Apple iPad initial thoughts
Good pricing with 6 models and $30 per month 3G. Kudos on making their own processor. Quite surprising that Apple didn't need any help from Texas Instruments or Nvidia. As with the iPhone, there is no multi-tasking, which really helps performance. The 1 Ghz CPU could probably keep a few things running, but it really depends on the RAM. How much RAM does it have? I'd guess 1 or 2 GB. I predict a software revision down the road that allows you to run a few iPhone size apps side by side. Edit: The worst part here is the web browser doesn't have tabs. I have been using tabs for about 6 years, and can't imagine browsing without them. Leaving out tabs is inexcusable, and a deal breaker for most users. Not sure if a video camera will come in a hardware revision or a peripheral.
The resolution is 1024 by 768. Not wide screen or high definition (although the pixel density is plenty). So most new videos will not fill the entire screen unless cropped. Of course, there is a huge back catalog of 4:3 television shows that fit perfectly (and actually look lame with black bars on the sides on our wide screen monitors and televisions). The ratio is probably nice in portrait mode for reading books and other text. Speaking of reading, there are e-books and a dedicated New York Times browser. Steve Jobs mentioned they're using some standard book format. Not sure if that is rich enough. I'm hoping to see HTML5 take off and for some sort of magazine or newspaper style of website to emerge, similar to all the websites optimized for iPhone that have popped up.
