The iPad is in many ways one of the first products of its kind–making it hard to draw easy comparisons. When weighed against high-end smartphones, users should know that the iPad is not designed for voice calls or text messages (though there are apps that can work around this limitation). More importantly, the iPad does not include a built-in camera for taking photos or videos.
When compared to low-end laptops and Netbooks, the iPad can’t run common full-fledged applications (such as Microsoft Word), or use multiple apps simultaneously. Conventional input and output ports, such as USB, SD, VGA, and LAN are also missing, though some adapters exist to address this. Critics routinely point out that the iPad does not support Adobe’s Flash media format, which is required to view content on many popular Web sites. Lack of an integrated hardware keyboard or high-resolution video output are also common complaints from the laptop perspective.
Finally, compared against dedicated e-readers (such as the Amazon Kindle and Barnes & Noble Nook), the iPad’s reflective glass front and backlit color LCD screen arguably strain the eyes more than a passively illuminated non-glare e-ink display.
Do YOU get it now? Don’t get it!
What you need:
iPod Touch 32GB + Netbook 250GB w/ WI-FI N = $600
Thanks for reading!
Diego R.
