Apple’s iPad Still Has No Competition
techcrunch.com
techcrunch.com
Of course, as always, it is hard to get a man to understand something when his job requires that he does not. For example, where are all these bad reviews for the Xoom? Most put it a bit below the iPad.
Most put it a bit below the iPad.
A lot of the old PC vs Mac decision making factors in on the consumer side. Cheaper has its own quality, but combined with Apple's design - well. It is very much if the Mac mini was priced at $199 versus the rest of the PC market at $399.
I think HP will be seriously competitive and Microsoft might finally give up on the Windows 7 tablets and get someone to make WP7 tablets. Honeycomb looks good, but cellphone makers seem to have a lot of problems crossing to tablets because they love their business model with subsidies from the carriers. I think the first company that has a better iPod touch based on Android, webOS, or WP7 will be the sign post for their tablet to be a true iPad competitor. I think it will show they get the whole market.
IMHO, Honeycomb is far beyond the current iOS iteration for iPad. Granted I'm a Google services oriented person and Apple will most likely be releasing a new version of iOS for the iPad 2 in March, but apples to apples comparison: I've owned both now and I prefer Android. Not for "openness", or because I don't like Apple, but because the functionality is just more intuitive and convenient. Google really did good with Honeycomb. Most specifically is the tabbed browsing (though apps like Google Reader still don't work correctly).
I realize there's no WiFi model at the moment to compete with the iPad's lower end choices but I would imagine that's coming. Obviously there's a serious lack of apps for Android tablets as the Xoom is the first major tablet to be put out. I think these problems will be solved in time and only be a concern to early adopters.
tldr; Android is serious competition for Apple and without some serious innovation they're at serious risk of falling behind. I purposely purchased my Xoom so that the 14-day return window include the March 2nd iPad2 announcement, so I'm definitely not staying with the Xoom if Apple pulls a rabbit out of their hat.
Theoretically this feature will be coming to iOS soon (it's already present in the Verizon iPhone 4 refresh), depending on how badly AT&T decides to continue to gouge their customers.
The rest are there to capture some price discrimination value, and that's all.
What reviews has he been reading? I have read several and most have said in short "While there are still a few kinks to work out, this is better than the iPad right now."
"Go where the puck is going to be"
You mean like putting 2 cameras, HD aspect ratio and resolution, dual core processors, 4G upgrade-ability, true multi-tasking, a UI that relies on no hardware buttons other than power and volume (orientation free), Wi-fi hot-spotting, workstation style docks, etc. into a tablet ahead of the current market line? Kind of like the Xoom perhaps? Yes I know iPad 2 is coming but I don't expect it's specs to exceed that by much feature wise.
From the very first line: "Jim Dalrymple has been writing about Apple for more than 15 years." I had a strong expectation this was going to be an "Apple's Best' article and that's exactly what it was. I would like to give it more weight than that as I have occasionally respected his views in the past but this time I just can't. There are "fan-boys" in every camp and this article is to me another example.
You cannot exclude things like ecosystem from the equation.
> The entire article, comparing the tablet market,
> never _once_ uses the word Android or Honeycomb.
It's kind of a shitty argument, though, if you ask me. I don't follow the Android market all that closely, but it seems competitors are, in fact, doing things to differentiate themselves, even if they share the same core OS.
That is a rather fundamental difference and explains why the android marketplace is one big sorry mess with no direction. I wish it would be different but it's not.
The difference between the chaos on the internet and the Android ecosystem is almost non-excisting.
So I think it is fair to not spend much time if any on Androids ecosystem. What is there really to say about it other than it's big?
What is great about the iOS ecosystem is that the quality is much higher, people actually pay for their apps apple constantly and consciously help evolve.
It might be a walled garden, but it is a very well kept garden.
How is Apple "helping evolve" (apps? iOS?) in a way that Google and its various partners aren't? The Android Market has features and categories, Android gets lots of new features on each cycle, and it's totally open-source. So what's the problem here? What is the big secret special thing Apple does that makes everything magically better on iOS?
Also I am not talking about the quality of the apps only, I am also talking about he quality of the app-store, the payment process, access to music so easily and so on.
All these things are what matters at the end of the day much more than crazy tech specs or complete freedom.
And of course you can make money on Android but there is a reason why Angry Birds is free there and not on the iPhone.
My best guess is that some day tablets will be "essential", in the way that phones are, and there will be cheapo Android tablets for those who can't afford iPads or don't have enough taste to care. Both of those things are a long way off though, if they ever happen.
And the article does not take into account the effects of Apple's overreaching control of their platform, which I think has as big a punitive effect on their platform's growth as anything their competitors do.
Apple has a vast amount of experience in creating consumer software and interfaces, and even with Google's help, Samsung, Motorola and HTC will have a hard time matching that in the near future.
Motorola, for instance, I lost much trust in due to the endless stream of problems I've had with my Droid 2 phone. Many of these problems are said to be present in the original Droid, too (the most current issue? The camera's focus is stuck at about 1 foot). What Motorola seems to lack is Apple's high standards.
However, he builds so many little strawmen that I fear that argument will be lost. For example, there is competition. The Xoom is competition. Apparently, it's pretty good, too. No, it won't beat the iPad, but it's there. It's good. We've yet to see how well it does, even.
Who knows what will be a real threat to the iPad–it probably won't be Android; the iPad is not fungible (just like the iPhone has proven not to be). Instead, Android devices will carve out market of their own, and continue to compete against each other.
I wonder if it would take an entirely new OS and an entirely new company to successfully compete. I doubt we see anything soon, but I can only hope. Apple's making me feel more and more walled in, every day, even as I enjoy their products.
- removable storage
- wired networking
- audio speakers
- scanners
- printers
- cameras
- keyboard
- mouse/trackball
- joypad input
- any of a million other HID inputs like fingerprint readers, graphics tablets, biometric sensors...
I can understand Apple wanting to avoid opening that Pandora's box. Do all those device vendors really want to write and support iOS drivers in addition to all their other platforms? Does Apple really want to be involved in vetting and approving driver code for all that? Does Apple want the inevitable support burden for when those devices don't work?
Hooking up my Android devices to anything and everything as a peripheral via usb has proven useful numerous times. In several cases it has literally saved the day while my colleagues sat there in silence brandishing useless (for that moment) iPhones and iPads.
Not using a standard old USB port on iDevices has mystified me since they iPods first started coming out.
(oh, and since I'm wishing here, SD card support would be super great too)
Most the of the other vendors, Motorola included, don't control their OS.
Everyone else is just copying last year's Apple product with a shotgun approach with no idea of why they're in the market (other than Apple is in it), what their vision for their product and company is or what consumers actually want.
There are also countless examples to prove that just because you take a working formula and add stuff to it, it isn't by definition any better. In fact, it can be worse.
And the iPod wasn't the first MP3 player.
His point about being first is misguided. It's more accurate to say Apple was the first to do each of these things right. The competition are simply mimicking what Apple already did right and, in doing so, chasing last year's model.
I'm not sure how you define "first product of its kind," but as far as I'm concerned Apple created the first tablet with a multi touch OS targeted at consumers. You can argue that the crap tablets MS and its partners put out beat Apple to the punch, but that's missing the entire point.
Nothing that was released prior to the iPad was anything like the tablets that people have decided are so exciting now, and to pretend they were is disingenuous at best.
Actually, that is the entire point. That's exactly what is being discussed. Apple did not invent the tablet, they took an existing idea and improved its implementation dramatically.
"Nothing that was released prior to the iPad was anything like the tablets that people have decided are so exciting now, and to pretend they were is disingenuous at best."
The IPad certainly evolved far beyond its predecessors. That doesn't mean it took nothing from those designs. Clearly there are some similarities if they've all been labeled 'tablets'. To pretend there aren't is disingenuous at best :-/
The iPad is best compared to a console gaming system: an entertainment appliance with a curated application library. Marrying that to the tablet form factor was the winning insight.
"Invention" is probably a better term than "clairvoyance" for what Apple does. They aren't so much predicting the future as creating it.
I suppose the iPad will have the bloody camera, but it is not yet available.
Completely disagree. All previous attempts have been nothing more than laptops with the keyboard torn off, and a stylus sensitive screen.
You can actually watch Apple invent the tablet right before our eyes with the iPod touch, iPhone, unibody MacBooks, and glossy displays.
One upon a time someone had the bright idea to close the first Mac in that no one could open it up and customize...
PCs came in at a lower price and less features and in 2 years time Apple was losing..
So which vendor infrastructure is now acting as wintel?
Every OEM/Mobile Operator combination that did not get an iPad deal is gunning to beat Apple..no one tablet has to out compete iPad..the sheer number of choices and volume of those choices will..