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Eight ways other tablets beat the iPad
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Apple supporters will claim that no competing tablet could offer the "iPad experience," no matter how similar the underlying hardware. However, we believe that thanks to a number of gaffes, the iPad may be less successful than expected. Below is a list of eight problems with the iPad that provide opportunities for competitors.
* Display limitations -- Multi-touch and IPS are good, but at 1024 x 768 pixels, the iPad's screen offers little more real estate than the typical netbook. (If you've owned one of the latter, you know that many web pages just aren't usable or enjoyable with such resolution.)
In an apparent compromise between video and e-book usage models, Apple gave the iPad a 4:3 display, meaning that movies display with thick black bars at top and bottom. We're not sure about reading a novel on this device, either; an E-Ink display wouldn't have worked here, but dual-mode Pixel Qi screens will allow future tablets to be legible even in bright sunlight.
* Lack of multitasking -- Apple's bull-headed insistence on not allowing iPhone OS applications to run in the background (except, of course, for a few of its own) is a deal-breaking deficiency. Not only is this limitation insulting to computer nerds, it's also a hassle for ordinary people, who just want to listen to music streaming from Pandora or keep an instant messaging client alive while they also browse the web.
* Crippled video output -- A tablet device should have an HDMI video output, for easy connection to an external TV screen, not just for movies but also for productivity purposes. Apple's device fails to, and add-on component or composite video cables provide resolution only up to 576p. This is a needless limitation, apparently designed to force those who want to purchase movies from iTunes to buy a separate Apple TV device.
* No cameras -- At the minimum, tablets should have user-facing cameras for video chats, and there's no reason they shouldn't also have cameras for taking pictures. The iPad willfully offers neither.
* No Adobe Flash support -- Apple touts the iPad as "the best way to experience the web." However, as even the company's debut demonstrations yesterday revealed, the iPad doesn't support Adobe's Flash technology, and Apple apparently has no plans to remedy this. Flash has many detractors, but it's an integral part of many websites, which are often incomprehensible without it.
Lack of Flash on the smaller iPhone and iPod Touch is excusable. But no Flash on a 9.7-inch screen? Epic fail.
* No standard USB port or SD slot -- This limitation was expected, since the iPhone and iPod Touch sport only proprietary dock connectors, and Apple has grudgingly added an SD slot to only two MacBook models. An SD slot, which would have been provided by any other manufacturer in the world, would be great for moving pictures and other media onto the iPad, and for adding internal storage. Apple says it will sell a dock-connector-to-SD add-on, but this is just one more thing to buy and is guaranteed to be misplaced when you need it.
As for a USB port, such could have been provided with both host and device capabilities. The former would have allowed connection of an inexpensive wired keyboard, generic battery charger, or even an external hard disk drive, while the latter would have allowed easy connection to a PC. Apple's own cable is sufficient for most of these needs, but the lack of USB underlines the iPad's closed nature: If it's like the iPhone and IPod Touch, the iPad won't emulate a disk drive (though the humble iPod Nano does), forcing owners to use iTunes for moving files to and from the tablet.
* No real GPS -- Unless you pay extra for 3G connectivity, the iPad doesn't include a GPS receiver. On the more expensive models, the device's navigation functionality is described as assisted GPS, meaning that it probably requires the user to have a cellular data plan and be within reach of a carrier network. Apple might have given the iPad the ability to revert to autonomous GPS -- as provided by Linux-based PNDs (personal navigation devices), but we doubt it.
* Awkward text input -- This might seem like a niggling complaint on our part, given that the iPad does include a software keyboard and an optional keyboard dock. But the device does not appear to include anything to make the on-screen typing experience easier, such as the predictive technology, nor does it have haptic feedback to let a user know when a "key" has been pressed.
We could have padded out the above list to at least ten items by criticizing the iPad's looks (ugly large bezel), OS limitations (apart from no multitasking and reliance on iTunes, apps will only run full-screen), lack of a removable battery (of course, that's par for the course from Apple), or reliance on the beleaguered AT&T data network.
However, the eight deficiencies cited above provide manufacturers with plenty of ways to create a variety of iPad-beating devices.
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