Apple's Unveils The iPad

At a special event last night 20:00 South Africa time, Apple's CEO Steve Jobs unveiled the new iPad. I couldn't watch it online since unfortunately Apple didn't broadcast it but I did listen to an audio feed together with some photos from Engadget, Live Gizmodo all from my iPod Touch (on Wifi) while in bed with a stomach bug.

The iPad got multi-touch, very big screen, fast processor, comes in Wifi only, Wifi/3G models etc. For all the details you can read the references below - I'm not going to repeat here. For me it got some advantages / disadvantages:

Advantages:

• Bigger then the iPhone/iPod Touch so browser is nicer
• Comes in Wifi/3G models.. if you don't want to wait for the 3G model you can buy the Wifi only model and use a tool like MyFi that broadcast a Wifi signal from 3G (3G -> Wifi).
• Very fast processor, most of the reviews are happy about how fast it is.
• iWork: Office like package (try to compare it with MS Office) for word processing, spreadsheets etc. USD $9.99 from the AppStore.
• AppStore: Buy all existing applications developed for the iPhone from the AppStore and run it on the iPad without modifications.
• New SDK: New SDK for development of iPad applications
• Games: Very good graphics, I love playing games on my iPod Touch / wife's iPhone.
• Keyboard: A physical keyboard that you can connect to the iPad if your not keen on using the on screen keyboard (like me: I dislike typing on the iPhone/iPod Touch).
• iBooks: New online store where you can buy e-books and read them the iPad.
• Price: At USD $499.00 (about R3,773.09 base upon the current exchange rate) for the Wifi only model the pricing is very good.

Disadvantages:

• Its not a PC, you still would require a Mac OS device to write applications for the iPad.
• No multi-windows, only one application can run at a time... Just like the iPhone / iPod Touch.
• Base upon new iPhone OS so got the same disadvantages
• No GPRS - Not everywhere in South Africa there is Wifi or 3G.
• No webcam build-in or microphone... doesn't see how applications like Skype/Fring will work if you want to do VOIP.
• Wait: We're going to wait months before its available in South Africa.

So for me: I will not buy one, its got all the same stuff that the iPhone got already and you can phone with the iPhone (and use Skype/Fring), it got 3G and GPRS. I would like to see iBooks and the keyboard for the iPhone but that is something that I can live without.

References:

• Apple Special Event Jan 2010 - Watch Online
• iPad Models
• Do a search on YouTube there are a lot of videos or a Google search for a lot of content online