“Wow. So Apple has unveiled its iPad, an iPod touch like tablet computer that, so far at least, doesn’t seem impressive at all,” Paul Thurrott writes for Supersite for Windows. “And what’s with the huge bezel? It’s actually … can I say this about an Apple product? … ugly.”
MacDailyNews Take: “The iPad’s bezel is its handle. It’s where your fingers grip the device without covering the content on the screen, no matter which way you’re holding it. Give Apple some credit; they’re not Microsoft, they think things through.” – SteveJack, MacDailyNews, January 27, 2010
Thurrott continues, “The thing I don’t get here is… Nothing new. This has all been done before elsewhere. I’m astonished this isn’t nicer looking or more interesting… OK, this has to be a joke… It’s a joke. It’s gotta be. Right? …A 1 GHz Apple A4 chip (What the???)”
MacDailyNews Take: Oh, trust us, it’s all being iCal’ed for future use.
Thurrott continues, “This stuff is just boring. If Apple wanted this to be a game machine, they should have built hardware controls into that huge bezel.. Overall, this is a letdown. I’d be surprised to see anyone try to claim otherwise.”
Full article – Think Before You Click™ – here.
MacDailyNews Take: Apple’s iPad is obviously destined to be a huge hit.
and don’t let the iPad hit you on your way out…
Paul has to serve up some red meat to his minions, while he still has some.
It’s sad that these people aren’t getting it. The iPad is totally an Apple device. It has specific functionality.
I wonder if the same things were said about the iPhone. Probably.
I couldn’t have asked for anything better. Like the iTouch, except bigger and better. Plus it has the potential to have some killer apps made for it.
This has all been done before elsewhere…
One word, NOT!!!!!!!
LOL… Thurrott of course doesn’t get it. He’s not forwarding thinking enough. He’s incapable of understanding real innovations. He’s a Microsoft whipping boy who always as “may I have some more please”?
Finally, a device that does not directly compete with a Microsoft product. Now Bill Gates can proudly show off his new Apple device in public without hearing about it from Steve Ballmer.
I wouldn’t bother iCal’ing this douchenozzle. He’s gone from somewhat-reserved Apple basher to batshit crazy Apple-baser over the last 6 months. He contributes absolutely nothing to tech conversations. I would argue that he actually makes people who read him stupider.
All that aside, handle, functionality etc. you know you were disappointed a bit by that bezel the first time you saw it. I hate to say it, but I just can’t bring myself to call that an inspiring design.
For any other company, I’d say this was acceptable, but Apple has set the bar too high for us to applaud every lame semblance of mediocrity.
Meanwhile, I’m glad SJ didn’t invite McGraw Hill et al in his presentation.
Other analysts view of the iPad.
“In our view, Steve Jobs and the Apple crew surpassed expectations with the long-anticipated unveiling of the tablet device, officially named iPad,” Mr. Marshall said. “While we were impressed with the specs during the briefing given by Mr. Jobs, it was not until we actually used the iPad for about 15 minutes were we convinced this will be another grand slam product for Apple.”
Thurrott is SO WRONG!!!!
come on people. if they iPad was SO “magical” don’t you think the multi touch screen could tell that your ENTIRE finger was resting on the screen and NOT count that as a gesture?
i’m a self proclaimed fanboy, but this product is NOT magic. its been 5-10 years in the making and seems half baked….very un-apple like.
why would that giant screen be cluttered up with iPhone app icons? so now a 10 inch screen demands the same UI as a 2.5 inch screen. wha?
Thurott is right! First, it’s not beige. And it doesn’t even have a 5 1/4″ floppy drive, fer chrissakes. There’s no command prompt. I can’t even do regedit with the thing. How can I, an IT administrator, implement new paradigms on a go-forward basis to improve my workflow? The truth is that you can’t with this iPad or whatever they call it. And a graphical user interface? Bah. Give me the blue screen any day.
“Overall, Paul Thurott’s analysis is a letdown. I’d be surprised to see anyone try to claim otherwise.”
No one seems to be talking about Stage 2. Don’t think of iWork as the only new iPad app. This of it as a ‘how to’ guide for OSX developers to re-invent their existing software using a touch-screen interface. Imagine when 2011/2012 beings us iPad versions of OmniGroup, MS Office, Photoshop. Imagine all the Windows Desktop apps embracing the platform based in a way they never embraced OSX on the momentum of the iPhone App store. Now imagine Apple getting 10% because they’re the software distribution model. Think long term. Jobs has a plan. This is just the foundation.
Guys, you’re missing the point: Thurott is paid to say these things. Trust me, he can’t possibly really believe them (no one is that brain dead). It’s just his job. He preaches to his lemmings and they lap it up. All is as it’s supposed to be. They will miss the boat and we will sail happily into the sunset with our shiny (elegant, easy to use, aesthetic, fast, reliable) toys and they will be left to suffer with Windoze. Don’t waste your breath or time on them. Just pity them…
i think the iPad has huge potential, but man this homescreen looks awful! almost as if acer or samsung had designed it.
iphone icons lost on a huge grid with gigantic spaces between them? the mpst ugly backrounds they could fine. what is gooing on here?
it almost seems as if steve wants to punish his designers for using the most ugly version because they didn’t come up with something he liked.
I don’t know about you guys but I see potential in this product (as is the case with any other mac product) particularly within the home. I see this device sitting at my table being able to control locks, tvs, DVDs lights and as well as my house alarm and locks and all that stuff. But overall, I see it replacing our ancient house phones. Just imagine when close to 1/3 or more of the population has one of these at home connected over wifi and assigned a number by your company to be able to
make and recive calls. And then with the added camera it will soon have (just my speculation) apple will revolutionize yet again. I sincerley think this ipad realy is the missing link between the iPhone and the laptop
Within one minute of the end of the presentation, a Windows buddy of mine sent me an email claiming 28 PC manufacturers already have a tablet on sale, and what’s the big deal.
I simply reminded him there was probably 28 companies selling MP3 players before the iPod came out, and 28 different versions of smart phone before the iPhone. It’s not the feature set, it’s the functionality.
When the iPad was first flashed on screen, I, too, was underwhelmed. But by the end of the presentation I was stoked. I can totally see how cool and useful this will be, and how this device will help usher in the future of always-on, always-available cloud computing.
I’m no Apple apologist, but this time Thurrot really shows that he is defending his Microsoft blogging business. I can’t wait to hear what he says on Windows Weekly. I have a feeling he will be very stiff.
I was watching a Special edition of mac break weekly and Paul Thurrott said he doesn’t think it will succeed but that he likes it and plans on buying one! Huge difference from his article.
Alright, let’s pretend for a minute you’re in charge of designing the iPad. You decide it shouldn’t have a bezel. This confronts you with two problems.
1. How do you make the touchscreen tell that your ENTIRE finger is resting on the screen and NOT count that as a gesture in a way which doesn’t result in unbelievably convoluted touch recognition logic that cannot possibly function reliably despite its complexity?
2. How do you turn the user’s thumbs invisible so they aren’t constantly blocking the damn screen?
Giving the iPad a bezel conveniently solves both problems. What’s your solution for them?
@ mike g – i’m a self proclaimed fanboy,
Yes, but clearly not of Apple.
The iPad is going to be one of those devices that people are going to have to see “in the wild” to really get. Wait till you see folks in the grocery using it for their shopping lists, or people in Starbucks with their lattes and the NY Times meaning less clutter to clean up, or passengers on the plane watching a movie or even doing some work on those postage stamp sized folding tables.
And the price…before Wednesday, when I’d broach the subject with my husband, he said, “Yeah, but it’s going to be too expensive.” Now, though, he’s at least open to the idea of getting one as an iPhone replacement; I can just use a generic cell phone for calls.
Paul gets what Paul is paid to get, and even then it’s a struggle.
I love how all these people commented on Thurrot’s site complaining about the processor being only 1 GHz. No one has even seen one in person who commented, yet they’re claiming it’s not enough horsepower.
Apple via PA Semi designed the A4 specifically for the iPad, so it could avoid having to take into consideration other uses, like a netbook, optical drives, or whatever. If the processor can be custom-designed for a particular use, then it won’t have to be as powerful to accomplish the same tasks because you can avoid bottlenecks. Plus, you save power, which helps battery life.
I can’t wait for a year from now, when fantastic new apps are out for the iPad and it’s a runaway hit so Thurrot and his minions/hit whores can suddenly say how much they love the iPad.
Is Paul channeling Steve Ballmer, or is he just being his douche-like self?
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Game controls in the bezel.
Why not? I can’t believe Paul said something useful. At the very least, a third party clip-on.
unless APPLE does what I mentioned….then they can NOT call this “MAGIC”. sorry.
and to clarify…I am an APPLE fanboy. trust me.
come on guys/girls. you know deep down you were not impressed with this announcement. the tablet isn’t even a 16:9 device so you can’t watch movies on it in a way that’s “better” than a laptop. it doesn’t easily hook up to your TV. you have to dock the freaking thing to sync it. what am I missing? why is this thing so great at $499?
“2. How do you turn the user’s thumbs invisible so they aren’t constantly blocking the damn screen?”
so you’re saying the iPhone is a terrible gaming machine? wha?
Someone over at Ars Technica posted a link to a slashdot article with reactions to the first iPod in 2001, they were along the same lines as Thurott’s drivel….some people never learn.
This guy is an idiot… typical windows fanboy…
IT IS TOO BIG.
The reason the icons and the home screen look awkward is because the screen is too big.
iPad is a hunk of shizzz… I am a fanboy and my sorry ass isn’t plunking money down on one. Pass!
Who cares what Thurott thinks. He’s probably paid by some hedge fund to spread this FUD with the sole purpose of driving down the stock price.
many miss the point… you have million’s of iphone users, who are NEW to a apple product… what a better way to migrate them into the apple computer world, then to give them a device that they would already know how to use, but it’s more like a computer than a phone…. building a customer base…
“Nothing new. This has all been done before elsewhere.”
Funny, They said the same thing about the iPod when it first came out.
I spent an hour reading all of the comments following Thurrott’s article.
Highly recommended. The windows users contribution far outnumber the one’s on this site and I found them to be highly entertaining.
Aside from the usual unimaginative drivel, the comments fall along the two-camp lines.
Windows users are quick to point out the inadequacies of a product they’ve never seen, much less used and the Mac loyalists are attempting to define what they’ve never seen or used; what is the purpose of a tablet computer.
I love the way people complain about a device as though it will suddenly become mandatory to own one. Some of the wildest and biggest fools on that site act as though they’re being forced to buy one and feel compelled to regale us with their objections.
I will buy the cheapest model that offers wi-fi/3G this summer and if the experience is half as good as my Touch, I will be ecstatic.
I like the iPad, it looks pretty cool, but i do wish it had a camera for video conferencing. Can an external camera be plugged in?
Also, if I use any of the new iWorks apps on the iPad, how do you print them, con you even setup a printer> Do I need to print it from another system? I guess we’ll wait and see.
“The iPad’s bezel is its handle. It’s where your fingers grip the device without covering the content on the screen, no matter which way you’re holding it. Give Applesome credit; they’re not Microsoft, they think things through.” – SteveJack, MacDailyNews, January 27, 2010
More importantly than fingers covering up the content, is avoiding spurious touches on the active area of the screen. Lessons learned from the relatively small bezel on the iPhone/Touch.
What did Paul said when iPhone was launched in 2007? Did he liked it…
I print wirelessly from my Touch, so I see no reason why developers couldn’t create print software for this device.
If EuroSmartz can create Print n’ Share (highly recommended) why can’t Apple build in Wi-Fi printing to their products as well?
Remember when the iPOD Mini was announced? These very same bozos were all over the web predicting doom and gloom for the new product claiming that it was too expensive, people would NEVER pay that much $$ for a smaller unit with less storage capacity, blah blah blah, whine, whine whine.
Fast forward to 6 months after the release of the iPOD Mini and it quickly became the BEST SELLING iPOD model in Apple History!
Once you start going back and looking that the track record of these Windows apologists and anti-Apple idiots, you quickly discover that whatever they predict is going to happen, will end up just the opposite in reality.
I ignore everything these tools say and predict. They have no idea what they are talking about, abd obviously NEVER learn from their past mistakes, which considering the volume of their WRONG assumptions is amazing in itself.
MORE BUTTONS!!!!!
” the tablet isn’t even a 16:9 device so you can’t watch movies on it in a way that’s “better” than a laptop.”
Trust me, there is more to life than watching widescreen movies. And for many/most of those uses, a 16:9 display is nowhere near to being optimal use of real estate.
Most of us on this thread and Thurrott’s followers are the techies anyway. Apple didn’t make the iPad for us. My wife is already saving up for this because she loves how the OS is out of the way. To her the iPad does everything she needs (web surfing, FaceBook, email, music, casual games, photos and video) without having to deal with a computer OS. I think she and millions of other non-techie people will buy the iPad for that reason.
Sci-fi movies have been doing this stuff for 5 years. Same with flying cars and teleportation. Yawn. Wake me up for something NEW.
Thurrott is an idiot. I have increased my buy of ARMH slightly because *I* understand the importance of the A4 (and beyond!!!!).
exactly what you would expect from a guy that owes his living and claim to fame to Microsoft.
@Demon
exactly what you would expect from a guy that owes his living and claim to fame to Microsoft.
My sentiments exactly.
And the fact that MDN has iCal’d this doesn’t surprise me either. They’ve got their thinking caps on, fer sure. When the tablet sells a million units in the first weekend, MDN will regurgitate Thurrott’s words verbatim to prove how much of a putz he is… in other words preaching to the choir.
MDN’s membership will say, “here, here, harumph!”
For those who just don’t get it, just don’t get it. More for those of us that do get it. But don’t expect us to help you get it, because if you don’t get this, we can’t help you. Got it? Good!
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“I’d be surprised to see anyone try to claim otherwise.”
Considering the positive press I’m reading around the web, Thurott has got to be way beyond surprised.
His head must have exploded.
The fact remains that Thurott is merely a shill, and articles such as this one are merely clickbait to help him justify his payments.
Perhaps someone could be so kind as to highlight what actual _claims_ Paul has made, other than he doesn’t ‘get it’? For example, did he claim that Apple won’t sell XX million units or anything?
As such, all he has done — and FYI, this is actually a *service* to Apple — is that he has revealed what the typical Windows-drone initial interpretations of the product are.
Personally, it will take me some time to decide if I’m going to buy an iPad … I’ve been thinking about getting a touch for awhlie, and once I upgrade my work laptop (Windows, sorry…no choice) from the current 6.9lb beast to an <5lber, then I’ll have the budget to put a 1.5lb device such as this in my bag for trips.
Of course, what’s really needed is a way for AT&T;3G to not cost a huge bag of money when running on GSM networks in Europe.
-hh
Anyone who supports Apple won’t click on Thurridiot’s link. Ignore him and he becomes even more irrelevant, hopefully fading into total obscurity and…who was I talking about?
Cringely said it feels like the Segway. Come on man… that’s cold ..
“Every revolutionary idea seems to evoke three stages of reaction. They may be summed up by the phrases: One, it’s completely impossible. Two, it’s possible, but it’s not worth doing. Three, I said it was a good idea all along.”
If Apple were to rebadge a Dell-Netbook (without saying it…) it would be fun to see how badly PT would judge it.
For PT apparently EVERYTHING that comes out of Cupertino cannot be worth it, does not live up to the hype, is just pathetic. Poor guy…