initial iPad thoughts

So the Apple iPad has been released!

What I like from what I see so far!

The price:- for a bit of good looking equipment with the  features it contains I think the entry price is good.  Although  an additional 48 gigs of storage $330 seems a bit steep.

iBooks: It is fantastic that Apple are going with ePub as its format and the application looks like it’s really making an effort to improve the book browsing performance

iPhone application compatibility: By making it so all iPhone applications can run on the iPad gives the opportunity for further innovations from the likes of Stanza, Kobo, Kindle and Fictionwise.  With all these great readers and the new iBooks application eBooks are just going to get better and better.

The touch screen keyboard: Lots of people don’t seem to understand this.  Typing on a tablet till now has been crap, the reason for this was the inability to multi-touch,  i.e. you couldn’t hold the shift key and a letter down at the same time.  This screen will be fine for the touch-typing and the Apple correction software will ensure it.

What could be better?

The OS:- the iPad desperately needs an improvement to include multi-tasking and java compatibility so I can truly browse the web and use this as a home device.

The Screen: oLed is needed to make the screen readable for long times, the compromise is pretty good through and I think will be fantastic for non-fiction books.

Storage: a few movies, few songs, few books and then you will run out of storage.  The storage needs to be expanded or at the very least the ability to add memory cards

ITunes: I don’t want to have to sync this with my computer constantly and I want to be able to travel without the constant need to sync.

Camera: video conferencing please?