I tried my best to ignore the hype surrounding this product. Everywhere I looked people were talking about it. Come D-Day (April 3rd), I went on with my day. The closest Apple store was located in Los Gatos, which was 45 minutes away, and I wasn't going to be standing in line waiting for hours. It hit the afternoon, and websites that I frequented often such as Gizmodo were bombarded with iPad postings. I couldn't deal with it any longer. I talked to my girlfriend Jenny about how badly I wanted one, and she told me she would make the trek to the holy land of the Apple store and purchase one... that is if any were left. She agreed to go halfsies with me because she would use it just as much as I would. I frantically called around to all the Apple stores seeing if they had any left in stock. Only one store in the West Valley Fair mall in San Jose had some left. I had to finish up on a film shoot I was working on, but my girlfriend flew over to San Jose to snag the last iPad. About an hour after she had left I got a call from her. Nervously answering the phone I asked her, "What's up?" She said, "Good news and bad news. Good news, they have iPads left in stock. Bad news, they only have the 64GB versions, which retail for $699." This was a little more than I wanted to pay. I would have been fine with the 16GB, but now that wasn't an option. I figured this was day one, and Jenny had driven all the way down there so.... "Let's do it," I yelled into the phone. She happily said, "Okay," and that was that. Two hours later she was back home in Santa Cruz and we were syncing it up via iTunes. I still had some more work to get done on the shoot, but my brain definitely wasn't all there. During a much needed break, Jenny and I found a quiet corner and just sat and stared at our sleek new toy. We had no idea where to start. From flicking, to pinching, to tapping it was a touch screen orgy. Many people on set shyly came up to us asking, "Is that the iPad?" and "Can I touch it?" We divulged in our spectators wishes so long as they did not hoard our new gizmo. I was nervous telling Jenny on the phone to go for it, but holding that piece of aluminum with a gorgeous glass screen, I knew it was well worth the money. No regrets here!
It's been over a month now, and Jenny and I have been using the iPad daily. There will be days where I won't even touch my laptop. Jenny uses the iPad for taking notes in her classes. She says it's so much easier to tote around a 1.5 lb tablet then it is a bulky computer. Plus the sex appeal of the chic new gadget has everyone in her classes focusing on her more than the content being presented in lecture. As soon as textbooks are available for the iPad, this will be the ultimate learning device.
I on the other hand, have been getting a lot of use out the iPads numerous apps. I was never big on the news before the iPad, but having such a content rich application as USA Today and New York Times, make reading news stories a pleasure. The Netflix App is great for those nights when you want to stay in bed an just kick back and watch a film, in fact Jenny and I just finished our third season of Weeds on the iPad. The games look phenomenal on the tablet as well. Plants vs. Zombies, Angry Birds HD, Flight Control HD, and Asphalt HD are all must haves. All the other core apps (mail, calender, etc.) work great utilizing the bigger screen. I'm proud to say that I finished my first iPad book. I bought the book Caught via Apple's iBook store because it was advised by recent purchasers as a great first book to own on your iPad. The ability to change the font and print size was great so that the content was the perfect size. Once more books become available, I cannot wait to order some more.
The iPad is still in its primitive stages, but its slowly getting there. New apps are coming out everyday that are making the device an essential tool in anybody's life. The main qualm people seem to have with this product is that one cannot so much create content with it. I do agree with this, however, Apple made this device for people to consume large amount of media (films, pictures, mail, news, magazines, YouTube, etc.). I cannot wait to see where app developers take the iPad and it's features down the line, after all the success of this product is mostly relying on them.
No comments:
Post a Comment