From the realm of sci-fi to Steve Jobs’ stage: The iPad is official.
What is it? What can it do? How does it work? Here’s everything you
need to know about Apple’s newest creation, all in one place.
It’s almost impossible to overstate the buzz leading up to this device.
Immediately after the death of the Newton, rumors began trickling out
about a followup from Apple; in the last five years, speculation and
scraps of evidence about an Apple tablet have been a fixture in the
tech media; in the last year, the rumors were unavoidable. Today,
Apple’s tablet has finally arrived, and we’ve got the full rundown—from
specs, features, content and price to what it’s like to actually use
one.
The Hardware
• Size and shape: The screen’s aspect ratio makes it seem a bit squat,
but this is intended to be a bi-directional tabl—err, Pad. The bezel is
a little fat, but otherwise, this thing is basically a clean slab of
pure display. It’s just .5 inches thick, which is a hair thicker than
the iPhone 3GS, and measures 9.56 x 7.47 inches. Final weigh-in is 1.5
pounds without 3G, and 1.6 with. Says Brian, who’s actually held one:
Imagine, if you will, a super light unibody MacBook Pro that’s smaller,
thinner and way, way, way lighter. Or, from a slightly different
perspective, think about a bigger iPhone that’s been built with unibody
construction.
• The screen: The tablet’s multitouch screen measures in at 9.7 inches,
meaning that it’s got a significantly smaller footprint than the
smallest MacBook, but a much larger screen than the iPhone. (That’s 9.7
inches diagonal, from screen corner to screen corner.) The screen’s
resolution is a dense 1024 x 768.
Here’s what it looks like in photos, and on video:
• The guts: It’s a half-inch thick—just a hair thicker than the iPhone,
for reference—and weighs 1.5 pounds. It’s powered by a 1GHz Apple ARM
A4 chip, and has 16GB, 32GB or 64GB of flash storage. From the looks of
it, Apple finally got some use out of that PA Semi purchase, and built
their own mobile processor, but that’s no totally clear yet. It’s also
loaded with 802.11 n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR, a 30-pin iPod
connector, a speaker, a microphone, an accelerometer and a compass.
Video output runs through and iPhone-type composite adapter at up to
576p and through a dock-to-VGA adapter at up to 1024 x 768. No HDMI, no
DVI—not even a Mini DisplayPort.
3G is optional, and costs more, not less. Along with 3G, the upgraded
models include A-GPS. (More on this below)
Oh, and there isn’t a rear-facing camera, nor is there a front-facing
camera. This tablet is totally camera-less, which seems a bit odd.
• The battery: Apple’s making some bold claims about battery life: ten
hours for constant use, with a one-month standby rating. Ten hours of
constant use includes video viewing, so you could conceivable watch
about six feature films before this thing dies.
• How you hold it: You can hold it two different ways, and the software
will adapt to both. Portrait mode seems like the primay mode, a la the
iPhone while landscape mode—better for movies and perhaps magazine
content—is a secondary mode. The Apple decal is oriented for portrait
mode, so basically, just get ready for a whole bunch of HEY IT’S A
GIANT IPHONE!! jokes.
Connectivity
Some models have Wi-Fi exclusively, while some have 3G as well. It’s
with AT&T, and costs either $15 a month for 250MB of data, or $30 for
unlimited data. With the plan, you get access to AT&T’s Wi-Fi hotspots
as well. Best of all, it’s a prepaid service—no contract. You can
activate it from the iPad any time, and cancel whenever you want. This
sounds like a fantastic deal, until you consider how it’s probably
going to brutalize AT&T’s already terrible 3G coverage.
The iPad itself is unlocked, so you can conceivably use it with any
Micro SIM card . But what the hell is a Micro SIM card? For one, it’s
not the same kind of SIM that’s in your iPhone, so don’t expect to just
pop that in and surf for free. It’s a totally different standard, and
the iPad’s the only device that uses it right now. Even if, say,
T-Mobile released a Micro SIM card, the iPad can’t connect to its
1700MHz 3G network.
The Software
• The OS: The operating system on the tablet is based on iPhone OS,
which is in turn loosely based on OS X. In other words, it’s got the
same guts as the iPhone, as well as a somewhat similar interface. What
this means in practical terms is that the UI is modal; you can only
display one app at a time, and there aren’t windows, per se. There’s a
new set of standard UI tools as well, including a pull-down menu,
situated at the top left of most apps.
• The homescreen: It’s like a mixture between the iPhone and OS X: it
uses the iPhone launcher/apps metaphor, but has an OS X-style shiny
dock. It feels very spread out compared to the iPhone’s homescreen,
though I suspect this is necessary to keep things from getting too
overwhelming. For our full walkthrough of the new OS, check here.
• The keyboard: Input comes by way of an onscreen keyboard, almost
exactly like the iPhone’s. Typing on it is apparently a “dream,”
because it’s “almost lifesize”. Steve wasn’t typing with his thumbs,
but with his fingers, as if it were an actual laptop keyboard.
Navigation throughout the rest of the OS is optimized for one hand,
though.
• The browser: The browser is essential an upscaled version of Safari
Mobile, with a familiar, finger-friendly title bar and not much else.
It rotates by command of the accelerometer. From the looks of it, it
doesn’t have Flash support, but we’ll have to confirm. UPDATE: Yup,
none at all. You can get away with that kind of thing on the iPhone,
sort of, but on a 10-inch tablet it’s a glaring omission.
• Email: Mail again takes its visual cues from the iPhone, but with a
lot more decoration: you can preview your mailbox from any message with
a pull-down menu, and preview any message from within the mailbox, with
a pop-up window.
• Music: The music player is even more hybridized, styled like a mix
between the iPhone’s iPod interface and full-fledged desktop iTunes.
Interestingly, Cover Flow seems to have more or less died off.
• Maps: This one may be the most direct conversion from the iPhone,
with a very similar interface through and through. It includes Street
View, too.
• Photos: The photo library app looks a lot like iPhoto, only adapted
for multitouch finger input.
• Video: YouTube is available by way of an app, iPhone-style, which can
play videos in 720p HD. iTunes video content plays back in a dedicated
app, just like on the iPhone, and can also play back in HD. Movie codec
support is otherwise the same as the iPhone, which is to say pretty
limited.
• Calendar and contacts: The calendar app is desktop-like, until you
open organizer mode, where it looks like a literal organizer. It’s
beautiful, and dare I say a bit Courier-like.
Apps
• iPhone apps: This thing runs them! The iPad runs iPhone apps right
out of the App Store, with no modification, but they’re either
relegated to the center of the screen or in “pixel double” mode, which
just blows them up crudely. Any apps you’ve purchased for your iPhone
can be synced, for free, to your iPad.
• New apps: The iPhone app SDK has already been expanded for tablet
development, including a whole new set of UI elements and expanded
resolution support. The raw iPhone app compatibility is just a
temporary measure, it seems—any developer who wants their app to run on
the tablet will develop for the tablet. Some of the early examples of
adapted apps, like Brushes, are spectacular. More on the SDK here.
Apple’s pushing gaming on this thing right out of the box, demoing
everything from FPS N.O.V.A to Need for Speed. It’s presumably running
these games at HD, so the rendering power in this thing is no joke.
• Ebooks: Apple’s also opened an ebook store to accompany the iPad, in
the mold of iTunes. It’s called iBooks.
It offers books in ePub format, and makes reading on a Kindle seem
about as stodgy as, you know, paper. To be clear, though, this is just
Apple’s solution—unless they’re explicitly banned from the iPad, you
should be able to download your Kindle app as well.
This store doesn’t sell magazines or newspapers, which’ll be relegated
to regular app status. At this point, whether or not the tablet helps
them out is in their hands.
• iWork: Apple’ also designed a whole new iWork suite just for the
tablet, which implies that this thing is as much for media creation as
it is for consumption. There’s a new version of Keynote designed just
for the iPad, as well as new version of Pages, (word processor), and
Numbers, which is the spreadsheet app. Here’s what Keynote looks like:
The interfaces are obviously designed strictly for touch input, but
from the looks of it can handle every function that the old,
mouse-centric version could, plus a few more. And man, they’re so much
prettier. Each app costs $10, and you can get them all for $30.
Accessories
Right away, Apple’s offering three main official accessories: a
book-style case, a regular dock and a keyboard dock. (Ha!)
The book cover doubles as a stand, so you can prop the iPad up in a few
different ways. The keyboard dock hooks up with the iPad when it’s in
portrait mode, so you can type longer documents, charge, or both. The
iPad will also support Apple’s Bluetooth keyboards.
The iPad’s only really got one accessory port, and it takes an iPod
dock connector. Apple’s solution for this? Adapters! So many adapters.
There’s a Dock Connector to VGA adapter, a USB camera adapter (which
gives you one plain USB connection, though it apparently only works for
importing photos), a USB SD adapter, and a USB power adapter, which
lets you charge by AC or USB, not unlike the iPhone charger.
What It’s Like to Use
It’s hefty. Substantial. Easy to grip. Fast. Beautiful. Rigid. Starkly
designed. The glass is a little rubbery but it could be my sweaty
hands. And it’s fasssstttt.
Brian’s detailed impressions in our hands on, right here.
Price and Release Date
The iPad ships worldwide in 60 days, but only in Wi-Fi versions. The 3G
version will be another 30 days after that. Here are the prices:
Without 3G:
• $499: 16GB
• $599: 32GB
• $699: 64GB
With 3G:
• $629: 16GB
• $729: 32GB
• $829: 64GB
Apple will ship all the iPads in 60 days—the end of March—to America,
and just the Wi-Fi models internationally. It’ll be another 30 days
beyond that for 3G models to be available outside our shores; Apple
says they’re still working on carrier deals.
3G comes by way of AT&T, who’s offering the service without contract,
for $15 a month (250MB of data) or $30 a month (unlimited). That’s why,
unlike the iPhone, the iPad is actually cheaper off-contract.
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Posted By Mogul to THE MOGUL GROUP at 1/28/2010 09:25:00 AM
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