51–60 of 85 posts
I honestly think that Apple will be able to reinvigorate iPad sales when they offer some new capability. The iPhone has (almost) always had a compelling reason to upgrade. My wife's iPad 3 Retina doesn't seem to perform better than my non-retina iPad 2. While I'm itching to replace the iPad (it's getting slow, app crashing, etc.) I'll be moving to a Surface Pro 4 (or 3 if I can't wait that long) or a $200-300 Android…
I still don't "get" tablets. What are they good for again? If I need/want to code (or type anything longer than a text message), I want (at least) a laptop. If I want to consume media while on the go, I care more about portability than anything else, so I use my smartphone -- it fits in my pocket so I always have it with me (unlike a tablet). If I want to sit up in bed (or on the couch) and read a novel, I use an e-r…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
>At the very least, sliding a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse next to your tablet then having it turn into "laptop mode" would solve the problem. I don't really disagree. This might well be what the reconvergence looks like--in combination with software changes that better bridge different modes of operation. That said, you may also be right that enhancements to interfaces could make a tablet-type device qualitatively b…
Do you guys know you're actually describing the Surface 3 in detail? ;)
John Gruber had a good observation about the charts published in Quartz (specifically the last one): "Apple has sold more iPads in its first 57 months than they sold iPhones in its first 57 months." http://daringfireball.net/linked/2015/04/27/quartz-chartz-ap... http://qz.com/392202/were-live-charting-apples-second-quarte... If Apple pumped out over 250 million iPads, a great majority of which is probably still in us…
First of all, Gruber is absolutely right that there are still a whole lot of tablets being sold. That said, sales have plateaued at best and there are probably a lot of contributors: - Slow upgrade cycle as you suggest. I have a 2nd or 3rd gen iPad and I have absolutely zero reason to upgrade at this point. - They are probably being squeezed to a certain degree. I find that, even with just an iPhone 6 rather than a P…
The 2nd gen (non-Retina) iPads make my eyes bleed. They are terrible devices.
I had a 3rd gen and after a year, websites became more complicated and it just felt 'slow', so I sold it and got the Retina Mini.
Phone users upgrade for two reasons. Status symbol, and phones get abused. You need the new iPhone. You drop your existing iPhone. You lose it. People are more careful with tablets. At the coffee shop nobody gives a crap if you have the iPad or the iPad Air.
Not to mention that tablet users aren't as techy as laptop users or even phone users. Seniors love iPads. They don't see what the hubbub is all about with the new models. They can't see well enough to care about Retina screens. They don't like change and they don't see any point in spending $400 every 2 years on the latest stuff.
My 3 years old Ipad's job is mostly watching movies on planes. It does that job well enough and I won't replace it unless it breaks. I just don't need any more from a tablet.
Honestly, I think iPad's will almost go the way of the ipod, but with tougher competition. Good enough.
OTOH, if I was king of the apple…. I think a good idea for a new product category is a ~€500 iOS laptop. Chrome OS is selling well, and I think Apple would probably do a better job in that general space. Iphone apps could run as 'widgets" which would automatically tick a lot of boxes (Skype, VLC.. whatever your non negotiable apps are).
There's still a poorly served market here. Home users who don't like computers much, don't want to spend a lot and need something simple that works.
I don't know if you still call that an iPad, but I reckon it'd sell.
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I'm not going to deny they are expensive, which slightly taints my take on it, but I see tablets as the ideal consumer device and a terrible retailer device. Once you purchase a sufficiently powerful device there is no need to upgrade it in anything like the sales cycle that people like Apple are hoping for. A yearly product update is useless for a device that is primarily used to view the internet, check email and w…
While I agree with this, the unfortunate reality is that with the iPad specifically, older versions become useless as Apple pushes OSes that demand more from the hardware, and performance becomes a huge issue. And if it's not performance, it's storage space. And opting out of the upgrade isn't much of an option, due to app upgrades that require the latest OS. And I guess you can also opt out of app upgrades, but then…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
I'm not going to deny they are expensive, which slightly taints my take on it, but I see tablets as the ideal consumer device and a terrible retailer device. Once you purchase a sufficiently powerful device there is no need to upgrade it in anything like the sales cycle that people like Apple are hoping for. A yearly product update is useless for a device that is primarily used to view the internet, check email and w…
While I agree with this, the unfortunate reality is that with the iPad specifically, older versions become useless as Apple pushes OSes that demand more from the hardware, and performance becomes a huge issue. And if it's not performance, it's storage space. And opting out of the upgrade isn't much of an option, due to app upgrades that require the latest OS. And I guess you can also opt out of app upgrades, but then…
At the same time, I had a desktop for "heavy lifting" like graphic design and 3d animation, storing a big media library, playing games, etc. I also kept a cheap, portable laptop for the occasional times I needed to travel and wanted some semblance of computing from a hotel room or an event. For all of the other lightweight tasks, I had been using smart phones since the early Treo days so that was fine for email and looking up info.
But then I was planning a longer trip from the US to Southeast Asia for several weeks and it was going to involve a lot of hopping from town to town. Suddenly even my laptop was too much to carry when I already had everything on my back. I caved and bought an iPad 2 for a good deal more than I wanted to spend. They were still hard to find so I could only find the larger capacity models and the only Android tablet worth considering (Xoom) was not as capable and still cost about the same.
That iPad was pretty cool and I used it for a year or two before it just got to be a pain in the ass. Updates were de facto mandatory as you mentioned. Staying on old OS versions meant unsupported apps and constant nagging. But each OS update made the thing perform worse and worse. The hardware cycle was much faster than that of desktop/laptop computers at that point so I couldn't assume the normal 5+ years of usefulness I'd get from a laptop and there's no option to just install a lightweight Linux distro or downgrade. Even after I jailbroke it I couldn't really do much to speed it up. At this point, doing more than opening a single browser tab or lightweight application will make the thing lag and stutter and generall suck.
I think now it gets powered on a few times a year for me to check on updates and see if there's anything worth checking out. Haven't bothered selling it since it's my only iOS device and I figure there may be a point where I want to try some iOS exclusive so I keep it around for that.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
>At the very least, sliding a Bluetooth keyboard and mouse next to your tablet then having it turn into "laptop mode" would solve the problem. I don't really disagree. This might well be what the reconvergence looks like--in combination with software changes that better bridge different modes of operation. That said, you may also be right that enhancements to interfaces could make a tablet-type device qualitatively b…
Do you guys know you're actually describing the Surface 3 in detail? ;)
Microsoft is approaching the tablet by scaling down a laptop. I like it but it needs more work.
I still don't "get" tablets. What are they good for again? If I need/want to code (or type anything longer than a text message), I want (at least) a laptop. If I want to consume media while on the go, I care more about portability than anything else, so I use my smartphone -- it fits in my pocket so I always have it with me (unlike a tablet). If I want to sit up in bed (or on the couch) and read a novel, I use an e-r…
If you have relatively large pockets a 7 inch tablet is quite carryable and does noticeably better for video and text reading IMO due to the larger screen unless you have a huge phone (though huge phones are getting more and more common - I use a tablet a less now I have a 5" phone screen).
You sound like you need at least one step more than that though, at which point yes you will probably find a tablet frustrating as it nearly does what you want but is far enough away to not be practical. Something like a transformer might work, but they tend to be pretty expensive. I have a "poor man's" version of that: an 8 inch tablet (both my winter and summer coats have large inner pockets!) with a bluetooth keyboard & mouse and a simple stand for when I need/want to use it more like a laptop. The tablet was less than 100ukp so the who kit cost a chunk less than a laptop or a transformer-style hybrid. It runs full Windows too which is a bonus for me (it means I can run anything I do at home rather than being limited to tablet apps) though the Windows desktop interface can be a bit fiddly at that size unless you drop the DPI a bit. There are similar 10 inch devices too if you want something with a bigger screen.
Of course a tablet may just not cover your use cases at all. Different strokes for different folks!
There is a lot of one-up-man-ship in tablet owning of course especially in the case of iDevices in my experience - in some circles having the latest of those is a style statement, and some people just get bought them as presents, though I'll stick to talking about more practical reasons for ownership!