11 ms·

I'm 24 years old, work in software. Neither I nor any of my friends uses a tablet for work or pleasure. I guess I know a couple of people who have Surface Pro's

I'm 24 years old, work in software. Neither I nor any of my friends uses a tablet for work or pleasure. I guess I know a couple of people who have Surface Pro's, but that's about it. I'm wondering if the appeal of these begins when you get older? Seems like a lot of the market for these is people who are 50+, but I'd like to know if any people under 25 are interested in them.

rorykoehler 8y ago
I have an ipad Pro which I use for work (diagrams, mind mapping, documentation, Skype calls, jira notifications etc) and fun (YouTube, games, audio books). I could definitely live without it but it makes the above mentioned activities much easier and enjoyable... I'm mid 30s
kkarakk 8y ago
nothing beats an ipad for media consumption - best combination of grippability,speakers and screen bar none. literally no one else is close in the market. i stopped using anything but an ipad for media consumption/talking to family after i bought one
- asdff 8y ago
  How is a laptop any worse? You gotta hold the tablet upright or prop it up with a flimsy case-stand whereas the laptop just sits upright and has all the features and more, unless you like to jab at the screen with your greasy thumb. Back in the day when laptops were 7lbs and lasted 2hr on charge with a sub 1080p screen and worse speakers than your phone, I could see it, but macbooks are 2lbs now and last 10hrs. No streaming service is going to give you video that's not compressed, wiping the benefits of that fancy screen, and apple wants the soul of your first born if you want enough local storage to store large video files.
i_am_proteus 8y ago
They seem to be popular with wealthy university students for taking notes in class.
mttjj 8y ago
I'm 28 (just outside your demographic) but I have an iPad Pro 12.9" as my main driver and a 27-inch iMac at home. I am a software engineer by trade but I don't have time to do that outside of work so that's not a concern. I carry the iPad with me throughout my house and use it for just about everything. I also take it with me to the high school classroom where I volunteer teach computer science. All of their assignments are online so it's super easy to access them via the iPad. Could I replace my iPad with a MacBook Pro? Sure. But the iPad is smaller, has touch, and does everything I need. Not sure if this was the answer you're looking for but I figured I'd chime in.
- uptown 8y ago
  OT but have you found a good case for that model?
  - mttjj 8y ago
    I bought the Apple Keyboard cover. Covers both front and back (and includes a keyboard obviously). I've never been a fan of cases or covers (my iPhone has been naked since I purchased it) so I'm probably not the most qualified person to ask about cases :).
  - drukenemo 8y ago
    My 12.9 is perfect for reading and annotating music sheets. Bought an used one mainly for that. The large screen size is close to a regular paper.
  - graeme 8y ago
    I have a ztotop one for the new 12.9. Works well, a bit heavy, maybe 50% more than the official one. But an 8th of the price, and otherwise works beautifully.
hiteho 8y ago
I know a few private charter pilots who are massively excited this morning. The iPad Mini is the only iOS device that is big enough to use at arms length, small enough to fit in a cramped cockpit, and approved by the FAA. They use a handful of apps during flight for planning, weather, approach data and whatnot. There has been a lot of fear among the local pilot community that the Mini would be discontinued. While the device might not be mainstream, for their admittedly specialized use-case, no other computer will do.
- halbritt 8y ago
  Oh, hey, that reminds me. I also use mine with an external GPS (Dual XGPS) for charts while sailing and for topo maps with Gaia GPS when I need that kind of thing.
- mediaman 8y ago
  Yes, the use of iPads has had a huge impact on aviation. Fancy built-in devices that cost $25k-80k to implement in the cockpit can be replicated on an iPad, and the mini is the best fit. A lot of pilots were really bummed when it appeared that Apple had given up on the mini. Of course, it can't be used as a primary instrument since it's not certified, but it's amazing paired with ForeFlight so you can see synthetic visualized terrain (you're stuck in clouds, and want to see where the ground is), you can see where other planes are in the airspace, their altitude and direction via ADSB-in, you can do flight planning on it and easily pull approach plates or pull up airport diagrams, it allows you to see the terrain profile of a planned trip much more easily than referencing the charts, and it can serve as a backup to your primary instruments if you have an electrical or vacuum failure in the plane.
- geerlingguy 8y ago
  Similarly, in the medical field, there have been some areas where the mini was a perfect fit for a doctor's pocket or certain devices, and they had a lot of custom apps and mounts so they could replace a lot of other types of devices.
landcoctos 8y ago
I'm 24 years old, work in software. Neither I nor any of my friends uses a tablet for work or pleasure. We use Ipads for pleasure. It's more pleasant to browse the net on the couch than sitting at a computer.
- kalleboo 8y ago
  It's more pleasant to stand a laptop on my lap on the couch than to keep gripping a tablet. And almost all the tablet cases are terrible floppy messes (especially Apple's with their weak magnets and poor angle choices) This is the main reason I don't "get" tablets. They're just more uncomfortable to use for me. You have to keep holding onto it and you get gorilla arm vs using a trackpad.
  - scott_s 8y ago
    I can see that if you're constantly gripping the tablet. I sit with it similar to how I would with a book or a magazine; I'm not actively gripping it, and it allows more posture variations than a laptop for me.
    - thrav 8y ago
      Therein lies the difference. If I’m on my ass, I’m horizontal. I only lay on the couch. Never sit.
      - CloudNetworking 8y ago
        Keeping in mind that most people sit on their sofas I'd say there's market for tablets then :P
  - kbd 8y ago
    This is why Microsoft's Surface line is great. I have the Go and the stand is wonderful. Plus it transforms into a tiny laptop by snapping on the keyboard.
    - 8y ago
currymj 8y ago
they’re reasonably common in universities nowadays for handwritten note taking. i’d expect to see at least one person other than me who has one in any reasonably sized class.
stwyde 8y ago
My girlfriend uses her two ipads (mini I got her a few years ago and a pro 12.9 I got her more recently) mostly for reading books. The libraries she has memberships with offer online book borrowing, so she'll open up the app and just start reading things on her book list. Otherwise most of her consumption is either watching videos on a larger screen that's easier to carry than a laptop, or drawing on the pro which is honestly pretty fun to do. I've been meaning to pick up an ipad or a surface in the next year or so just for doodling / mock up functionality as well. reading ebooks on a tablet or leaving documentation open on them while working on a laptop is honestly kinda nice.
rongenre 8y ago
Watching downloaded video on an iPad has made cross-country plane trips nearly tolerable.
abrowne 8y ago
I agree, but only because of the names: they all use the "iPad nano", i.e. iPhone.
JustSomeNobody 8y ago
I'm older (by nearly double), and I see releases like this and I think, hmmm... do I need a tablet. I could... nope, nothing[0]. I can think of a single use case where I need a tablet. For any other use case, I either have laptop, phone, or even just a sheet of paper. [0] Ok, there's one use. Media consumption, but a $35 kindle tablet takes care of that for the rare (ie: airplane) times I want media on the go.
tyleo 8y ago
I'm 26 and the iPad Air and iPad mini do not appeal to me but I own an iPad Pro and I am enamored with it. I use the iPad Pro at my full-time job as a Software Engineer at Microsoft. I get a lot of mileage by taking notes on it in OneNote and preparing/reading documents from the other Office apps. I also use the iPad to listen to music with Spotify (my headphones have trouble connecting to my work PC). Outside of the office, I use the iPad as a second screen for my Windows Laptop with Duet (https://www.duetdisplay.com/ https://www.duetdisplay.com/), reading books, web browsing and more Spotify. My major complaint with the device is the poor IDE support. I think I would love to be able to use it with Visual Studio Code as it is much easier to carry around than my laptop and I don't need the powerful laptop all that frequently. It has basically replaced all of the functionality of my laptop except for my development work. Hope you find that helpful.
- jordache 8y ago
  for a software develop what is the material difference between a pro and and air? the higher refresh rate of the pro?
  - tyleo 8y ago
    I got the Pro for two reasons: the screen-size (for use as a 2nd laptop monitor) and because the pencil was only supported by the Pro when I bought it. I don't use the 2nd screen as much as I thought I would though and there is a good chance any of the other iPads (which are all smaller) would have been better for me. Hard to tell exactly what size has the max utility. Smaller isn't better necessarily because my iPhone can do pretty much all of the same stuff but is too small to be useful. A good heuristic might be "large enough that the keyboard is comfortable".
  - briandear 8y ago
    A12x vs A12. 120 refresh vs 60. Pencil gen 2 vs gen 1. More RAM in pro. Quad speakers in pro.
    - jordache 8y ago
drenvuk 8y ago
They're typically toys for the technically inept. Larger screens than phones to allow larger fonts for hard of seeing with a dumbed down interface for those who can't use computers very well. It fills an important niche filled with very young children and many older people. For anyone like us, we're probably going to be ok with a phone and a laptop.
- gettingsnarky 8y ago
  Do you choke when it rains?
chrisseaton 8y ago
Do you do any reading? I use my tablets most of all to read papers.
crazygringo 8y ago
I got my first iPad a year ago, suspecting I wouldn't use it for anything (and I'm nowhere close to 50). Turns out I couldn't have been more wrong. It's now my primary device for: - Reading and annotating books and papers in PDF format (academic research has never been easier, I use a stylus too) - Mounting to a tripod and recording video (e.g. professional presentations, with a lapel mic connected -- again, screen size makes it far better than a phone for reviewing a take) - 3D anatomy app (whether you're working on massage therapy, posture, etc. -- nobody uses printed anatomy books anymore. Phone too small, laptop doesn't have touch) - Playing video games (same games as on a phone, but so much better on the larger screen) - Watching TV/movies while traveling (you can do it on a flight on a laptop, but it's hard in an airplane seat -- this is so much easier) - Video calling (bigger view than phone, but more portable than my laptop) - Doing light work in a coffee shop (writing, e-mailing, etc.) -- I pair it with the Bluetooth magic keyboard and do my work in Mail and Google Docs/Sheets -- it's way more lightweight than my laptop and just feels a bit more civilized than a big clunky laptop It's honestly really surprised me how I can't imagine my life without my iPad Mini anymore. Turns out there really is a sweet spot between my phone and my laptop.
- evmar 8y ago
  This is my story too. I am not in the Apple ecosystem (I use mostly Linux) and don't really buy tech gadgets (e.g. I use an old phone), but I got a cheap iPad for a long trip where I wanted a map with a long battery, expecting to not really use it much more than that. I have ended up using it a ton. My activities are similar to the above, primarily consumption. I have been reading books on it despite having a kindle (I maintain my "no gadgets" position above -- it was a gift) because it is so convenient to be able to switch between a book and other iPad activities, like looking up something online. I'll add that the screen is great, the battery lasts forever, and (as a programmer) I really appreciate the high software quality.
- dchuk 8y ago
  Out of curiosity, what do you use for PDF annotation?
  - 8y ago
0815test 8y ago
The iPad itself is just too limited to be usable, in my experience. But the tablet form factor can work reasonably well for not-too-intensive activity (i.e. it's no good if you'll be doing a lot of data/text/code entry, of course), and the mainstream Linux desktop is starting to support it quite nicely.
steven2012 8y ago
My kid is 6 years old and all he uses is an iPad. I think the next generation will be using iPads and tablets and think using laptops are for old people.
- navigatesol 8y ago
  >I think the next generation will be using iPads and tablets and think using laptops are for old people. I bet they'll replace that tablet with a phone, and continue to use a laptop/desktop for "real work".
- bookofjoe 8y ago
  "What's a computer?"—classic iPad commercial
intellent 8y ago
Do you have a large smart phone? I like small phones. So I own a tablet for all the personal stuff at home. I use my PC for work, my Phone for messaging and travel and my tablet for everything else. It’s really the most comfortable way of consuming.
navigatesol 8y ago
>Neither I nor any of my friends uses a tablet for work or pleasure. I use one, but only because it's a convenient media consumption device (e-reading, web browsing). It's entirely superlative to a phone + laptop though. Remember when the tech prognosticators (some on this very site!) told us tablets were going to replace everything?
yesimahuman 8y ago
Have kids and you’ll suddenly understand what all the fuss is about. That said, if our kid had to pick between an iPad and an iPhone he tends to prefer the iPhone (we just don’t give him one!) I personally have started using a surface for non-coding work and enjoy it for taking notes. It’s worth a try for that use case.
blakesterz 8y ago
I'm pretty much double 24... my usual work machine is a big Ubuntu box I built, with 2 big monitors. I'm stuck working on my MacBookAir for some time and it just sucks. Not because the MacBook sucks, but it just sucks working on a single small monitor, and the machine itself is slower at everything. Working on any laptop is just a big step down from a real machine for me. I can't even imagine working on an iPad, though for what I do (devops) it would be impossible (I assume) I have no idea what the appeal is, there's none at all for me, but there must be a decent sized market out there. It's interesting to read the other comments and see what the appeal is for them
- swozey 8y ago
  I can't work on a laptop at all. My work machine is a MBP i7 w/ 32gb ram. I plug it into a thunderbolt dock tied to 2 28" ultrawides that is also chained to my desktop (8 core, 32gb ryzen box) and I just flip over to the MBP when I need to work. Docks are obscenely expensive but the quality of life improvement is high. You're unfortunately very limited with the MBA, though. Perhaps see if you can replace it with a MBP? I DO like having my "work" machine be a powerful laptop in the event that I need to travel or some emergency arises where I HAVE to find a coffee shop and write a PR without monitors, as much as I won't enjoy the experience.
  - BuckRogers 8y ago
    Both you and blakesterz sound like me. Like blakesterz I have a high end desktop with lowend laptop. I would have bought the new Macbook Air but wanted a 2-in-1 and went with a Samsung because of the quality of the S Pen being unmatched. I've loved it and upgrading to the 2019 Samsung 9 Pen very soon. With the 13.3" it's just really handy to take notes or use it as a tablet if it's more comfortable. My 2nd choice was definitely the MBA. Are you suggesting that there are limitations with a dock on a MBA vs MBP (outside of just performance)? I'm unaware of any issues there but would be interested to know. My desktop is a Ryzen 2700X with 32GB of RAM. I really would like to pickup a TB3 dock at a point but am currently using RDP to my work laptop. Which works well enough over the local network. What I wanted to respond to was your point about having your work machine be a powerful laptop so that you're prepared. I've been mulling over ditching the desktop for a Thinkpad X1 Extreme for the same reason. While I could remote into my desktop in a rare coffee shop scenario, it wouldn't work out if it were happening often.
kevinherron 8y ago
I'm 34 years old. I have one of the new 11" iPad Pro's that I use as a consumption device and it also replaced the Moleskine I kept in my laptop bag for notes/diagrams/whatever.
reacharavindh 8y ago
I'm 33 years old, work in systems engineering. I use my tablet (ipad Pro 9") as an auxiliary device for pleasure and a little bit of work. It does the following, and does them well. * Spotify player at home. Gets passed around to friends during a get together. * Fancy annotator - I use the Apple Pencil to draw directly on pictures or even create from images scratch by sketching it out. * Books - I have several epub purchases that live in Apple Books app. I can read those books on ipad while I'm on the go, or on Mac while at work. * Netflix watcher while flights - I download some stuff before getting on a plane. * Youtube by the kitchen - Great for watching cooking related videos while in kitchen. * Look at photos directly on it, or cast the picture to Mac Mini(my HTPC). * Notes - I use Apple Notes as my main note taking application on Mac. I rarely find need to handwrite something.. in English or in my native language. Quickly take the ipad out to do just that and continue seamlessly on my Mac. I think the mileage of use of iPad depends on the user. I for one cannot stand development work, or even writing scripts on the thing. Yes, I have tried/played Pythonista and the bunch of apps in ios.
- alchemism 8y ago
  I am a ‘cloud’ engineer, and I find great use in pairing my iPad with an Apple Bluetooth keyboard, and then running shells in Terminus or Google Cloud Shell. I wouldn’t code on it, but for running scripts and checking servers — I can travel without my laptop.
intrasight 8y ago
I've an 8in Fire HD with just three apps that I use: Chrome, VLC, and DS File. <$100. My friend has 10in and uses for same - videos. Super light-weight. Price of a trip to grocery store. Why wouldn't you have a tablet on hand?
scott_s 8y ago
I'm 37. I use my iPad at home for when I want to watch videos or look something up on the internet, but I don't want to get out my work laptop. I try to limit my laptop usage at home to actual work (or things that are work-like, such as managing personal finances). So my iPad is for casual browsing and news reading. I also have an iPhone, and which one I reach for at home depends on my whim.
beat 8y ago
Every house I know with children has an iPad, either shared among the kids or one per kid if they can afford it. My spouse lives in hers... she has a Mac, but rarely uses it. I'm a power user. I have a battered 17" Macbook Pro that's nearly 9 years old now. I use it for programming, photo editing (mostly Lightroom), and audio recording/mixing (I've produced about ten albums on that Mac). But now it's time to retire it, and... I'm very seriously considering switching to an iPad Pro for a primary platform. I recently tried Lightroom on my old iPad Air 2, and it's in some ways better than Lightroom on a Mac, thanks to the touchscreen. I'm going to do a recording project in Auria and see if I can get good results with my usual record mixing workflow, and see what I can do about a terminal window and editor for programming. But an iPad is a very appealing alternative to dropping $2500-3000 on another Macbook, when I don't know if Apple is serious about maintaining the product or not. If I can do all the things that I "need" a Macbook for on an iPad these days... well.
- matwood 8y ago
  I prefer sorting photos in LR on my iPad Pro 11" vs. my 2017 MBP. Editing is fine, but I have so much LR muscle memory for the keyboard shortcuts I feel like I'm moving too slow.
sct202 8y ago
My iPad is mostly used as a remote for my Chromecast. Sometimes I'll take it traveling and load it with videos, but I haven't done that as much now that you have to take them out of your bag during the security check.
- agrippanux 8y ago
  Off-topic, but look into getting TSA PreCheck. You don't have to take devices out at airports (among other nice things like shorter lines, etc). It definitely helps a lot, especially when you have kids with devices.
taytus 8y ago
I'm 39. Started using Ipad since 2011. I use it for pleasure, cooking recipes, youtube videos, twitter, and games.
Kurtz79 8y ago
I'm 40 and I have been using a tablet for maybe 6/7 years (iPad and Android, for my uses they are mostly interchangeable), after buying an iPad almost as afterthought and ignoring it for the best part of six months. Now I cannot imagine doing without. For me it is mostly useless as a productive device (at best I use it to review some technical document on a plane or for minimal SSH work), but it's the best media consumption device I can imagine. For web browsing and Netflix/Youtube/Twitch/Spotify client it has replaced my computer, and in many cases my TV. Portability is the key, being able to carry it everywhere (bed, train, plane, kitchen, bathroom...) with minimal weight overhead, but still provide a decent screen real estate (unlike a phone) is priceless.
BuckRogers 8y ago
I have seen in-laws around your age using iPads extensively as their main device. I suspect if they were inputting more they'd get tired of not having a keyboard but it's mostly consumption, banking and such. I think a lot of people with an iPad and Apple Pencil would be very happy. It's just a different level of tech integration into their life than a videographer, writer, artist or developer. I can fast forward you a bit over a decade. As a techie that is old enough to have grown with the industry from the very beginning, no tablets here except an older Nook. E-ink will remain the best for reading. I do think there's benefit to the 2-in-1 form factor. Samsung is on the top the heap here. The 2019 Samsung 9 Pen[0] is the best of every world, it just hit the US market yesterday. The S Pen used in their 2-in-1 is as good as it gets today, being Wacom EMR based. While I wouldn't bother with an iPad, I think there's a lot of value and use in this form factor for work. The Samsung Pen devices are the main thing that pulled me away from a Macbook. [0]https://www.samsung.com/us/computing/windows-laptops/all-windows-laptops/s/_/n-10+11+hv22t/ https://www.samsung.com/us/computing/windows-laptops/all-win...
fipar 8y ago
I think you may be biased by your career. I work in IT too and I don't have a tablet either, but most people not in our field that I know rarely use a laptop (even less a desktop) anymore. Some don't even own one. They do all their computing on tablets and phones. There's a lot of market for kids too. Our 4yo has an ipad mini and our 12yo has an ipad pro. By the way, the 12yo loves to draw and the ipad pro + apple pencil is the first digital system she actually enjoys. She has a laptop too which she uses when she has to use specific software for school or do intensive writing, but otherwise most of her computing happens on the ipad.
- rgallagher27 8y ago
  Software dev here, use my new iPad Pro in work all the time. I originally bought one for home use, so I would stop using my laptop to watch Netflix/YouTube/Prime and then get distracted by work (too easy to flick over to an IDE or GitHub when an idea would pop into my head when at home). The iPad works really well for this but I now find myself using it in work too for almost the same reason. Rather than bringing my laptop to meetings and then getting distracted (same as watching Netflix at home) I now just bring the iPad to take notes or look up stats/analytics online(most of the platforms we use have pretty good iPad UI support). It's been great at properly focusing on meetings, now if I have an idea on a problem I just write it in a note and get on with the meeting rather than finding myself jumping to VS code and trying to work.
- basch 8y ago
  Are you sure the most common computer isnt a business desktop? What percent of people with office jobs, who are not in IT, sit at a desk all day? Personal computing is probably phone first, work computing I would guess is still desktop, followed by laptop.
PorterDuff 8y ago
Useless old man here. I keep wondering when Apple is going to simply drop their traditional laptop and desktop business in favor of things like this. It's not a great leap of imagination to think of a desktop version of an iPad ala a Chromeboxesque approach.
- snazz 8y ago
  It does make them a lot more money, even though a significant amount of their most enthusiastic (and evangelical) userbase is the “pro” market.
- deleted 8y ago
  [deleted]
- rchaud 8y ago
  With the 12-inch Macbook and 13" Macbook Air already clogging up the portfolio, I can see them dropping the MBP 13 and keeping just a single large MBP 15 model for the professional market. iOS is nowhere near good enough for Apple to consider scaling back their x86 line too much further. Hardware wise the iPad Pro is really nice, but it doesn't even have mouse support! Android has had that since 2011 at least, but it doesn't have the same ecosystem of good quality work apps.
  - jki275 8y ago
    iOS doesn't have mouse support because Apple doesn't want it to, not because it's "not good enough".
Havoc 8y ago
They’re great for travel. That’s about it. The rest of the time I’d rather use a laptop
- Jtsummers 8y ago
  It's also good for reading. I'd rather have my iPad than my laptop when I'm reading books and taking notes (some notes, if I were in school I'd still want my laptop for that tempo of note taking). I use it a lot at home and the only media that I play is music (with headphones) and then read a lot of books and such with it. Scrivener is pretty good on it for writing, but I don't have a keyboard for it anymore (my wireless keyboard got damaged in a move somehow, still not sure what happened). It's also nicer for tossing in my shoulder bag with a physical book and notebook than dragging around a laptop.
e40 8y ago
My stepmother uses one to browse Facebook. It's the only time I've ever seen an adult use one. The other case I've seen, and a lot: children. Parents seem to give them to their kids to mollify them. (I had this choice and did not give into the temptation.)
- Jtsummers 8y ago
  Reading, they're great for reading. If you read technical content, especially, where Kindles and other e-readers are either too small or don't provide the color you'd want for seeing some diagrams and other content.
cm2187 8y ago
Ain't under 25, but I was skeptical about tablets until I found two critical use cases. 1) browsing the web from my bathtub 2) watching movies in long trips.
- kingosticks 8y ago
  Honest question: are they waterproof these days? I used to have a waterproof "case" (a glorified plastic bag) for my kindle for the tub but that only worked because it had buttons. How can you use a touchscreen it with wet hands? And what if you drop it, that's $400 down the plug hole.
  - cm2187 8y ago
    I have done that for years and never dropped an ipad. But there is a secret: pick a hard ipad cover that only folds at the edge of the ipad, like a book. Then you can stick your finger between the cover and the ipad and hold it like that: https://imgur.com/n22Ce1p https://imgur.com/n22Ce1p https://imgur.com/De9VBCx https://imgur.com/De9VBCx This way, you can hold it with one hand, you don't need to apply pressure to hold the ipad, it is not tiring on your hands, and it is extremely stable. The cover I use I believe is this one: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Invision-Superior-Features-Magnetic-Recommended/dp/B005LXW9KK/ref=sr_1_1 https://www.amazon.co.uk/Invision-Superior-Features-Magnetic... Otherwise the ipad is splash proof, but I wouldn't bet on it being waterproof. And wet hands aren't too much of a problem from a touch point of view, but they leave drops that obstruct the display so you kind of want to have a towel around somewhere.
    - kingosticks 8y ago
      Ah OK makes sense. Thanks for that tip, much appreciated. I guess I never actually dropped the kindle either, although it did mysteriously stop working.
balls187 8y ago
Do you own a tablet? I didn't really see the need for one, until I bought one on a whim. It's my main multimedia consumption device.
rosege 8y ago
I think you might be right - I know quite a few people in their 70s who love the mini. They were quite upset 6 months ago when I was telling them it looked like it was going to be discontinued. I guess all those predictions of its death were wrong!
bookofjoe 8y ago
I'm 70 and have an iPad Gen 3 (2012), an iPad mini Gen 2 (2013), and an iPad Pro (late 2018 Gen 3) + Apple Pencil Gen 2. I'm pretty sure if I were under 25 I'd be just as stoked about them — though prolly unable to afford them.
danieldk 8y ago
I'm wondering if the appeal of these begins when you get older? I am 36, I had several iPads, but they always end up gathering dust in a closet. For work, I am several times more productive on a laptop, for occasional browsing, e-mail, etc. iPhones have become large enough. So, at some point I just sold my last iPad and never bought a new one. My wife also has an iPad, but only uses it quite rarely. And when she does, she usually finds that she has to charge it ;). Others have mentioned iPads as a kid's device. Our daughter (5) likes the iPad, and occasionally uses it to program her Micro:Bit. Other than that we've found that most iPad apps for kids aren't all that great, so we just prefer physical books, sketchbooks, paint, Lego, etc. She loves Lego and paper. She probably uses the iPad every month or so. She did get a Nintendo DS recently for playing games, though we do severely limit the amount of DS screen time though. We are considering to buy her a NUC with Linux, just to tinker. My dad allowed me to poke his MS-DOS PC when I was about her age. I loved it and learned a lot. Since she likes her Micro:Bit a lot, I think she'd do well on some non-walled garden machine. No pressure though, we'll just put it there and see if she is interested or not.
wenc 8y ago
I'm a bit older than you, work in software dev and data science, main platform Linux. I'm the sort of person who has a few command-line windows and vim open, and am a keyboard fiend. Yet... I use my iPad a ton at home and when I travel (I travel a lot). I don't even own a personal laptop anymore -- I work on desktops with 3 monitors and at home. I used to think that the iPad being purely a consumption device was too limiting, until I got an iPad Air 2 that was on sale at the time. It does everything I need just fine, plus it's lightweight enough to travel with. (caveat: I don't do any dev work when I'm on the road)
xhruso00 8y ago
iPad is a perfect device for my mum who doesn't know how to use computer. I would never buy any other device because of UI/UX. She uses it for browsing so there is no real need to upgrade as I keep her on old iOS due to familiarity and battery life (those who upgrade know the battery life is best when iOS isn't updated)
- kakaorka 8y ago
  I agree with you that upgrading usually means worse battery life, but iOS 12 was an exception to this I believe.
bashwizard 8y ago
I'm 35 and this is what I use mine for: - Blink Shell and Mosh to do light coding in vim, remote scanning etc on my desktop at home while I'm away from home - Effects processor in my music production/dj setup - Paint/sketch in procreate - Reading books - Watching movies/series while traveling - Control my Sonos setup - Browsing the web obviously So to answer your question; no it doesn't. The iPad product line is probably not for people coding during the day and playing fortnite at night.
halbritt 8y ago
I primarily read books through Kindle and O'Reilly (Safari Books Online). I went through a couple different kindle devices. E-Paper type devices are good for prose, but not really that great for any books with graphical content and don't work at all with web content. I tried using a Kindle Fire, but the pixel density on all those devices is terrible. I had an older Fire HD for a moment which was decent at 254ppi, but it bricked itself during an upgrade. Amazon offered me a discount on a "newer" unit with 189ppi. I gave up and got an iPad mini with a 326ppi display. I mostly use it for reading books on public transportation.
fxfan 8y ago
I will be downvoted to hell but I'll say this- tablets for fun were a fad that most people don't repeat twice (except the tech crazy/HN type crowd). Some people still use tablets for work (something the iLine of devices is horribly deficient at) and surface works well- I think you can install linux too.
- halbritt 8y ago
  I think they have enough use cases that they'll continue to sell, but I think the market is pretty much saturated at this point.
jxdxbx 8y ago
I stopped using a laptop a while ago. For me, when I need to do complicated work I sit down at a desk with my 30” monitor and clacky keyboard. But on the go and for day-to-day tasks all I need is my 12.9” iPad Pro which, as a bonus, is s much better entertainment machine (reading comics and magazines, video, games) than my laptop ever was. I’m a lawyer fyi, so no I'm not writing apps on the thing or doing fancy multimedia workflows.
oarsinsync 8y ago
I got a bonus roughly twice the cost of the iPad 2 64GB when it first came out, so I used half of it to buy it on a whim, no use case in mind at the time. It's now my primary personal computing device. My day job has me in front of a desktop with keyboard all day. I have little to no desire to do things resembling work when I leave the office. My iPhone SE is too small to use for extended periods (but I won't get a bigger one as I want to be able to use it one-handed and hands wont oblige), so the iPad (now an iPad Pro) gets all my outside-the-office attention. Reading, planning holidays & booking flights, budgeting, Netflix, whatever.
- gglitch 8y ago
  What do you use to budget?
kristianc 8y ago
You probably overstated your case by saying that only people over 50 are interested in them (though my parents have one each), but the number of people in their 30s saying they have one on this thread is interesting for sure.
hellofunk 8y ago
What do you use to read books on? For me, the iPad, for either Kindle books or general PDFs, was a game-changer for me. I also use it for watching lots of movies or TV shows.
armandososa 8y ago
I had iPads 1 trough 3, and they were awesome comic-reading devices. Then amazon bought Comixology and buying comics became too much of a hassle and I stop using my iPad altogether.
askafriend 8y ago
Talk to a designer of any kind. They’re hooked on iPad. All the designers at our company have personal iPads that they use for various things including illustration, taking notes, sketching concepts, wire framing, etc. I’m not a designer but I’m a hobbyist photographer and I love using my iPad for editing photos in Lightroom, reading, consuming media, etc. I can’t wait until Adobe fills out their creative suite on iPad. They announced that a fully featured Photoshop will come to iPad in 2019 - we’ll see. I wrote this comment on an iPad, in fact. I do use the keyboard cover though so don’t get the impression that I wrote this on the on-screen software keyboard. That’d be tough.
Woofles 8y ago
I'm 25 and work in software and I have found it to be a decent (not amazing, but solid) daily driver given you're willing to put up with some annoyances. I use the app Termius to allow me to SSH into a VPS and my home server and do development. I don't really do web development in my free time so I don't have to worry about the pains of not having a js console. I also develop almost exclusively in vim, so paired with the magic keyboard it's basically a very lightweight laptop. It's great for Lightroom, with a dongle (everyone's favorite thing) you can connect your camera and upload RAW photos, then edit them with Lightroom and upload to your favorite site. It's wonderful for Plex/Netflix/Hulu. Offline viewing is amazing, battery life is better than my laptop by far so it lasts long spurts where I can't charge it. For creatives, there are some amazing digital art apps. My friend hypes up Procreate every time we talk about iPads (he's also 25/software and loves his iPad Pro). And lastly, it's about $1k cheaper than buying a MacBook Pro (which I had previously). I was able to trade in my 2013 MBP and old iPhone and made the final cost about $300, which is much more palatable than the extra $1k or so I'd need for a machine that doesn't really need that much computing power. Disclaimer: I do use a MacBook Pro for work (running VMs, development in vim) and it's definitely easier (has JS console, can do development without internet, can use IDEs that don't exist on iPad).
vbezhenar 8y ago
I bought iPad 3 in 2013 (I was 25). I liked it a lot and spent almost all entertainment time with it: web, movies, books, games. I even used it for work a little bit (to present design to customer). Unfortunately with iOS 7 release it turned to potato and I never used it since then, except for occasional PDF reading (I'm reading epub from phone, but for PDF big screen is a must). I waited for that announcement and I expected them to update cheap iPad. I would buy it. But I'm not sure about that iPad Air, it costs too much and I probably won't buy it. Actually funny thing is, it's iPad that led me to Apple ecosystem. I liked iOS a lot and then my old phone broke, so I had to buy new. When I realized, that I can buy iPhone 4S and have the same iOS that I'm using on iPad, it was almost a non-brainer and later I bought Macbook, because it felt pretty natural to keep using Apple product and I wanted to develop iOS apps. I shifted from macOS recently (Apple does not make any computers I would like to buy), but I'm still using iOS on my phone and I like it.
eeeeeeeeeeeee 8y ago
I think you’re right. I have one but never use it. My dad, however, in his 70s, loves his. He still has a laptop but rarely ever uses it now. The iPad is basically his computer.
Shivetya 8y ago
I gave one to my mother and father to use to manage their email and surfing the web while at home and RV traveling; many parks of wi-fi and there is always McD. They are just the right size to easily portable and big enough with pinch/zoom to make easy reading for even poor eyes. the logic was it kept them from being stuck in the room with their computers. even laptops seem to find permanent homes but not a tablet. my father even figured out to use his cell phone as a wi-fi hotspot.
qubex 8y ago
I'm pushing 38 and an executive and iPads of various generations (which I have refreshed yearly) have been my main working/travelling machine right since the release of the very first versions. I still have a i7 MacBook, a specced-out quad-core 2012 MacMini (with dual CinemaDisplays) and a trashcan Mac Pro, but somehow the iPad (currently in it's 11” iPadPro incarnation) is always my favourite tool both because of its portability and because of its focus. You'd be amazed what I can do locally on this machine: construct, symbolically solve, and make predictions based thereupon mathematical models being one of the things that surprise people most. Writing and locally executing Python code. Storing versioned copies of business plans.
subhro 8y ago
The iPad mini is extremely popular among pilots. The iPad Pro is too big for the general aviation (and even commercial aviation) in my opinion, and iPad non pros so far does not have enough oomph to run ForeFlight. Source: I am a pilot.
irrational 8y ago
They are great for playing digital board games: Carcassonne, Ticket to Ride, Agricola, Colt Express, Patchwork, Twilight Struggle, Pandemic, Splendor, Castles of Mad King Ludwig, etc. Though there is also something to be said for the eye sight factor. I'm in my mid-40s and my focusing just doesn't work as well as it used to. Its becoming increasingly difficult to do a lot of reading on a small screen like my iphone 8+.
occamschainsaw 8y ago
Counter point: I am also 24 but in academia. A lot of people in our age group (and professors) use tablets (especially with styluses, iPad Pro and Surface). I guess it is field dependent. It is a blessing for managing stacks of research papers and taking notes. I got the new iPad Pro and installed some latex and jupyter apps, and with a decent terminal app, I can start working on my iPad. YMMV ofcourse.
jdlyga 8y ago
I have an iPad for reading. It works better with PDFs than Kindles since it's larger, and the pencil is great for highlighting and taking notes.
mixmastamyk 8y ago
Movies and TV. Cut the cable bill a decade ago. Got rid of the giant, heavy, expensive, fear-mongering TV. Now watch a small screen with a mount that is much closer.
mercer 8y ago
I used my iPad Mini quite a lot for browsing and reading, but since I got a dedicated eReader it's mostly been collecting dust. I think if I had a bigger iPad it might find some use, but I can't really justify the cost for the minimal benefit over simply using my laptop instead (even as someone with a decent income).
pk2200 8y ago
One use case I haven't seen mentioned is note-taking. Apple Pencil is a truly amazing device. I use it at work all the time, especially in meetings. It's quieter than typing and because I don't have my laptop open, I'm much less likely to get distracted by slack, email, HN, etc. It's also slower typing, but that may be a good thing because it forces me to mentally organize/consolidate whatever I'm writing.
anisppp 8y ago
If you were in the healthcare industry your experience would be different
asark 8y ago
1) they're great for certain kinds of graphic art. 2) they're great for various sorts of low-end creative work, like making films (think: for kids or adults to learn the basics of shooting and editing on a single device capable of making something half-decent, not pro-level) 3) Good as a writing terminal, given an external keyboard. Better than a laptop in a lot of ways. 4) The 12.9" pro's the best device I've seen for reading comics, by far. 5) iPads are easily the best devices I've seen for reading PDFs (lots of non-fiction books and papers) 6) in a lot of important ways, they Just Work, unlike most other computing devices. More so than macOS machines, even, by a good margin. 7) it's where edutainment and casual science software's at now. Want software for some not-super-serious stargazing? You'll want an iPad. Edutainment programs for kids (like the Math Blasters and Number Munchers and Microsoft Dinosaurs! of yore) are mostly on iPads. Swift playground, for that matter. 8) can be positioned to take up a lot less space on a desk than a laptop while in use—nice when you need that desk space for other things, like books or notebooks. 9) portable second monitor for your macbook.
TulliusCicero 8y ago
They're great as a digital babysitter. Sometimes you just need your kid to sit quietly, and they're a total lifesaver for something like long flights.
imandride 8y ago
I'm 26 and since I purchased a Surface Book, my iPad has been gathering dust. The convenience of having both available in one package has been great.
noir_lord 8y ago
I have the current iPad and an iPad Mini. I use the mini far more, I like the bigger iPad but the mini is the perfect form factor for watching TV in bed and reading PDF's. Will definitely be picking up the new Mini and the old one which is in perfect condition will go to the boy. He loves his (1st gen) iPad but it's finally on the way out.
KennyCason 8y ago
I’m in my early 30s and bought an iPad last year to give digital art a try. I ended up falling in love with it and regularly use it to draw. I also now draw all my graphics for my indie game development with it. I primarily use Pixaki and Procreate. It certainly beats using a mouse to draw or even any other drawing pad I’ve used previously. It’s also, imo, a far smoother/natural experience than a Wacom. I was then very surprised by the long battery life and now also use it to watch Netflix.
jen729w 8y ago
I’m 42. My first computer was a ZX Spectrum+ back in the 80s. I bought the first iPad the day it came out because I’m a(n Apple) nerd. I loved it, because it was amazing. Then for a while I fell out of love with it, because I wasn’t sure what it was for. Now I work from home and this thing (10.5” Pro, previous model) is like my pet dog. It follows me everywhere. It plays music via AirPlay, it plays podcasts from its speakers while I’m in the shower, I text on it, answer calls, do most of my casual internet, do most of my casual notes (Bear, with the Smart Keyboard), calendar ... everything. I sometimes look at this device and really think that in many ways, here we are. The future. I have this impossibly slim, sturdy, beautiful tablet, whose battery life is extraordinary, which does everything I could possibly want. It’s a little bit Star Trek. Now, for proper work, the MacBook Pro on the desk upstairs plugged in to the 27” monitor is the way to go. But I type this to you from my kitchen bench as I make my girl her morning coffee, and that’s just fantastic.
baq 8y ago
have kids, with some kid-proof rubber armor that doubles as a stand it's the single best portable video player in existence.
alekq 8y ago
It is probably more connected to career choice and technical background of the person, then the age. I am pretty sure that most of people can use it as domestic media consumption device (it really is perfect use case), however when it comes to work, people I meet in my business use it for it’s compact size and battery life (great for travels and portability in general), as well presentation-wise possibilities.
fwip 8y ago
If you use your phone a lot at home, you'll probably appreciate using a tablet instead. If you use your laptop a lot at home but don't really need to type that much, you'll probably appreciate a tablet. Otherwise, it's probably not for you.
anth_anm 8y ago
I'm 30 but I only use mine to read comics. Doesnt' help that I stupidly bought the 16GB version, crippling it.
Bokanovsky 8y ago
Tablets are useful for commuters. If you're on a train you can read ebooks. Comics publishers now have tons of stuff you can read too. You can also watch Netflix and similar services that let you download content. This takes the edge off repetitive train journeys. At work I've seen business analysts use it as a light weight laptop replacement to take notes (with the addition of the keyboard) and with the Apple Pencil to draw basic diagrams while on the go. Photographers also use them to show off portfolios and do image editing editing on the go. You can get Lightroom and Photoshop for the iPad and other software vendors offer competing products to edit images on the go. Also don't forget kids. For long car journeys, a tablet loaded up with a mix of shows and appropriate (often educational) apps can help them stop asking the dreaded "Are we nearly there yet?!"
blablablabla991 8y ago
I wouldn't personally need one, but it is great for kids imo.
Grustaf 8y ago
I live in Denmark and am above 40. i don’t think I’ve met anyone here with children that doesn’t have one or more ipads. I also don’t think ipad less developers are very common at any age. At my former company even our android developer had one. Of course Scanidnavia is iOS country, almost eveyone has an iPhone.
skrowl 8y ago
I think most people progress past tablets to things like Surface Pros and Chromebooks naturally. The tablet market is dying because it's just not useful in a world where Chromebooks & Surface form factor PCs can run Android apps.
- graeme 8y ago
  Apple sells mpre ipads annually than surface pros and chromebooka put together. About 43 million ipads in 2018: https://www.lifewire.com/how-many-ipads-sold-1994296 https://www.lifewire.com/how-many-ipads-sold-1994296 Chromebook is estimated to be under 11 million: https://www.computerworld.com/article/2476098/huge-chromebook-sales-growth--will-2019-be-the-year-of-the-linux-desktop-.html https://www.computerworld.com/article/2476098/huge-chromeboo... I couldn’t find 2018 unit estimates for the surfsce, but in 2017 the estimate was about 3 million: https://www.pcworld.com/article/3254235/microsofts-surface-pro-turns-5.html https://www.pcworld.com/article/3254235/microsofts-surface-p... Surface revenue in 2018 was about 5 billion. Apple’s ipad revenue was a bit under 20 billion. And these surface numbers are for everything in the surface line, not just pros. A more likely explanation for lower ipad sales is that they last a long time. My ipad air 2 from 2014 still runs beautifully and gets security and software updates. But in any case ipad sales dwarf the surface and and chromebook sales combined.
cafebeen 8y ago
Perhaps a person's interests, income, or lifestyle are salient variables as well? I would guess that each person's circle of friends has some of these in common in addition to age (likely true for HN discussions as well). For a less biased picture, here are some statistics about tablet use by age: https://www.statista.com/statistics/805143/us-tablete-users-by-age-group/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/805143/us-tablete-users-... and for a baseline, iPhone use by age: https://www.statista.com/statistics/203063/iphone-users-in-the-united-states-by-age/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/203063/iphone-users-in-t... It's striking how uniform the distribution of tablet use was across age! There was a bump after age 25, though that was mirrored in the iPhone usage. This is really salient at the low and high end: age 0-18 was 20% of tablet usage and only 6% of iPhone usage, and age 55+ was 20% of tablet usage and only 14% of iPhone usage. Given all of this, it seems like tablets are quite broadly adopted devices
albertshin 8y ago
The number of students that simply download slides and take notes directly on their iPads with their Apple Pencils is astonishing these days...
graeme 8y ago
I use an imac for stationary work, and an ipad pro for everything else. I have nomuse for a laptop while travelling now. It helps that I have to make educational videos, so I have a clear use case for the pro with the pencil. Can plug a focusrite audiobox in too, and power it from the usb c port. Originally got an ipad as I used it for online tutoring with a whiteboard and a stylus, pre-pencil days. Oddly enough I do a lot of email and text work on my imac. The ipad pros browser has a lot of subtle limitations compared to the desktop version.
baby 8y ago
I use the iPad pro to read whitepapers (because it's bad for multi-tasking, I can focus on reading) and draw (the pen is freaking amazing).
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bas_ta 8y ago
I'm 27, a software engineer and I've only recently bought an iPad with Apple pencil support because I wanted to try out Procreate in my spare time. I use my iPad for: - drawing and lettering in Procreate (this is what I do most of the time, I've been practicing lettering on paper before and this is just so much more convenient) - writing notes in Notes app (that way I can see them on my iPhone) or OneNote - browsing Pinterest (the app works better than the web app I use on Safari in macOS) - YouTube (much more convenient to carry around home than my MacBook Pro) I don't use iPad for messaging, because I mostly use my iPhone and MacBook for that. I decided I don't need a keyboard for the iPad ATM, but maybe that'll change in the future.
wingerlang 8y ago
I've used an iPad since 2012 give or take, when I was under 25. I don't see what it has to do with age, for me it is a use case. When I move from my laptop to either toilet, cooking or the bed I simply bring it with me to consume some youtube. It's bigger than a phone, but more mobile than a laptop.

rorykoehler 8y ago

I have an ipad Pro which I use for work (diagrams, mind mapping, documentation, Skype calls, jira notifications etc) and fun (YouTube, games, audio books). I could definitely live without it but it makes the above mentioned activities much easier and enjoyable... I'm mid 30s

kkarakk 8y ago

nothing beats an ipad for media consumption - best combination of grippability,speakers and screen bar none. literally no one else is close in the market. i stopped using anything but an ipad for media consumption/talking to family after i bought one

asdff 8y ago
How is a laptop any worse? You gotta hold the tablet upright or prop it up with a flimsy case-stand whereas the laptop just sits upright and has all the features and more, unless you like to jab at the screen with your greasy thumb. Back in the day when laptops were 7lbs and lasted 2hr on charge with a sub 1080p screen and worse speakers than your phone, I could see it, but macbooks are 2lbs now and last 10hrs. No streaming service is going to give you video that's not compressed, wiping the benefits of that fancy screen, and apple wants the soul of your first born if you want enough local storage to store large video files.

i_am_proteus 8y ago

They seem to be popular with wealthy university students for taking notes in class.

mttjj 8y ago

I'm 28 (just outside your demographic) but I have an iPad Pro 12.9" as my main driver and a 27-inch iMac at home. I am a software engineer by trade but I don't have time to do that outside of work so that's not a concern. I carry the iPad with me throughout my house and use it for just about everything. I also take it with me to the high school classroom where I volunteer teach computer science. All of their assignments are online so it's super easy to access them via the iPad. Could I replace my iPad with a MacBook Pro? Sure. But the iPad is smaller, has touch, and does everything I need. Not sure if this was the answer you're looking for but I figured I'd chime in.

uptown 8y ago
OT but have you found a good case for that model?
- mttjj 8y ago
  I bought the Apple Keyboard cover. Covers both front and back (and includes a keyboard obviously). I've never been a fan of cases or covers (my iPhone has been naked since I purchased it) so I'm probably not the most qualified person to ask about cases :).
- drukenemo 8y ago
  My 12.9 is perfect for reading and annotating music sheets. Bought an used one mainly for that. The large screen size is close to a regular paper.
- graeme 8y ago
  I have a ztotop one for the new 12.9. Works well, a bit heavy, maybe 50% more than the official one. But an 8th of the price, and otherwise works beautifully.

hiteho 8y ago

I know a few private charter pilots who are massively excited this morning. The iPad Mini is the only iOS device that is big enough to use at arms length, small enough to fit in a cramped cockpit, and approved by the FAA. They use a handful of apps during flight for planning, weather, approach data and whatnot. There has been a lot of fear among the local pilot community that the Mini would be discontinued. While the device might not be mainstream, for their admittedly specialized use-case, no other computer will do.

halbritt 8y ago
Oh, hey, that reminds me. I also use mine with an external GPS (Dual XGPS) for charts while sailing and for topo maps with Gaia GPS when I need that kind of thing.
mediaman 8y ago
Yes, the use of iPads has had a huge impact on aviation. Fancy built-in devices that cost $25k-80k to implement in the cockpit can be replicated on an iPad, and the mini is the best fit. A lot of pilots were really bummed when it appeared that Apple had given up on the mini. Of course, it can't be used as a primary instrument since it's not certified, but it's amazing paired with ForeFlight so you can see synthetic visualized terrain (you're stuck in clouds, and want to see where the ground is), you can see where other planes are in the airspace, their altitude and direction via ADSB-in, you can do flight planning on it and easily pull approach plates or pull up airport diagrams, it allows you to see the terrain profile of a planned trip much more easily than referencing the charts, and it can serve as a backup to your primary instruments if you have an electrical or vacuum failure in the plane.
geerlingguy 8y ago
Similarly, in the medical field, there have been some areas where the mini was a perfect fit for a doctor's pocket or certain devices, and they had a lot of custom apps and mounts so they could replace a lot of other types of devices.

landcoctos 8y ago

I'm 24 years old, work in software. Neither I nor any of my friends uses a tablet for work or pleasure. We use Ipads for pleasure. It's more pleasant to browse the net on the couch than sitting at a computer.

kalleboo 8y ago
It's more pleasant to stand a laptop on my lap on the couch than to keep gripping a tablet. And almost all the tablet cases are terrible floppy messes (especially Apple's with their weak magnets and poor angle choices) This is the main reason I don't "get" tablets. They're just more uncomfortable to use for me. You have to keep holding onto it and you get gorilla arm vs using a trackpad.
- scott_s 8y ago
  I can see that if you're constantly gripping the tablet. I sit with it similar to how I would with a book or a magazine; I'm not actively gripping it, and it allows more posture variations than a laptop for me.
  - thrav 8y ago
    Therein lies the difference. If I’m on my ass, I’m horizontal. I only lay on the couch. Never sit.
    - CloudNetworking 8y ago
      Keeping in mind that most people sit on their sofas I'd say there's market for tablets then :P
- kbd 8y ago
  This is why Microsoft's Surface line is great. I have the Go and the stand is wonderful. Plus it transforms into a tiny laptop by snapping on the keyboard.
  - 8y ago

currymj 8y ago

they’re reasonably common in universities nowadays for handwritten note taking. i’d expect to see at least one person other than me who has one in any reasonably sized class.

stwyde 8y ago

My girlfriend uses her two ipads (mini I got her a few years ago and a pro 12.9 I got her more recently) mostly for reading books. The libraries she has memberships with offer online book borrowing, so she'll open up the app and just start reading things on her book list. Otherwise most of her consumption is either watching videos on a larger screen that's easier to carry than a laptop, or drawing on the pro which is honestly pretty fun to do. I've been meaning to pick up an ipad or a surface in the next year or so just for doodling / mock up functionality as well. reading ebooks on a tablet or leaving documentation open on them while working on a laptop is honestly kinda nice.

rongenre 8y ago

Watching downloaded video on an iPad has made cross-country plane trips nearly tolerable.

abrowne 8y ago

I agree, but only because of the names: they all use the "iPad nano", i.e. iPhone.

JustSomeNobody 8y ago

I'm older (by nearly double), and I see releases like this and I think, hmmm... do I need a tablet. I could... nope, nothing[0]. I can think of a single use case where I need a tablet. For any other use case, I either have laptop, phone, or even just a sheet of paper. [0] Ok, there's one use. Media consumption, but a $35 kindle tablet takes care of that for the rare (ie: airplane) times I want media on the go.

tyleo 8y ago

I'm 26 and the iPad Air and iPad mini do not appeal to me but I own an iPad Pro and I am enamored with it. I use the iPad Pro at my full-time job as a Software Engineer at Microsoft. I get a lot of mileage by taking notes on it in OneNote and preparing/reading documents from the other Office apps. I also use the iPad to listen to music with Spotify (my headphones have trouble connecting to my work PC). Outside of the office, I use the iPad as a second screen for my Windows Laptop with Duet (https://www.duetdisplay.com/ https://www.duetdisplay.com/), reading books, web browsing and more Spotify. My major complaint with the device is the poor IDE support. I think I would love to be able to use it with Visual Studio Code as it is much easier to carry around than my laptop and I don't need the powerful laptop all that frequently. It has basically replaced all of the functionality of my laptop except for my development work. Hope you find that helpful.

jordache 8y ago
for a software develop what is the material difference between a pro and and air? the higher refresh rate of the pro?
- tyleo 8y ago
  I got the Pro for two reasons: the screen-size (for use as a 2nd laptop monitor) and because the pencil was only supported by the Pro when I bought it. I don't use the 2nd screen as much as I thought I would though and there is a good chance any of the other iPads (which are all smaller) would have been better for me. Hard to tell exactly what size has the max utility. Smaller isn't better necessarily because my iPhone can do pretty much all of the same stuff but is too small to be useful. A good heuristic might be "large enough that the keyboard is comfortable".
- briandear 8y ago
  A12x vs A12. 120 refresh vs 60. Pencil gen 2 vs gen 1. More RAM in pro. Quad speakers in pro.
  - jordache 8y ago

drenvuk 8y ago

They're typically toys for the technically inept. Larger screens than phones to allow larger fonts for hard of seeing with a dumbed down interface for those who can't use computers very well. It fills an important niche filled with very young children and many older people. For anyone like us, we're probably going to be ok with a phone and a laptop.

gettingsnarky 8y ago
Do you choke when it rains?

chrisseaton 8y ago

Do you do any reading? I use my tablets most of all to read papers.

crazygringo 8y ago

I got my first iPad a year ago, suspecting I wouldn't use it for anything (and I'm nowhere close to 50). Turns out I couldn't have been more wrong. It's now my primary device for: - Reading and annotating books and papers in PDF format (academic research has never been easier, I use a stylus too) - Mounting to a tripod and recording video (e.g. professional presentations, with a lapel mic connected -- again, screen size makes it far better than a phone for reviewing a take) - 3D anatomy app (whether you're working on massage therapy, posture, etc. -- nobody uses printed anatomy books anymore. Phone too small, laptop doesn't have touch) - Playing video games (same games as on a phone, but so much better on the larger screen) - Watching TV/movies while traveling (you can do it on a flight on a laptop, but it's hard in an airplane seat -- this is so much easier) - Video calling (bigger view than phone, but more portable than my laptop) - Doing light work in a coffee shop (writing, e-mailing, etc.) -- I pair it with the Bluetooth magic keyboard and do my work in Mail and Google Docs/Sheets -- it's way more lightweight than my laptop and just feels a bit more civilized than a big clunky laptop It's honestly really surprised me how I can't imagine my life without my iPad Mini anymore. Turns out there really is a sweet spot between my phone and my laptop.

evmar 8y ago
This is my story too. I am not in the Apple ecosystem (I use mostly Linux) and don't really buy tech gadgets (e.g. I use an old phone), but I got a cheap iPad for a long trip where I wanted a map with a long battery, expecting to not really use it much more than that. I have ended up using it a ton. My activities are similar to the above, primarily consumption. I have been reading books on it despite having a kindle (I maintain my "no gadgets" position above -- it was a gift) because it is so convenient to be able to switch between a book and other iPad activities, like looking up something online. I'll add that the screen is great, the battery lasts forever, and (as a programmer) I really appreciate the high software quality.
dchuk 8y ago
Out of curiosity, what do you use for PDF annotation?
- 8y ago

0815test 8y ago

The iPad itself is just too limited to be usable, in my experience. But the tablet form factor can work reasonably well for not-too-intensive activity (i.e. it's no good if you'll be doing a lot of data/text/code entry, of course), and the mainstream Linux desktop is starting to support it quite nicely.

steven2012 8y ago

My kid is 6 years old and all he uses is an iPad. I think the next generation will be using iPads and tablets and think using laptops are for old people.

navigatesol 8y ago
>I think the next generation will be using iPads and tablets and think using laptops are for old people. I bet they'll replace that tablet with a phone, and continue to use a laptop/desktop for "real work".
bookofjoe 8y ago
"What's a computer?"—classic iPad commercial

intellent 8y ago

Do you have a large smart phone? I like small phones. So I own a tablet for all the personal stuff at home. I use my PC for work, my Phone for messaging and travel and my tablet for everything else. It’s really the most comfortable way of consuming.

navigatesol 8y ago

>Neither I nor any of my friends uses a tablet for work or pleasure. I use one, but only because it's a convenient media consumption device (e-reading, web browsing). It's entirely superlative to a phone + laptop though. Remember when the tech prognosticators (some on this very site!) told us tablets were going to replace everything?

yesimahuman 8y ago

Have kids and you’ll suddenly understand what all the fuss is about. That said, if our kid had to pick between an iPad and an iPhone he tends to prefer the iPhone (we just don’t give him one!) I personally have started using a surface for non-coding work and enjoy it for taking notes. It’s worth a try for that use case.

blakesterz 8y ago

I'm pretty much double 24... my usual work machine is a big Ubuntu box I built, with 2 big monitors. I'm stuck working on my MacBookAir for some time and it just sucks. Not because the MacBook sucks, but it just sucks working on a single small monitor, and the machine itself is slower at everything. Working on any laptop is just a big step down from a real machine for me. I can't even imagine working on an iPad, though for what I do (devops) it would be impossible (I assume) I have no idea what the appeal is, there's none at all for me, but there must be a decent sized market out there. It's interesting to read the other comments and see what the appeal is for them

swozey 8y ago
I can't work on a laptop at all. My work machine is a MBP i7 w/ 32gb ram. I plug it into a thunderbolt dock tied to 2 28" ultrawides that is also chained to my desktop (8 core, 32gb ryzen box) and I just flip over to the MBP when I need to work. Docks are obscenely expensive but the quality of life improvement is high. You're unfortunately very limited with the MBA, though. Perhaps see if you can replace it with a MBP? I DO like having my "work" machine be a powerful laptop in the event that I need to travel or some emergency arises where I HAVE to find a coffee shop and write a PR without monitors, as much as I won't enjoy the experience.
- BuckRogers 8y ago
  Both you and blakesterz sound like me. Like blakesterz I have a high end desktop with lowend laptop. I would have bought the new Macbook Air but wanted a 2-in-1 and went with a Samsung because of the quality of the S Pen being unmatched. I've loved it and upgrading to the 2019 Samsung 9 Pen very soon. With the 13.3" it's just really handy to take notes or use it as a tablet if it's more comfortable. My 2nd choice was definitely the MBA. Are you suggesting that there are limitations with a dock on a MBA vs MBP (outside of just performance)? I'm unaware of any issues there but would be interested to know. My desktop is a Ryzen 2700X with 32GB of RAM. I really would like to pickup a TB3 dock at a point but am currently using RDP to my work laptop. Which works well enough over the local network. What I wanted to respond to was your point about having your work machine be a powerful laptop so that you're prepared. I've been mulling over ditching the desktop for a Thinkpad X1 Extreme for the same reason. While I could remote into my desktop in a rare coffee shop scenario, it wouldn't work out if it were happening often.

kevinherron 8y ago

I'm 34 years old. I have one of the new 11" iPad Pro's that I use as a consumption device and it also replaced the Moleskine I kept in my laptop bag for notes/diagrams/whatever.

reacharavindh 8y ago

I'm 33 years old, work in systems engineering. I use my tablet (ipad Pro 9") as an auxiliary device for pleasure and a little bit of work. It does the following, and does them well. * Spotify player at home. Gets passed around to friends during a get together. * Fancy annotator - I use the Apple Pencil to draw directly on pictures or even create from images scratch by sketching it out. * Books - I have several epub purchases that live in Apple Books app. I can read those books on ipad while I'm on the go, or on Mac while at work. * Netflix watcher while flights - I download some stuff before getting on a plane. * Youtube by the kitchen - Great for watching cooking related videos while in kitchen. * Look at photos directly on it, or cast the picture to Mac Mini(my HTPC). * Notes - I use Apple Notes as my main note taking application on Mac. I rarely find need to handwrite something.. in English or in my native language. Quickly take the ipad out to do just that and continue seamlessly on my Mac. I think the mileage of use of iPad depends on the user. I for one cannot stand development work, or even writing scripts on the thing. Yes, I have tried/played Pythonista and the bunch of apps in ios.

alchemism 8y ago
I am a ‘cloud’ engineer, and I find great use in pairing my iPad with an Apple Bluetooth keyboard, and then running shells in Terminus or Google Cloud Shell. I wouldn’t code on it, but for running scripts and checking servers — I can travel without my laptop.

intrasight 8y ago

I've an 8in Fire HD with just three apps that I use: Chrome, VLC, and DS File. <$100. My friend has 10in and uses for same - videos. Super light-weight. Price of a trip to grocery store. Why wouldn't you have a tablet on hand?

scott_s 8y ago

I'm 37. I use my iPad at home for when I want to watch videos or look something up on the internet, but I don't want to get out my work laptop. I try to limit my laptop usage at home to actual work (or things that are work-like, such as managing personal finances). So my iPad is for casual browsing and news reading. I also have an iPhone, and which one I reach for at home depends on my whim.

beat 8y ago

Every house I know with children has an iPad, either shared among the kids or one per kid if they can afford it. My spouse lives in hers... she has a Mac, but rarely uses it. I'm a power user. I have a battered 17" Macbook Pro that's nearly 9 years old now. I use it for programming, photo editing (mostly Lightroom), and audio recording/mixing (I've produced about ten albums on that Mac). But now it's time to retire it, and... I'm very seriously considering switching to an iPad Pro for a primary platform. I recently tried Lightroom on my old iPad Air 2, and it's in some ways better than Lightroom on a Mac, thanks to the touchscreen. I'm going to do a recording project in Auria and see if I can get good results with my usual record mixing workflow, and see what I can do about a terminal window and editor for programming. But an iPad is a very appealing alternative to dropping $2500-3000 on another Macbook, when I don't know if Apple is serious about maintaining the product or not. If I can do all the things that I "need" a Macbook for on an iPad these days... well.

matwood 8y ago
I prefer sorting photos in LR on my iPad Pro 11" vs. my 2017 MBP. Editing is fine, but I have so much LR muscle memory for the keyboard shortcuts I feel like I'm moving too slow.

sct202 8y ago

My iPad is mostly used as a remote for my Chromecast. Sometimes I'll take it traveling and load it with videos, but I haven't done that as much now that you have to take them out of your bag during the security check.

agrippanux 8y ago
Off-topic, but look into getting TSA PreCheck. You don't have to take devices out at airports (among other nice things like shorter lines, etc). It definitely helps a lot, especially when you have kids with devices.

taytus 8y ago

I'm 39. Started using Ipad since 2011. I use it for pleasure, cooking recipes, youtube videos, twitter, and games.

Kurtz79 8y ago

I'm 40 and I have been using a tablet for maybe 6/7 years (iPad and Android, for my uses they are mostly interchangeable), after buying an iPad almost as afterthought and ignoring it for the best part of six months. Now I cannot imagine doing without. For me it is mostly useless as a productive device (at best I use it to review some technical document on a plane or for minimal SSH work), but it's the best media consumption device I can imagine. For web browsing and Netflix/Youtube/Twitch/Spotify client it has replaced my computer, and in many cases my TV. Portability is the key, being able to carry it everywhere (bed, train, plane, kitchen, bathroom...) with minimal weight overhead, but still provide a decent screen real estate (unlike a phone) is priceless.

BuckRogers 8y ago

I have seen in-laws around your age using iPads extensively as their main device. I suspect if they were inputting more they'd get tired of not having a keyboard but it's mostly consumption, banking and such. I think a lot of people with an iPad and Apple Pencil would be very happy. It's just a different level of tech integration into their life than a videographer, writer, artist or developer. I can fast forward you a bit over a decade. As a techie that is old enough to have grown with the industry from the very beginning, no tablets here except an older Nook. E-ink will remain the best for reading. I do think there's benefit to the 2-in-1 form factor. Samsung is on the top the heap here. The 2019 Samsung 9 Pen[0] is the best of every world, it just hit the US market yesterday. The S Pen used in their 2-in-1 is as good as it gets today, being Wacom EMR based. While I wouldn't bother with an iPad, I think there's a lot of value and use in this form factor for work. The Samsung Pen devices are the main thing that pulled me away from a Macbook. [0]https://www.samsung.com/us/computing/windows-laptops/all-windows-laptops/s/_/n-10+11+hv22t/ https://www.samsung.com/us/computing/windows-laptops/all-win...

fipar 8y ago

I think you may be biased by your career. I work in IT too and I don't have a tablet either, but most people not in our field that I know rarely use a laptop (even less a desktop) anymore. Some don't even own one. They do all their computing on tablets and phones. There's a lot of market for kids too. Our 4yo has an ipad mini and our 12yo has an ipad pro. By the way, the 12yo loves to draw and the ipad pro + apple pencil is the first digital system she actually enjoys. She has a laptop too which she uses when she has to use specific software for school or do intensive writing, but otherwise most of her computing happens on the ipad.

rgallagher27 8y ago
Software dev here, use my new iPad Pro in work all the time. I originally bought one for home use, so I would stop using my laptop to watch Netflix/YouTube/Prime and then get distracted by work (too easy to flick over to an IDE or GitHub when an idea would pop into my head when at home). The iPad works really well for this but I now find myself using it in work too for almost the same reason. Rather than bringing my laptop to meetings and then getting distracted (same as watching Netflix at home) I now just bring the iPad to take notes or look up stats/analytics online(most of the platforms we use have pretty good iPad UI support). It's been great at properly focusing on meetings, now if I have an idea on a problem I just write it in a note and get on with the meeting rather than finding myself jumping to VS code and trying to work.
basch 8y ago
Are you sure the most common computer isnt a business desktop? What percent of people with office jobs, who are not in IT, sit at a desk all day? Personal computing is probably phone first, work computing I would guess is still desktop, followed by laptop.

PorterDuff 8y ago

Useless old man here. I keep wondering when Apple is going to simply drop their traditional laptop and desktop business in favor of things like this. It's not a great leap of imagination to think of a desktop version of an iPad ala a Chromeboxesque approach.

snazz 8y ago
It does make them a lot more money, even though a significant amount of their most enthusiastic (and evangelical) userbase is the “pro” market.
deleted 8y ago
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rchaud 8y ago
With the 12-inch Macbook and 13" Macbook Air already clogging up the portfolio, I can see them dropping the MBP 13 and keeping just a single large MBP 15 model for the professional market. iOS is nowhere near good enough for Apple to consider scaling back their x86 line too much further. Hardware wise the iPad Pro is really nice, but it doesn't even have mouse support! Android has had that since 2011 at least, but it doesn't have the same ecosystem of good quality work apps.
- jki275 8y ago
  iOS doesn't have mouse support because Apple doesn't want it to, not because it's "not good enough".

Havoc 8y ago

They’re great for travel. That’s about it. The rest of the time I’d rather use a laptop

Jtsummers 8y ago
It's also good for reading. I'd rather have my iPad than my laptop when I'm reading books and taking notes (some notes, if I were in school I'd still want my laptop for that tempo of note taking). I use it a lot at home and the only media that I play is music (with headphones) and then read a lot of books and such with it. Scrivener is pretty good on it for writing, but I don't have a keyboard for it anymore (my wireless keyboard got damaged in a move somehow, still not sure what happened). It's also nicer for tossing in my shoulder bag with a physical book and notebook than dragging around a laptop.

e40 8y ago

My stepmother uses one to browse Facebook. It's the only time I've ever seen an adult use one. The other case I've seen, and a lot: children. Parents seem to give them to their kids to mollify them. (I had this choice and did not give into the temptation.)

Jtsummers 8y ago
Reading, they're great for reading. If you read technical content, especially, where Kindles and other e-readers are either too small or don't provide the color you'd want for seeing some diagrams and other content.

cm2187 8y ago

Ain't under 25, but I was skeptical about tablets until I found two critical use cases. 1) browsing the web from my bathtub 2) watching movies in long trips.

kingosticks 8y ago
Honest question: are they waterproof these days? I used to have a waterproof "case" (a glorified plastic bag) for my kindle for the tub but that only worked because it had buttons. How can you use a touchscreen it with wet hands? And what if you drop it, that's $400 down the plug hole.
- cm2187 8y ago
  I have done that for years and never dropped an ipad. But there is a secret: pick a hard ipad cover that only folds at the edge of the ipad, like a book. Then you can stick your finger between the cover and the ipad and hold it like that: https://imgur.com/n22Ce1p https://imgur.com/n22Ce1p https://imgur.com/De9VBCx https://imgur.com/De9VBCx This way, you can hold it with one hand, you don't need to apply pressure to hold the ipad, it is not tiring on your hands, and it is extremely stable. The cover I use I believe is this one: https://www.amazon.co.uk/Invision-Superior-Features-Magnetic-Recommended/dp/B005LXW9KK/ref=sr_1_1 https://www.amazon.co.uk/Invision-Superior-Features-Magnetic... Otherwise the ipad is splash proof, but I wouldn't bet on it being waterproof. And wet hands aren't too much of a problem from a touch point of view, but they leave drops that obstruct the display so you kind of want to have a towel around somewhere.
  - kingosticks 8y ago
    Ah OK makes sense. Thanks for that tip, much appreciated. I guess I never actually dropped the kindle either, although it did mysteriously stop working.

balls187 8y ago

Do you own a tablet? I didn't really see the need for one, until I bought one on a whim. It's my main multimedia consumption device.

rosege 8y ago

I think you might be right - I know quite a few people in their 70s who love the mini. They were quite upset 6 months ago when I was telling them it looked like it was going to be discontinued. I guess all those predictions of its death were wrong!

bookofjoe 8y ago

I'm 70 and have an iPad Gen 3 (2012), an iPad mini Gen 2 (2013), and an iPad Pro (late 2018 Gen 3) + Apple Pencil Gen 2. I'm pretty sure if I were under 25 I'd be just as stoked about them — though prolly unable to afford them.

danieldk 8y ago

I'm wondering if the appeal of these begins when you get older? I am 36, I had several iPads, but they always end up gathering dust in a closet. For work, I am several times more productive on a laptop, for occasional browsing, e-mail, etc. iPhones have become large enough. So, at some point I just sold my last iPad and never bought a new one. My wife also has an iPad, but only uses it quite rarely. And when she does, she usually finds that she has to charge it ;). Others have mentioned iPads as a kid's device. Our daughter (5) likes the iPad, and occasionally uses it to program her Micro:Bit. Other than that we've found that most iPad apps for kids aren't all that great, so we just prefer physical books, sketchbooks, paint, Lego, etc. She loves Lego and paper. She probably uses the iPad every month or so. She did get a Nintendo DS recently for playing games, though we do severely limit the amount of DS screen time though. We are considering to buy her a NUC with Linux, just to tinker. My dad allowed me to poke his MS-DOS PC when I was about her age. I loved it and learned a lot. Since she likes her Micro:Bit a lot, I think she'd do well on some non-walled garden machine. No pressure though, we'll just put it there and see if she is interested or not.

wenc 8y ago

I'm a bit older than you, work in software dev and data science, main platform Linux. I'm the sort of person who has a few command-line windows and vim open, and am a keyboard fiend. Yet... I use my iPad a ton at home and when I travel (I travel a lot). I don't even own a personal laptop anymore -- I work on desktops with 3 monitors and at home. I used to think that the iPad being purely a consumption device was too limiting, until I got an iPad Air 2 that was on sale at the time. It does everything I need just fine, plus it's lightweight enough to travel with. (caveat: I don't do any dev work when I'm on the road)

xhruso00 8y ago

iPad is a perfect device for my mum who doesn't know how to use computer. I would never buy any other device because of UI/UX. She uses it for browsing so there is no real need to upgrade as I keep her on old iOS due to familiarity and battery life (those who upgrade know the battery life is best when iOS isn't updated)

kakaorka 8y ago
I agree with you that upgrading usually means worse battery life, but iOS 12 was an exception to this I believe.

bashwizard 8y ago

I'm 35 and this is what I use mine for: - Blink Shell and Mosh to do light coding in vim, remote scanning etc on my desktop at home while I'm away from home - Effects processor in my music production/dj setup - Paint/sketch in procreate - Reading books - Watching movies/series while traveling - Control my Sonos setup - Browsing the web obviously So to answer your question; no it doesn't. The iPad product line is probably not for people coding during the day and playing fortnite at night.

halbritt 8y ago

I primarily read books through Kindle and O'Reilly (Safari Books Online). I went through a couple different kindle devices. E-Paper type devices are good for prose, but not really that great for any books with graphical content and don't work at all with web content. I tried using a Kindle Fire, but the pixel density on all those devices is terrible. I had an older Fire HD for a moment which was decent at 254ppi, but it bricked itself during an upgrade. Amazon offered me a discount on a "newer" unit with 189ppi. I gave up and got an iPad mini with a 326ppi display. I mostly use it for reading books on public transportation.

fxfan 8y ago

I will be downvoted to hell but I'll say this- tablets for fun were a fad that most people don't repeat twice (except the tech crazy/HN type crowd). Some people still use tablets for work (something the iLine of devices is horribly deficient at) and surface works well- I think you can install linux too.

halbritt 8y ago
I think they have enough use cases that they'll continue to sell, but I think the market is pretty much saturated at this point.

jxdxbx 8y ago

I stopped using a laptop a while ago. For me, when I need to do complicated work I sit down at a desk with my 30” monitor and clacky keyboard. But on the go and for day-to-day tasks all I need is my 12.9” iPad Pro which, as a bonus, is s much better entertainment machine (reading comics and magazines, video, games) than my laptop ever was. I’m a lawyer fyi, so no I'm not writing apps on the thing or doing fancy multimedia workflows.

oarsinsync 8y ago

I got a bonus roughly twice the cost of the iPad 2 64GB when it first came out, so I used half of it to buy it on a whim, no use case in mind at the time. It's now my primary personal computing device. My day job has me in front of a desktop with keyboard all day. I have little to no desire to do things resembling work when I leave the office. My iPhone SE is too small to use for extended periods (but I won't get a bigger one as I want to be able to use it one-handed and hands wont oblige), so the iPad (now an iPad Pro) gets all my outside-the-office attention. Reading, planning holidays & booking flights, budgeting, Netflix, whatever.

gglitch 8y ago
What do you use to budget?

kristianc 8y ago

You probably overstated your case by saying that only people over 50 are interested in them (though my parents have one each), but the number of people in their 30s saying they have one on this thread is interesting for sure.

hellofunk 8y ago

What do you use to read books on? For me, the iPad, for either Kindle books or general PDFs, was a game-changer for me. I also use it for watching lots of movies or TV shows.

armandososa 8y ago

I had iPads 1 trough 3, and they were awesome comic-reading devices. Then amazon bought Comixology and buying comics became too much of a hassle and I stop using my iPad altogether.

askafriend 8y ago

Talk to a designer of any kind. They’re hooked on iPad. All the designers at our company have personal iPads that they use for various things including illustration, taking notes, sketching concepts, wire framing, etc. I’m not a designer but I’m a hobbyist photographer and I love using my iPad for editing photos in Lightroom, reading, consuming media, etc. I can’t wait until Adobe fills out their creative suite on iPad. They announced that a fully featured Photoshop will come to iPad in 2019 - we’ll see. I wrote this comment on an iPad, in fact. I do use the keyboard cover though so don’t get the impression that I wrote this on the on-screen software keyboard. That’d be tough.

Woofles 8y ago

I'm 25 and work in software and I have found it to be a decent (not amazing, but solid) daily driver given you're willing to put up with some annoyances. I use the app Termius to allow me to SSH into a VPS and my home server and do development. I don't really do web development in my free time so I don't have to worry about the pains of not having a js console. I also develop almost exclusively in vim, so paired with the magic keyboard it's basically a very lightweight laptop. It's great for Lightroom, with a dongle (everyone's favorite thing) you can connect your camera and upload RAW photos, then edit them with Lightroom and upload to your favorite site. It's wonderful for Plex/Netflix/Hulu. Offline viewing is amazing, battery life is better than my laptop by far so it lasts long spurts where I can't charge it. For creatives, there are some amazing digital art apps. My friend hypes up Procreate every time we talk about iPads (he's also 25/software and loves his iPad Pro). And lastly, it's about $1k cheaper than buying a MacBook Pro (which I had previously). I was able to trade in my 2013 MBP and old iPhone and made the final cost about $300, which is much more palatable than the extra $1k or so I'd need for a machine that doesn't really need that much computing power. Disclaimer: I do use a MacBook Pro for work (running VMs, development in vim) and it's definitely easier (has JS console, can do development without internet, can use IDEs that don't exist on iPad).

vbezhenar 8y ago

I bought iPad 3 in 2013 (I was 25). I liked it a lot and spent almost all entertainment time with it: web, movies, books, games. I even used it for work a little bit (to present design to customer). Unfortunately with iOS 7 release it turned to potato and I never used it since then, except for occasional PDF reading (I'm reading epub from phone, but for PDF big screen is a must). I waited for that announcement and I expected them to update cheap iPad. I would buy it. But I'm not sure about that iPad Air, it costs too much and I probably won't buy it. Actually funny thing is, it's iPad that led me to Apple ecosystem. I liked iOS a lot and then my old phone broke, so I had to buy new. When I realized, that I can buy iPhone 4S and have the same iOS that I'm using on iPad, it was almost a non-brainer and later I bought Macbook, because it felt pretty natural to keep using Apple product and I wanted to develop iOS apps. I shifted from macOS recently (Apple does not make any computers I would like to buy), but I'm still using iOS on my phone and I like it.

eeeeeeeeeeeee 8y ago

I think you’re right. I have one but never use it. My dad, however, in his 70s, loves his. He still has a laptop but rarely ever uses it now. The iPad is basically his computer.

Shivetya 8y ago

I gave one to my mother and father to use to manage their email and surfing the web while at home and RV traveling; many parks of wi-fi and there is always McD. They are just the right size to easily portable and big enough with pinch/zoom to make easy reading for even poor eyes. the logic was it kept them from being stuck in the room with their computers. even laptops seem to find permanent homes but not a tablet. my father even figured out to use his cell phone as a wi-fi hotspot.

qubex 8y ago

I'm pushing 38 and an executive and iPads of various generations (which I have refreshed yearly) have been my main working/travelling machine right since the release of the very first versions. I still have a i7 MacBook, a specced-out quad-core 2012 MacMini (with dual CinemaDisplays) and a trashcan Mac Pro, but somehow the iPad (currently in it's 11” iPadPro incarnation) is always my favourite tool both because of its portability and because of its focus. You'd be amazed what I can do locally on this machine: construct, symbolically solve, and make predictions based thereupon mathematical models being one of the things that surprise people most. Writing and locally executing Python code. Storing versioned copies of business plans.

subhro 8y ago

The iPad mini is extremely popular among pilots. The iPad Pro is too big for the general aviation (and even commercial aviation) in my opinion, and iPad non pros so far does not have enough oomph to run ForeFlight. Source: I am a pilot.

irrational 8y ago

They are great for playing digital board games: Carcassonne, Ticket to Ride, Agricola, Colt Express, Patchwork, Twilight Struggle, Pandemic, Splendor, Castles of Mad King Ludwig, etc. Though there is also something to be said for the eye sight factor. I'm in my mid-40s and my focusing just doesn't work as well as it used to. Its becoming increasingly difficult to do a lot of reading on a small screen like my iphone 8+.

occamschainsaw 8y ago

Counter point: I am also 24 but in academia. A lot of people in our age group (and professors) use tablets (especially with styluses, iPad Pro and Surface). I guess it is field dependent. It is a blessing for managing stacks of research papers and taking notes. I got the new iPad Pro and installed some latex and jupyter apps, and with a decent terminal app, I can start working on my iPad. YMMV ofcourse.

jdlyga 8y ago

I have an iPad for reading. It works better with PDFs than Kindles since it's larger, and the pencil is great for highlighting and taking notes.

mixmastamyk 8y ago

Movies and TV. Cut the cable bill a decade ago. Got rid of the giant, heavy, expensive, fear-mongering TV. Now watch a small screen with a mount that is much closer.

mercer 8y ago

I used my iPad Mini quite a lot for browsing and reading, but since I got a dedicated eReader it's mostly been collecting dust. I think if I had a bigger iPad it might find some use, but I can't really justify the cost for the minimal benefit over simply using my laptop instead (even as someone with a decent income).

pk2200 8y ago

One use case I haven't seen mentioned is note-taking. Apple Pencil is a truly amazing device. I use it at work all the time, especially in meetings. It's quieter than typing and because I don't have my laptop open, I'm much less likely to get distracted by slack, email, HN, etc. It's also slower typing, but that may be a good thing because it forces me to mentally organize/consolidate whatever I'm writing.

anisppp 8y ago

If you were in the healthcare industry your experience would be different

asark 8y ago

1) they're great for certain kinds of graphic art. 2) they're great for various sorts of low-end creative work, like making films (think: for kids or adults to learn the basics of shooting and editing on a single device capable of making something half-decent, not pro-level) 3) Good as a writing terminal, given an external keyboard. Better than a laptop in a lot of ways. 4) The 12.9" pro's the best device I've seen for reading comics, by far. 5) iPads are easily the best devices I've seen for reading PDFs (lots of non-fiction books and papers) 6) in a lot of important ways, they Just Work, unlike most other computing devices. More so than macOS machines, even, by a good margin. 7) it's where edutainment and casual science software's at now. Want software for some not-super-serious stargazing? You'll want an iPad. Edutainment programs for kids (like the Math Blasters and Number Munchers and Microsoft Dinosaurs! of yore) are mostly on iPads. Swift playground, for that matter. 8) can be positioned to take up a lot less space on a desk than a laptop while in use—nice when you need that desk space for other things, like books or notebooks. 9) portable second monitor for your macbook.

TulliusCicero 8y ago

They're great as a digital babysitter. Sometimes you just need your kid to sit quietly, and they're a total lifesaver for something like long flights.

imandride 8y ago

I'm 26 and since I purchased a Surface Book, my iPad has been gathering dust. The convenience of having both available in one package has been great.

noir_lord 8y ago

I have the current iPad and an iPad Mini. I use the mini far more, I like the bigger iPad but the mini is the perfect form factor for watching TV in bed and reading PDF's. Will definitely be picking up the new Mini and the old one which is in perfect condition will go to the boy. He loves his (1st gen) iPad but it's finally on the way out.

KennyCason 8y ago

I’m in my early 30s and bought an iPad last year to give digital art a try. I ended up falling in love with it and regularly use it to draw. I also now draw all my graphics for my indie game development with it. I primarily use Pixaki and Procreate. It certainly beats using a mouse to draw or even any other drawing pad I’ve used previously. It’s also, imo, a far smoother/natural experience than a Wacom. I was then very surprised by the long battery life and now also use it to watch Netflix.

jen729w 8y ago

I’m 42. My first computer was a ZX Spectrum+ back in the 80s. I bought the first iPad the day it came out because I’m a(n Apple) nerd. I loved it, because it was amazing. Then for a while I fell out of love with it, because I wasn’t sure what it was for. Now I work from home and this thing (10.5” Pro, previous model) is like my pet dog. It follows me everywhere. It plays music via AirPlay, it plays podcasts from its speakers while I’m in the shower, I text on it, answer calls, do most of my casual internet, do most of my casual notes (Bear, with the Smart Keyboard), calendar ... everything. I sometimes look at this device and really think that in many ways, here we are. The future. I have this impossibly slim, sturdy, beautiful tablet, whose battery life is extraordinary, which does everything I could possibly want. It’s a little bit Star Trek. Now, for proper work, the MacBook Pro on the desk upstairs plugged in to the 27” monitor is the way to go. But I type this to you from my kitchen bench as I make my girl her morning coffee, and that’s just fantastic.

baq 8y ago

have kids, with some kid-proof rubber armor that doubles as a stand it's the single best portable video player in existence.

alekq 8y ago

It is probably more connected to career choice and technical background of the person, then the age. I am pretty sure that most of people can use it as domestic media consumption device (it really is perfect use case), however when it comes to work, people I meet in my business use it for it’s compact size and battery life (great for travels and portability in general), as well presentation-wise possibilities.

fwip 8y ago

If you use your phone a lot at home, you'll probably appreciate using a tablet instead. If you use your laptop a lot at home but don't really need to type that much, you'll probably appreciate a tablet. Otherwise, it's probably not for you.

anth_anm 8y ago

I'm 30 but I only use mine to read comics. Doesnt' help that I stupidly bought the 16GB version, crippling it.

Bokanovsky 8y ago

Tablets are useful for commuters. If you're on a train you can read ebooks. Comics publishers now have tons of stuff you can read too. You can also watch Netflix and similar services that let you download content. This takes the edge off repetitive train journeys. At work I've seen business analysts use it as a light weight laptop replacement to take notes (with the addition of the keyboard) and with the Apple Pencil to draw basic diagrams while on the go. Photographers also use them to show off portfolios and do image editing editing on the go. You can get Lightroom and Photoshop for the iPad and other software vendors offer competing products to edit images on the go. Also don't forget kids. For long car journeys, a tablet loaded up with a mix of shows and appropriate (often educational) apps can help them stop asking the dreaded "Are we nearly there yet?!"

blablablabla991 8y ago

I wouldn't personally need one, but it is great for kids imo.

Grustaf 8y ago

I live in Denmark and am above 40. i don’t think I’ve met anyone here with children that doesn’t have one or more ipads. I also don’t think ipad less developers are very common at any age. At my former company even our android developer had one. Of course Scanidnavia is iOS country, almost eveyone has an iPhone.

skrowl 8y ago

I think most people progress past tablets to things like Surface Pros and Chromebooks naturally. The tablet market is dying because it's just not useful in a world where Chromebooks & Surface form factor PCs can run Android apps.

graeme 8y ago
Apple sells mpre ipads annually than surface pros and chromebooka put together. About 43 million ipads in 2018: https://www.lifewire.com/how-many-ipads-sold-1994296 https://www.lifewire.com/how-many-ipads-sold-1994296 Chromebook is estimated to be under 11 million: https://www.computerworld.com/article/2476098/huge-chromebook-sales-growth--will-2019-be-the-year-of-the-linux-desktop-.html https://www.computerworld.com/article/2476098/huge-chromeboo... I couldn’t find 2018 unit estimates for the surfsce, but in 2017 the estimate was about 3 million: https://www.pcworld.com/article/3254235/microsofts-surface-pro-turns-5.html https://www.pcworld.com/article/3254235/microsofts-surface-p... Surface revenue in 2018 was about 5 billion. Apple’s ipad revenue was a bit under 20 billion. And these surface numbers are for everything in the surface line, not just pros. A more likely explanation for lower ipad sales is that they last a long time. My ipad air 2 from 2014 still runs beautifully and gets security and software updates. But in any case ipad sales dwarf the surface and and chromebook sales combined.

cafebeen 8y ago

Perhaps a person's interests, income, or lifestyle are salient variables as well? I would guess that each person's circle of friends has some of these in common in addition to age (likely true for HN discussions as well). For a less biased picture, here are some statistics about tablet use by age: https://www.statista.com/statistics/805143/us-tablete-users-by-age-group/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/805143/us-tablete-users-... and for a baseline, iPhone use by age: https://www.statista.com/statistics/203063/iphone-users-in-the-united-states-by-age/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/203063/iphone-users-in-t... It's striking how uniform the distribution of tablet use was across age! There was a bump after age 25, though that was mirrored in the iPhone usage. This is really salient at the low and high end: age 0-18 was 20% of tablet usage and only 6% of iPhone usage, and age 55+ was 20% of tablet usage and only 14% of iPhone usage. Given all of this, it seems like tablets are quite broadly adopted devices

albertshin 8y ago

The number of students that simply download slides and take notes directly on their iPads with their Apple Pencils is astonishing these days...

graeme 8y ago

I use an imac for stationary work, and an ipad pro for everything else. I have nomuse for a laptop while travelling now. It helps that I have to make educational videos, so I have a clear use case for the pro with the pencil. Can plug a focusrite audiobox in too, and power it from the usb c port. Originally got an ipad as I used it for online tutoring with a whiteboard and a stylus, pre-pencil days. Oddly enough I do a lot of email and text work on my imac. The ipad pros browser has a lot of subtle limitations compared to the desktop version.

baby 8y ago

I use the iPad pro to read whitepapers (because it's bad for multi-tasking, I can focus on reading) and draw (the pen is freaking amazing).

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bas_ta 8y ago

I'm 27, a software engineer and I've only recently bought an iPad with Apple pencil support because I wanted to try out Procreate in my spare time. I use my iPad for: - drawing and lettering in Procreate (this is what I do most of the time, I've been practicing lettering on paper before and this is just so much more convenient) - writing notes in Notes app (that way I can see them on my iPhone) or OneNote - browsing Pinterest (the app works better than the web app I use on Safari in macOS) - YouTube (much more convenient to carry around home than my MacBook Pro) I don't use iPad for messaging, because I mostly use my iPhone and MacBook for that. I decided I don't need a keyboard for the iPad ATM, but maybe that'll change in the future.

wingerlang 8y ago

I've used an iPad since 2012 give or take, when I was under 25. I don't see what it has to do with age, for me it is a use case. When I move from my laptop to either toilet, cooking or the bed I simply bring it with me to consume some youtube. It's bigger than a phone, but more mobile than a laptop.