a Mac or MacBook with touchscreen and keyboard that I can use at home, and can do everything a PC can do. Lack of applications, fine. I have patience to wait for applications to be developed.

And I hate touch keyboards. I will always prefer mechanical buttons over touch buttons because I don't get that tactile sense of typing.
And that's why chose Blackberry over iPhone.

Ailuros

02-Feb-2010, 22:50

Arwin,

While I don't think next generation handheld consoles will end up with a screen size as the iPad, the latter has the disadvantage that the resolution is too low for the screen size.

On top of that I don't expect future handhelds to be pure handheld consoles as we know them today; some functionalities will be added.

Look in your post how often you pointed out that the PSP is a 2004 device ;)

Rys

02-Feb-2010, 23:43

Rys that can sustain the casual game ports ... but how smart is it to only aim for that market?

With Ontario and Medfield on the horizon they better be quick about it if they want to capture players of more high end games, with those x86 tablets of similar power consumption can be made (and hybrid forms thereof like the touchbook and the netbooks with fold away keyboards) with capable GPUs ... and adding a touch interface to a PC game is easier than porting it to the iPad.
The market's enormous though. Apple sell upwards of 2M iPhones a month now. Just iPhones. Combined iPhone and iPod Touch sales are in the combined DS sales ballpark now (a bit of a way off, granted, but obliterating everything else in the world at the same time).

The high end/non-casual market might be better served by Windows on other tablets and PC game ports, but as a developer that market is just orders of magnitude smaller to play in. Games developers go where the money is, by and large, so while adding a touch interface to an existing PC game might be easier than an iPad port, are they going to bother (at least in 2010-2011)? Studios that make AAA PC games are already moving their IP to Apple handhelds. None of them have announced plans to go into what they see as a new Windows-based touch gaming market on PC-based tablets. That market is imaginary right now.

Rys

02-Feb-2010, 23:47

And that's before we argue that x86 in the same power, heat and battery envelope is any better than ARM. Show me a 10hr x86 device at 10" that isn't already SGX, that doesn't weigh more than 800g (if that's a shitty strawman argument, I apologise, I haven't researched what's out there in that form factor for x86 that much).

Silent_Buddha

03-Feb-2010, 00:06

After looking at the announcemet of the iPad I went from somewhat interested (pre-launch) to not even remotely interested. If I want something like this I'll get the iPod version.

For book reading, nothing comes even remotely close to E-Ink, especially outdoors on a sunny day.

For a tablet, I'm going to want a full OS. I was hoping to see something like an OSX Tablet PC edition. Similar to Window XP Tablet PC, Vista or Win7.

As such I'll keep hoping someone comes out with a cheaper Slate PC (not covertable tablet PC) than most of what's out there. I love Vista/Win7 tablet interface and handwriting recognition, but hate the weight and limited battery life of a convertable tablet. And most Slate PC's (lighter and longer battery life) are either too expensive or underpowered (for the cheap ones).

That said I certainly would find an Atom based slate PC interesting if it had long battery life and was cheap, even if it was underpowered.

Regards,
SB

MfA

03-Feb-2010, 02:44

Games developers go where the money is, by and large
Even without WoW the PC games market still has an order of magnitude over the iPhone in revenue ...
Studios that make AAA PC games are already moving their IP to Apple handhelds.
Everything is multiplatform these days. Next years PC netbooks/tablets though will most likely be powerful enough to run multiplatform current gen console aimed titles ... though we don't have the specs yet, I'm willing to bet the same can't be said about the iPad.

I don't see how the installed base for the iPhone/iPod touch is entirely relevant BTW. The limited resolution and the fact that your finger's width is ~1/10th that of the screen kind of limits the potential of touch based gaming there. The iPad gets away from that, at the same time any game which wants to make use of the extra potential leaves the installed base of the iPhone/Ipod touch behind as well.

mboeller

03-Feb-2010, 06:12

But what about the times when you are carrying it, and fancy some casual gaming? It's not like an iPad owner will religiously only use it in the places where they'll have access to other forms of gaming.

IMHO; its not about the will to use the iPad on the go, but about the ability to use it on the go. One IMHO big point is the really Glare Glare display of the iPad (as far as I have seen on the pics). Maybe you are not able to see a lot on the screen if you are not in your "dark" house/flat?

MrSpiggott

03-Feb-2010, 10:03

I wonder if Apple have plans to take the iphone OS further.
Could this be a genuine threat to Microsoft, a beachhead into their home user market?

We, as B3D forum members, are not typical PC users. We think nothing of tweaking settings, installing patches and ignoring the 'I can't close this program' error messages that pop up from time to time. Now this isn't a dig at Windows or microsoft, trying to support an almost infinite number of hardware and software configurations must be akin to herding cats. But looking at Ipad, doesn't the OS do almost everything that a home PC user would need? A few little improvements here and there, DVD writing, multitasking support etc stick it in a box with a hard disk and a big monitor, well an imac case in fact, and I think you'd have a perfectly acceptable home computer. One that just works out of the box with 'good enough' performance. In other words take the WII console model and apply it to the desktop space.

I never considered before that a new OS would ever stand a chance. No software would support it so you'd need to make it windows compatable.....what's the point. But Apple have the app store and millions of people have grown quite comfortable using and downloading from it. Wouldn't they be happy with an iPC as well?

N00b

03-Feb-2010, 12:05

I wonder if Apple have plans to take the iphone OS further.
iPhone OS could make sense as foundation of a gaming console plattform.

Entropy

03-Feb-2010, 12:14

Even without WoW the PC games market still has an order of magnitude over the iPhone in revenue ...

Everything is multiplatform these days. Next years PC netbooks/tablets though will most likely be powerful enough to run multiplatform current gen console aimed titles ... though we don't have the specs yet, I'm willing to bet the same can't be said about the iPad.

This is a very strange assertion, are you sure your biases aren't unduly influencing your analysis?
What device was more powerful than the iPhone3Gs at launch? The iPad is according to reports significantly faster still - what is out there in the same class that is more powerful exactly?
As far as I can see, the pattern thus far is that Apple has been leading in terms of general graphics performance, for phones and now for small handheld pads/tablets/PDAs/whatever. Since they have a history of being on the leading edge performance wise, and of updating the internals of their devices to stay there, why would you assume that this would change now that they seem to acknowledge games on their platform?

MfA

03-Feb-2010, 12:55

There is a huge difference between a SGX543 quad core (which is the fastest I see Apple using) and a 80 shader HD5000 (which is the slowest I see the AMD Ontario using). Now of course that's the difference a year makes, but as I said ... if Apple wants to capture non casual gamers it has to be quick about it.

Ailuros

03-Feb-2010, 13:25

There is a huge difference between a SGX543 quad core (which is the fastest I see Apple using)

Way too much die area dedicated for graphics for a device like the iPad IMHO. It's times likelier SONY's next generation goes for such a solution and in that case it's at least 4x times more graphics power compared to anything the iPad could contain.

and a 80 shader HD5000 (which is the slowest I see the AMD Ontario using). Now of course that's the difference a year makes, but as I said ... if Apple wants to capture non casual gamers it has to be quick about it.Llano is bigger than Ontario and has 6 clusters or else 240SPs or 48 Vec5 ALUs. How are you counting ALUs on a SGX543 exactly, because I get 4 ALUs/core there and 80SPs gives me for Ontario 16 Vec5 ALUs ;)

MfA

03-Feb-2010, 13:38

Also designed for about double the clockspeed.

Ailuros

03-Feb-2010, 13:46

Also designed for about double the clockspeed.

SGX543 is in production while Ontario or any future SoC obviously isn't. What makes you think that it's impossible to use anything SGX in the future under 28LP and I'm even elegantly avoiding to mention the bandwidth advantage a TBDR can have especially in a UMA environment.

MfA

03-Feb-2010, 14:07

This isn't about the potential of SGX543 ...

As for a quadcore SGX543 being way too much die area for the iPad ... a quadcore SGX543 probably wouldn't have power consumption in the same order of magnitude as the backlight for a 10" LCD display. The cost for the physical silicon would be multiple orders of magnitude removed from the price of the iPad. So why too much die area?

Lazy8s

04-Feb-2010, 03:02

Apple's close relationship with IMG and their liberal use of die area and clock speed for the GPU when they were speccing chips with Samsung indicates that they'll probably put a lot of emphasis on the graphics parts of their own SoCs in the future. The next, 45/40nm iPad and iPhone/touches should compare well to any other ARM platform and offer a superior form factor and/or battery life to any competing x86 device.

The around 32 mm^2 of die taken up by the SGX543MP8 on a 45/40nm process isn't so much considering Apple is making custom SoC's for the iPad and its form factor.

Ailuros

04-Feb-2010, 06:51

This isn't about the potential of SGX543 ...

No it isn't. But when you throw Ontario into the mix and claim a huge difference (and no you didn't neglect to note the time difference between those two) I will note that the "80 shader" estimate isn't a 80 vs. 16 value in reality but rather either 80 vs. 80 or 16 vs. 16 depending on how you want to count units. That of course under the presupposition that Ontario truly has only one cluster and not more.

As for a quadcore SGX543 being way too much die area for the iPad ... a quadcore SGX543 probably wouldn't have power consumption in the same order of magnitude as the backlight for a 10" LCD display. The cost for the physical silicon would be multiple orders of magnitude removed from the price of the iPad. So why too much die area?No a 4MP wouldn't have the same power consumption as a <10" display but it would add up quite a bit. The most important factor however IMHO would be in the date of the following press release: http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=497 vs. for example this one: http://www.imgtec.com/News/Release/index.asp?NewsID=415

Now I can't obviously know if the A4 SoC contains IMG IP to start with or in extension SGX535 or 540, but if yes the possibilities for one of the latter two is times higher than a SGX543 MP for obvious reasons. One more link would be the following: http://www.anandtech.com/tradeshows/showdoc.aspx?i=3719&p=2 . Anyone will have a damn hard time convincing me that PA Semi is hypothetically that much ahead of any other of IMG's licensees.

Laurent06

04-Feb-2010, 09:14

what is out there in the same class that is more powerful exactly?
I guess we'll have to wait a few months for Tegra2 release, but I think it could be a good contender :)

wco81

04-Feb-2010, 09:20

I heard that the makers of some of the tablets shown at CES are scrambling because they didn't expect the iPad to start out at such a low price.

Could be that Apple has a cost advantage with the A4 instead of buying from a vendor.

Mike11

04-Feb-2010, 10:11

What do you guys think the iPad's low resolution 1024x768 (132 ppi) means for a future iPhone? IMHO it's highly unlikely that Apple went with a 9.7" 1024x768 display in the iPad and then equips the next iPhone with a 3.x" WVGA (or 960x640, 768x512, 720x480 or similiar high-res) display. I think the iPad makes it more likely that Apple will keep the HVGA display for another year.

MfA

04-Feb-2010, 11:06

No a 4MP wouldn't have the same power consumption as a <10" display but it would add up quite a bit.
I didn't say same, I said I didn't think it would be in the same order of magnitude ... ie. I think the power consumption would be less than 1/10th of the LCD.

roninja

06-Feb-2010, 14:25

Update: A former Apple engineer writes, “A4 was stated to contain an ARM Cortex-A8, not an A9. It was an internal source that told me. I trust them. No confirmation on which SGX, but it is one.”

http://venturebeat.com/2010/02/05/apple-a4-ipad/

Ailuros

06-Feb-2010, 17:10

darkblu

06-Feb-2010, 18:03

ROFL on the A8. Hate me but that's exactly what I expected. Ok my bets are now on SGX540.
as long as they don't use A8's VFPv3 implementation, i wouldn't mind.

knux

06-Feb-2010, 20:28

I doubt it's SGX540. Remember that although Sgx 540 has more shading power, it has one TMU less than 535. It's either SGX535 or 545 IMO.

rpg.314

06-Feb-2010, 21:33

I doubt it's SGX540. Remember that although Sgx 540 has more shading power, it has one TMU less than 535. It's either SGX535 or 545 IMO.

Whatever it is, it is not 545. It was released too recently to have been used. Besides it so\pends die area for features that aren't needed.

Lazy8s

07-Feb-2010, 00:32

The formal announcement was what happened recently for the 545, yet implementations based upon it are probably already a ways into development with the obvious lead partner.

The TMU count stays doubled for the 540 and up, I believe, over the 530.

warmi

07-Feb-2010, 03:13

as long as they don't use A8's VFPv3 implementation, i wouldn't mind.

It won't matter .... the compiler already generates Neon code by default and the thing is fast enough to run VFP-optimized apps for 3g.

warmi

07-Feb-2010, 03:19

I doubt it's SGX540. Remember that although Sgx 540 has more shading power, it has one TMU less than 535. It's either SGX535 or 545 IMO.

If it is 535 how is it going to maintain similar performance as 3gs while dealing with 5 times number of pixels.

darkblu

07-Feb-2010, 04:25

It won't matter .... the compiler already generates Neon code by default and the thing is fast enough to run VFP-optimized apps for 3g.
oh, i'm not saying it's unusable. i would just prefer to have a proper scalar fpu in there.

MfA

07-Feb-2010, 04:31

If it is 535 how is it going to maintain similar performance as 3gs while dealing with 5 times number of pixels.
Interpolation :p

Ailuros

07-Feb-2010, 07:09

I doubt it's SGX540. Remember that although Sgx 540 has more shading power, it has one TMU less than 535. It's either SGX535 or 545 IMO.

535, 540 and 545 have each 2 TMUs. The 535 is the only one out of the three with a 1:1 ALU/TMU ratio; 530,540,545 have all a 2:1 ALU/TMU ratio.

If it is 535 how is it going to maintain similar performance as 3gs while dealing with 5 times number of pixels.

Higher frequency. Intel got the GMA500 to 400MHz afaik under 45nm.

warmi

07-Feb-2010, 08:59

535, 540 and 545 have each 2 TMUs. The 535 is the only one out of the three with a 1:1 ALU/TMU ratio; 530,540,545 have all a 2:1 ALU/TMU ratio.

Higher frequency. Intel got the GMA500 to 400MHz afaik under 45nm.

I doubt you could get 5 times fill rate just by bumping up the GPU frequency.

Ailuros

07-Feb-2010, 10:26

I doubt you could get 5 times fill rate just by bumping up the GPU frequency.

Unless you mean all fillrates (which for z/stencil fillrates it'll get trickier) when it comes to pixel/texel fillrates if you can't get a 5x times jump in fillrate out of a 535 then you have even less changes to get it out of a 540 or 545:

1) Again all 3 have 2 TMUs.
2) 540/545 might not reach as easily the 535 peak frequencies due to higher chip complexity.

That of course if you concentrate exclusively just on texel fillrate. And yes in that regard you can raise the texel fillrate up to 5x times compared to the 3GS (which is clocked slightly over 100MHz?) but you of course will have too high power consumption at =/>500MHz.

IMHO the 3GS already has more fillrate than it actually needs, especially in comparison to the MBX Lite in the iPhone3G. The latter needed 2 clocks for 1 pixel afaik and had only 1 TMU probably somewhere =/>50MHz. Do the math.

knux

08-Feb-2010, 15:49

We still haven't seen games taking full advantage of sgx 535 on the iphone, while the mbx lite is being pushed to its limits (nova, need for speed shift, etc.).

knux

08-Feb-2010, 15:55

Whatever it is, it is not 545. It was released too recently to have been used. Besides it so\pends die area for features that aren't needed.

Yes you're right 545 would be overkill. My guess is that it's either an SGX 535 with higher frequency or an SGX 540.

wco81

08-Feb-2010, 15:57

Aren't many of the most popular games still 2D games?

Maybe iPad will usher in more popular 3D games, actually push the hardware more.

Lazy8s

09-Feb-2010, 12:06

The limitations in the iPhone OS's software environment, drivers/APIs, etc. prevent the potential of even the MBX Lite to be stressed, so impressive games like Nova are still leaving a lot of (conditional) capabilities un/under-utilized.

Mike11

10-Feb-2010, 15:01

Very interesting. So the safe bet seems to be:
Cortex-A8@1GHz and SGX535@200-400MHz, unknown VXD and no VXE. And I would guess 512MB RAM.

Ah well, maybe next year's SoC will be more thrilling :roll:

IMHO this would also mean no big SoC and RAM update in this years iPhone, just basically same SoC as last year @45nm, maybe clocked @700-800MHz).

wco81

10-Feb-2010, 15:24

Well Steve Jobs was reportedly quoted as saying this year's iPhone would be an "A+" update.

Mize

10-Feb-2010, 15:27

Well Steve Jobs was reportedly quoted as saying this year's iPhone would be an "A+" update.

Does that mean it, too, will be "magical"?

Arwin

10-Feb-2010, 16:27

Our company has more or less decided to go iPhone for their company phones. I also noticed during my business trip to Norway that it has become very popular there as well as a business phone, and two IT managers I spoke noted that while they have a free programme hosted by a third party where their users can choose their preferred phone from blackberry, iPhone, HTC Android and a Windows Mobile device, the iPhone is the most popular one yet has the least issues. Worst case they need a firmware reinstall. They also tested the remote management tools and killed an iPhone remotely to simulate theft scenarios, and within 3 seconds the phone was completely wiped and unusable, so they were satisfied with that too. :lol:

Apple is definitely doing something right. In our case, we might have gotten Blackberries, but we're in a situation where a Blackberry Enterprise Server is not an option (mother company doesn't support it, and they host our Exchange). Without it, blackberries lose a LOT of their charm.

I've been playing around with the iPad dimensions, creating a cardboard cutout of the proper size to get an idea. It's smaller than you'd think. Pixel density should be ok for that resolution, but I definitely see space for a device twice as big as well. But it should be a good size. Should be interesting to play with the 3.2 SDK again now, as it should come with the iPad emulator.

eastmen

10-Feb-2010, 16:57

I was hoping the ipad would be like this http://gizmodo.com/5365299/courier-first-details-of-microsofts-secret-tablet

Dual screen is great as it allows folding for better portability.

Oh well. I can wait. The ipad seems to be verison .1 . Hopefully the ipad version 1 comes soon. A camera for video calls would have made this a decent purchase. But as with apple I'm sure we will see that in ipod shuffle. Cause the shuffle needs a camera not the ipad

wco81

10-Feb-2010, 17:24

No American 3G network at least can support good quality 3G video streaming, so it would have to be video chats on Wifi.

That's the thing, people want fanciful features like 1080p video capture and so forth but mobile networks can't support that.

Supposedly all the other tablet manufacturers are reacting to iPad, especially the starting price. Like it or not, it appears to be the benchmark. Apple supposedly tipped that they're open to being "nimble" on pricing so it sounds like they're ready to push it as a high-volume product.

The form factor will either be a hit -- you have to hold it all the time -- or people will prefer the clamshell. If a tablet doesn't sell well, what will it do to SOC development? Without a high-volume, large-screen product, will there be a need to push the performance envelope?