Submitted by Tate on Tue, 06/01/2010 - 08:27
Yes, I bought one. I pre-ordered it the day it was available for pre-order in Australia. Yes, I like Apple gear and pretty much knew I would like the iPad too. It gets added to a rather large family of Apples at our place: 2 x iPhones, 1 x iPod Nano, 1 x iPod Touch, 2 x iMacs and a MacBook Pro.
I purchased it as a business tool, and so far in the few days I've had it it's been brilliant. I did a portraiture session for a young lady on Saturday and shot her surprise 21st Birthday a few hours later. I loaded up the iPad with ten great photos from the portraiture shoot for everyone at the party to see. The iPad was passed around about 100 people throughout the night, and although I was a little nervous, it was returned to me in perfect condition apart from a few finger prints. It was amazing watching people look at the photos - the screen is just gorgeous and the photos looked fantastic. Of course, some comments were along the lines of "OMG, is that an iPAD???!?!" and then usually followed by "wow, look at Priyal, she looks amazing!".
I've used it a couple of times since showing clients photos at my studio. I'm planning to load it up with heaps more photos so people can browse around to what interests them, but so far it's been great. Just last night I was describing an image, and usually would fire up the laptop and find my way to the photo and drag it onto the TV screen, but it was one of the photos I already had loaded onto the iPad. With a few pinches and pokes the image was on the screen (and full screen) and iPad handed to client for them to admire it. There's something about holding a photo in your hand too. Brilliant!
Games. Wow, does it work well as a gaming device. I tell you what, Nintendo will be worried, this thing is amazing. The graphics and speed and form factor are such a winning combination. I enjoyed a few rounds of Real Racing HD with my son. Played a bit of Small World with my wife. A full game of Civilization Revolution (at easy level), and a game or two of solitaire. Yeah - this is good.
Battery Life. Does it even have a battery? It feels like it's got some kind of wireless power feed... battery life is a total non issue. Those rounds of Real Racing HD I played last night, the battery moved from 100% down to 100%. No joke.
Problems. I'm using the iPad in the case. I quite like the case too as it has a nice feel and fits perfectly. The problem, though, is that it doesn't sit on the Dock when in the case... boo :(
Summary: buy one :)