<p>The simple reason is you get what you pay for. You can buy a very cheap PC laptop. If you want a laptop with better technical specs, you have to pay more. Apple doesn’t make very cheap laptops. They make laptops that have technical specs similar to higher end PC laptops. Those are competitive in price. If you want to buy cheap, fine, but you might as well ask why some people prefer good food to McDonalds or good wine to 2 buck Chuck. That holds for PC’s and Macs: many PC buyers prefer a better machine.</p>
<p>A simple example is the MacBook Air. Price out competition. Most of it is more expensive, not less. The ones that are have things like plastic cases and other downgrades. </p>
<p>Or take the iPad. When it came out, people said PC makers would overwhelm it with cheaper tablets. That proved impossible: they had trouble even matching Apple’s price. Put aside anemic sales, their margins were much less than Apple’s because Apple has become the lower cost competitor in the higher end market. That isn’t a mis-statement. You can be the low cost competitor in the low end market but that doesn’t mean you can compete where profit margins are higher. Apple is the most competitive company where profit margins are higher. It took Amazon selling at a loss - and now Google doing the same - to move any tablets other than the iPad.</p>
<p>I’m thinking of getting my D an iPad as many of the applications for iOS aren’t available on MAC and those of us with executive function issues need all the help we can get!</p>
<p>My kids explained to me that iPads are mainly for CONSUMING, not CREATING. They said that mostly I create and don’t believe that FOR ME an iPad makes any sense. My dad enjoys his iPad for consuming, as does my sister & other sibs. There are no iPads in our home, as most of us create content and don’t do much consuming.</p>
<p>My kids like having a netbook with a desktop. I have a laptop & desktop, as does H. So far, this type of pairing works well for us.</p>
<p>And there are products that fit particular at a certain price point. The iPad is a remarkable device, but it is no more a computer than an iPhone is. All its positive attributes end when people are trying to use them as productive tools. Yes, one could take notes during a meeting, but not as well as on a notebook. Yes, armed with the patience of a monk, one could print those notes on a printer just as well as one does from a Mac. This means that it will go well in a Mac-friendly atmoshere, and not so well in a PC/business/networked type of environment. Anyone tried to print for a MacBook on a Windows7 home network lately? Good luck is all I can say, but I digress. </p>
<p>The long and the short is that the iPad might be useful to some for what I call … wasting time. That means surfing the web idly, listening to songs, or even reading a book. It also works (quite well) to send messages to other iOS captives and receive emails. It also works quite well as long as it is used without attachments. And since the Cupertino geniuses thought that a USB was a nuisance, it was probably intended to be used in its native form. Attach a keyboard? Yes that will work but you still have a toy that is not built for massive or even moderate typing.</p>
<p>Fwiw, I used to hate the iPad with a passion. I gave it away (keyboard and all) to my parents. They could not wait to give it back to me. Its only use was to look up recipe from the web in the kitchen. Something that all our notebooks could do MUCH better. I tried to use it on a short overseas trip and it was a mistake as its limitations precluded to do much productive. And, as far as not accessing websites but declaring them NOT worth looking at, please do think how you’d tell that to your clients who happen to host that site! </p>
<p>Now, I hate it a lot less, because I no longer worry about trying to do something with it. I surf the web. I got used to the constant memory crashes (it is a first gen iPad) and do not mind the reboots as it is pretty fast. As I said, it beats the iPhone to send messages and quick emails. It even works decently to surf this site from the couch. </p>
<p>But that is about it. A toy it is. A nice toy for sure, but still a toy in all its spendor!</p>
<p>It’s weird to see several folks with mac notebooks dying right and left. Nearly everyone I know still has mac notebooks running after 7+ years of constant usage. When I asked mom whether she needed a newer mac to replace the one I got her in 2006, she thought the whole idea was absurd as the old macbook pro is still running fine…and she’s a medium-heavy daily user. </p>
<p>Only folks I know whose macbooks died earlier than that are either extremely unlucky to receive the odd lemon or more likely…folks whose problems are self-inflicted due to carelessness(i.e spilling drinks on notebook, setting notebook down on insulated surfaces such as couches/beds*, dropping them onto hard surfaces while machine is on, etc). </p>
<ul>
<li>Prevents adequate ventilation for notebook to vent heat generated by system components…especially the increasingly hot running processors.</li>
</ul>
<p>While the iPad may not be the best fit for everyone, it’s portability can’t be beat (for me). Here’s an example of how iPad went to bat for me recently.</p>
<p>Went on a three day vacation to visit friends out of town. Short trip, so no need for computer, right? No job tasks that couldn’t wait, right??? Of course NOT! Got a call from a colleague who had to put together a federal grant at the last minute. In order for my program to be included in the grant, he needed a couple of paragraphs to describe our tasks/committment to the grant and a general budget. Ahhh! No computer! </p>
<p>No worries. I have “Pages” downloaded on iPad - I was able to gather info from the internet, compose my paragraphs, access my work email to get budget info and form this all in a PDF. Directly from the Pages app I could email with one click all the info to my colleague - and to myself - for later printing, saving or whatever. </p>
<p>Process was only slightly more complex than had I been sitting at my desk at work. Without the iPad, I would not have been able to complete the task. </p>
<p>The ability to make the iPad functional is in the hands of the beholder - or owner.</p>
<p>I think of the iPad as a niche creator. It’s terrific for writing if you don’t mind using an attached keyboard. But it really shines in music, where it can essentially be not only a recording studio but a full synthesizer and a full drum/rhythm kit. You can produce full scores, etc. Invaluable for musicians. You can attach a guitar directly to it and record. It’s also terrific for editing photographs but really shines at managing that workflow. </p>
<p>A number of store owners and artisans I know have square readers attached to their iPads. Easy point of sale credit card management, emails receipts, feeds directly into inventory control. </p>
<p>I also know people who need to use CRM software and love the iPad apps for that and connecting to their work servers. They can use this one device for contact management and working with customers, showing demos, etc. </p>
<p>The main complaints about “content creation” seem to come from people who think in terms of Office and spreadsheets. Oracle, for example, has an app that allows access to enterprise applications and so on. </p>
<p>The thing is amazingly flexible and its utility is growing as apps come on line.</p>
<p>It’s a nice story, but I am afraid you’re somehow missing the point, which is about using an iPad as a REPLACEMENT for a real computer. It is easy to understand that an iPad can save one’s bacon in a case of emergency. Just … as borrowing your friends computer might have or even a trip to Kinko’s. The point is that you would NOT want to rely on the iPad had you known to have to do work … in advance. And, fwiw, it is entirely possible that your online research would have been hampered by the inability of the iPad to connect to PLENTY of websites.</p>
<p>Again, I decided to go an trip and leave either the notebook or the iPad home. I decided on going as light as possible, and I regretted it as I ended up having to go to an internet cafe to check on issues that came up during the trip. </p>
<p>And, fwiw, this is not really about liking the iPad or not. Its success is undeniable and many people love it with the usual “apple” passion. It is also not about being able to make the iPad “better” by loading it up with applications, as none of the so-called business applications are worth much of anything. Again, it can serve a temporary emergency, but I frankly do not see anyone deciding to spend hours working with Pages, Numbers, or any of the other junk that pretends to be a computer program. </p>
<p>To each his or her own, but there is a limit to the KoolAid commercials.</p>
<p>Actually, I can tell you that I bought the iPad in April 2010 for a specific project that had nothing to do with spreadsheets and “office” work. The project consisted of uploading several hundreds medical photographies and share them with a community of expert oncologists who were expected to add disgnostics and comments on the photographies. Simply stated, the iPad was a complete disaster on the input as well as on the output. Not only were the available programs to “edit” photographies extremely rudimentary, there was no workable way to organize the various files with multiple edits in a system that worked for everyone. Trying to implement the use of Ipads ended up delaying our project by 2 months. </p>
<p>The solution? Using cheap PC boxes, cheap graphic tablets, USB keys, and notebooks. The day we told people to dump the iPads and keep them for their children to play games on was a great day for everyone.</p>
<p>Apple puts a lot of money into the educational system Kool-Aid. Our system bought into it…every 7-12 students is now getting an iPad. The sup’t really pushed it heavily…more for his own agenda than anything else (IMO). He actually said there was no use for a keyboard, because “these kids all type with their thumbs”. Here’s to Susie typing her next 12 page term paper “with her thumbs” on an iPad. Thumbs down on increasing the textbook rental 50% for this venture. </p>
<p>We have one. They are a cool toy, emphasis on “toy”. I like the comments on consuming vs. creating. Over the years my kids have wasted a ton of time on the computers at school. Can’t wait to see how this increases with one in the hands of every kid 8 hours a day. One. More. Distraction.</p>
<p>"long and the short is that the iPad might be useful to some for what I call … wasting time. That means surfing the web idly, listening to songs, or even reading a book. It also works (quite well) to send messages to other iOS captives and receive emails. "</p>
<p>There’s no real difference in reading or posting on College Confidential via laptop versus via iPad - either way, it’s technically a waste of time :-)</p>
<p>I like being able just to bring an iPad with books loaded on vacations or business travel. I like being able to read / surf the internet in bed next to my sleeping husband - I’d be more disruptive to him on a laptop.</p>
<p>And I find a lot of value in terms of being on a conference call or Webex where I need to be focused on a screen, but having an extra screen on the iPad where I can quickly check emails or even open up a document and have it to refer to.</p>
<p>For the record, I stand by what I said throughout the thread - that I personally wouldn’t ONLY own an iPad to care of all my tech needs, but that MANY people underrate its uses as just a tool to click on websites and play games. It CAN come through for what many people use a computer for on a regular basis (as the OP mentioned) and be fairly satisfying if not for 100% of your intended uses.</p>
<p>So, as an iPad owner I tire of hearing people refer to it as an expensive toy. It is expensive, it is playful, but it has much merit for more complicated things as well.</p>
<p>I would not use it as my only computer, but at least 90% of the time I can travel with only the iPad. I use apps such as Splashtop that connect me to my computer at home to access the data and programs on it. I can manipulate my computer from the iPAd and not carry it around with me. I love that. My heavy lifting work is done on the computer at home. Maybe if I had one of the newer real light computers I would feel differently, but right now it is working for me this way. So, not a replacement but a compliment.</p>
<p>I’ve been texting since I was probably 10 or 11. I type with my thumbs on a screen and have for some time. HOWEVER, when I use my boss’ iPad, I can’t type more than a few lines on an iPad. That gets so tiring. I couldn’t imagine writing a document without an external keyboard. Maybe the kids 10 years under me can do it, but I can’t. For some odd reason, I don’t think they can quite do it either.</p>
<p>I am not sure if we disagree on the technical side of wasting time! It is easy to recognize the areas that are well-served by owning and logging around an iPad. I think that over the past years, we have had similar discussions.</p>
<p>Regarding CC’s differences, I usually can track my posts cum iPad versus computer quite easily. My iPad “contributions” are full of “forced” typos (including the unfortunate it’s versus its} and a lack of simple add-ons. For instance, I do not even try to enter the shortcuts for quotations. </p>
<p>Try to add THIS on CC via your iPad </p>
<p>[noparse]
[/noparse] </p>
<p>
</p>
<p>PS If there are some tools for iPad CC Power Users, I am all ears! And, fwiw, I started a couple of threads to find out about USEFUL and NON-LEISURE programs I could load on my aging iPad. Unfortunately, I am not sure I ever found one. Perhaps we ought to start a new thread. After all, things might have changed over the past two years.</p>
<p>PPS Actually, the leisure programs can be helpful. On my return from Europe, I shared the row with a talkative and hyperactive ten years old girl. The parents were on the other side of the plane. After one hour of torture, I lent her my iPad and it bought me several hours of peace and quiet time, as she played every game available!</p>
<p>xiggi, people can genuinely like their iPads and not have “drunk the Kool-Aid.” I use a Dell laptop for work but would prefer a Mac if I weren’t tethered to what my office uses. I have an iPhone, which I infinitely preferred over a Blackberry. And I have gotten tons of use out of my iPad. None of this means I’m an Apple junkie or that I genuflect at the mention of Steve Jobs’ name; I just happen to have been satisfied with their products. My one complaint is the battery life on my iPhone, but the battery life on my Dell laptop is nothing to write home about either.</p>
<p>My H gets by with just his iPad for most of what he does - he needs to access electronic medical records from home, which is all done via apps, not via Office-type applications. On the rare occasions he needs to create an Office document, he just borrows my laptop or usually asks me to do it for him, which I’m happy to. He gets far, far more utility out of the iPad than he would a laptop - the iPad is just more enjoyable and easier to use. </p>
<p>Moreover, the iPad is less intrusive. If we’re all sitting around as a family watching a TV show, for example, and someone isn’t interested, it’s still far more congenial IMO for that person to read a book or browse the internet on an iPad than it would be to haul out a laptop. It has more of the air of “browsing a magazine” than a laptop, which has more of an air that “I’m ignoring you.”</p>
<p>PG, I do NOT disagree with you. My KoolAid comment was regarding the attempts to convince “us” that the iPad could replace a computer as a primary device, or intimate that “we” might not really know how to use the tool properly.</p>
<p>Over the years, I have come to like the Apple products a lot more than I used to. Our family is firmly divided between Windows and Apple … along gender differences. Yet, I also work in an environment that is almost 100 percent Apple. Like others, I do carry the battery of iPhone, iPad, and MacBook Pro. I also own the mandatory iPods. </p>
<p>All in all, I tend to use the technology that works the best for my particular needs. And I think that everyone does the same. I also believe that, coming from a MS/Windows environment, I am more immune to the proselytism coming from Cupertino. The Apple geniuses do offer a lot of good products, but they also cling to some pretty dumb idiosyncracies, including horrendous integration. Despite all their RECENT successes, they do not seem to abandon their niche player mentality and their constant desire to be different.</p>
<p>What be fuzzles me, is that I have been using Macs for almost twenty five years, when Ive had a choice, and Ive put up with derision from people since then who were threatened because I didn’t make the same choice of computer hardware that they did.</p>
<p>Did I give them a bad time because they were constantly complaining about worms, security holes, malware and shoddy manufacturing? </p>
<p>All I ever did was make sympathetic noises ( while thinking you get what you pay for)
Now that people want to be able to use a product that works, and Apple technology is deservedly popular, users are accused of being faddish. </p>
<p>Why can’t someone just be happy with their choice of equipment without someone else telling them how expensive and frivolous it is?</p>
<p>There is, however, another way that includes the cult-like following of the niche market players (*Apple) that could not stop telling people about how cool, how hip their fancy computers were. In the meantime, people from the “other side” had to hear that the Apple were safer and easier to use. As always, a part of truth was there … the Apple was easier to use if you happen to own one and not any easier if you did not. Safer … as in in fewer virus attacks … yeah, but only because nobody would bother creating the darn things for computers that were only used by graphics artists and academic coneheads. </p>
<p>In the meantime, there were a LOT of things one could do on a dull, boring, and unsafe Windows computer. And, if you wanted to do those, you had to “put up” with the snarky remarks of the cool Apple dudes. The same dudes who then would borrow your grey PC to have fun with games, and get something done! </p>
<p>There are always different angles to any story!</p>
<p>I don’t understand why you care to be honest. Let people spend their money however they please. I see the back and forth on here over this issue quite often and its the same rehashed thing over and over again. </p>
<p>I am a PC user. I often have to troubleshoot problems on my roommate’s Mac because I’m good with computers and she’s not (it’s usually compatibility issues and I fix them for her). I don’t like Macs. I never have and I likely never will. I don’t own an Apple product and even if I could afford them, I think I’d stay away (have no real interest in a tablet, like Zunes for MP3s and I’ll stick with my PC :D) But I don’t begrudge those who do. Different strokes for different folks. </p>
<p>I don’t know. I guess I just don’t understand why people need to prove the superiority of their choices over others (and I get it a LOT from BOTH sides).</p>
And, fwiw, I started a couple of threads to find out about USEFUL and NON-LEISURE programs I could load on my aging iPad. Unfortunately, I am not sure I ever found one. Perhaps we ought to start a new thread. After all, things might have changed over the past two years.</p>
</p>