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The Apple iPad | The Official Thread

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Timbuktu said:
Seeing this and the Marvel app, I really want to see what someone like Chris Ware could come up with if he did a piece specifically for this kind of presentation.

Listen...just...my brain can't handle the thought of that, okay?

If him and McSweeney's teamed up for some kind of insano iPad type thing?

Shit, my nose is bleeding already.
 

Seth C

Member
PotatoeMasher said:
Just curious Seth: did you order yours online or pick it up in Lexington? I'm going to bite the bullet and buy one this week.

I went to Best Buy this morning. They may have some left. The Nicholasville Rd. store was expecting 90 today (30 of each).
 

Fusebox

Banned
StoOgE said:
I have my room set up with a reading lamp that I use for paper books now... my concern is eye strain from reading with a backlight. Are their controls to turn it down? .

On the iPhone I set Stanza to reverse colors in a dark room, so the writing is white on black - amazingly easy on the eyes, hopefully the Pad has a similar option.
 

Seth C

Member
As promised, the Magnetic Draw photos. One screen grab and one "in the wild." Thanks, RSP!

magnetic1.png

magnetic2.jpg
 

hiryu2015

Member
Dammit. I wasn't interested in the iPad at all and felt it was very underwhelming when it was first revealed. Now that I've read reviews and seen it in action, I really want one. It would be a great tool for traveling, watching videos (MLB.tv would be godly) and surfing at home. I've never been the person who needs to buy something on day 1 but today has been a challenge in restraint.

It's not like I couldn't afford it...but I wanted to get the new iPhone this summer. If I got an iPad, I'd feel like I wouldn't need an iPhone anymore. Why must this be so difficult.
 

fireside

Member
Vennt said:
I'm confused.

iFixit, who I gather have a good reputation and a fair bit of experience with Apple hardware (understatement) now claim that following their teardown that the iPad has 512MB RAM, 256MB on each die, what do they mean by each die, I only see an A4 (The Processor), where's the seperate DRAM chip with the other 256MB on their pics?
There are two chips with the same part number to the left of the A4 chip in this picture. Perhaps those are the DRAM chips they are referring to?
 

Kenobi

Member
Anyone tried browsing gaf while using the web app? It's lightning fast. Also, am I the only foo' that left the plastic on their iPad? lol :lol
 

StoOgE

First tragedy, then farce.
Damnit.. not I'm really wanting one of these :(

Those pics look pretty hot.

I was planning on getting a Kindle in the next month or so and the new 3DS when it drops. Since this does games, movies and books it could be the perfect airplane companion.. plus music and internet surfing in bed/on the sofa.

Really would be a great work trip companion.

the only sticking point is needing 3G access so I can buy new shit in an airport. I guess buying something before I leave the hotel will be easy enough vs going to a book store before I get to the airport.

:mad:
 
DoctorWho said:
Give us some details regarding what you love about it.
It organizes the comics very well, the comics themselves are absolutely beautiful on the iPad with great clarity and perfect zoom controls with the touch gestures, and with the iPad being so portable and being instant on, it is perfect for reading comics while I am sitting in bed.

I tried to read comics on my netbook and it just didn't work well. The screen was not the right size for comics.

I find the dimensions of the iPad to be almost perfect for reading comics. Most of the comics I have read fit a whole page on the screen at once and are perfectly readable at that size. If the page spans multipages, you can easily zoom in to see the page the way you need to with touch gestures.

Turning pages is also great. All you do is touch the page and move your finger to the right as if you were turning the page, and voila, you are at the next page. I have already read about 6 comics in the last half hour. It feels natural reading a comic on this thing and you can read them at the same speed you can read a normal paper comic.
 
StoOgE said:
Damnit.. not I'm really wanting one of these :(

Those pics look pretty hot.

I was planning on getting a Kindle in the next month or so and the new 3DS when it drops. Since this does games, movies and books it could be the perfect airplane companion.. plus music and internet surfing in bed/on the sofa.

Really would be a great work trip companion.

the only sticking point is needing 3G access so I can buy new shit in an airport. I guess buying something before I leave the hotel will be easy enough vs going to a book store before I get to the airport.

:mad:
I have a kindle. Reading books on the iBook app is better, IMO. iBook supports illustrations, pictures and colors and handles them very well. The iBook app comes with a free copy of Winnie the Pooh which also has illustrations and the book is damn beautiful. It makes reading on the Kindle seem so lifeless now. :lol
 

see5harp

Member
Maxwell House said:
It organizes the comics very well, the comics themselves are absolutely beautiful on the iPad with great clarity and perfect zoom controls with the touch gestures, and with the iPad being so portable and being instant on, it is perfect for reading comics while I am sitting in bed.

I tried to read comics on my netbook and it just didn't work well. The screen was not the right size for comics.

I find the dimensions of the iPad to be almost perfect for reading comics. Most of the comics I have read fit a whole page on the screen at once and are perfectly readable at that size. If the page spans multipages, you can easily zoom in to see the page the way you need to with touch gestures.

Turning pages is also great. All you do is touch the page and move your finger to the right as if you were turning the page, and voila, you are at the next page. I have already read about 6 comics in the last half hour. It feels natural reading a comic on this thing and you can read them at the same speed you can read a normal paper comic.

O god please stop. I don't mind reading comics on my laptop, but you are spot on about the sizes of monitors. Muuuust control myself.
 

antispin

Member
Vennt said:
I'm confused.

iFixit, who I gather have a good reputation and a fair bit of experience with Apple hardware (understatement) now claim that following their teardown that the iPad has 512MB RAM, 256MB on each die, what do they mean by each die, I only see an A4 (The Processor), where's the seperate DRAM chip with the other 256MB on their pics?

EDIT:

The A4 is a Package-on-Package (PoP), with at least three layers of circuitry layered on top of each other. A4 is packaged just like the iPhone processors, microprocessor in one package and two memory modules in the other package. They’re all sandwiched together in a very nice and thin PoP.

The iPad RAM is INSIDE the A4 processor package. Confirming this took quite a bit of sleuthing: we had to partner with Chipworks to X-ray the processor. The X-ray revealed two layers of RAM. In addition to the ARM processor, the A4 package contains two stacked Samsung dies.
 

aparisi2274

Member
booooo, my favorite author is not in the book store... how is that possible?

He is under the Ballantine Books label... Are they on the iBook store?
 

Stat Flow

He gonna cry in the car
Well, just came from an Apple store to play with one. And I've decided I'm definitely getting one for my birthday (April 22nd)...

It was pretty glorious.
 

StoOgE

First tragedy, then farce.
Maxwell House said:
I have a kindle. Reading books on the iBook app is better, IMO. iBook supports illustrations, pictures and colors and handles them very well. The iBook app comes with a free copy of Winnie the Pooh which also has illustrations and the book is damn beautiful. It makes reading on the Kindle seem so lifeless now. :lol

Do you know if you can get magazine subscriptions like you can for Kindle? I have subscriptions to FT and Economist and being able to move them digital with auto downloading of new issues is a real selling point of the kindle.

Is there going to be something like that for iPad? I know it has a kindle app, but the economist in full color would be nice.

I'm really starting to sell myself on this thing. It will probably cost the same as the kindle + new DS...
 
V

Vennt

Unconfirmed Member
fireside said:


Nope, they are the NAND flash, which make up the storage on the device, not the RAM.

But I have just had my question answered, colour me impressed :p

The A4 is a Package-on-Package (PoP), with at least three layers of circuitry layered on top of each other. A4 is packaged just like the iPhone processors, microprocessor in one package and two memory modules in the other package. They’re all sandwiched together in a very nice and thin PoP.

The iPad RAM is INSIDE the A4 processor package. Confirming this took quite a bit of sleuthing: we had to partner with Chipworks to X-ray the processor. The X-ray revealed two layers of RAM. In addition to the ARM processor, the A4 package contains two stacked Samsung dies.

Although there is still confusion, some are saying it's 2x128MB DRAM layers for a total of 256MB, with iFixit's teardown page saying it's 2x256MB DRAM layers for a total of 512MB, however some developers have reported their own apps only reporting a total of 256MB, can't see why Apple would reserve 50% of available RAM so it's likely the reports saying 256MB could be accurate, who knows?
 

Seth C

Member
see5harp said:
O god please stop. I don't mind reading comics on my laptop, but you are spot on about the sizes of monitors. Muuuust control myself.

Give it up. I used to turn my laptop on its side to read comic books. This is so much better, and turning pages on iPad feels better than scrolling a mouse wheel ever did.
 
Sobriquet said:
No data plan, no 3G. You can only access via wifi.

There are two plans for 3G, and they can be canceled at any time. $15/month for limited, $30/month for unlimited. If you exceed the limited amount, you can upgrade to the $30 plan.

You can tether if your if your iPhone is jailbroken, or use something like MyWi. Not sure about other phones.
I have a feeling a lot more people will be jailbreaking their iPhones. I sure as hell will when I eventually get a 3rd gen wifi ipad.
 

Foob

Member
I fucking LOVE the USA today app. Really well organized.

If only there was a way to plug my external HD with all of my music into this, I honestly wouldn't even really need my laptop anymore. Still trying to figure out what the best way to hold my hands on the keyboard is, though, my hands are a wee bit cramped.
 
StoOgE said:
Do you know if you can get magazine subscriptions like you can for Kindle? I have subscriptions to FT and Economist and being able to move them digital with auto downloading of new issues is a real selling point of the kindle.

Is there going to be something like that for iPad? I know it has a kindle app, but the economist in full color would be nice.

I'm really starting to sell myself on this thing. It will probably cost the same as the kindle + new DS...
Well at the iBook book store I didn't see any magazine subscriptions yet so I am not sure if there are any supported yet or not (didn't look at the store for very long though..could have overlooked it) but I did read that Apple plans to support most of the major magazines on the iPad eventually.

Here is a link to a story on it:

http://www.engadget.com/2010/03/25/wsj-on-ipad-17-99-a-month-magazines-to-be-at-or-near-newsstand/

I can't wait because the iPad would be perfect for reading magazines on.
The Wall Street Journal is running a piece that focuses on ad sales for the iPad. Pretty boring stuff except for a few nuggets related to the actual content we crave. Rupert Murdoch already confirmed that his monument to main stream media was coming to the iPad. Hell, they've even been treated to a rare, in-house device to assist with the development of the iPad version of the Wall Street Journal. Now it's quoting "a person familiar with the matter" (wink) who says that The Journal plans to charge subscribers $17.99 per month for iPad subscriptions -- for comparison, the print version of the WSJ costs $349 for 52 weeks or about $29 per month. Not bad, but you can't roll up an iPad to swat the dog.

Conversely, magazines appear set to offer weekly or monthly editions out of the gate, not annual subscriptions. Sources told the WSJ that the April issue of Hearst's Esquire magazine (no stranger to new media) will arrive in downloadable format without advertisements for $2.99, $2 less than the newsstand price, and will include five music videos (each containing the phrase "somewhere in Mississippi," oddly enough) to take advantage of the device's multimedia capabilities. On the other hand, a full iPad issue of Men's Health with match the glossy's $4.99 price. Of course, as we heard earlier, publishers will be experimenting with advertising and pricing models to see what works so expect things to be fluid for quite some time after the April 3rd launch.
 

Fusebox

Banned
DoctorWho said:
Give us some details regarding what you love about it.

Original ComicZeal on a larger screen is all it would take for me to spooge about ComicZeal. The app is sick enough on iPhone, I can only imagine how godly it must be on the Pad.
 
BenjaminBirdie said:
Listen...just...my brain can't handle the thought of that, okay?

If him and McSweeney's teamed up for some kind of insano iPad type thing?

Shit, my nose is bleeding already.
Even a simple image of his art is on this screen is... /swoon

ChrisWare1.png
 
So far I'm loving everything about this device. Streaming a NetFlix TV show was like magic. It even remembered that I had only watched half of it on the Xbox. Seamless. Perfect. Responsive.

Now I just have to figure out how to get the most bang for the buck out of it. I'm a PC guy, and intend to stay that way, but I'd still like to remote desktop to some work machines, use a tool to help diagram UIs/Flowcharts/Freehand and text, and synch up work documents between my work machine and the iPad.

Anybody know where I should start?

I couldn't find any diagramming/whiteboard tools that seemed to allow text/images and basic shapes. Nor do I know the best way to keep my work docs in synch - they are mostly text files and MS Office docs.

Any help is appreciated. I'm still a noob at all of this.
 

Burger

Member
Man those guys over at JooJoo must be pretty sad face right now.

iPad should be out in Australia when I visit in early May. Gonna be hard not to be lead into temptation.
 

Messi

Member
Oh another question. How is the video quality of a regular 350mb mp4 file. Of say a tv show. When it is in full screen. All I have seen is how great 720p stuff looks, but kinda curious how most of my video content would look.
 

mrkgoo

Member
I showed my iPad to my flatmate, and she was amazed.

She was looking at paper maps, and the iPad maps app instantly became a great accessory for planing directions and routes. Then when she started playing angry birds, her cat jumped in her lap, and she remarked that the iPad would make a better web browser than her computer because she can use it in the air.

She said the apps were 'more fun' than desktop apps, because you're touching things.

Revolution!
 
Messi said:
Oh another question. How is the video quality of a regular 350mb mp4 file. Of say a tv show. When it is in full screen. All I have seen is how great 720p stuff looks, but kinda curious how most of my video content would look.

I'm about to test this. iPad is syncing now.
 

panda21

Member
hiryu2015 said:
Dammit. I wasn't interested in the iPad at all and felt it was very underwhelming when it was first revealed. Now that I've read reviews and seen it in action, I really want one. It would be a great tool for traveling, watching videos (MLB.tv would be godly) and surfing at home. I've never been the person who needs to buy something on day 1 but today has been a challenge in restraint.

yeah the more i see the more i want! what the tested.com guys were saying about it being a leaning back device rather than being hunched over your laptop/computer is very appealing.

it sounds like a small thing but being able to sit back and read web sites wherever just holding it in your hands and touching it, rather than having a laptop on your lap that you have to interact with via keyboard/touchpad is very appealing.

i can imagine getting up in the morning and reading websites on it with a cup of coffee would be pretty sweet.

add to that the fact that is actually useful for other things like email and presentations (i would actually use it to take to give presentations rather than a laptop, since its smaller and you can plug it into a projector), and it almost seems worth the ridiculous euro price.

only thing putting me off is that i just got an android phone and seeing the possibilities of full multitasking and a completely open platform makes the iphone/itouch/ipad os seem like a downgrade.

is 4.0 really going to have multitasking or did some site just make that up?
 

SSGMUN10000

Connoisseur Of Tedium
I might be in the extreme minority here but me and the wife stopped by the apple store to check this out and both of us were underwhelmed. I sold my Archos 7 and eager for a replacement I just dont think this is it. I will wait for other tablets to come out before choosing one.
 

acksman

Member
SSGMUN10000 said:
I might be in the extreme minority here but me and the wife stopped by the apple store to check this out and both of us were underwhelmed.

I could definitely see that. It just does not show very well in the store. They need a couch in there and a way to relax with it.
 

Seth C

Member
Messi said:
Including the frame or just the screen, thanks :)

The frame is wider than a comic book, but the screen itself is less wide than a comic book. Here are some photos. I grabbed the book at the front of my long box.

comics1.jpg
comics2.jpg

comics3.jpg
 
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