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Apple releases Ipad 3

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Re: Apple releases Ipad 3

#201

Post by eropple »

masklinn wrote: post #190
justincormack wrote: post #166

Earlier quoted context omitted.

True. Not even the ones made by Apple. Even after 10 years of shrinking desktop feature sizes. Clearly there is much more money to be made in tablets and mobile than laptops...

> True. Not even the ones made by Apple. Apple is probably the worst offender on that issue, in fact.

Huh? Apple offers 1366x768 in 11", 1440x900 in 13", and 1680x1050 in 15". The only comparable-and-better that I know of is the 1600x900 HP something-or-other.

They aren't standouts (although the 15" at 1680x1050 is really nice), but they're no worse than anybody else.

EDIT: I misread the original post. Sorry about that. That said, OS X isn't appreciably worse as far as resolution independence than the rest of your options. (Not that that's praise for OS X, but neither GNOME nor Windows are particularly good either.)

Re: Apple releases Ipad 3

#202

Post by megablast »

woobar wrote: post #154
jevinskie wrote: post #18

No mention of bumping the RAM from 512 MB to 1 GB. Even my TF101 Tegra 2 tablet has 1 GB of RAM. I wonder how much the 4x larger retina display assets will increase RAM usage. Edit: I guess it does have 1 GB of RAM. http://chronicwire.com/the-ipad-3-has-1gb-of-ram

The comparison to the amount of RAM in TF101 doesn't make any sense. It runs different software.

It all runs different software, but games are generally going to use the same amount of data.

Re: Apple releases Ipad 3

#203

Post by rdl »

k-mcgrady wrote: post #142
jiggy2011 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I wonder if the next step for Apple is to use their cash reserves to buy a carrier then of course all of their devices will be restricted to it.

Not really possible. If they were going to restrict their devices to their own carrier they would need a presence in most countries in the world. For Apple to buy a big carrier in every country they operate would be costly and stupid (it would be difficult to manage carriers all over the world when they just want to produce hardware and software).

They could MVNO (basically being a carrier reseller, buying bulk bandwidth from the actual network operator.) This is how Virgin Mobile, I think Boost, and some other networks have operated. Then reinforce with their own networks in places they care about (i.e. SFBA and NYC).

I don't think it makes sense, but I'm sure they've evaluated it. As a customer, having Apple as my single point of contact for everything mobile would be amazing, even if I had to pay a premium. Still wouldn't get around the limitations on spectrum and towers, though, but given that Apple's cash on hand is probably 15x Sprint's market capitalization, ...

Re: Apple releases Ipad 3

#204

Post by bunderbunder »

dagw wrote: post #185
AntiRush wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple doesn't let you download anything (apps, movies) bigger than 50mb over a cellular connection.

But once you go to 4G, that limitation just doesn't make sense any more. I know several people for whom 4G is the fastest internet connection available to them. Sure you could hack around it by setting up a wifi hotspot on a different 4G device, but still forcing them to use a slower network for larger downloads seems kind of dumb.

Heck, for me 3G is the fastest data available to me.

However, 3G (and 4G) are much more expensive, in terms of the price it costs to transmit a given quantity of data. And compared to glass and copper, the total number of bits available within a given geographic area at any given moment is a fraction as large. Unfortunately, cellular companies failed to realize that offering "unlimited" data plans would set up poor expectations. They (apparently) didn't anticipate seeing a significant percentage of their customers try to use the cellular networks for transferring large quantities of data, and thought that for most people "unlimited" would just be a marketing-friendly euphemism for "a couple hundred megabytes."

In turn, people who assumed that "unlimited" really means unlimited, and assumed that the prices that were originally offered for "unlimited" were realistic prices for high volumes of cellular network usage, now seem to think that the prices that cellular network providers want to charge for data usage are rapacious. On the contrary, it's not that the price they're trying to charge now is disastrously high; it's that the price that they used to be charging was disastrously low.

There's also a serious resource contention issue on cellular data. The towers can only be placed so close together before they start interfering with each other, and the bandwidth that's being advertised is the bandwidth you'll get if you've got the tower to yourself. Chicago's an illustrative story: A company came along offering household internet service through a 4G network, promising impressive bandwidth numbers. And they delivered on them for the few months between when they first opened for business and when they started getting serious traction in the market. Since then, they've earned a reputation as a pretty crappy ISP, simply because the technology itself couldn't deliver quality service to that many users at once. A wireless network cell is effectively a hub, and like on any hub resource contention can be a serious issue.

Which, I suspect, is ultimately why Apple goes along with the file size caps for cellular network transfers: From a user experience perspective, they would much rather allow everyone to transfer small files at high speeds, than let everyone's user experience suffer because the network is being choked by large file transfers.

Re: Apple releases Ipad 3

#205

Post by noonespecial »

Aloisius wrote: post #10

It should be noted that the limited data plans for both AT&T and Verizon mean that at the max 4G speed of 73 Mbps, you could use all your bandwidth for the entire month in less than three and a half minutes (2 GB plan). The overages of $10/GB per month on both services mean once you go over your plan, you'll be looking at a little over $5/minute in new charges. It is possible (though highly unlikely) to rack up over…

While this particular example seems extra silly, it does fit the long tradition of carriers advertising amazing new features that are technically true but always hampered in some minor way as to make them functionally useless.

I explain it to laypeople in one simple sentence: "You can't really watch the game on your phone."

Re: Apple releases Ipad 3

#206

Post by kaiwetzel »

tlb wrote: post #187

Resolutionary . What a godawful marketing department word. The first thing you see. I miss Steve.

The equivalent on the German Apple page seems to be "Sehvolutionär", literally "see-volutionary". (In case you thought it couldn't be worse.) Though I actually think it's a fun idea.

Re: Apple releases Ipad 3

#207

Post by lukifer »

afterburner wrote: post #64
lukifer wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's still slightly lighter than the first iPad, so for those of us who didn't upgrade, it'll be an improvement. :)

Heh, yes, by 5%. :) I think a nice weight would be about 400g. The Kindles are 200-300g, except the DX-2 which is 540g.

I prefer my Nook Toucho the iPad for pure text reading because it is so ridiculously light. But it would be tough to make the iPad 3 lighter than it is, without major breakthroughs in batteries or materials (lighter gorilla glass).

Re: Apple releases Ipad 3

#208

Post by waitwhat »

mark_l_watson wrote: post #161
Aloisius wrote: post #10

It should be noted that the limited data plans for both AT&T and Verizon mean that at the max 4G speed of 73 Mbps, you could use all your bandwidth for the entire month in less than three and a half minutes (2 GB plan). The overages of $10/GB per month on both services mean once you go over your plan, you'll be looking at a little over $5/minute in new charges. It is possible (though highly unlikely) to rack up over…

Don't most people, really, use iPads over wifi? Or am I just one of the cheapskates who bought one without 3G or 4G support? I bought an iPad 2 last year and I didn't even consider buying one with a data plan. I am near wifi about 99% of the time, discounting driving, hiking, and airplane time. In a pinch, I can check email on my Droid. Eventually 4G will become inexpensive, but it isn't right now.

I really don't want or need all my devices to have seperate data contracts -- one contract (for the phone) and hotspot capability is just fine.

Re: Apple releases Ipad 3

#209

Post by tomflack »

tybris wrote: post #158
Aloisius wrote: post #10

It should be noted that the limited data plans for both AT&T and Verizon mean that at the max 4G speed of 73 Mbps, you could use all your bandwidth for the entire month in less than three and a half minutes (2 GB plan). The overages of $10/GB per month on both services mean once you go over your plan, you'll be looking at a little over $5/minute in new charges. It is possible (though highly unlikely) to rack up over…

Apple should really use their vast piles of cash to buy one of the major carriers.

It's a nice dream, but would it actually make sense? Spend a lot of money to get an expensive capital-intensive business that is very different to any other business units in Apple and operates in only one of the countries Apple has a market presence.
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