The last tear-down said there were 21 magnets in the smart cover alone. And another 10 in the iPad. Though I'm not sure how much fridge testing was done before release.

That number blew me away in fact. They do have a ton of variations of all their products, but those others have traditionally been managed as BTO (build to order) configurations, with a limited set of standard configurations for shelf-stocking.

One thing is crystal clear right now however. All 18 of those SKUs seem to be selling out everywhere. I think I might pick up an older first-gen iPad if I can get "the right price" and then see what happens toward the end of the year with regards to the refresh rumors.

The refurbs are a good deal at the moment (in the UK at least). My 80 year old father just picked up a 16GB wifi iPad for £289.

If it was most other companies (the Dell outlet store being the other exception that springs to mind), I would never have thought of recommending a refurb to him.

From the mouth of an 8th grader:



http://jpteti.com/post/4072771125/the-ipad-is-99-more-open-than-any-other-computer

There are a few instances where the text needs minor editing, but it's a great read. From an 8th grader. Nice.

No, it sounds exactly like an essay from an 8th grader. There's very little there beyond hearsay: "All my friends think that the iPad can do more than a laptop."

I'm not sure the word "open" is correct. But I agree with what has says about iOS meaning that normal people buy software now.

Before iOS, normal people, in their private life, just didn't buy software (unless it was gamers buying games). iOS changed all that, normal humans actually buy software now.

And who do you think represent the not-so-in-the-future market for computing?

I guess you don't do as much tech reading as I do. More than a handful of bloggers and tech journalists, not to mention analysts, could learn a thing or two from such an 8th grader.

Or maybe my expectations of what an 8th grader would have to say fall more in line with the typical comment section of any tech blog.

He's distilled the meaning of "open" to the general populace. It's not whether you can compile your own code or run Flash, it's about the experience and the platform's ability to be adopted by the average joe. Open in the sense of accessible and inviting. That's what seems to matter to everyone buying these things.

Sorry. I forgot for a second that you're obsessed with marketing.

And sales Bitt. Don't forget sales.

Seriously though, this has nothing to do with marketing. I just thought it was refreshing to see a well spoken 8th grader who seems to grasp what so many pundits miss.

He may grasp it, and he may write better than your typical tech pundit, but he still writes like an 8th grader.

Bitt, I must [not-so] respectfully disagree.

The typical 8th grader, no, the typical high-school senior, writes like the semi-literate clod that he is, with misspellings, incomprehensible grammar and sentence structure, and not the faintest idea of how to present ideas in a logical sequence.

Why do you think that 82% of college freshman are required to take remedial English courses?

I think your expectations are too high, possibly being biased by exposure to the extraordinary competence of most of the people on this bbs.

"Wen I started Colege I cudnt evin spel jurnalist, and now I are one!"

tanstaafl.

Because there are a significant number of college freshmen for whom English is a second (or even third) language?

As quoted, the statistic is meaningless.

So the way to start calling Apple and iOS as "open" is to change your definition of "open?"

No. You're missing the point. It's not about being open to hacking, it's about being an open and welcoming experience.

Anyway, I just thought it was a neat blog post, a positive effort by an 8th grader and it just generally made me smile.

1080p video output from the iPad2 while using its own display for additional content... WOW.

http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/25/real-racing-2-hd-update-might-just-make-you-get-an-av-adapter-fo/

In this case it's Real Racing 2 on a large screen TV @ 1080p with the iPad acting as controller and map. Impressive.

"Open to hacking?" When was that the definition of "open?" That's what I'm talking about. I completely understand what you're saying you and this kid are defining "open" to be, but you were missing my point, which is that it isn't what anyone has definined "open" to be up to this point. This wouldn't be a problem because I agree with what you're saying about the welcoming experience, except that you're using this new definition as an argument against the previous definition.

*edit*
naturally, I'll take this discussion to Tom's new thread

Wow, I'm surprised your post didn't include the phrase "kids these days," or "whippersnappers."

I was going to write a longer response, but instead I'll point out the irony of your criticism of the literacy of today's children by pointing out that you stated "82% of college freshman," when the story you linked was specifically talking about percentages of community college freshmen. *edit* Just read it again, and it's even more specific: it's a single school they're talking about */edit*

Now, I'm not criticizing community colleges. Virginia has an excellent CC system. But to make that claim for the entirety of Colleges and Universities in the country based on one story about California community colleges is just plain misinformed.

Matt, "open" has a lot of definitions and they're all in the dictionary. Open doesn't have to have anything in particular to do with software and I wasn't trying to make any type of argument against open software development. Or trying to put one definition of open against its use in another.

It's a "look, this is what people are saying. Look, this is what people are doing," type of post. I don't have an agenda here.

You are correct.

I allowed my experiences hiring people and reading resumés to bias my thinking. I won't quote any more badly researched statistics, but I will not back off from my statement about semi-literate clods. This 8th grader in his blog wrote far better than the majority of people who expected me to hire them, people who were high school and even college graduates. I was apalled reading job applications and CVs.

Yeah, you young whippersnappers just have no idea...

tanstaafl.

I will give you that he speaks in complete sentences, which is head-and-shoulders above most adults. I was thinking more of his line of thinking, which I think is indicative of an 8th grader. (Not, again, that most adults think any better.)

He states that teenagers are bellwethers of up-and-coming technology. He supports this by noting that all of his friends have either an iPhone or an Android phone, one specifically getting the Droid shortly after it was released. I can assume that very few adults have smartphones. I know that I've been avoiding getting one. This four-year-old revolution in portable computing amongst the (then) 10-year-olds almost passed me by.

He argues that it's understandable that the iPad is seen as doing more than a laptop because it has applications that people use, like Facebook, YouTube, and web browsing, built into it. I know that when I got my new laptop, it was a struggle to get all the software installed that I needed in order to access those web sites, and web sites in general.

He argues that the iPad is opening up technology by allowing people to install new apps and otherwise tinker with the computer.

He argues that allowing people to install new apps and otherwise tinker with the computer, when under the guise of such dinosaurs as Motorola and Google, is too open — too powerful. (Man, I feel sorry for that friend of his who got rooked with the Droid. I hope he's less bellwether-y than his clearly superior iPhone-owning peers.)

He argues that the version of Mac OS X is going to help Apple's PC sales. He supports this by noting that people think that the iPad is more open. (I guess all those non-geeks are now in love with everything Apple, but thought they'd hold off for a version update on the base OS.)

Obviously, I'm exaggerating to some extent, and being overly harsh; he clearly writes better than most people. And I like the iPhone (and iPad, theoretically). In many ways they're better than their Android equivalents, especially for non-geeks. I think his basic thesis is probably fairly accurate. But how you can present this as a guide to logical thinking is dumbfounding to me. It smacks of the spastic mind of an 8th grader. Sadly, many adults have that same trait.

It was simple, but well written. BTW, the aspects of the new Mac OS he's talking about are the launcher and full-screen app modes. Essentially a single-task view on an multi-tasting system, like iOS.

I guess I'm easily impressed when someone can string together coherent sentences and doesn't improperly use apostrophes. Huge pet peeve.

Don't bother buying an iPad 2. The tablet thing is a fad and no one is clearly interested in this latest round of products from Apple and their "ilk."

http://www.macworld.com/article/158849/2011/03/macalope_noyes.html

If you want a laugh (or a sobbing cry) go read the original article the Macalope cuts to pieces in that link.

Whatever I think about it (and I actually don't completely agree with her), the original review was pretty even-keeled, and the responder comes off as a raving buffoon to me.

Katherine Noyes is a long-time Anti-Apple zealot. And The Macalope writes in character, shooting straight from the hip. Anything even remotely factual from the original article, and there isn't much, has been twisted and contorted beyond nearly any recognition with spite and hate. It's so painfully obvious that Noyes has an agenda that she might as well have included it in bold face at the start of the article.

Frankly, I'm really shocked by your reply. I don't even know how anyone could read the original story and take it as anything but a spiteful hate piece. There's simply nothing credible about it at all.

What I'm most interested in is how she's going to spin her angle over the next few years as she's continually proven wrong by Apple and other tablet manufacturers.

While the Macalope is always colorful, at least he was completely accurate in everything reported, including his assessment of Katherine Noyes.

I have to agree with Bruno here, the original "review" was just ludicrous. The best bit was criticising Apple for being 3 months ahead of the competition, just odd.

Though I can see how one might find the Macalope somewhat uncompromising when you come across it for the first time and are unaware of the tongue in cheek way it is written

Hate to say it, but I agree with Bruno, she comes off as a complete loon.

Okay, I read it again, and it did come off as a little crazier. I guess I wasn't a fan of either writer And for some reason I just really dislike the nickname "Macalope." I don't know why it grates on me (know, it's not because the word "Mac" is in there)

But I will say, some of the things she talks about have been stated by other tech journalists. Many of the podcasters I listen to have thought the iPad 2 was mostly incremental improvements in hardware. They stop there, though, and don't minimize its importance or how well it will do despite those incremental improvements like she did. But they definitely have talked about the hardware being something that could easily be surpassed.

In the end, I'm actually surprised that Ms Noyes didn't harp on the one area that most reviewers have: the quality of the cameras. Every review I've seen (that wasn't from the Grubers of the world) has panned the cameras. Again, they don't say that's an impediment to the iPad 2's success, they just point out that the cameras are awful, and that Apple decided not to put the iPhone's cameras in there.

Anyway, I'll concede this one, Bruno She's definitely incorrect. I didn't even agree with her the first time I read it. I mean, even this Google fanboy knows that the Xoom has zero chance of making a dent in the iPad's market share

The cameras suck. Big time. But to be fair (not to Apple), I think Gruber did say the same thing. The cameras in the iPod are equally crap, likely because they're the same parts. I'm not even a huge fan of the camera in the iPhone, though it's leaps and bounds better.

And no one (including myself, Gruber and the Macalope) is arguing that Apple's update is not incremental. Definitely not revolutionary like the first revision. But let's be real. No one had caught up to the first version yet. The revision is over 2 times faster with graphics easily 9x faster, putting all dedicated gaming hardware to shame except the PS3 and XBOX 360 by all accounts. In an 8.8mm thick tablet of all things.

Even if you discount the insanely positive response from customers around the globe, the other players in the industry have already also been remarking and changing their business plans because of this incremental product. MOtorola has commented that it's their SECOND Xoom that will be the ticket. Samsung has stopped plans to release the tablets they debuted a couple of months ago in most markets and have instead started working on something else to come out in June - something they don't even have ready to show prototypes of.

There are a number of companies out there that can come out with something that blows the iPad away in terms of specs. But when many people talk about this, they forget that Apple itself is also one of those companies. Most people forget that Apple has more money, more manufacturing capacity, better supply management and (of all things) a better track record than anyone else. But this isn't a specs race anyway. It's not specs that are obviously selling this product.

But to brush it all off as marketing tricks is also completely out to lunch. There's an emotional tie, but after using one it's not difficult to form a rational decision as to the many uses one can put such a product to.

If anything, Noyes article was fueled more by emotion than the purchasing habits of the people buying tablets. Most of of whom are Windows PC users by the way. The numbers just can't reflect anything else.

Even though I'm getting one myself, I still feel pretty much the same way about tablets as I did prior to the iPad launch and which I've talked about here. I can see a ton of vertical/dedicated uses for one, even around my house, but it's not a product I'd be likely to use or carry around constantly. My impetus at this point is to get my 18mo daughter using technology.

This is pretty awesome. I was not aware of whatever advances in glassmaking make this possible.



Warning: The soundtrack is some awful dub/ska, and it's really loud. Turn down your volume.