First the obvious - it is a big iphone/ipod (could be either depending if you get the 3G or not and if you count the iPhone 'phone' features as relevant). That's fine for me as this was exactly what I was looking for and it's certainly working as a casual web surfing/tweeting/etc platform while watching TV.
Also obvious to anyone who's held one - it's heavy. Thin, well made and satisfying to hold but certainly heavy. Ideally for me it needs to be less than half the weight to allow me to hold it comfortably for long periods of web browsing, but the stand held, as does adopting strange postures resting the weight on different parts of the body.
I had anticipated all the existing iPhone apps I'd invested in (even the free ones requiring an investment of time to get used to) to work, and so far I've not been disappointed. However, the native iPad apps taking advantage of the drastically improved screen space put the iPhone apps to shame and so I've ended up hunting down many native iPad versions/equivalents for the same apps instead. I doubt many people would want to put up with the scaled up graphics of iPhone apps when there are native alternatives as the improvement is dramatic.
Some of the first new apps I invested in were the Apple office productivity apps, Pages, Numbers and Keynote as demonstrated in the keynote launch as I have in mind using the iPad in work - and also to be able to advise colleagues on their utility. I'm pleased to say they seem very useful, although I have yet to really try them in earnest for real work. The key for me will be how easily I can adopt a working practice which will give me access to the docs I need to refer to in meetings and create notes at the same time. I suspect it will remain a compromise compared to a "real computer" at least until OS4 and some semblance of multi-tasking.
The next app I tried was the Apple iBooks as I know a lot of people are interested in the iPad as a new publishing revolution. The apps seems OK as reader apps go, although it doesn't appear to allow annotation of the books which is a major omission for me. The book store seems slick and easy to use - yet again Apple making it very easy to part you from your money - but the book prices are excessive in my view. If e-books are really going to work, they need to offer either a significant saving over the physical versions, or provide valuable additional content/features. The Alice In Wonderland Book app is an example of how the platform can add a whole new level of involvement and 'magic' to books, but unless that is replicated with other books, personally I'd prefer a paperback to reading on the iPad screen and paperbacks are much nicer to hold to read than the too heavy iPad.
Before I reflect on the other apps I've tried, a few notes on the additional peripherals I've got.
The wireless bluetooth keyboard works very well. Its a standard Apple device designed for the Macs primarily and as such, it lacks a few of the dedicated iPad keys which the dock keyboard includes (home button in particular). This is slightly irksome, but not a show stopper. I've not been able to replicate the issue I'd read on the net of losing the onscreen keyboard if you don't "unpair" the wireless keyboard first. Once paired, I've found I can just switch off the keyboard and the iPad makes the onscreen keyboard available again.
The dock - simple but effective. It is a pity you can only dock the iPad in portrait orientation though, particularly as the nice photo frame feature means the majority of the photos are scaled down and only use a fraction of the screen.
The Photo connection kit - I've only tried the SD card reader so far which works OK but has crashed frequently when selecting more than only a few photos to selectively import. I haven't found a pattern to this yet but my guess is a memory leak in the built in app.
I haven't tried the VGA out converter yet but I have previously used the composite video out cable on the iPhone and I'm expecting it to just work. In case anyone didn't realise, this doesn't replicate the whole device onto the external video. It is only certain apps which support it.
I haven't yet configured the SIM I bought to try the 3G network to judge that aspect. I only got the 3G version for the few times I'll be out of wifi signal range so this hasn't been a priority.
Wifi reception seems OK although not quite as strong as the iPhone in my flat. It is much quicker however, boasting approx 80% quicker downloads according to Speedtest.net app.
The Apple default carry case is best described as 'functional', but I suspect I'll be investing in an alternative quite soon.
The built in apps have all be improved over the iPhone versions. Perhaps the most important such app for me is the Mail. This no longer has the modal approach and presents the choice of e-mails/folders alongside the current open e-mail. The spell checker now built into the OS certainly helps too (which the iPhone will have with OS4).
The App store emphasises iPad specific apps much more than I had expected. It's actually quite difficult to just browse iPhone apps now and although they do still show up in search results, they have been depreciated to a bottom separate list. The app store is more irritating to browse than the iPhone version as it's slower to move from page to page in the results and loses it's place in a long list frequently when returning to the list after looking at the details of an app. With long lists that are slow to scroll through, this makes older/less popular apps almost impossible to stumble upon.
iTunes however is a much improved experience. It presents the information more clearly and works quicker.
The calendar app is a joy compared to the iPhone. It's like opening a real diary compared to trying to use one through a keyhole. Its still (currently) limited in the same ways as the iPhone app - only able to connect to one Exchange account, unable to configure which calendar appears in which colour, incorrectly shading whole days for all day events even when the events are flagged to be "free" etc, but it's a big improvement.
Other apps:
RSS reader choice - News Rack. I used and liked MobileRSS on the iPhone, and while this still works on the iPad, it's only in scaled up graphics form so I looked for a native iPad equivalent. I wanted something that would sync with Google reader in particular and settled on News Rack. It offers integration features with InstaPaper, Twitter, Facebook, email etc. can provide downloaded cached reading and offers a simple toggle between RSS and web view. There may be other apps which are better as I haven't tried others, but I did read all the blurb and reviews on all the RSS apps before making my choice. I was tempted by the Star Trek inspired LCARS Rss reader app, and I may go back to have that just as a gimmick as using the iPad does feel very Star Trek :)
Blogging - BlogPress which I already had for the iPhone also provides a native iPad experience and so I'm sticking with it.
Twitter - Twitterific. I prefer SimplyTweet on the iPhone, mostly for giving me an indication of how many unread tweets there are in my stream so I can adjust the depth to which I read or skim according to how much time I wish to give it, but there doesn't appear to be a native iPad version of this so far. The iPhone version works, but the text suffers a lot from the scaling. I've also tried Tweetdeck which works well too but I don't like how that scrolls to the most recent tweets on start up - I prefer starting at the oldest unread tweets and moving forward in time.
Office apps - Office2 HD. This seems a well featured MS Office like tool with reasonable compatibility (some reports of issues with older Office docs). I basically got this as a backup for the Apple apps and because it offers loading/saving to google docs / mobileME and other WebDAV storage options, which could be more convenient than the Apple sync through iTunes approach.
Note taking - Daily Notes. I like the look of this app for keeping reflective journals under different categories which I think will prove useful. Time will tell.
Remote Desktop - RDP. I've used this app for a while on the iPhone to access my Work PC when I really need the software only available on it and I'm delighted with the improvement the same app provides on the iPad. It effectively gives me a full Windows 7 experience in my hand. If only it was able to automatically start the VPN connection needed rather than having to start that manually.
Fun Stuff - I haven't tried many iPad specific games (yet), but here's a list of entertainment type apps I have tried:
WeatherPro HD - I've used the iPhone equivalent to this for a while and I like the radar and satellite views as well as the detailed breakdown of expected weather factors. It's apparently possible for me to transfer the paid for in app purchase of more detailed info I have on the iPhone to the iPad too, but it's not supported directly within the app yet but I will do this eventually.
F1 Timing '10 CP - if you like watching F1, this app makes it much more engaging, but it's not cheap. It only lasts one season and it works out about £1 a race, but the detailed track view with real time tracking of the cars, detailed timing screen and live news feed works well as an accompaniment - particularly on the races with little overtaking when the exact gaps on track for pit stops / traffic etc are all invisible but vital to the result.
IMDB - yes, the web site works but this app makes searching and navigating the info much easier and quicker.
SketchBook Pro - a 'mini-photoshop' complete with layers, blending effects etc. Again, I've used the iPhone equivalent of this for a while and it's drastically better on the larger iPad screen. Anyone who thinks the iPad is just for consuming content should try this app. (they should also note this whole post was created on the iPad :)
Flickr Photos - makes browsing flickr as easy as the local photo albumn
Web Albums - the same for Picasa. What would be great is an app that worked as well as these that also worked with Flickr/Picasa/MobileMe etc albums, but for now I need separate apps.
Wikipanion - obviously a Wikipedia browser that works well.
Plane Finder HD - anyone who looked at the images of the empty skies due to the ash cloud on the web/flash based site will recognise this. Its the same experience but without the flash. I don't really have a use for this except passing interest but it works well and might be useful for frequent flyers.
That's it for now. I've only had a few days with it so my views my change. I'd be interested to hear how others get on :)
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
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