"sell me an ipad" Topic

So my wife is fed up ofthe old PC cluttering the desk, and it is old and on it's last legs.

But there's talk of an ipad to replace it… Why would I get one of those over a new laptop.

The ipad cannot connect to our recently purchaes kodak wi-fi printer and it seems expensive comparedto a lap top since what she wants is email, Word, Excel and internet access. she's not intohunderds of apps to do stuff.

the only up side I can see it it gets me FOGv2 when that happens but so what… she'll want the ipad wehn I'm awat at conventions…

Can any one persuade me an ipad is best for our needs?

No. I have an Ipad, and I love it dearly, but it *is* over-priced, and it's certainly no substitute for a PC. A fantastic supplement, and wonderfully convenient (although truth be told mine is used far more on the couch than actually out and about) but if it's either an Ipad or a "proper" computer, there's no contest – the Ipad simply won't do what you want.

You need to look into all the Apps available, particularly print apps.

You'll also need to look at the additional hardware required to connect to printers if you want it to 'replace' your PC.

Been looking into it a little for work and it's messy!

Yeah. IPads strengths are in their mobility. They are really a different animal than a desktop PC.
-Kle.

iPads are fine for media applications and doing some light computer work. But if you need to do more complex tasks, you're better off with a laptop, you'll get better overall specs and more harddrive space and the convenience of a keyboard.

If you need a computer substitute to check the occasional mail, play games, watch a film, read a book on the move or use as a virtual map, you're fine with an iPad or any of the alternatives.

I have an iPad and a MacBook Air. The iPad is fun and better to carry around. At home we use the laptop 90% of the time or more.

I have recently got one. It's an entertainment M/C not a computer. Most disappointed but maybe when I know it better I might like it better. Good for reading on line comics, checking email, youtube and music and little else that I do regularly.

So far it is an accessory to my computers a pretty ad on and replaces nothing.

x42

An iPad is just a bigger iPhone. It doesn't replace a laptop at all I've found. A handy device, but limited functionality if you want a PC more than an application/media device….

what she wants is email, Word, Excel and internet access

An iPad can certainly handle email and internet access. Personally, I use Pages and Numbers on the iMac so I can't comment how those apps would work on the iPad, they are available but I'm sure you will want a bluetooth keyboard at least. I use Penultimate a lot more on the iPad than say, Notes.

As for printing, you can hook up a USB printer to an AirPort extreme. That works rather well. I don't think iPads are great for content creation of any sort but they are good for connectivity while on the run.

If you haven't owned an iPad, you will call it expensive, not any better than a laptop, and less efficient than a laptop, etc. However, you would be wrong on many counts.

The iPad will print to your WIFI printer – if you know how to set up the iPad and the printer to talk to each other – which is really quite simple. The iPad is much better for email, web surfing, and it handles small amounts of work on spreadsheets and word processors. I would not write a book on it, but a simple letter or two, sure. Also, it is MORE portable than any laptop, even a microbook style laptop. I have both a Macbook Air, and an iPad 2. The versatility of the iPad just can't be overlooked. It really is the iPad is fairly cool, and works well for so many things. If you look on Apple's site you can get a refurbished iPad 2 for fairly cheap. store.apple.com/us/product/FC764

It is more expensive than many netbooks, but once you own one, you will realize that there are plenty of things it does that other's don't. There are accessories which make it INTO a netbook for fairly cheap too like keyboard covers, and even stylus devices (too many to name) to write on the screen.

Pages and Numbers work just fine on the iPad. I use them every week in court for reviewing electronic documents and making changes or adding comments to them concerning my monitoring of treatment court participants. Spreadsheets work fine too and I use them to create army lists for various games with point values. Once you set up a template or two, they become very easy to use.

One thing that you must understand is that unless you already have a WIFI system at home, your iPad will not update.

Another caveat that I will give you is that currently I run an iMac at home which runs both Windows and iOS, and all of my devices sync to the iMac, including the iPad.

My iPad has been one of the best purchases I've made, and I carry it with me everywhere. It holds so much information, you just won't believe how useful it becomes. But like any other tool, if you don't use it, don't familiarize yourself with it, and learn the idiosyncrasies of the device, it will be just another paperweight.

I would NOT recommend switching from a computer to JUST an iPad. If you sit in one spot to do your computing, you don't use it on the go, and expect that it will be shared, don't get one – unless you each get one – a his and hers proposition. Once you have one, you won't want to share it.

I've been forced by default to use my iPad in place of a computer after my desktop iMac died. Using Pages (an app you download for $10 USD), I completed my latest novel on the iPad (I do have a Bluetooth keyboard, which makes things easier). I've also added a spreadsheet program, although I do very little work on a spreadsheet, so I can't really comment on how effective it is on that front.

Pages works well as a light word processor and page layout app that's capable of reading and exporting in Word format. The iPad version, however, cannot do margin comments or tracking of changes to a document, and strips these from any document opened in Pages. I haven't yet discovered if there is an alternative app that can resolve this issue.

For the Internet and e-mail, the iPad is terrific, and handy.

Printing is an issue, but there are solutions that will work, especially if you have a printer with wifi built in. If not, you'll need a computer or wireless print server of some sort.

DO your research before just buying anything. You have to sit down and figure out what you want to do with the device then compare the specs and price of what's available. You also have to remember that a tablet is an accessory to a desk/lap top not a replacement, they overlap in purpose in some areas but they do not do all the same things.

Apples are nice but you can't discount any of the other manufacturers. I did 3 months of research before I finaly got a Asus tablet 2 weeks ago, and for what I needed and wanted I got 3 times what Apple offered for 2/3ds the price.

I've got an iPad and I absolutely agree that it is primarily a media delivery system… and a shopping cart. It's not for creating/working. The main use I get out of it is watching Youtube videos before I got to sleep at night, and to pull up recipes in the kitchen.
It's nice to have around… but gets nowhere near the use my PC does.