John Coles - Blog

A quickly edit picture of the iPad to look like a “real computer” running OS X.

Having used my iPad for nearly a whole day as a “computer” I can say that it can keep up with the majority of the things that I wanted to. As a licensed Apple Developer I am of course running iOS 4.2 allowing me to multi task and run apps like Skype in the background. The only thing that really annoys me is the fact that whilst it acts and can be used as a “computer” it isn’t really.

There is another person sat infront of me with a small Windows XP netbook (themed to look like OS X), and to be honest I think that I would have got a lot more work done if I had of brought my Mac Book (or any other laptop for that matter). It is programmes like the Adobe Creative suite that I miss. The abillity to use a mouse, yes after 4 and a half hours of use I am sick of just “reaching out and touching”. Luckily I brought my Apple Wireless keyboard otherwise I would be in a real mood.

I always thought, and still do think, that the iPad makes a great content consumption but as far as a content creation device it falls flat on it’s 9.7” Multi-touch display. I love the iPad and have enjoyed using it today (a long with the 3 MiFi) but I don’t think that I could use it as my main “computer” day in day out. I don’t think that the world is ready for the truely revolutionary device that is the Apple iPad.

By the way I put the word computer in quotation marks as I don’t believe that a lot of people really know what a computer is or what makes a device a true computer.