I have an iPad mini, and I like the size of it very much. I hesitated for awhile until finally I decided to switch, from 7.9" to 9.7" screen. It sure take a little getting use to, but I'll be okay real soon I guess. Anyway, this is not going to be the usual review you saw from other website, comparing soecs and comparing with previous generation iPad and etc. I'm just sharing my thoughts about this piece of gadget that I have been using these few days.
I really love the mini, but seriously, it is really slow. And I always have issue with it's wifi, the connection always seems weak. And after the iOS 7 update, the chipset's age gets even more apparent. So, why Air and not the mini with retina display, or maybe something else like the Nexus 7 or Galaxy Note 10? Well, seriously, in the market, currently there's only two tablet you can consider: iPad or Nexus. Oh, if you need water proof, Sony has something to offer. Other than that, forget it. So I decided to go for Air instead because: free iLife and iWorks suite from Apple, and the retina display for mini will surely hit by some production issue (and it's already proven with user reporting with image retention issue on their screen).
I wanted to start making full use of the iLife and iWorks apps, on a mini, with the limited screen estate, it is going to be hard and tuff. While I still think that the mini serves better in terms of reading books and playing games, but we have to compromise somewhere, don't we? So I trade in my mini for the Air. It's light, it's fast, it's slim. But that pretty much sum it all. I'm amaze by the engineering effort put behind this device, I'm already aware of the speed of the A7 chip as I have the iPhone 5s, the weight... Well, it's lighter obviously, but it doesn't have that WOW factor in lightness like the iPhone 5 during it's debut. No touch ID is really a bummer, I guess Apple is saving it for next year, otherwise there will be no new feature to talk about in their keynote. The speaker is too bassy to my liking, otherwise every other thing just works fine like the iPad you use to know of.
All in all, the hardware of iPad Air is amazing, really, no doubt. But there's really nothing much to talk about other than that. Is it because there's no innovation in it? Well, not really. I would say iPad was already a great and refined product to begin with during it's first debut, therefore there's really nothing much can be done to take a leap other than making it faster slimmer lighter. But one thing that I really can see for room of improvement is on the software side. Sure iOS 7 is great and nice, but seriously, on the iPad... A lot of times it just feels like a blown up iPhone. Apple really should focus on making iOS better for iPad, as currently there's a lot of potential in it that's got wasted.
So what's the problem with iOS on iPad? The waste of screen estate. On the iPhone, you get a 4" screen, I can surely forgive Apple for only allowing app icon to show on screen while we need to get into notification centre for other information that we need, but on the iPad, with such huge screen being used to just shiw rows of icons... It's a total waste. Well, maybe they have to make sure the OS is not that much different from the iPhone than on the iPad, but it really is degrading my user experience with it. On the androids, you can choose to put all sorts of widget to display info that you need, and now with KitKat coming, there's a home screen for Google Now which shows you all information that you want and need in a single page. That's something really useful, and if iPad can do that, it would have been great.
Another things that can be improve will be multi window or multi apps running simultaneously on screen. On a phone, this feature is rather meaningless, but on the tablet... It's going to be a whole new level of experience. It will make the tablet gets closer to replace your laptop or desktop. There are all sorts of apps that designed for iPad, which is one of the main reason I have switched from android tablet to iPad (yes, I used to own an android tablet until I fed up with it), and this is really good. If only Apple can improve the iOS for iPad further, otherwise we will probably be seeing just incremental upgrade for years to come.
All said, I have some plans on my mind to make my new toy really work it's ass for me. Even now this post was completely typed out and posted from my iPad Air, which is something I normally do only on my laptop. I'm exploring the possibilities of spending the money on an iOS devices (where you can literally get yourself a laptop with the same amount of money) and we'll see how things work out ultimately. And if android tablets really catches up someday in terms of overall product built quality and user experience, who knows I might even switch back to android for their "openness". Till then, I'll still enjoy tourturing my iPad while still hoping deep down in my heart that the iOS can really improve further on the iPad.
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