iPad Unfinished Business
On the surface (pun unintended), Apple proffers the iPad Pro as a computer. We don’t begrudge Apple its right to ‘performance bragging’: Witness Apple’s rightfully proud statements about its powerful homegrown Ax line of processors and the impending A10 64-bit processors that easily outperform Seymour Cray’s supercomputers. But simply promoting the iPad to ‘computer’ avoids the real issue: Is the iPad Pro a PC replacement? Can we toss out our laptops and move wholly to our iPads?
The problem with the iPad is both hardware and software related. Anything work related you can do on an iPad can, in most cases be done faster on a Mac. No question.
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This is still one of the fundamental problems with having the iPad attached to a keyboard — when you need to interact with the screen, you have to raise your arm out in front of you to interact with apps, it’s cumbersome and gets tiring very quickly.
iPads are great to use while you’re lounging on the couch. However, they are not so great to use for extended periods of time at a desk.
Dean:
Remember when @tim_cook talked about android tablet apps being blown up phone apps?
The new Apple Store app on iPad is just the iPhone version blown up to fit the screen. Come on…
> "when you need to interact with the screen, you have to raise your arm out in front of you to interact with apps, it’s cumbersome and gets tiring very quickly."
Does it, though? Maybe for some people, but I think a lot of the people complaining about "arm fatigue" have never actually used a setup like this extensively. I'm using a Surface Book regularly, and I never use the mouse to interact with it, and I've never had any kind of problem with it being cumbersome, or tiring. In fact, when I use a MacBook, I have to actively remind myself that I can't touch the screen. "Arm fatigue" seems to be a mostly theoretical problem that doesn't really occur in practice.
Now, if your dual 27-inch Mac Pro setup had touch screens, that might be more of an issue, but for something more MacBook-sized? I doubt most people would notice any kind of issue.