Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

iPad Air

arstechnica.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

71–80 of 286 posts

Re: iPad Air

#71

Post by pearjuice »

At this point they are not even trying anymore. They put up the same tactic as with the iPhone 5C (marginally cheaper, definitely worse device than the top line just to make the step to the high-end device seem more reasonable and will be taken faster whilst getting rid of their old iPad supply), made everything a bit thinner, did some software updates and upgraded the hardware components.

So, enjoy your time waiting for the NEW IPAD AIR 2014, TWICE AS LIGHT, NOW WITH FINGER PRINT SCANNER. RETINA MACBOOK AIR 2014. You can say anything you want, but this is nothing new. Gimmicks, I tell you. Which is absolutely fine if it weren't for Apple to market this stuff as revolutionary, insane new concepts beating the competition at every point. They are basically scamming customers and they don't even care as long as they get an Apple logo with it.

To those Apple zealots down voting me: do you really need to suppress criticism this bad? Maybe it is because you are in denial or something? Feel bad, because it hurts to know you are being scammed?

Re: iPad Air

#72

Post by alexeisadeski3 »

epmatsw wrote: post #13
alexeisadeski3 wrote: post #11

Why does Apple depart from the series numbers with the iPad? New iPad, now iPad Air... seems silly?

An interesting guess would be that they're going to repurpose the generic iPad name for something beefier like the Surface. In that case, the iPad Air would sort of be the lighter portable version similar to the Macbook Pro/Macbook Air. Just an idea that popped into my head.

That's an interesting thought.

It's presumably only a matter of time before the heart of Apple's PC line is converted to touchscreen. Whether they will carry the Macbook branding or iPad branding or a mixture of both will be interesting.

Re: iPad Air

#73

Post by roryobrien »

radicalbyte wrote: post #15

Lighter. Faster. More magical. Sigh. Disappointing. What happened to doing something revolutionary? Where is the the text input? Apple are driving by creatives. When can I write my book on my Apple tablet? And what's with the 16gb model. As they said, it has been almost 4 years now. And the 16gb model persists.

I'm sure they have some real 'revolutionary' products on the road map, but from a business standpoint, why change what they are doing? They are profitable with their current product releases because of their crazy following. Small iterations to their technology that (my guess) cost very little but they can sell at a higher margin? Money in the bank. That 16gb HD is to make sure you pay them monthly for your necessary iCloud space. We are slaves to the Apple ways!

I'm sure we'll see something in the next year or two that is actually brand new that's not just a small upgrade to their current line up.

Re: iPad Air

#74

Post by stevetursi »

fivethree wrote: post #28
radicalbyte wrote: post #15

Lighter. Faster. More magical. Sigh. Disappointing. What happened to doing something revolutionary? Where is the the text input? Apple are driving by creatives. When can I write my book on my Apple tablet? And what's with the 16gb model. As they said, it has been almost 4 years now. And the 16gb model persists.

It's 2013 and most people's data is in the cloud rather than on local devices? Just because something is capable of doing something doesn't mean it should. A Truck is capable of street racing, but you'd be better off in an actual racing car. Make devices for specific use cases, not for everything. That's how you end up with Windows 8.

Yes, it's 2013 and both Verizon and ATT are still charging $50/month for 5GB. Until unlimited plans at reasonable prices become available, cloud+mobile is useless to me and it'd be more affordable to store media on my device instead of streaming it.

Re: iPad Air

#75

Post by mikeevans »

bsimpson wrote: post #30

No TouchID? Surprised they'd introduce a new feature on their premium phone and not include it on the (currently) premium iPads, especially since the other 5s hardware (motion coprocessor, 64-bit architecture) has been carried over. I would have thought they'd want to build a basic foundation for the future, e.g. "all devices better than the 5s include 64 bit, motion, and TouchID". When you vary on a feature (like To…

I agreed 100%. I'm assuming that it will come next year (or whenever) when/if they have multi-user support in iOS. Scan your finger, get logged in as your user.

Re: iPad Air

#76

Post by mfringel »

jmduke wrote: post #7

One of the more interesting aspects of this is that they're keeping the iPad 2 at $399 (compared to the Air's $499). I can't imagine the value proposition for a new iPad 2 is at all attractive at that price point (I bought mine used for ~$250 last summer.)

There are a ton of vertical applications (think industrial/manufacturing, etc.) built on an iPad2 plus purpose-built case with sensors, etc.

The margins will only get better on the older hardware, and there's no way they'd walk away from that stream.

Re: iPad Air

#77

Post by AJ007 »

alexeisadeski3 wrote: post #11

Why does Apple depart from the series numbers with the iPad? New iPad, now iPad Air... seems silly?

If you look at the back of the iPhones, the iPhone 3GS was the last one to name itself. Recently an Apple store employee wasn't to happy that I kept saying iPad 4.

I suppose in a world where change is frequent and incremental rather than dramatic and rare removing the version number is appropriate to minimize consumer confusion.

What strikes me more about this iPad Air is the price points. $499 16GB wifi only is a very hard sell to the mass market when a Nexus 7 16GB comes in at $230. Size matters here, but I can see Apple being in big trouble when Google's tablet is half the price and has a handful of more advanced features. I guess that is why Apple hired that Burberry executive last week. They can sit right next to the Vertu store.

Re: iPad Air

#78

Post by corin_ »

robflynn wrote: post #19
yeukhon wrote: post #9

> Apple says is 8 times faster and has 72 times better graphics performance than the old processor. I am always amused by this.

That was with respect to the original iPad compared to the iPad Air . I may have misheard. I had the video minimized while working on other things.

http://www.apple.com/ipad-air/ says 2x for both CPU and GPU.

Re: iPad Air

#79

Post by jreed91 »

pearjuice wrote: post #71

At this point they are not even trying anymore. They put up the same tactic as with the iPhone 5C (marginally cheaper, definitely worse device than the top line just to make the step to the high-end device seem more reasonable and will be taken faster whilst getting rid of their old iPad supply), made everything a bit thinner, did some software updates and upgraded the hardware components. So, enjoy your time waiting…

Why is this comment at the top? I don't know what else people want. You can't rewrite the script every year, iteration after iteration apple has improved this device and it only gets better. There is nothing wrong with that.

Re: iPad Air

#80

Post by falcolas »

ultimoo wrote: post #52
untog wrote: post #25

Okay. Looks good. Recently, Apple seems big on iteration and small on innovation. Miniaturising an existing product is definitely a good iteration, but when I see Microsoft experimenting with touch covers and the like, I do wish Apple would try one or two new things again.

I think TouchID and the new Mac Pro are quite innovative in their functionality and design.

The Mac Pro is over a year old now. And touch id has been around in some form for years. Both are nice, though neither is very revolutionary.
Post reply on HN