Like most major press conferences held by Apple, the one Mr. Jobs held today was pretty important. With this morning’s debut of the iPad, Apple unveiled one of their most talked about products, with a surprisingly low starting price of $499. With a 9.7″ inch display, the gadget falls some into what Jobs calls the “third category” between your laptop and your iPhone, with many of the same functions as both. Joel over at Gizmodo made a great point about how Steve and the folks at Apple handle these things though. Other companies hold press conferences and show you a geeked-up, fancy prototype, only to have the real product let you down. Apple, on the other hand, gets it right the first time, and shows off the actual product you’ll be spending your money on. Most of the time, we’re still blown away anyway. Check below for all the specs, courtesy of Techcrunch, as well as videos of the press conference, and the iPad at work.
From Techcrunch:
All the naysayers can feel free to eat their hats. Today Apple finally revealed the device we’ve all been whispering about for a good year or more. The Sasquatch of gadgets is real. We’ll update this with all the details as they happen; in the meantime, follow our live coverage.
Looks like a big iPhone to us.
• 1GHz Apple A4 processor (custom)
• 0.5″ thick
• 1.5 pounds
• 9.7″ Capacitive touchscreen (1024×768)
• 16-64GB of SSD storage
• 3G available but not in all iPads
• $14.99 for 250MB, $29.99 for unlimited data on AT&T (no contract)
• 3G iPads are unlocked, have GSM micro SIMs
• Accelerometer, Compass
• 802.11n and Bluetooth 2.1
• Runs iPhone apps in window or pixel doubling
• Hardware-accelerated OpenGL graphics
• SDK out today
• $499 for 16GB base model, $830 for all maxed out
• Dock with hard keyboard available
There’s a very custom interface that I won’t bother describing — we’ll put video here as soon as Apple puts it up. Needless to say it’s very good looking. Prices start at $499 for 16GB, $599 for 32GB, $699 for 64GB. Adding 3G costs $130.
We’re seeing lots of great-looking apps from the live coverage of the event, including 3D games, a really sweet-looking calendar, a nice email app, and a New York Times app that looks really stunning.
Concerns, though:
• No camera so no video chat
• Limited space — 64GB may be a lot for an iPod, but when you’ve got movies and such, it’ll disappear real fast
• Multitasking?
• No SD or multi-card reader means that’s all the storage you get
• It’s obviously no more customizable than the iPhone
• iPod dock connection only means no easy connection of USB devices
Our minds all just got blown by the $499 starting price. I was thinking way more for sure. Nice move, Apple.
4 Comments
it’s all about that new new shit
To quote Chris Grant from Twitter (http://twitter.com/chrisgrant)
“it’s a big iPhone/iTouch… No multitasking, no Flash, splintered App Store. All eyes on Dell’s Android tablet”
No multitasking = Only one thing open at a time. That means no switching between windows, which is common on Phones by Google and Microsoft.
No Flash = No Youtube, no flash-based games or websites, no embedded videos. Again, common on what are now basic phones of 2010.
Apple can’t impress me until they make a device that actually, truly introduces something revolutionary. It seems like now all they’re doing is making their own product, which is commendable, but with minimal effort… All they do is copy/paste their old, old Ipod Touch interface on all of their devices, change the resolution, slap their name on the product and gets an insane amount of press. Really, the only thing that’s changed is theyve added a bigger screen. That amount of Hard drive space(16-64GB) is shameful when looking at the size of the product and ultimately limits its capability. To put it into perspective… The HTC HD2 phone can ultimately do the same things as this “iPad”, and more.
The specs on the iPad has the same results as putting a Honda’s V4 engine in a Ferrari. It looks nice, but has no power compared to what else is on the market.
In about February, you will be able to by full on computers in this exact same form factor (slate, but WITH keyboard). They will be loaded with 160, 250, 320 or 500 GB hard drives (probably solid state). They will have multitasking (countless windows open, as with any computer). You will be able to play all of your media… Not only that, but all websites will work at full capacity, just as you would expect.. all embedded content, Youtube, anything that works with your computer now.
It’s funny to see so much hype around this overpriced iPad when there are so many better, more powerful, more revolutionary devices that receive no press or coverage:
http://gizmodo.com/5440207/netbook-tablets-get-capacitive-multitouch-with-the-ideapad-s10+3t
http://gizmodo.com/5440922/ideapad-u1-hybrid-hands+on-meet-voltron-he-could-be-amazing
haha honestly i don’t get the need for a super ipod touch. but its chiller nonetheless
Chris, thanks for providing some much needed perspective. I think you make some sharp points. The lack of multi-tasking and flash and limited memory are all major concerns in my book. Not to mention, no flash = no Bowties. Hmmmm…