“Ben Brooks has two Apple screens on his desk but neither of them are plugged into the nearby Mac computer, which has been gathering dust for so long he cannot remember when he bought it,” Tim Bradshaw writes for Financial Times. “As chief executive of MartianCraft, he manages the software development consultancy and its 37 staff entirely from a pair of iPads. ‘I do all of my work from it,’ he said. ‘I always think it’s funny when people are dumbfounded by that.'”
“Any business manager could do the same, he said. ‘I have a hard time wrapping my head around people who say they can’t do it, when I know the kind of work that they are doing,'” Bradshaw writes. “But despite Apple’s efforts to sell the iPad as a tool for professionals, Mr Brooks remains in a minority, even among Apple aficionados.”
“Though sales of Apple’s once-pioneering tablet have started to show signs of recovery in the past few quarters, to 11.5m in the third quarter of this year, they remain far from the 26m peak of the first quarter in 2014,” Bradshaw writes. “Next week, at its annual iPhone launch event, many analysts believe Apple will try to revive the iPad, offering a radical redesign that will remove the device’s home button and add facial recognition technology similar to that of the iPhone X.”
Carolina Milanesi, analyst at Creative Strategies, “predicts the iPad could see its biggest upgrade cycle in years with the forthcoming improvements, the Apple Watch is now more important to Apple’s long-term future. ‘The market, I think, is bigger for the Watch than for the iPad,’ she said,” Bradshaw writes. “Jonathan Ive, Apple’s design chief, seems to agree, given his personal investment in the product.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: The iPad will be just fine. Apple finally bringing Xcode to iPad Pro certainly wouldn’t hurt in helping developers and the world see the iPad as the personal computer it most certainly is.
We find that there are many older users longing to make iPad work like a laptop, because that’s what they know.
Take a look at a twelve-year-old who’s only really ever used an iPad for personal computing. It’s an eyeopener. It’s like looking into the future.
The answer isn’t to try to make the iPad into a MacBook. The answer is to provide all the tools possible in iOS for developers to make robust apps that can take advantage of the multi-touch paradigm. — MacDailyNews, May 16, 2017
SEE ALSO:
Steve Jobs’ vaunted ‘Post-PC Era’ never really happened — and likely won’t anytime soon – September 6, 2018
As we head toward Apple’s annual device announcement-palooza – July 13, 2018
Adobe to launch full version of Photoshop for iPad in strategy shift – July 13, 2018
Apple’s 12.9-inch iPad Pro has replaced my 12-inch MacBook – December 26, 2017
Apple: With iPad Pro + iOS 11, a post-PC world may be closer than you think – November 17, 2017
Apple’s iPad Pro from the perspective of a college student – October 13, 2017
Apple’s iOS 11 turns the iPad Pro into the only device your family needs – June 28, 2017
Apple’s iPad Pro is now a true photographer’s tool – June 26, 2017
10.5-inch iPad Pro: Back on an Apple computing device, but not in the form I anticipated – June 23, 2017
Apple’s powerful, new 10.5-inch iPad Pro is a typing champ – June 22, 2017
Apple’s iPad Pro and iOS 11 will finally kill the MacBook Air – June 21, 2017
How Apple’s iPad Pro’s 120Hz ProMotion technology works – and why it’s awesome! – June 21, 2017
Tim Bajarin: Apple’s iOS 11 finally brings Steve Jobs’ vision for the iPad to life – June 20, 2017
Macworld reviews Apple’s 10.5-inch iPad Pro: ‘If any iPad replaces the MacBook, it’s this one’
Tuesday, June 20, 2017
CNBC review: In the market for a new tablet? You should buy Apple’s new 10.5-inch iPad Pro – June 17, 2017
TechCrunch reviews new 10.5-inch iPad Pro: ‘Apple pays off its future-of-computing promise’ – June 14, 2017
Apple’s game-changing 12.9- and 10.5-inch iPad Pros arrive in stores – June 13, 2017
Jim Dalrymple reviews Apple’s new 10.5-inch iPad Pro: Highly recommended – June 12, 2017
LAPTOP reviews Apple’s new 10.5-inch iPad Pro: Amazingly fast performance beats most Windows laptops – June 12, 2017
Ars Technica reviews Apple’s 10.5-inch iPad Pro: Much more ‘pro’ than what it replaces – June 12, 2017
These go to 11: Apple makes iOS more Mac-like and iPad’s promise is finally realized – June 9, 2017
I rely exclusively on my iPhone and two iPads – no laptop, no desktop. Looking forward to the next gen iPad.
Good for you.
I have absolutely no use for an iPad. It is arguably a big iPhone and media consumption device for kids and also those that do not make a living on pro computers.
Good for both camps …
A pool is arguably a big bathtub. You’re totally right, you can’t do anything important or worth doing in a pool that can’t be done in a bathtub /s.
100% agreement with you I think the iPad is a waste of money. Just another product for Apple to tell people they need so that they can gain additional revenue buy a MacBook Pro and be done with it save yourself $1000 or more
I appreciate your point of view and still have my laptop. However, I wrote a whole lot of my Masters Thesis in my iPad, or in some instances, used my iPad right alongside my regular computer so that I could refer something I needed , and see it at that same time as my writing space. It saved me a huge amount of time and frustration. Please don’t be so quick to call something a useless toy until you see how others work.
Have second generation IPad (2011) ready to upgrade.
Well, arguably, a business manager doesn’t require a pro computer. Sure some use it for media and other light-duty stuff. But that’s just scratching the surface of the iPads capability. The point of the article was to enlighten others that the iPad is more than “a big iPhone” and, if you choose to, you can do some pretty powerful computing on it.
Keyboard, mouse, and graphic power are absolute necessities for what i do, which is HTML5 animation for web. The developer of the software has no plans for iOS.
End of story
When the software makers decide to make software for the iPad that matches their OS X versions there will be a shift. It will still depend on basic ease of use and efficiency. When Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop and In-design are iPad ready in their OS X versions I would love to jump in. (I know they did announce they would be doing this and I cannot wait:)
Right now for me, the existing CC iPad apps are purely for illustration and design concept. Production ready they are not. For me anyway. Everybody has different needs…
I do love my big screen iPad though. I would buy a 17″ if they made it!
“When the software makers decide to make software for the iPad that matches their OS X versions there will be a shift.” Not technically possible in many cases.
Especially true in terms of input devices. Keyboard and mouse functions cannot be matched by touch, biggest reason is the size of the human finger. No room for complex menus.
Most iOS entertainment consumers have no awareness of what is required in the in very apps that they consume their enertainment content. How many of you have ever seen the complex menus of apps like Photoshop? Few, I would imagine. I personally use Pixelmator Pro for image work, and Tumult Hype for HTML5 animation. You apparently have no idea of the large numbers of nested menu items. Try producing something more complex than a word processing document sometime. I would not do even that, you need a keyboard in order to create more than a simple e-mail in a touch app. I won’t waste the time even for that unless its a real emergency.
TKD you identify the major stumbling block. Input. Being optimistic I do think the pencil plus fingers could be utilized with a re-imagined menu context. Maybe its a paradigm shift in software design? VR meets AR:P Who knows?
I do agree with you technically. I am a design heavy Ai, Psd user. I have custom keyboard commands to the hilt. Not sure we will see a revolutionary jump away from the keyboard/mouse anytime soon. I am curious to see Adobe’s software when it comes out though.
Screen real estate is another thing too. Rocking two 27″‘s and thinking i may need another one. But thats another story.
travelling for over a month with just an iPad Pro 12.9
It was OK but when I came back to my Mac Pro connected to large monitors, a 27 inch and a 25 inch , there is no comparison to the performance advantage of the Mac. Opening multiple windows simultaneously already is great time advantage, not to mention the more sophisticated Mac OS (like having a proper hierarchal folder system… )
for certain people the iPad is fine. Like the article’s example, the person is a ‘manager’ (like Tim Cook! ) and probably reads reports etc and sends orders rather than ‘creating’ (like those making 3D visuals, or working on large spreadsheets etc.). For people like that manager iPads are fine.
but as surveys show iPads for pros are now mostly limited to besides higher end executives to a few professions like medical staff, real estate agents, factory floor workers etc. Everybody else probably do better with a Mac.
Apps which can live in the cloud and can be accessed by both Mac and iPad are the best, then you can decide which device to use. Unfortunately with various limitations including iOS and cloud limitations like file size, safety, etc there are still roadblocks for major apps doing this.
The iPad cannot Replace a MacBook until And iPad can open two files in the same App
i.e. Pages and Numbers and Windows Excell and Word
I use an iPad Pro for the majority of my business computing, both when in the office and when travelling. There is very little I can’t do andy that is usually software problems with out of date websites (I hate flash!). I might spend 10 minutes a week on my iMac. My iPhone is mainly consuming device and just to catch up ready emails on the move – but I am not inclined on doing much work on such a small screen. Just one sentence emails, or checking a figure in a document. My 12’0” iPad Pro is a pleasure to use and can do virtually anything, some things better than a Mac. One an example would be review and mark up documents – better on an iPad