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Category Archives: ipad

10 best (or most important) gadgets of the year

24 Dec

With technology advancing exponentially, so too are the number of new gadgets flooding the market. There are indeed so many gizmos coming out on a daily basis that it’s almost impossible to keep track of them.

That’s why, love them or hate them, top-10 lists are especially useful when it comes to this particular theme. All such lists are purely subjective, as is the one I’ve put together below, but they are handy in identifying some of the standouts amid the sea of stuff out there.

Here are the 10 gadgets I liked best – or that I thought were important – in 2012:

10. Sony 4K TV

sony-4k

With everyone already owning an HDTV, it was inevitable that manufacturers would eventually start pushing the next big thing. Sony is one of the first with its 4K TV, with the 4K standing for the more than 4,000 pixels along its width, making it twice as sharp as a regular 1080p model. This 84-inch beast costs $25,000 so it’s clearly not something I’ll be getting any time soon, but it did look sweet in the demo I saw earlier this year. The only question is: how would Santa get it down the chimney? Read the rest of this entry »

 
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Posted by on December 24, 2012 in android, apple, copyright, gadgets, Google, ipad, iphone, nintendo, samsung, sony, video games

 

The iPad Mini is a big dilemma for Apple

12 Nov

The question now is: Why would anyone want a full-sized iPad?

One thing I didn’t get into when talking about the iPad Mini the other day is its effect on Apple. As the markets have been indicating recently by sending shares tumbling, the device may indeed be a sign of bad things to come for the company.

At $329, the basic iPad Mini is still relatively expensive for a 7-inch-or-thereabouts tablet, but it’s almost $200 cheaper than the latest full-sized iPad. Yet, as I wrote last week, the Mini has a major advantage over its bigger cousin: it’s much smaller and lighter. The only thing it’s missing is a full Retina display, which we can be relatively sure will be in the next model at the same price some time next year. Is a couple inches of screen size and a faster processor inside worth $200? It’s a safe bet that most consumers don’t think so, which is why Apple sold three million a ton of Minis in no time flat.

Once the smaller device gets that Retina display, there’s going to be little reason for the mass market to buy full-sized iPads. The larger tablet, which has been criticized from many corners for being primarily a media consumption toy rather than a productivity device, may ironically see its main use become business situations. Visual artists or sales personnel who need the larger screen might turn out to be the only people who really want these larger tablets. The rest of the mainstream consumer market will likely be quite happy with the smaller, lighter and – most importantly – cheaper iPad Mini. Read the rest of this entry »

 
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Posted by on November 12, 2012 in apple, ipad

 

iPad Mini is almost the ideal tablet

07 Nov

Apple’s senior vice-president of marketing one-hands the iPad Mini.

I’ve been using the iPad Mini for the past few days, and boy was Steve Jobs wrong. The Apple co-founder, before his passing, derided the sort of smaller tablets being pumped out by competitors two years ago as inferior and undesirable. Here’s what he said:

One naturally thinks that a seven-inch screen would offer 70% of the benefits of a 10-inch screen. Unfortunately, this is far from the truth. The screen measurements are diagonal, so that a seven-inch screen is only 45% as large as iPad’s 10-inch screen. You heard me right; just 45% as large.

If you take an iPad and hold it upright in portrait view and draw an imaginary horizontal line halfway down the screen, the screens on the seven-inch tablets are a bit smaller than the bottom half of the iPad display. This size isn’t sufficient to create great tablet apps in our opinion. Read the rest of this entry »

 
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Posted by on November 7, 2012 in apple, ipad

 

Tablets expected to take schools by storm

02 Nov

With the iPad Mini hitting stores today, the tablet wars are heating up. As the technology gets better and cheaper and the competition between manufacturers gets even more fierce, tablets are going to start popping up everywhere, even more so than they already have.

A little while ago, a friend of mine who’s taking some night courses asked me if he should get a laptop or a tablet for taking notes. I instinctively recommended an ultrabook, but he instead went with with a tablet. After thinking about it, he was convinced that it served his course purposes and doubled as a nice entertainment device.

I’d never really considered the classroom as a place where tablets could replace traditional computers, so I talked to some educators and experts about it. With tablet fever gripping the general public, I wanted to know if this was a growing trend among students or if my friend was just crazy.

According to educators, students still prefer to use laptops for taking notes in class, but the tide will shift soon, possibly even this year. Read the rest of this entry »

 
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Posted by on November 2, 2012 in apple, education, Google, ipad

 

10 technologies I’m thankful for

08 Oct

What’s more useful: Google’s Street View or Apple’s Flyover?

It’s Canadian Thanksgiving, which means that many of us here in the Great White North have spent the weekend in food-induced comas. In between bouts of overeating, some of us may also have taken the holiday to heart and reflected on the things we’re grateful for. Since technology is the operative theme in these parts, I spent the weekend thinking about the various gadgets, software and tech-related things that I’m thankful for.

What follows is a top 10 list of technologies – inventions that have made my life better, easier or more productive. I tried not to include the big, obvious things, like the internet, but rather focused on the specifics that have enhanced my particular slice of the world.

10. Amazon: Whenever possible, I buy my stuff on Amazon, mostly because it’s the epitome of how a business should operate: low prices, great service. I also dig the fact that the company is a purposeful disruptor, even this far into its existence. Its ongoing fight with publishers to lower the price of books while at the same time giving authors the power to disintermediate those same publishers makes it an easy company to root for, both as a consumer and as a writer.

9: Xbox 360: I play most of my games on the Xbox 360, mostly because I like its controller better than the PlayStation 3. If measured by the number of hours of pure joy delivered, no other machine or technology even comes close. Read the rest of this entry »

 
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Posted by on October 8, 2012 in amazon, apple, Google, ipad, iphone, microsoft, piracy, radio, skype, video games

 
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