Everything iPad

It’s January 2010 and already users, industry and analysts are lining up to see what Apple’s bringing to the table. Wednesday January 27th saw the debut of the Apple iPad, the company’s long-awaited and much-rumored touchscreen tablet. A 9.7-inch multitouch slate, powered by the 1Ghz Apple A4 chipset of the company’s own creation, the iPad represents the Cupertino company’s best shot at the so-called “third device”, the middle-ground between smartphone and laptop.

Steve Jobs took to the stage to dismiss netbooks and instead position the iPad, not only as a mobile web tablet, but also as an ultraportable platform for work, entertainment and ebook consumption. Based on the latest incarnation of the iPhone OS, when the iPad hits shelves in roughly two months time it will be available in 16GB, 32GB and 64GB capacities, packing WiFi a/g/n, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR and a 10hr battery as standard, and with pricing starting at $499. A month later, 3G/GPS versions will arrive at a $130 premium; Apple also shocked the industry with hitherto-unseen pre-pay 3G plans, with buyers able to activate AT&T data service directly from their iPads, pay $14.99 for 250MB per month or $29.99 for unlimited data, and cancel without penalty at any point.

Since the iPad is based on Apple’s existing iPhone OS, it gets access to the over 140,000 titles in the App Store. Unchanged, these apps will run either at their native resolution or at a pixel-doubled zoomed resolution closer to full-screen; meanwhile Apple have added iPad support to the iPhone SDK, including an emulator, and are offering developers not only the chance to code for the new tablet but get priority placement in the iPad-version of the App Store. What users won’t be able to do, however, is run more than one third-party app at a time; like the iPhone and iPod touch, the iPad doesn’t support multitasking.

For that fact, reception among the tech community has been mixed. Apple are seemingly targeting the iPad at a less computing-savvy audience, and that’s left holes in the spec sheet. The iPad lacks a webcam or rear-facing camera, has no memory card ports (like the SD card slot on the latest MacBook Pro ranges), USB 2.0 or native video-output; instead the 9.56 x 7.47 x 0.5 inch slate has just a 3.5mm headphone port and a 30-pin Dock Connector. Apple will offer adapters for VGA output, hooking up USB cameras or SD cards, and even a Keyboard Dock with an attached full-sized QWERTY keyboard.

That keyboard – or the regular on-screen QWERTY, which in landscape orientation is almost the same size as a hardware ‘board – will come into its own with Apple’s new iPad-centric iWork suite. Three productivity apps have been specially created for the tablet – Numbers, Keynote and Pages – for producing and editing spreadsheets, presentations and word processor documents, each of which will be sold for $9.99. However at this stage there’s no sign of handwriting recognition, and the 1024 x 768 multitouch-capable capacitive touchscreen will only respond to finger input rather than the active styli found on Windows-based tablets.

Apple’s other push with the iPad is into ebooks, and they’ve a new app – iBooks – intended to challenge Amazon. Already they’ve signed up five major publishing houses, who will sell their ePub wares via Apple’s wireless iBooks store; bestsellers are expected to retail for $14.99 before dropping onto a touch-friendly virtual bookshelf on the iPad. The news – and the publishers’ attempts to renegotiate with Amazon now that another strong player is entering the market – has sent waves through the ebook industry; reacting to Macmillan’s intent to push bestseller prices from $9.99 to $14.99, and fix retail cut at 30-percent, Amazon have stripped the publisher’s titles from their store.

Less than seven days in the public eye and the iPad has polarized opinion and shaken up an industry, and the tablet is yet to even go on sale. If Apple expected a slam-dunk reception then they’ll have been disappointed – there’s plenty of criticism to go around right now, as pundits and public weigh in on the iPad’s strengths and weaknesses – but there’s also a sense that the company wouldn’t launch their first tablet without closely examining exactly what the market will support. It could well be too early to judge their hand.

Don’t forget to join Everything iPad’s forums and if you haven’t done so – watch our full iPad hands-on below!

Apple iPad detail hands-on demo: