Sometimes when we judge a book by its cover, we are left wondering if what we got was worth the wait. In January, 2010, amid nearly a decade of rumors and promises, Apple announced one of its most groundbreaking products to date. So significant, that it has the potential to change the paradigm of the entire personal computer format. Even the name “iPad” represents more than just a product. It represents an “idea.” But ideas can be mere marketing fluff or truly the revolutionary shape of things to come.
What separates an idea from a product is whether it is embraced by the market as a toy or a tool. Many so-called “revolutionary” toys that integrate well with PCs are released to the marketplace annually. But a tool not only has potential staying power — it can also serve as a foundation for real innovative change in the world of personal computing.
Smart Business spoke to Chris Jones of ATW Management Inc. about what makes the iPad an inventive toy as well as an innovative tool that businesses can use as a foundation for new ideas.
What were your first impressions of the iPad’s look and capabilities?
After months of standing poolside, we finally dove into the iPad pool and, like that initial shock of diving into a swimming pool, there was also a jolt of the expected — and simultaneously unexpected — change in temperature. Take the design for instance, the first thing you notice is it is the ultimate in clean simplicity. The surface is mainly a 9.7-inch, 1024 x 768, multi-touch display surrounded by a glossy black bezel. The only initial interaction is with Apple’s ‘home’ button, which is reminisent of the ‘start’ button in most of today’s sport roadsters. Like the roadster, the iPad is small, revs up with power, and is a beauty to behold, but the design is simple enough to enable the focus to be on the powerful interaction with the screen — which is kind of the point.
In our quest to define the iPad as a tool, we chose the 16GB model with Wi-Fi + 3G in order to integrate it into the company network as well as create a virtual private network into various applications utilizing a Wi-Fi outside of the office. The iPad contains a PA Semi-designed 1 GHz A4 system-on-a-chip, an 802.11a/b/g/n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth 2.1, and can be purchased in capacities of 16GB, 32GB, or 64GB.
Did you find it to be functional and user-friendly?
As mentioned earlier, the iPad is all about its screen, and the 9.7-inch LED backlit IPS display is certainly impressive. Colors are vibrant and can be cranked up to intense brightness, which makes the image quality for HD sharper than most TVs. Due to the IPS (in-plane switching) for the display, viewing angles are remarkable broad, which comes in handy with the calendar and contacts applications. Information is easier to see due to the layout, and the constant need to scroll is minimized as with the iPhone.
And speaking of iPhone, it’s not difficult to realize that the iPad’s interface is nearly identical to the iPhone due to the fact that it is built on a derivation of the same iOS operating system. This makes actual navigation on the devices identical as well. So far, every single application used on the iPhone has worked on the iPad in our testing. A few applications have had a noticeable decrease in the quality of the graphics but this is irrelevant for most business applications. (When it comes to games and watching videos, it’s quite nice to have the larger screen for the whole multimedia experience, but the iPad has already been established as a great toy.) In a business setting, the ability to use the same applications on both the iPad and the iPhone justifies the money invested in them in the first place.
If you haven’t noticed, we have yet to discuss windows, files and folders, which are commonplace in the PC world. Initially, this environment along with multi-tasking was practically non-existent. But we need to realize that the iPad is not a common computer in the usual sense. It is, rather, a hybrid version of its not-so distant cousin, the iPhone. Once you embrace this concept you will be able to play, purchase, surf and even accomplish some work with this ‘computer’ that’s so easy to use nearly anyone can understand it immediately.
