Maximum PC

I've been considering making this post for a while now, and finally decided to do it today. I owned an iPad for about a month before getting sick of it, so I think I have enough experience to bitch about it. First off, games. I actually found it incredibly hard to play anything other than PvZ on the iPad's touch screen, and PvZ is still better on the PC. People keep hailing this as the device to kill mobile gaming consoles or gaming netbooks (ASUS 1215n), but I don't see how the touch interface will work for that. I played several different types of games on the iPad, but the controls were so broken and the games were so uninteresting that I couldn't keep myself occupied for more than 5 minutes at a time. I'd honestly rather play PC games at lower settings on an Ion 2 netbook than ever try to game on the iPad.

I also hated how the device played Youtube. The Youtube app interface was so frustratingly hard to navigate that I gave up and brought my 15-inch laptop upstairs to play the video instead. Wasn't this thing supposed to be easy to use? Also, I didn't think the lack of Flash would be a very big deal when I first bought the iPad, but, like many things about the tablet, it became a huge issue. Turns out that many of the video sites I frequent (The Escapist, for example) use Flash video, meaning that I was SOL in trying to watch Yahtzee's game reviews.

Even with all of this to complain about, the thing that ended up frustrating me the most was the lack of REAL multitasking. I normally have 3 or more windows open at the same time, so closing apps to switch to another one angered me to no end. I've seen the multitasking in iOS 4, but even that isn't enough to satisfy me. After the new and shiny factor faded along with the novelty of owning an iPad, I was wishing I had a netbook.

After all this, I am so incredibly glad not to have the iPad any longer, and am now going to buy the ASUS 1215n. This device by Apple belongs in the pound.

I can't say much about the iPad, but I bought a used iPhone 3G a few months ago and really hated it, mostly because of the horrendous performance under iOS 4, because the 3G has an ARM v6 processor, whereas iOS is optimized for ARM v7 processors of 3GS and newer vintage. So I sold the 3G and bought a 3GS for a few bucks more, and I still hate it. It's slow, if not as slow, but my friend's Samsung Galaxy S (I'm stuck on T-Mobile, and that's pretty much the only smartphone they have aside from the G2 which can't be rooted and I will never buy) completely stomps my 3GS's snappiness. Also, I agree that iOS really isn't all its cracked up to be. The youtube app is whatever, its incredibly slow on my iPhone, but other wise the UI isn't too bad. I also don't care for Flash, its so slow and poorly implemented that I'd rather not have it on my mobile devices. But HTML 5 isn't much better. Sigh.

The multitasking in iOS was fairly satisfactory to myself, simply because a smartphone doesn't have the screen real estate for multiple windows. If I were running iOS on something with a 7" or larger screen, I would also be unhappy that it takes to so long to change from one application to another.

As for making the post, there's nothing wrong with posting your bad experience with a device, even when its one of big bad apple's devices. In fact, by even considering not doing it you're letting apple bully you around. Don't. Also, jailbreaking my iPhone made a huge positive impact on my experience with it, now that I actually own my own device. I hope you didi that?

I think in the end its just that you're not the target crowd for the iPad. You didn't just sit there and take in Apple's magic and be happy. Those people are simply not the people the iPad is targeted at.