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Lighter. Faster. More magical. Sigh. Disappointing. What happened to doing something revolutionary? Where is the the text input? Apple are driving by cre

• deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
• seanmcdirmid 13y ago
  1 lbs for a 10" tablet is not revolutionary? Plenty of people are writing books on Apple tablets, it's easy to attach a keyboard and many do. Or maybe you meant that as a non sequitur?
  • jewel 13y ago
    > 1 lbs for a 10" tablet is not revolutionary? It's a welcome incremental upgrade, but that's not what most people would consider revolutionary. The 10" Sony tablet is 1.09 pounds. Revolutionary would be something like eye tracking and constant voice input to make it possible to do completely hands-free usage.
    • memossy 13y ago
      Kindle HDX 8.9" a similar size, but 0.82 lbs (20% lighter)
      • acqq 13y ago
        The display area is significantly smaller in Kindle. Try to calculate. I get 45 sq in for iPad, 36 sq in for Kindle.
      • enraged_camel 13y ago
        Yeah, and my Hyundai Santa Fe is 20% larger than a Honda Civic, which clearly makes it better.
        • Kylekramer 13y ago
          And if anyone had said the Kindle was better, this snark would be relevant. But this is clearly a discussion of tablets' weight and whether the iPad Air's weight is a significant advance.
          • enraged_camel 13y ago
            The weight does not exist in a vacuum. It has to be evaluated in light of not just the other specs, but also the user experience. Think about this: if the Honda Civic was upgraded to be able to do everything my SUV can, including towing, off-roading, cargo capacity, and overall comfort, but its size AND price stayed the same, would that not be considered revolutionary?
            • Kylekramer 13y ago
              I guess that is a reasonable argument, but it was not at all what I got from your original post. Obviously all the features must be considered in concert under the umbrella of "user experience" but that is also nearly impossible to discuss as everyone's experience is personal and difficult to express. I don't think the iPad shaving off 200g is anywhere near upgrading a Civic to be able to do everything my SUV can for the same price and size, but I can see someone thinking that.
            • officemonkey 13y ago
              Weight clearly exists in a vacuum. Weight doesn't exist without gravity, because weight is mass times 9.8 m/s^2. Signed, Physics pedant.
      • jfb 13y ago
        But that's hardly revolutionary, given that the HDX is ~20% smaller.
        • phaus 13y ago
          I'm impressed that Apple got the weight down to 1lb, but shrinking the size of a consumer electronics device is par for the course, not really something that I would consider "revolutionary."
    • rsynnott 13y ago
      > Revolutionary would be something like eye tracking and constant voice input to make it possible to do completely hands-free usage. Ah, I see. "Revolutionary" is a code-word for "gimmick which will not work properly, but will look good in the marketing". As in "Siri is revolutionary".
  • deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
• fivethree 13y ago
  It's 2013 and most people's data is in the cloud rather than on local devices? Just because something is capable of doing something doesn't mean it should. A Truck is capable of street racing, but you'd be better off in an actual racing car. Make devices for specific use cases, not for everything. That's how you end up with Windows 8.
  • nknighthb 13y ago
    Games can easily kill 16GB of storage, no matter what other media you might have on the device, and apps in general are bigger than they used to be with Retina resources. And "the cloud" really does me no good on a plane or a road trip or anywhere else fast wifi may not be available. 16GB is small enough to require active storage management, even for fairly casual users. It's becoming a real issue.
    • etchalon 13y ago
      …hence why larger sizes are available?
      • nknighthb 13y ago
        If Boeing made a jet that everyone over 4' tall had to bend in half to sit in, would you say "hence why larger sizes are available"? 16GB iPads are a poor (or at least mediocre) user experience, even for ordinary users. It's contrary to Apple's ethos to continue making them at all. It's even sillier when you consider that everything else about the baseline $499 model has been drastically improved several times over since 2010, and Apple has taken steps that clearly reduced the utility of the 16GB baseline (retina graphics, full HD video). 32GB should be the new $499 baseline. It's way past time.
        • mddw 13y ago
          Ahah, the mythical ordinary user. I know some users. I don't know if they are ordinary. I think they are. My parents in their 50's. A grandmother of 80. Some friends which are 30 with a very average computer literacy. Every one of them took fast with the iPad (that's how Apple is good), but no one of 'em'll fill 16gb of space.
• devindotcom 13y ago
  My, how entitled we are! Your priorities may differ from the tens of millions who have bought these, the most popular tablets in the world. Apple is making safe, welcome changes to their products, which is something you can do in times of plenty. Personally, I will be happy to have an iPad that lasts longer, doesn't take ages to turn a page in a high-rez PDF, and is half a pound lighter. What happened to doing something revolutionary? Lord! Do it yourself! Who says you can't write a book? And why do you have to do it on an iPad? Why not a Surface or whatnot, if that's your priority? Why not a MacBook Air or ultrabook? Your complaints infuriate me!
  • nawitus 13y ago
    Making small, iterative upgrades to a product is fine, but then you shouldn't post it on Hacker News like it's something important.
    • DanHulton 13y ago
      a) Apple didn't post this, an interested user did. b) It's interesting to hackers and has plenty of upvotes. c) To a lot of people using this site, it is something important.
      • nawitus 13y ago
        a) Never claimed they did, b1) that's debatable b2) my comment tried to say that maybe it shouldn't be upvoted c) each to their own
        • sbuk 13y ago
          a) No, you merely insinuated it, b1) no, the 210 [at time of writing] make it a substantiated fact, (b2) who do you think you are to suggest whether or not some votes for a article. It's how the set works. Don't like the article, don't click the link it really is that simple, (3) absolutely. It would've helped if you'd applied tha before posting first.
        • sbuk 13y ago
• roryobrien 13y ago
  I'm sure they have some real 'revolutionary' products on the road map, but from a business standpoint, why change what they are doing? They are profitable with their current product releases because of their crazy following. Small iterations to their technology that (my guess) cost very little but they can sell at a higher margin? Money in the bank. That 16gb HD is to make sure you pay them monthly for your necessary iCloud space. We are slaves to the Apple ways! I'm sure we'll see something in the next year or two that is actually brand new that's not just a small upgrade to their current line up.
  • xerophtye 13y ago
    I acknowlledge your point that people only innovate when they really NEED it. That's why disruptive innovation comes from more downtrodden companies. But apple is famous for the opposite of this. That even when at the top, they keep innovating to REMAIN at the top. And that is why its always a let down to see a new product with no innovation
• cylinder 13y ago
  I don't understand why you would want to write your book on a tablet. Sounds counterintuitive. Why not just use a real keyboard and OS on a Macbook Air? They are marginally thicker than the iPad.
  • rfnslyr 13y ago
    Why not just use a goddamn type writer? Man I love typing on those things. I still write up my programming assignments on it just to hear the clickity clackity. Computer Science in hard mode: Do your programming assignments on a type writer. Once.
    • mturmon 13y ago
      Hmm, I thought hard mode was toggling the program in using the switches on the front panel. After you translated to machine code.
    • cylinder 13y ago
      Poor analogy. I already said that a Macbook is almost just as thin and light, with a superior OS and input mechanism. Tablets were never intended to be the next generation of word processing devices.
      • hobb0001 13y ago
        > Tablets were never intended to be the next generation of word processing devices. sigh If only that we're true. iWork for iPad was announced at the first iPad announcement.
      • rfnslyr 13y ago
        Wasn't much of an analogy at all, just felt like it was an appropriate time to voice my love for type writers.
    • trentmb 13y ago
      In place editing? Instant copying/backup? I feel your analogy is a bit broken.
• devx 13y ago
  I know at least 2 people who'd love to have the option to buy Wacom pens for iPads. Right now it doesn't really work unless you use some very hacky solutions. I wish Apple supported pressure sensitive pens. I'n also still hoping for an 11"-12" 16:9 iPad Pro (they can just make it longer like they did with the iPhone 5 that comes with a keyboard. It should basically be an iPad laptop (not hybrids, no point) that costs $700, and comes with a new A8 processor in spring, or at least A7X, and maybe 64 GB by default.
  • berntb 13y ago
    >>still hoping for an 11"-12" 16:9 iPad Pro Personally I was hoping for two products; a retina iPad with 11"-13" screen -- and a Macbook Air with the same screen! (If they could reuse the screen and electronics it wouldn't be expensive, but drivers etc would hardly be easy to move over processor architecture?)
    • andy_ppp 13y ago
      Great idea - the top half of the computer is an 11" iPad that detaches from an 11" MacBook Air (keyboard part only) - could be awesome, especially if Remote Desktop worked via Wifi... Software integration would need loads of thought though, as would the hinge/detachment mechanism!
  • aeontech 13y ago
    Have you seen http://intuoscreativestylus.wacom.com/en/ http://intuoscreativestylus.wacom.com/en/ ? No idea how well it works, but might be just what they need.
    • devx 13y ago
      Yeah, it might be pressure sensitive, but I doubt it's anywhere as close to accurate as active digitizer pens. It looks like a capacitive pen with a thick rubber tip, so I doubt it's much more useful than a $20 capacitive stylus.
• snowwrestler 13y ago
  If you look back at their last decade or so, Apple only rarely releases revolutionary things. The bulk of Apple product releases have been incremental upgrades. We just forget about those more easily.
  • epo 13y ago
    Revolutions are notable because of their rarity. Were they commonplace they would be "events". 10, 20 years ago these incremental changes would indeed have seemed revolutionary but now they are just "boring upgrades". Anyway, all these "lack of innovation, where is the revolution" comments are really just Apple haters complaining that there is nothing sexier for Samsung or Microsoft to copy.
• 72deluxe 13y ago
  Tried a Bluetooth keyboard? I have a cheap Chinese knock-off of an Apple keyboard and it works fine. In fact, when using my Motorola Xoom, I use the Bluetooth keyboard plenty when typing because a) typing on a screen is really slow and b) the onscreen keyboard isn't the most responsive in the universe, particularly when in a busy browser.
• rsynnott 13y ago
  > Where is the the text input? Apple are driving by creatives. When can I write my book on my Apple tablet? Er, attach a keyboard to it? What were you expecting, mind-reading?
  • JohnTHaller 13y ago
    Possibly a top-notch first-party keyboard from Apple that turns the iPod into more of a laptop form factor when you want to use it as such. The kind of thing Microsoft is doing with the Surface. As much as Windows RT is pretty useless, the Surface keyboard is a really nice piece of kit.
    • rsynnott 13y ago
      There are already very good third-party solutions (though the better ones tend to be expensive); not sure why Apple making one would make a huge practical difference.