The Watering Hole

As much as I never thought I'd say this, it looks like I'll be getting an IPad.  There are 4-5 programs that are deal sealers for me.  (The ability to run our digital Yamaha mixer at church, from any location in the auditorium, is a BIG one).  Yes, it still burns me to the point of almost changing my mind, that there are NO traditional I/O's on these things.  I still think Apple is screwing up royally here, but selling them faster than they can make them, must mean a WHOLE bunch of people don't care about card slots, USB or HDMI connections.  Boggles my mind actually, in a +$500 device.  

Anyway, that leads to my main concern. memory.  with no card slots and no ability to plug in a USB memory stick and no ability to connect to a PC via USB, I wonder how long this magic device that they want me to spend $500 for will be usable before I run out of memory.  IN fact, (this is kind of funny to me and why I in fact initially decided NO WAY on the IPad.  No connectivity via USB to a computer means that anything I have on the computer (music, movies, pictures, etc.) has be be transferrred some other way.  Hmmm.... now I'm clearly remembering why I initially decided to look at an Android tablet, the better of which have ALL of these features above.  PLUS FLASH!  >:(  

If I haven't just talked myself OUT of one, is the 16 gig model enough?  We bought Daphne the 64 gig one because it was the only one in stock the week before she graduated college.  I WILL NOT spend $700 for something that can't do 1/3 of what my laptop can.  

Maybe I should just wait for the (according to ZDNet and many other tech sources I read) soon coming price crash on Android tablets.  If I can get one for $300 or even $350 that has all the features mentioned above, I WOULD, instead of the Apple.  Right now, the Apple has too many "use" advantages, but has hardware choice disadvantages.  

They say a big price drop is coming on Android tablets for the Christmas season.  And, Ice Cream Sandwich is one the way.  Hmmm.... what to do...  

My Toshiba Thrive has full-sized USB and HDMI ports, plus the other goodies you want (mine was under $300).  However, as you probably know, it DOESN'T have the apps that you want.

You can always transfer things between your PC and the iPad by using FTP to upload to a website then downloading onto the iPad.  A free FTP client that I definitely can recommend is FileZilla.  Here's their link:  FileZilla

that's one of the ones I AM considering (especially since I have and love a Toshiba laptop)

There is supposed to be a big price drop coming on android tablets because they just aren't selling.  It almost seems worth waiting.  Although, if I could get a 10" screen model Thrive for $300 I'd buy it now and be done with it!  

What do you mean no USB?  It's got a standard Apple connector, which is USB on the computer end.  If that doesn't qualify as a "traditional" I/O, with 250 million devices sold, I don't know what does!

I absolutely love my iPad and the only thing I wish was different was that it was the iPad2.

Mine is 16GB and that seems to be plenty of space... what are you planning to do, store your shit on it?  It's a great tool that runs killer apps, not a home computer.  You can use it to control stuff, run all kinds of sound apps (yah it's got a built-in mic, maybe you'll finally record something?).  For standard USB there's the apple camera connection kit which lets you connect USB devices... for example, we use it to connect a USB keyboard controller to play synths.  

But yah, it's an iPad, not your freaking computer, so don't get all worked up over what it doesn't do, I promise you a few weeks on it and you will be totally sold.  I was very meh on mine for the first week, but then the power and apps and insane possibilities completely jazzed me.  If I bought an audio in (there's a killer one my buddy has been working on), I could compose and record FNJs on it (hell I could do that using the built-in mic, it just wouldn't sound that great).

When you get it, grab Polytune, GarageBand, and some synths.  You'll find some serious and immediate satisfaction in it.

Why don't you get a 13" macbook pro? Shit! Do whatever you want to with it.

Charger, so the connector that plugs into the ipad goes into a USB on the other end?  Funny, i didn't know that, and in looking at some specs, it didn't say so...  That was my MAIN gripe with it, thinking that I could not connect it to my computer.  If I can, that's a completely different ball game.  The ability to move stuff to and from my laptop via USB would be almost mandatory.  

No, I'm not looking to store "stuff" on it.  Considering I have over 100 gigs of music, I clearly can't put even my MP3's on it.  But what I would like is to be able to put some tunes and some shows or movies on it before we go out of town.  Stuff like that.  With no ability to insert a card or USB stick, I can't even throw 3-4 movies on the thing if I get a 16 gig model, or at least I assume I can't... don't know what format I'd be using.  With one of the Androids I can literally plug in a mini DVD player if I needed too.  Or just put movies on a SD card or USB memory stick....  

I want something that will function as Ereader for books and mags, will do my after bedtime web surfing and possibly movie watching, etc.  I said there were several apps that were almost enough to make me buy it.  One was the Yamaha thing.  But another is the Time Warner app which allows you to watch TV on it.  And there are a couple others.  

However (again, this is what makes it frustrating) with no flash, one of the things I MUST get caught up on is the Iguitarmag.com site.  You can't do that without flash.  What I am wondering, is how many other sites will be compromised by this.  

That said, I went to Microcenter tonight to look at them.  The IPad 2 is SO much "slicker" than any of the others.  Lighter than most, thinner than all (the Toshiba I mentioned above was one of real interest to me until I saw it.  It is the thickest one I saw and they had at least 15 brands).  The Samsung seemed nice, but it's as much or more then the Apple and I simply wouldn't pay that given what I've read.  The Motorola Zoom was nice too.  If either of these came with Ice Cream Sandwich for $350 or less, I'd buy it.  But as of now, they don't.  

p.s.  Do you have IRig?  

p.p.s.  One thing that bugs me about this potential purchase is that I'm just buying something "cool."   Meaning, my 500gig, 4 gig ram 16" screen Toshiba laptop was $500.  I'm buying something thats at least that much, that seems to be FAR less capable.  Just to have something slick and smaller...  Again, it just seems like these things should cost $300, $400 and $500 not $500,$600 and $700.  If I could just get the millions of people buying these things before they even get stocked, to stop buying them, the price would go down to where it should be!  LOL  

DreamTheaterRules — Nov 08, 2011p.s.  Do you have IRig?  

p.p.s.  One thing that bugs me about this potential purchase is that I'm just buying something "cool."   Meaning, my 500gig, 4 gig ram 16" screen Toshiba laptop was $500.  I'm buying something thats at least that much, that seems to be FAR less capable.  Just to have something slick and smaller...  Again, it just seems like these things should cost $300, $400 and $500 not $500,$600 and $700.  If I could just get the millions of people buying these things before they even get stocked, to stop buying them, the price would go down to where it should be!  LOL  

You can look at it as far less capable or you can look at it for what it is.  Does your $500 laptop have a multi-touch screen?  does the screen rotate when you flip it?  Does it's battery last for days and days?  does it have a whole bunch of really killer apps purpose built to respond to touch and multi-touch, and guaranteed to run on the hardware?

As to the other questions--yes, you can put movies on it for your plane flights or road trips, with iTunes you can add all kinds of stuff, plus you can rent or buy movies direct from Apple.  I usually put 3 or 4 movies on there for the kids before we fly somewhere.  Movies compressed to iPad size with mp4 take somewhere around 300-500 MB.  All the apps for reading stuff--kindle, bn reader, ibooks, movie and tv stuff, netflix, hulu, etc.  It's got a ton of stuff.

What's battery life like on the ipad?  I've been thinking of getting onr but I do need a full charge to last all day with heavy useage when I'm on the road visiting clients.

I don't use it "heavily" nor do I have the 3G version... but I use it daily for 2-3 hours over wifi and I charge it maybe twice a week. sometimes more, depending on what I was doing: watching video on it drains it a lot faster - photos/web not as bad - text/iBook barely at all.

I think you'd probably get a full day out of it without much trouble but can't say from experience.

also, I'm using the first generation iPad, so the newer one might be better/worse... dunno.

DreamTheaterRules — Nov 07, 2011PLUS FLASH!  >:(

DreamTheaterRules — Nov 08, 2011However (again, this is what makes it frustrating) with no flash, one of the things I MUST get caught up on is the Iguitarmag.com site.  You can't do that without flash.  What I am wondering, is how many other sites will be compromised by this.

good news! ;)

SAN FRANCISCO (MarketWatch) — Shares of Adobe Systems tumbled Wednesday after the software maker unveiled several changes to its strategy, which includes a large round of job cuts as well as a plan to stop development of its Flash player software for mobile devices.

...

In a blog posting on Wednesday morning, another major change was outlined, which involves a plan to end the development of its Flash Player software for mobile browsers. Adobe plans to focus instead on HTML 5, another platform for publishing content on the Web.

“We will no longer continue to develop Flash Player in the browser to work with new mobile device configurations following the upcoming release of Flash Player 11.1 for Android and BlackBerry PlayBook,” Danny Winokur, general manager of Adobe’s interactive development.

HTML5 is superior to Flash anyway.

Battery life is insane.  I haven't charged mine in about two weeks, and I use it for an hour or so every day, usually for web browsing, email reading, etc when I'm in meetings at work, and also keeping my calendar up to date, and the occassional game or synth session.  Last night it had 65% left.  Mind you this is iPad1, iPad2 has more power in the processors and probably less battery life but I think an iPad can easily go all day and probably two days.

they claim 10 hours but you know how that is.  HEAVILY influenced by use.  

charger — Nov 09, 2011HTML5 is superior to Flash anyway.

Yep!

Adobe to kill Flash in favor of HTML5

yep, saw that in a different tech site.  

Also, DTR, it's really friggin handy to have it set next to you when you're building a pedal... last night I was using mine to read the pedal instructions PDF, and switching between that and a resistor color code calculator site I found when soldering. Super handy because I really don't want to print a 20 page document that I'll use once... saving paper!

I'm sold... just waiting for the next $50 off coupon on them at Microcenter

forget that.  Going to pick one up at lunch.  What are the "must have" apps?  

Wired did an app guide that I bought a month or so back. Had to fight my ten year old to get to read it.  They also have it (surprise, surprise) as an app, for $6.

IMO, you should buy Garage Band, Polytune, and Cleartune, Pandora,. I also have a couple synths... look around, the best ones (and most expensive) are Korg and the new moog app, but synthopia runs down the full list and has good reviews.  There are tons and tons of guitar reference apps. Gibson's got a free one that includes a metronome and some theory stuff... I mostly ignore it though.

netflix, your cable app (mine is xfinity, which lets me control my cable boxes over WiFi from the iPad), kindle app, NPR, This American Life, Pulse newsreader, weather channel, Ted, Shazam.

iPad2 has a camera (not my iPad1) so there are a lot of other possibilities. At a minimum, BeFunky is a good free image editor, Hipstamatic is a vibey photo app. there are many, many others. Photosynth is the best panorama app I've seen, for example, and it is free.

Time Warner (my cable and net company) has one that lets you watch TV on it.  I'll be snagging that one ASAP.  

Funny, Amy just said "are you getting a white one?"  I said no that I thought I'd prefer black.  She said "get what you want, but I always think of white when I think of Apple computers."  This from a woman who can do minor surfing and email and that's about it.  (on the computer  ;) )

If the Time Warner one is like the Comcast one, it's just letting you watch Hulu stuff on your device.  It may be different though.  Netflix is pretty killer... $8 a month and you get lots and lots of content... my cable costs around 10x that and I'm not sure it's worth it just for Dexter and Homeland...

I'm back, and setting it up.

Time Warner supposedly has a bunch of channels on their app.  Will know shortly...

Cool!  Remember you don't have to let it do everything automatically... I manually manage my lists of movies, music, etc that it loads.  Otherwise it will try to fill itself up with stuff from your library.

thanks!   I popped in here on it.  Now I just have to figure out how to bookmark.  :)

the little box with an arrow coming out of it next to the address.

Thanks sheep.
Next question... Im pretty attached to Google stuff.  Everything from gmail to docs.  Should I use them with the iPad or use apple stuff?  

Probably a waste of time for me to post here, I really don't know what I'm talking about. ;D

I'm pretty sure Apple did away with the email program they had, mobile me or whatever.

Surely you can put google chrome on it and do whatever you want.

Hookbender — Nov 12, 2011Probably a waste of time for me to post here, I really don't know what I'm talking about. ;D

I'm pretty sure Apple did away with the email program they had, mobile me or whatever.

Surely you can put google chrome on it and do whatever you want.

Or Safari, but his name is Howie, Roy, don't call him Surely.  ;) :D

FYI Charger and Sheep, 3 days, at least 2 hours per day, (about 4 total yesterday) Battery at 46% of the first full charge.  
I know they claimed "smaller, lighter, faster, better battery life."  

Digging this thing so far!  Have to sort out what all to do with it.  LOL  All the Google stuff I have on laptop and phone doesn't need to be on it too...