tmk-nj Posted December 8, 2012 Posted December 8, 2012 I am looking to buy an iPAD for the family for Christmas. With all the different types, what do you all recommend? I would love to hear what you all have bought and your opinion on it. Thank you. Tom Go BILLS
DrDawkinstein Posted December 8, 2012 Posted December 8, 2012 As far as the product itself goes, it's very nice, reliable, and stable. WRT which model you should get, definitely go with the new Retina display version. After that, all you need to decide is storage capacity and if you want Cell service on it. I have a 16GB with only Wifi. The storage is enough for me because I dont have a ton of apps on it, and I keep my music on my phone. I do wish I wouldve purchased the Cellular capable model, even if I wasnt using the service. It would be nice to have that option, and Ive been stuck without a wifi connection a couple times, but no huge deal. Guess it depends if you plan on traveling with it. MOST IMPORTANT: Always, always get the additional AppleCare protection. If anything goes wrong, or one of the kids breaks it, they'll swap it out with no hassle.
boyst Posted December 8, 2012 Posted December 8, 2012 As far as the product itself goes, it's very nice, reliable, and stable. WRT which model you should get, definitely go with the new Retina display version. After that, all you need to decide is storage capacity and if you want Cell service on it. I have a 16GB with only Wifi. The storage is enough for me because I dont have a ton of apps on it, and I keep my music on my phone. I do wish I wouldve purchased the Cellular capable model, even if I wasnt using the service. It would be nice to have that option, and Ive been stuck without a wifi connection a couple times, but no huge deal. Guess it depends if you plan on traveling with it. MOST IMPORTANT: Always, always get the additional AppleCare protection. If anything goes wrong, or one of the kids breaks it, they'll swap it out with no hassle. Go get FoxFi. It is a app allowing you to turn on your phones wifi hotspoy feature without whatchamacalliting your phone....rooting! Anyway. Yeah, it works for stuff like that. If you have a grandfathered Verizon or other contract of unlinitted data they can't stop you, either. Maybe only attempt to send you a bill for you using it...but that issue is in court already. Verizon got spanked by stopping open GPS. It will on this, too.
UConn James Posted December 8, 2012 Posted December 8, 2012 Like Doc, we got a 16GB iPad 3 back in March/April or whenever it came out.... It's basically replaced my laptop. Also got the wifi-only because it rarely leaves the house and then that's just as an offline games distraction, a shopping list, or for music/camera function. Gotta say that I love the thing. Yep, it cost a bit but it's one time and done. Uses less power than one of those new light bulbs, despite how great the screen looks, and the battery length is awesome. I've got a fair amount of apps, just about all my songs ported over from the laptop, and camera/video-roll with ~300 pictures on it (actually need to delete some stuff that my 4yo niece made of the dog etc. while she was playing with it) and still have a little more than 8GB of space left. Hell, the Simpsons Tapped Out and Temple Runner game apps are almost worth it alone! TuneIn Radio gets ANY station you want crystal clear.... It's just a great little device. And this is from someone who didn't even have a cellphone until about this time last year... not that I'm a technophobe. My father is and even he can get around on it. It just about runs itself. Definitely get the new version, what they're calling the iPad 4 (it has a slightly different power strip design than the third) because some things are starting to lose support from the 1st and 2nd gen. Tried my brother's Nook and that thing is unusable.
HopsGuy Posted December 8, 2012 Posted December 8, 2012 I have a generation 2 iPad WiFi only 32 GB about 15 months ago. I love the thing. I use it like a laptop for everything but hardcore processing applications (Excel, etc). It's pretty great. The only other tablet device I've spent any time with was a Kindle Fire. Last March a bunch of us got together at a sports bar in Charlotte to watch St. Bonas play Xavier in the A-10 championship game. The problem was the game was blacked out in NC because for some reason we were required to watch the meaningless ACC championship game at the time. One of my friends had his 9 year-old in tow and commandeered the only thing that was keeping him occupied to see if I could find a pirate feed. No dice but we were able to run the ESPN Gamecast just to keep up. It seemed like a nice device for what we were trying to do. If you're in need of email you might want to research that further but if it does that it might be something that fits your needs at a lower price. Has anyone done a jailbreak of their iPad? I'd like to run HBO GO and watch stuff on a my HDTV and that might free that app up to do so.
Garion Posted December 9, 2012 Posted December 9, 2012 I bought a two with 16mb and no 3G about a year ago and love the thing. We have cell phones if we need 3G coverage for our pattern of use anyhow. I would definitely get one of the newer retina displays but storage capacity is up to you. We limited how much music is stored on it and have been fine with 16.
mead107 Posted December 9, 2012 Posted December 9, 2012 Love the iPad, only 16 MB. Do no music with it and do not watch any movies.
DrDawkinstein Posted December 9, 2012 Posted December 9, 2012 (edited) Can you hook up a large external drive to Ipad? Not really and not directly. It doesnt have a USB port or anything like that. If the drive was networked, and you could browse to it through an app, maybe. But that is basically recreating Apple's cloud service. What do you specifically have in mind with this question? With streaming services such as Pandora and Spotify for music, and Netflix, Hulu+, Amazon, WatchESPN, HBOGo, etc for videos, there really isnt a need to load a bunch of stuff onto the iPad or even keep it in a large personal library. But that is where the importance of the cellular connection comes in. So you can stay connected to those services. Edited December 9, 2012 by DrDareustein
Nanker Posted December 9, 2012 Posted December 9, 2012 (edited) Can you hook up a large external drive to Ipad? Of course you can. But, you're not talking about a clunky, messy wire-based setup are you? Why would you want to connect through a bunch of junky wires to the external storage device's physical location? That's so last decade. Well, if you must. There are devices like this. Edited December 9, 2012 by Nanker
Pete Posted December 9, 2012 Posted December 9, 2012 Not really and not directly. It doesnt have a USB port or anything like that. If the drive was networked, and you could browse to it through an app, maybe. But that is basically recreating Apple's cloud service. What do you specifically have in mind with this question? With streaming services such as Pandora and Spotify for music, and Netflix, Hulu+, Amazon, WatchESPN, HBOGo, etc for videos, there really isnt a need to load a bunch of stuff onto the iPad or even keep it in a large personal library. But that is where the importance of the cellular connection comes in. So you can stay connected to those services. Thanks for the info. I am interested in a retina display macbook pro, but those are so costly. I was thinking perhaps the Ipad might work. I have 2 TB of photos I would like to edit, and I have Mac specific photo software. Sounds like macbook pro is way to go. I will wait it out until the price drops a little
DrDawkinstein Posted December 9, 2012 Posted December 9, 2012 Thanks for the info. I am interested in a retina display macbook pro, but those are so costly. I was thinking perhaps the Ipad might work. I have 2 TB of photos I would like to edit, and I have Mac specific photo software. Sounds like macbook pro is way to go. I will wait it out until the price drops a little Macbook Pro is definitely the way to go for you. Again, get the Apple Care.
Fezmid Posted December 9, 2012 Posted December 9, 2012 The only other tablet device I've spent any time with was a Kindle Fire...It seemed like a nice device for what we were trying to do. If you're in need of email you might want to research that further but if it does that it might be something that fits your needs at a lower price. My wife has a Fire and loves it. In fact, she's upgrading to the larger one (8.9") this month. The advantages to the Fire are that it's much more portable (because it's smaller), it's much cheaper, and it integrates with Amazon perfectly. The downsides are that it's smaller (double edged sword, right?) and doesn't have QUITE as nice a display (although it's still very good). Some people will still point to the fact that iPad has more apps -- but realistically anything you can do on the iPad, you can do on the Fire (or any Android tablet, for that matter). It's all personal preference. And if you want a smaller tablet, the iPad mini is also an option.
Captain Hindsight Posted December 10, 2012 Posted December 10, 2012 My parents both have the ipad and love it. Lots of good advice in this thread my parents describe it as a web browser. For myself, going back to school shortly it makes more sense for me to have a full on laptop but I must admit they are pretty cool
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