Apple’s iPad sold 300,000 units by midnight April 3, including pre-orders, on its first day of general release: enough to ensure the device as a commercial hit, at least in the short-term. In a larger way, though, those sales numbers represent not so much a victory for Apple but a sign that a market indeed exists for consumer-oriented tablets. As companies ranging from Hewlett-Packard to Nokia prepare similar tablet PCs in coming months, Apple’s hardware choices and rollout could become the competitive benchmark by which these competitors map their own choices and strategy.

Some signs of that shift are already present in HP’s strategy for its upcoming tablet, with videos and a company blog showing off the device’s ability to video conference and snap images. HP has also highlighted its Slate’s support of Adobe Flash, which powers rich content on many popular Websites. By contrast, the iPad does not support Flash, nor does the current version include a camera—both things that HP seems eager to highlight as the competitive differentiator for its own offering, due at an as-yet-unannounced point later in 2010.

“With this slate product, you’re getting a full Web browsing experience in the palm of your hand. No watered-down Internet, no sacrifices,” Phil McKinney, vice president and chief technology officer for Hewlett-Packard’s Personal Systems Group, wrote in a March 8 posting on the company’s Voodoo Blog. “A big bonus for the slate product is that, being based off Windows 7, it offers full Adobe support.”

McKinney followed that up a few weeks later with another Voodoo Blog post touting the HP slate’s other abilities.

“Think about the last time you chatted with friends over Skype on your notebook,” McKinney wrote on April 5. “Or uploaded a picture from your mobile phone to Facebook or Flickr. How about the last time you viewed images or video from an SD card or USB device. We know that you expect to be able to capture and share digital content on your mobile devices.”

That same day, Engadget posted an image of what it claimed was an internal HP presentation comparing the specs of the company’s upcoming tablet PC to the iPad. That document suggested that the “HP Slate” would retail for between $549 and $599, and feature a 1.6GHz Intel Atom Z530 processor, inward-facing VGA Webcam and outward-facing 3-megapixel camera. Windows 7 Home Premium, tethered to a proprietary HP touch-optimized user interface, will serve as the operating system.

Nokia is also developing a tablet competitor for entrance into the market later this year, according to recent online reports.

“Right now the supply chain (for a Nokia tablet) is being primed up for a fall release. It has to be on the shelf by September-October to meet demand for the holiday window,” Rodman and Renshaw analyst Ashok Kumar told Reuters on April 7. “You don’t want to give that much of a lead to Apple because otherwise it becomes insurmountable.”

Nokia apparently declined to comment on those supposed developments. Other manufacturers, including Fujitsu and Fusion Garage, have tablets in some stage of active development. This year’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas highlighted a number of laptops with touch-screen functionality, including the HP Touchsmart tm2 and Fujitsu Lifebook T4410, designed with an eye towards both the tablet and traditional PC markets.

But how will these tablets market themselves? HP and Fusion Garage, creator of the JooJoo tablet, are already touting their Flash support in a bid to slice off some iPad market-share. (Recent online reviews of the JooJoo’s Flash support have been unkind.) Other manufacturers could follow that same route, using Flash support to set themselves apart, whether or not their device uses Windows 7 or another, more proprietary user interface.

“By ignoring a pervasively widely used technology like Flash and treating its parent company with disrespect,” Charles Kind, an analyst with Pund-IT Research, wrote in a March 10 research note, “Jobs opened the door he must have preferred to leave closed: providing his competitors the opportunity [to] define these devices, technologies and markets far more clearly than he himself has done.”

On April 5, HP released a 30-second video demonstrating its slate’s video conferencing and image-snapping abilities, suggesting that both it and other companies may use embedded cameras as another differentiator over the iPad.

Yet despite the hoopla surrounding the iPad’s launch, and other companies’ aggressive entrance into the space, the tablet market is still nascent; as one analyst warns, simply because Apple managed to sell a few hundred thousand units during its new product’s first weekend on the open market doesn’t mean that others will be able to reproduce a similar feat, extra hardware and Flash support or no.

“The market will play host to a flood of ‘me too’ tablets in 2010, but it’s an immature product category with an unproven use case,” CCS Insight analyst Geoff Blaber told Reuters in an April 7 article. “Apple’s brand and service offering means the iPad will be an exception in a category that will struggle to gain consumer acceptance.”

Resource:
http://www.eweek.com/c/a/Mobile-and-Wireless/Apple-iPad-Sets-Tablet-Bar-for-Nokia-HP-Microsoft-801771/

Materials for the iPad, which went on sale on April 3, include a touch-screen display that costs $95 and a $26.80 processor designed by Apple and manufactured by Samsung Electronics Co., according to El Segundo, California-based ISuppli.

Analysis by ISuppli indicates that components of the lowest-priced, 16-gigabyte iPad amounts to 52 percent of its retail price of $499. That leaves the iPad on par with other Apple products, including the iPhone 3GS. A high-end 64-gigabyte version of the iPad, which retails for $699, contains components that cost $348.10, according to ISuppli.

Much of the iPad’s component costs went toward making the device appealing to use, said ISuppli principal analyst Andrew Rassweiler, who supervised the “teardown” analysis of the product. More than 40 percent of the iPad’s cost is devoted to powering its touch-screen display and other components of the computer’s user interface — “what you see with your eyes and what you feel with your fingers,” he said. The distinctive aluminum casing on the back of the device contributed about $10.50 to cost of materials.

Apple spokeswoman Natalie Harrison declined to comment on ISuppli’s findings.

Teardown Analysis

Research firms conduct so-called teardown analysis of consumer electronics to determine component prices and makers and to estimate profit margins. The estimate doesn’t include costs for intangible items such as software development, advertising, patent licensing or shipping. In February, ISuppli had estimated that the least expensive iPad would carry a $219.35 cost of materials.

Once it took one apart, ISuppli found more silicon chips than it had expected to power interactions with the iPad’s 9.7- inch screen.

“Because of the sheer scale of this device, we’re seeing more here than we expected,” Rassweiler said. Apple uses three chips to control the iPad’s touch screen, for example.

Over time, Apple may have leeway to combine many of the iPad’s electronic components, or integrate them into the display, Rassweiler said.

“We’ll see a lot less silicon required to make them work,” he said.

Pricey Touch Screen

Apple, based in Cupertino, California, rose $1.06 to $240.60 at 4 p.m. New York time on the Nasdaq Stock Market. The shares have climbed 14 percent this year.

The most expensive component in the iPad is its touch- sensitive, custom-manufactured screen. South Korea-based LG Display Co., Samsung and Japan’s Seiko Epson Corp. make the LCD display, according to ISuppli. Taiwan-based Wintek Corp. makes the glass overlay necessary to detect touches of users’ fingertips. The screen’s special design makes it about twice as expensive as those used in comparably sized netbook computers, according to Rassweiler.

LG spokesman John Taylor didn’t return a call seeking comment. Wintek spokesman James Chen, based in Taiwan, and an Epson spokesman couldn’t immediately be reached for comment. Chris Goodhart, a spokeswoman for Samsung, declined to comment.

Flash memory chips, obtained from various suppliers including Samsung, account for $29.50 in costs on the 16- gigabyte model, $59 in the 32-gigabyte version and $118 in the 64-gigabyte model, Rassweiler said. These chips push the cost of manufacturing the 32-gigabyte version of the iPad, which sells for $599, to $289.10. They boost the cost of the 64-gigabyte version, which sells for $699, to $348.10.

Samsung Processor

While Apple designed the main processor in the iPad, Rassweiler said South Korea’s Samsung built the chip for Apple and also supplied a memory chip attached to it for a combined cost of $26.80, a difference of $9.80 over the previous estimate of $17.

“We believe that this chip was designed by PA Semi,” Rassweiler said, referring to the chip company that Apple acquired in 2008 for $278 million. “But the markings make it look like a Samsung chip.”

Other chips found in the iPad also proved more costly, and more numerous, than original estimates. Broadcom Corp. supplied a chip that cost $8.05 and handles both Bluetooth and Wi-Fi wireless data connections, as well as two others that together cost $3.70 and are used to control the touch screen. Texas Instruments Inc. provided a chip used to help control the touch screen at a cost of $1.80, while Cirrus Logic Inc. supplied an audio chip that cost $1.20.

Bill Blanning, a spokesman for Broadcom, didn’t return a message seeking comment. Kimberly Morgan, a spokeswoman for Texas Instruments, and Bill Schnell, a spokesman for Cirrus, declined to comment.

–Editors: Tom Giles, Stephen West

To contact the reporter on this story: Arik Hesseldahl in New York at arik@businessweek.com.

Resource:
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-04-07/apple-ipad-s-components-may-cost-260-isuppli-says-update1-.html

In the coming months, we’ll see how exactly the iPad will impact the ‘gadget’ industry. Will it save publishing? Will it revolutionise gaming? Will it change lives? Will it kill laptops and netbooks?

Apple has priced the basic Wi-Fi-only version at $499. The highest-end 3G version goes up to $825. Pricing will play a significant role in whether the iPad gains widespread acceptance or remains a niche product that is reduced to being an expensive indulgence or a fanboy badge of honour. People respond to pricing based on perception-they will compare a product to what they consider alternatives in the same category. Since the iPad is technically creating a whole new category (at least according to Apple), consumers will start comparing it, to either other media players such as the iTouch, or netbooks and laptops. And herein lies the rub. Evaluated on its own as a standalone category, the iPad does seem like it’s reasonably priced. However, things get murkier when you start comparing it to media players or netbooks. Netbooks and laptops offer far greater functionality and much better value for money. Media players, notably Apple’s own iTouch, offer very acceptable experiences at much lower prices. And so, while many consumers will still buy the iPad simply for the quality of its experience, many will consider it and then opt for alternatives which, in their perception, offer better value for money.

However, the fact is that Apple are past-masters at manipulating perception, and convincing huge masses of people that the iPad is something they absolutely cannot do without shouldn’t be a major challenge. It is undeniable that they have delivered an impeccably engineered product that delivers an experience quite unlike any other. And all those complaints about the lack of features, functionality and the closed ecosystem really won’t matter, because the iPad user is looking for an experience, not functionality. Thanks to Apple’s flair for great design and supercharged brand management, it will only be a section of techies and sworn Apple-haters who will end up disappointed, and this is not something that will give Steve Jobs sleepless nights.

While the price of the device itself shouldn’t be a major worry, the price of content is going to play a more significant role. If the iPad is to seriously impact publishing and gaming, then it needs to offer a wide variety of affordable content. But a monthly subscription to the iPad version of the WSJ is $17.99, while an iPhone subscription to the same publication costs less than $10. Going by initial murmurings, books and games are also going to be costlier, on average, on the iPad than on other digital distribution platforms. How this impacts the acceptance of the device as a primary media consumption platform remains to be seen.

What Apple needs to watch closely, this time around, is the competition. While mobile handset manufacturers were caught napping by the iPhone’s revolutionary design, there is already talk of iPad-killing devices hitting markets soon. The iPhone had the advantage of completely upending the market because it changed the perception of what people want from a phone. With the iPad, Apple is the incumbent that is setting the standard-and the competition will look for ways to make their products ‘better than the iPad’. Since there really are no strong preconceived expectations from the consumer for the category, people will be more receptive to competing products this time around. In fact, lots of potential customers have already proclaimed that they are waiting for alternatives from companies such as HP, Asus and India’s own Notion Ink before they take a buying decision. It’s extremely likely that these products, with the benefit of hindsight, may offer comparable experiences with more flexible features and open standards that attack the iPad’s perceived weak areas. In the long-term game, Apple could find that how they respond to competition could make the difference between mainstream dominance and niche presence.

But hey, this is Apple. They have built up a fan following that borders on being a religion, based on their ‘less is more’ philosophy. They have shown that a lot of people value simplicity, aesthetics and quality of experience over features or flexibility or open standards. Will they prove it all over again with the iPad? I wouldn’t bet against it.

Resource:
Yahoo News

On Thursday, Apple Inc. will unveil updates to the software that powers both devices. Although Apple has provided no details, iPhone owners and computer programmers who write applications for the popular smart phone are hoping the company will address their gripes about limits to such multitasking. The matter may escalate as people with iPads, which have larger screens, try to use them in place of more powerful computers.

The iPhone already allows for some multitasking, but that’s largely limited to Apple’s own programs. One of Apple’s recent commercials shows an iPhone user taking advantage of time spent on hold paying bills, checking e-mail, playing games and then switching back to calling.

But Apple has yet to give users ways to seamlessly switch among all the software “apps” available from outside software companies, the way phones from rivals Palm Inc. and Google Inc. already do.

So an iPhone user wouldn’t be able to listen to music using the Pandora program and check a bank account online simultaneously, for example. In most cases, users must return to Apple’s home screen, effectively quitting the open program, before starting a new task.

That’s unacceptable to many users and software developers, and full multitasking remains high on many people’s wish lists. Because Apple’s new iPad runs the same software as the iPhone, changes would apply to that larger gadget as well. Some people have held off buying one because of its inability to run more than one program at a time.

But the reasons Apple is believed to be resistant to broader multitasking — worries about battery life, performance and security — remain.

Ross Rubin, an analyst from NPD Group, said he believes those are still big issues for Apple, and he doesn’t believe full multitasking will be among the changes in the iPhone operating system to be announced at Apple’s Cupertino, Calif., headquarters Thursday. Apple did not immediately answer requests for more information about its plans.

Apple has given software developers limited ways to work around the multitasking restrictions, such as allowing them to send very basic notifications nudging iPhone users to open an app for updated information.

Some people hope that if Apple doesn’t add multitasking, it would at least make the notifications less intrusive. Now, if a notification comes through, users must deal with it or dismiss it before returning to what they were doing.

The last time Apple made a major revision to its iPhone operating software, in March 2009, it added features that many iPhone users had been clamoring for since the device launched two years earlier. Those features included the ability to copy, cut and paste, and a search function that worked across all programs.

But this time, beyond multitasking, there seemed to be fewer big-ticket requests from everyday iPhone owners.

The new version of the iPhone system that Apple is announcing Thursday, likely to be known as OS 4.0, probably won’t be available for a few months. Most of the changes would have immediate appeal to software developers, not regular users, said Charles Golvin, an analyst for Gartner Inc.

Golvin believes Apple is likely to launch a system for delivering ads to iPhone and iPad apps, reflecting its January acquisition of mobile advertising company Quattro Wireless.

Although many of the changes Apple makes to the iPhone software will take awhile to translate into benefits for the average iPhone user, the most committed Apple watchers and bloggers have been honing their iPhone wish lists.

They want, among other things, a unified inbox for all e-mail accounts, support for more e-mail folders, wireless synching with a computer and a way to connect an iPhone with a regular keyboard, by plugging one in or using Bluetooth wireless technology.

But as is always the case, predicting the next move by secrecy-obsessed Apple is next to impossible.

“It’s Apple,” Golvin said, “so who … knows what actually could come out.”

Resource:
Yahoo News

The last time we saw the Slate was in the hands of Steve Ballmer during a rather tepid presentation in Las Vegas, with Ballmer showing off the Kindle reader and struggling a bit as he tried to tee up a video. But HP has clearly stepped up its game, starting with this snazzy 30-second teaser video that makes a point of showing off all the features on the Slate that are missing on the iPad, such as a built-in camera, a USB port (a real one, not an adapter), and an SD card slot.

Just a few hours after the video was posted, Engadget managed to snag what appears to be an HP marketing sheet — titled, none too subtly, “HP Slate vs. iPad” — that specifically stacks up the Slate to the iPad, point for point. Now, before we dive into the details here, let’s just point out that HP has yet to officially cough up detailed specs for the Slate, much less a price tag or a release date (other than “this year,” that is). Still, if what we’re looking at here is real, it’s a pretty clear indication that HP is positioning the Slate as an iPad killer.

Looking at the (purported) spec sheet, the Slate appears to have a series of enticing features that are missing on the iPad. There’s the camera, of course, and we’re not just talking one but two: a 3MP lens in back and a front-facing VGA camera for video conferencing. We’ve also got a single USB 2.0 port, an SD card reader, a “conventional” SIM tray for 3G networking, and HDMI-out video capabilities (not to mention 1080p playback) via the Slate’s dock connector. (Each of these key points are highlighted on the leaked marketing sheet as an “HP advantage,” by the way.)

Pretty interesting, and here’s a few more details to boot (again, not official): an 8.9-inch, 1024-by-600-pixel display (slightly smaller and lower-res than the iPad), a 1.6GHz Intel Atom processor under the hood, and 32 or 64GB of built-in flash storage (expandable via the SD card slot). The spec sheet doesn’t mention Flash support specifically, but HP has already made it pretty clear that yes, you will be able to view Flash videos on the Slate.

The leaked spec sheet describes the Slate as measuring 9.2 by 5.7 by 0.57 inches, making the Slate (potentially) a tad taller, narrower, and thicker than the iPad (9.56 by 7.47 by 0.5 inches), as well as a tiny bit lighter (1.49 pounds, vs. 1.5 pounds for the iPad).

The leaked marketing sheet also ticks off a few specs labeled as “HP threat” — in other words, areas in which the iPad would have a leg up over the Slate, at least for now. Among them: no support for 802.11n, the latest official Wi-Fi standard; just five hours of battery life, versus 10 hours for the iPad; and a slightly more expensive price tag for the 16GB model ($549, versus $499 for the 16GB iPad) — although, to be fair (and if the leaked specs are true), the $549 16GB Slate might come with a SIM tray, whereas the equivalent 3G-enabled iPad will set you back $629.

Of course, one of the biggest selling points for the Slate (and yes, this we know for certain) is Windows 7, a full-on, multitasking, desktop-caliber operating system. The iPad runs on a modified version of the iPhone OS, and among other things lacks third-party-app multitasking (although that may be changing soon). Then again, the iPad OS is specifically designed for touch and runs lightning-fast; Windows 7 is designed for a keyboard and mouse (HP is promising a “touch-optimized UI” to help with fingertip navigation). And it remains to be seen whether Slate’s 1.6GHz Intel Atom processor will be up to the task of making Windows 7 run smoothly on a 1.5-pound tablet.

Let’s just say one more time that the leaked marketing sheet obtained by Engadget isn’t official; and even if it is real, the listed specs are certainly subject to change; and again, we still don’t have an official price tag.

Still, if the Slate proves anything, it’s that the tablet wars won’t end with the iPad; indeed, they’re only beginning. If the iPad turns out to be a hit (and the jury’s still out), it’ll spur more competition in the tablet “space” (“Courier,” anyone?), and that’s a good thing.

Resource:
Yahoo News

So here are answers to some of the most common questions I’ve received, in hopes they may help clear up any confusion. One caveat: Apple is offering a “sneak preview” on Thursday of a forthcoming revision to the iPhone operating system, which powers the iPad, so some changes might be revealed.

Can you print from an iPad?
Apple didn’t build in a printing function, so you can’t just tap a menu button to print an email, photo or Web page. But a few third-party apps allow printing of some items from an iPad to a networked printer. One is Print Online. It costs $5 and I tested it successfully. But these apps are complicated and limited workarounds—inadequate substitutes for built-in printing.

The iPad lacks a USB port, so how do you get files into it ?
Like the iPhone and iPod Touch, the iPad has the familiar Apple connector port and comes with a cable that links this port to a USB port on a PC or Mac. Then, using iTunes on the PC or Mac, you can sync over to the device your songs, photos, videos, contacts, apps and more.

New to the latest version of iTunes is a function that will also transfer to the iPad files like Microsoft Office documents. But this feature only works if you’ve installed on your iPad certain programs that can edit these documents, such as Apple’s optional $10 word-processor, spreadsheet and presentation programs. Documents can be moved in the other direction, too.

You also can get some types of documents into the iPad wirelessly, if you receive them as email attachments or as downloads from the Web. For example, if you receive a Word-document attachment, and you have Apple’s Pages word processor installed, you can send it to Pages, where it can be stored and edited. Pages can then send back the edited version.

Is there a way to type on the iPad without laying it flat and using the virtual keyboard ?
There are several. Apple sells a $39 case that bends to angle the device in a more convenient typing position (and allows for hands-free video watching). The company also sells a $69 accessory physical keyboard that features a dock at the rear to hold the iPad upright. In addition, you can type on the iPad using Apple’s $69 wireless keyboard for the Mac, which can be held on your lap.

Can I run Windows or Mac programs on the iPad ?
Not unless their makers produce iPad versions of these programs. The iPad doesn’t run the Macintosh or Windows operating systems, so it can’t run programs designed for them. It runs the iPhone operating system, which is only compatible with iPhone and iPad apps, of which there are more than 150,000. There are some iPad and iPhone apps that let you remotely control Windows and Mac computers, so you could indirectly run Windows and Mac programs via the screen of an iPad, but that isn’t like running the programs locally.

I hear the iPad lacks multitasking. What are the downsides of this ?
First, let me clarify that the iPad (and iPhone) can technically perform multitasking, or running more than one program at once. But Apple has chosen to limit this ability to some of its own built-in apps, and deny it to third-party apps. For instance, the built-in email program will continue to receive messages while you are watching a movie on the built-in video player.

The downsides of denying multitasking to all apps are considerable. For example, you can’t listen to streaming music from the Pandora music app while checking email. And you can’t view fresh Twitter posts while on other apps. You have to close the app you’re in, then re-launch a Twitter app and wait for it to fetch the new posts. And, you can’t, say, check email or surf the Web while waiting for a complex game to load in the background, because the game stops once you change to another app.

Since the iPad’s battery is sealed in, how do I replace it ?
The battery isn’t designed to be replaceable by the user. Apple will replace your iPad with one containing a fresh battery for $107, including shipping. The process takes up to a week. Most important, you will lose all your personal data unless you back it up regularly to your computer and restore it on the replacement iPad. Details are at: apple.com/support/ipad/service/battery/.

Resource:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303720604575169843380092872.html?mod=rss_Today%27s_Most_Popular

On this large canvas, people work differently and apps can behave differently depending on which way the device is turned. Apps can (and must) incorporate creative ways of navigating—in addition to the usual multi-touch gestures like flicking, two-finger swiping and pinching. Thus, although it runs most of the 150,000 apps already available for the much smaller iPhone and iPod touch, the iPad is spawning a new type of tablet-specific app.

This week, I’ve been testing some of these iPad apps that give users novel ways to interact with the device. These are designed to take advantage of a larger touch screen by using things like fly-out menus, multi-panel layouts, 3-D images intermixed with text and newspapers that can be read almost as easily as their paper counterparts.

Since most of us haven’t used apps like these or a device like this before, many apps install with brief tutorials on how to navigate them. It’s obvious that the makers of these iPad apps are still tinkering with what works best for a large touch surface. And ads appear in several digital newspaper and magazine apps. Unless otherwise noted, the apps listed below are free.

News

Multi-tasking isn’t yet possible on the iPad, but the NPR app allows people to do certain things simultaneously. While browsing news stories, a player in the bottom portion of the screen lets you listen to programs, interviews or songs. I played Jakob Dylan’s “Women and Country” song while reading an article about NCAA basketball. Content can be saved to a playlist for future listening.

The Wall Street Journal app’s home page displays a horizontal row of newspapers representing the past seven days’ editions and a “Now” edition, with late-breaking news, all of which can be read when the iPad isn’t online. These editions are designed to use the full screen to display easy-to-read newspaper layouts and videos that play right within the articles. A finger swiped from the top down skips to a different section of the paper, while pinching any screen with two fingers returns to the home page. And you can save articles and sections. The WSJ iPad app also can access saved data from a WSJ.com account.

The app is free to download but requires a subscription for access, which costs $4 a week or is free for a limited time to existing online or print subscribers.

The New York Times app is called Editors’ Choice and looks like a roomier version of the newspaper’s iPhone app. Five icons at the bottom of the screen instantly jump to different sections of the paper, or you can flick a finger across these screens to page to more articles. It doesn’t require a subscription.

The USA Today app brings the Gannett Co. paper’s color-coded blue, green, red and purple sections to the iPad. Its popular charts of information (called “Snapshots”) pop out from the bottom left of the screen and include polls that can be voted on using the device. The USA Today app looks less like the print edition of the paper and more like a list of news points with color photos beside each. This list can be scrolled with a simple finger flick up or down.

Magazines

Digital magazines on the iPad seem to be experimenting with different payment methods. Rodale Inc.’s Men’s Health, for example, is a free app and includes previews of magazine issues, but then it charges $5 to download the actual issue. Bonnier Corp.’s Popular Science app costs $5 up-front and includes an issue that must be downloaded within the app.

Popular Science really uses the iPad’s larger surface in creative ways. Instead of just letting you page ahead with each finger flick as if reading a regular magazine, you can read articles by flicking a finger down or across a screen. In some articles I read, images appeared to be floating in the background behind text. Two fingers flicking up from the bottom of the screen show shortcuts for a table of contents and previous magazine issues.

Music

Pandora’s iPad app makes good use of the device’s screen real estate by showing artist information, now-playing details, album art and a list of personalized radio stations all on the same screen. I found myself more likely to read about artists on the iPad than on my smaller iPod touch. But like many Pandora users, I like playing music in the background as I work on other tasks, and this isn’t possible on the iPad because it doesn’t allow third-party apps like Pandora to multi-task.

Entertainment

The Marvel Comics app displays stunning, large illustrations and moves you across the screen to see them as if the comic is one continuous strip and there’s no division between one screen and the next. A finger swipe moves you ahead in a guided view that jumps you from one character’s dialog cloud to the next in the correct order. This app is a free download and a handful of free comic books come with it, but each additional book costs around $2.

Scrabble for iPad costs $10 and includes options for playing with friends by passing the iPad back and forth, and an additional free app enables connecting an iPhone or iPod touch to the iPad to use these smaller screens as tile racks. You can play against your Facebook friends or the computer, and things like “Best Word” and an option to shuffle tiles make the game a little easier to play for some. Scrabble will even play your iTunes music in the background while you’re dragging tiles onto the board using your finger.

With Real Racing HD, you see a 3-D view of racetracks and steer a car by leaning the iPad in the direction you need to turn (a built-in accelerometer senses where you’re moving the iPad). I played this $10 game while sitting in the back seat of a moving car and got a bit dizzy since the race is so realistic.

Education

A great example of how the iPad can be used for education can be seen in an app titled “The Elements: A Visual Exploration,” developed by Touch Press. This costs $14 and displays the periodic table of elements stretched across the screen. Selecting one element brings it forward and spins a dazzling image of it so you can see all sides of it. A link to the Web pulls in real-time information about that element.

Others

Apple’s iBooks and Amazon.com’s Kindle are two terrific e-reader apps that bring digital books to the iPad. There’s a strong argument for using the Kindle app, since books bought through it can be accessed on a variety of platforms in addition to the iPad, all in sync right where you left off reading, while iBooks are currently limited to the iPad. But the books in iBooks are displayed in an arresting way, with animation that resembles real pages turning.

Pages, Keynote and Numbers are Apple’s versions of Microsoft Word, PowerPoint and Excel and they cost $10 each. When installed, these programs can convert documents from Microsoft’s formats and let you work on them. They present rich, PC-like features controlled by touch. Pages, also lets you convert the documents back to the original Microsoft format.

TruPhone and Skype will make calls over the Internet using the iPad when you’re online, and in one test, this worked relatively well.

The Houzz Inc. app is a digital look book for interior-decorating ideas that’s updated with current images of decorated houses. It displays large images of decorated rooms across the iPad’s screen, allowing you to search and save certain looks for offline access or sharing with others.

Resource:
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303411604575167932497910828.html?mod=rss_Today%27s_Most_Popular