Dr. Raymond Soneira, president of DisplayMate Technologies Corporation, informed me that he upgraded the Motorola Droid to Android 2.1. It has taken a long while for Google to get around to updating the Droid to 2.1. All is not good however. Dr. Soneira noticed the Gallery app was downgraded from 24-bit color to 16-bit. In Motorola Droid vs. Google Nexus One the 24-bit color display system garnered a lot of praise:

The Droid provides full on-screen 24-bit color, which has 256 possible intensity levels for each of the Red, Green and Blue sub-pixels that are used to mix and produce all of the on-screen image colors… The image and picture quality on the Droid is actually better than in most computer monitors and HDTVs.

Fortunately, Android 2.1 did not mess up the Browser app as it stayed at 24-bit. Image scaling in the Gallery and Browser apps also degraded from the previous Excellent ratings in 2.0 to Poor in 2.1. Some upgrade. Source: DisplayMate

Update 2010.04.15: According to PC Mag the next update to Android will restore 24-bit color. It took quite some time to get 2.1 on the Droid. I wonder how long 2.2 will take…

Readability is an arc90 laboratory experiment:

READABILITY is a simple tool that makes reading on the Web more enjoyable by removing the clutter around what you’re reading. Follow the steps below to install READABILITY in your Web browser.

What an experiment! I read, a lot, and make use of both high-tech (notebook LCD) and low-tech (paper). Although there has been a lot of excitement over the iPad as an e-reader, the excitement over the iPad is because it is more than just an e-reader. I am not sure what it is but I’m appreciating the simpler things in life. Readability makes the reading experience on my MacBook Pro significantly more pleasurable precisely because it allows me to focus on reading by stripping away all unnecessary crap that is usually littered all over the webpage. Unfortunately I still need to deal with the Safari menu, other URL bar, other tabs, buttons, and so forth. I want a reading experience that is without any distractions. I would like to share a possible solution.

What prompted this desire for even more simplicity was Kobo’s eReader (Image Source: electronista). Unlike many other e-readers the Kobo eReader is simple and excludes features such as 3G, a touch display and WiFi. My only two wishes would be Bluetooth and a more integrated less conspicuous directional pad. I would want a simpler e-reader, more an e-display than an e-reader, than even Kobo’s to be used as a display primarily for reading. It would work like this:

Click on Readability and the simple stripped-down version would be shown on the e-display instead of on the MBP. I think it will work since when I click on Readability all I want to do is read, and nothing else. Information, which I would assume will be rather small in terms of size, will be sent via the Bluetooth connection in a near-instant. (I prefer a wireless solution to a wired one and Bluetooth came up due to two reasons: less power and a lot of speed is not required.) I can then pick up the e-display and concentrate on reading without any distractions. The eReader from Kobo goes for US$149. My e-display concept would be considerably less.

Prad.de: NEC introduced several energy-efficient AccuSync monitors: AS171 (5:4 17-inch), AS191 (5:4 19-inch), AS191WM (16:9 19-inch), AS221WM (16:9 22-inch), and AS231WM (16:9 23-inch). All have garnered EPEAT Silver, Energy Star 5.0 and TCO 5.0 credentials. NEC has improved energy efficiency by using only half the number of CCFL tubes in the backlight unit. Power consumption and mercury content are both reduced by 50%. Power consumption is just 20 watts in eco mode on the touch-enabled AS231WM. Connectivity options include VGA, DVI with HDCP. Other specs are a 1920×1080 pixel format, 1000:1 contrast ratio, a brightness of 250 cd/m² and a 5ms response time.

NEC wanted to improve its green quotient but also wanted these new monitors to be affordable. The AS231WM is expected to have a street price of US$269. Any LCD monitor that uses the typical CCFL backlight, which requires the use of mercury, a known carcinogen, is not a green monitor. Affordability is not an excuse to pretend a product is green when in fact it is not. With a focus on innovation and reducing manufacturing costs by employing new technologies in a mass scale I am certain single-sided LED-backlit LCD monitors can be sold for only a small premium over these non-green models. LEDs enable thinner models; smaller packaging also means less transportation costs per monitor. LEDs are solid-state so they are more rugged and turn on instantly. Most importantly LEDs do not require the use of mercury. Next time, I hope to see real green monitors from NEC.

On March 30 Pixel Qi and OLPC signed a permanent and royalty-free display technology cross license agreement. As a result OLPC receives full license to all Pixel Qi’s 3qi display technology, more than 70 patents in process and all current and future IP related to multi-mode displays. Pixel Qi will receive full license to OLPC’s dual-mode indoor/outdoor display technology that is used in the XO. This is probably the largest blanket technology license of current and future IPs between a commercial firm and a non-profit organization according to Nicholas Negroponte, founder and chairman of One Laptop per Child. The cross license agreement almost means that the next-generation XO will make use of Pixel Qi’s 3qi display technology. One of the best features of 3qi is the ability to completely turn off the backlight at which point the reflective display makes use of ambient light, allowing for great visibility even in direct sunlight. Read Pixel Qi Easy To Read In Bright Light for more information.

Engadget: Jon Rubinstein, CEO of Palm, in a Fortune interview:

One of the analysts on our earnings call asked if we had launched when Droid launched, and Droid launched when [we] launched at Verizon, would the story have been opposite? I said I think we have a better product than Droid, and customers would have been happier with it.

It isn’t merely about who has the better product. Obviously Palm wasn’t able to execute as quickly as Motorola did with Droid and Verizon. Commercials for Droid seemed to have made a positive impact on sales. I can’t say that about the Pre’s. Getting back to the product: I don’t think the Pre is a better product that the Droid. I do think Palm did a better job on the keyboard. The hardware form factor is easier to use. I admit I have a bias toward keyboards that slide out in portrait mode. Palm’s webOS is quite usable and is considerably more polished than Android. These are all areas where Palm executed well. But Palm has to do better than just well to compete and win against Android, HTC, Motorola, Google, etc. One major component where the Pre falls considerably short compared to the Droid is the display. The Droid’s 3.7-inch LCD is supreme. For details why, read Motorola Droid vs. Google Nexus One.

Similar to Chris Ziegler’s editorial suggesting the merger of HTC and Palm, I think it would be better for Palm to concentrate on webOS and allow someone else such as HTC focus on building solid hardware. Owning and controlling the entire experience from software to hardware can be done but as everyone knows is extremely difficult to perfect.

John Kumahara, graphic designer:

@digitalinfant and I have been working on an infographic since the iPad was released last week, and we’ve finally finished it. Our goal was to look at the iPad from all the different ‘data angles’ we have been seeing’ and use design to highlight the more interesting bits.

@digitalinfant is Johnathan Bonnel.

LED SHORTAGE

Many sources point to a current shortage of LED chips. DIGITIMES has reported Epistar not being able to fully supply demand even though the company is running at full utilization. Demand is higher by 30-40%. In recent talks with a major LED chip supplier the company indicated a doubling of LED chip manufacturing capacity in the second half of 2010. iSuppli also reported that the LED shortage will last throughout 2010 and into 2011. Where is all of this LED demand coming from?

LED DEMAND

LED demand is coming from two primary sources: general lighting and backlight units (BLUs) for LCDs. I will focus on LCDs in this article. LED as a light source for LCD BLUs offers many advantages. LED is green and does not include mercury, a carcinogen, that is in CCFL BLUs. LED also offers enhanced durability, reliability, instant-on, and slimmer designs. The slimmer designs not only offers design flexibility but just as importantly leads to smaller and lighter packaging, which in turn leads to considerable savings in transportation and storage. Displays in mobile phones have completely shifted to using LED as the light source for many years. Now we see LED penetration in BLUs used in notebook PC LCDs to rapidly move toward 100%. But these applications are not the main source of demand for LEDs as they require on average less than 100 LED chips per LCD. The biggest source of LED demand comes from LCD TVs: a large 40-inch or 50-inch class LCD TV can require hundreds if not thousands of LED chips in its BLU. Approximately 2.5 million LCD TVs using LED BLUs were shipped in 2009. That number is expected to grow 10x to 25 million in 2010 with opinions reaching as high as 39 million. By 2014 some estimate total sales of LED-backlit LCD TVs to reach 100 million.

LED OVERSUPPLY

I mentioned a leading LED chip company doubling manufacturing capacity by the second half. This and other LED chip suppliers expand capacity by adding more systems, usually MOCVD (Metal-Organic Chemical Vapor Deposition) systems that grow LED materials into LED chips. Major MOCVD system suppliers have experienced substantial growth in sales in the first quarter and the second quarter looks just as upbeat. It takes roughly 4-6 months lead time to build the systems and another 3-4 months for LED chip manufacturers to customize and ramp to volume production. Because of the strong demand for LED, LED suppliers are rapidly adding manufacturing capacity all the while doing their best not to build out too much. Fortunately the LED suppliers have not established an OPEC-like consortium to manage global supply of LEDs. What I see happening is a probable over-supply situation in 2011 due to intense competition by LED suppliers. That’s not necessarily a bad thing as LED prices will in all likelihood tank and in turn lead to a significant increase in LED adoption for LCD BLUs. Personally, I would like to see products such as LG’s LE9500 come down in price significantly in the near future.

DisplayMate‘s Dr. Raymond M. Soneira has posted up a detailed analysis of the 3.7-inch TFT LCD used in Motorola’s Droid smartphone in Motorola Droid LCD Display Shoot-Out and compares it to the Nexus One in Nexus One Versus Motorola Droid Display Shoot-Out. The first set of articles in Display Showdown: Nexus One vs. iPhone 3GS took the PenTile Matrix OLED used in the Nexus One and compared it to the LTPS TFT LCD used in the iPhone. The winner was the iPhone’s 3.5-inch LCD. Now let’s see how the Nexus One compares to the Droid.

24-bit test patterns with a native pixel format of 854×480 and 24-bit test photos with HD pixel formats were downloaded to the Droid. All measurements were made using DisplayMate Multimedia Edition for Mobile Displays to generate the analytical test patterns. Precise measurements were taken with a spectraradiometer, specifically the Konica Minolta CS-200 ChromaMeter.

Android OS: Both the Nexus One and the Droid uses Google’s Android OS. In DisplayMate’s tests the Nexus One sported the updated 2.1 version while the Droid was stuck on 2.0.1 (Note: The Droid can now be upgraded to Android 2.1. Source: Motorola). The Nexus One exhibited many image-related quality problems in the previous study and I wonder whether it was the Nexus One or more of a problem with the Android OS.

Using the Gallery app, the Droid provided image quality that was the same as the Professional Sony High Definition Studio Monitor:

All of the photos on the Droid were an excellent match, including faces and well known objects such as fruits, vegetables, flowers, grass, even a Coca-Cola can.

As you may remember the Nexus One had issues using the Gallery app that led to false contouring and noise in the image. The “Sunset on Mars” NASA photo came out beautifully in the Gallery app as did the Intensity Scale Ramps in both the Gallery and Browser apps. The 24-bit color display system helps:

The Droid provides full on-screen 24-bit color, which has 256 possible intensity levels for each of the Red, Green and Blue sub-pixels that are used to mix and produce all of the on-screen image colors.

Calibration on the Droid was deemed excellent that produced artifact-free images. The white point color temperature as well as the intensity scale was very close to industry standards. Scaling always introduces some noise but the Droid’s rescaling function to fit the 854×480 pixel format was top-notch:

The image and picture quality on the Droid is actually better than in most computer monitors and HDTVs.

Yes, that good. One caveat: the Browser app used in the Android OS is not up to snuff. The same artifacts that were exhibited on the Nexus One showed up on the Droid. Google will need to fix this problem pronto since browsing is such a large part of what we do on smartphones… well, maybe a little less now thanks to the iPad.

Hardware Test Results: The Droid’s 3.7-inch TFT LCD posted excellent numbers!

• Maximum Brightness (Peak Luminance): 449 cd/m² – probably the highest among all current mobile displays.
• Black Brightness: 0.165 cd/m² – quite dark for a mobile display.
• Contrast Ratio (static): 1,436:1 – better than most LCD monitors!
• Contrast Ratio (dynamic): 2,721:1 – I don’t put too much credence into dynamic CR unless a direct-lit LED BLU and local dimming is part of the feature set.
• Screen Reflectance: 12.1% – average. SR is the most important spec for a mobile display.
• High Ambient Light Contrast Rating: 37 – very good. DisplayMate considers the Droid “among the best mobile displays for high ambient lighting.”
• Dynamic Color & Dynamic Contrast: Yes. Typically dynamic contrast is used to pop colors. The Droid, instead, uses it to reduce power consumption of the backlight. Kudos, but dynamic color and contrast should be options the user can turn off.
• Color Temperature of White: 6752° Kelvin – excellent, very close to the industry standard D6500, the color of daylight.
• Color Gamut: Excellent – Very close to the industry standard, sRGB / Rec.709
• Intensity Scale: Very Good – Matches closely to Gamma 2.2.
• Viewing Angle Brightness Shift: 64% decrease at 30° to just 160 cd/m² - terrible.
• Viewing Angle Black Level Brightness Shift: 88% increase in black level brightness at 30° to 0.31 cd/m² - terrible.
• Viewing Angle Contrast Ratio Shift: Falls to 280 at 30° – terrible, but still acceptable for text. Images are impacted more by shifts in contrast ratio.
• Viewing Angle Color Shift: None noticeable – excellent.
• RGB Display Power Consumption: 0.46 watts when completely black and 0.87 watts when completely white.
• Luminous Efficiency: 0.0007 when black, 0.19 red, 0.73 green, 0.08 blue (normalized to 1.0 for white)
• Spectra: The Droid’s TFT LCD uses a LED backlight. The LED uses a blue LED chip with a yellow phosphor coating to generate white light. The spectra of the Droid’s LCD is a filtered broadband spectrum.

DisplayMate Best Video Hardware Guide Awards: DisplayMate awarded the Motorola Droid the DisplayMate Best Video Hardware Guide Award for both smartphones and the entire mobile display category. Kudos to Motorola! For a more thorough analysis of the Droid’s measurement results hop on over to Motorola Droid LCD Display Shoot-Out.

Versus Nexus One: So how does the Droid compare to the Google Nexus One? Quite well actually.

• Overall Assessment: “The Motorola Droid LCD [sic] is the finest mobile display we have tested.” [Droid 1: Nexus One:0]
• Display Resolution: Tied. Though the Droid has a bit more pixels than the Nexus One, the two are quite equal. [Droid 2: Nexus One: 1]
• Total Number of Sub-Pixels: The Nexus One uses the PenTile Matrix OLED display sub-pixel system that has a different sub-pixel design than the typical 3×1 RGB in LCDs. Although the number of sub-pixels in the Droid is considerably more than in the Nexus One, because of innate difference in how those sub-pixels are driven the comparison is less meaningful than if the two displays used the same sub-pixel layout. Read Nexus One PenTile Matrix OLED Display for more details. [Droid 3: Nexus One 1]
• Displayed Color Depth: Droid wins hands down with 24-bit. [Droid 4: Nexus One 1]
• Image Scaling to Fit the Screen: Although the Droid does an excellent job in the Gallery app, it doesn’t fare as well in the Browser app. The Nexus One does poorly in both. [Droid 5: Nexus One 1]
• Overall Factory Calibration: The intensity scale as well as the white point color temperature on the Droid is very close to standards while the Nexus One is far from. [Droid 6: Nexus One 1]
• Maximum Brightness or Peak Luminance: At 449 cd/m² for the Droid and just 229 cd/m² for the Nexus One, the winner is clear. [Droid 7: Nexus One 1]
• Black Level Brightness or Black Luminance: The Nexus One beats almost everything out there due to the use of OLED technology. Black luminance is an almost unmeasurable 0.0035 cd/m². The Droid’s 0.165 cd/m² was also good for a mobile display. [Droid 7: Nexus One 2]
• Contrast Ratio for Low Ambient Light: Again, the Nexus One beats almost all other displays when it comes to CR, which was 65,415. The Droid’s 1,436 was very good but clearly not better. [Droid 7: Nexus One 3]
• Screen Reflectance of Ambient Light: The Droid’s 12.1% is average, but the Nexus One’s 15.5% is poor. [Droid 8: Nexus One 3]
• Contrast Rating for High Ambient Light: A very good showing of 37 for Droid and a very poor showing of 15 for the Nexus One. [Droid 9: Nexus One 3]
• Dynamic Color and Contrast: Both use them, though the Droid uses dynamic contrast to reduce power consumption of the backlight unit. Again, as mentioned above, the user should be given the option to turn off both of these features. [Droid 9: Nexus One 3]
• Color Temperature: At 6752° Kelvin, the Droid’s color temperature was very close to the standard D6500. The Nexus One’s 8870° Kelvin was too bluish. [Droid 10: Nexus One 3]
• White Point Chromaticity: u’=01946 v’=0.4680 is the Droid’s and very close to the CIE 1976 Uniform Chromaticity Coordinates. The Nexus One’s u’=0.1871 v’=0.4508 was not as close. [Droid 11: Nexus One 3]
• Color Gamut: The Nexus One’s color gamut was too large while the Droid’s was just right and about the same as the standard sRGB / Rec.709. [Droid 12: Nexus One 3]
• Color Saturation: As noted in previous articles the Nexus One over-saturated everything. The Droid, on the other hand, accurately reproduced images, photos and videos. [Droid 13: Nexus One 3]
• Intensity Scale and Image Contrast: The Nexus One’s intensity scale was very irregular and the contrast was too high. The Droid’s intensity scale was stable resulting in accurate image reproduction. [Droid 14: Nexus One 3]
• Gamma for Intensity Scale: 1.82-2.55 for the Nexus One, which means it was very irregular. The Droid’s intensity scale was 2.24, very close to the standard Gamma 2.2. [Droid 15: Nexus One 3]
• Brightness Decrease with 30 Degree Viewing Angle: The Nexus One experienced a 28% decrease to 168 cd/m², much better than the 64% decrease experienced by the Droid. [Droid 15: Nexus One 4]
• Black Level Increase with 30 degree Viewing Angle: Visually insignificant for the Nexus One. The Droid on the other hand was terrible with a 88% increase to 0.31 cd/m². [Droid 15: Nexus One 5]
• Contrast Ratio with 30 degree Viewing Angle: The Nexus One’s contrast ratio was through the roof while the Droid’s was just 280, good for text but not so for images. [Droid 15: Nexus One 6]
• Color Shift with 30 degree Viewing Angle: Δ(‘u’v')=0.0262, which is 7 times Just Noticeable Color Difference (JNCD) for the Nexus One. The Droid showed Δ(u’v')=0.0020, 1/2 times JNCD. Basically, the Droid has no noticeable color shift at angles. [Droid 16: Nexus One 6]
• Power Consumption at Maximum Brightness: 0.91 watts for the Nexus One and 0.87 watts for the Droid. [Droid 17: Nexus One 6]
• Power Consumption for the same Peak Luminance 229 cd/m²: 0.91 watts for the Nexus One and 0.54 watts for the Droid. [Droid 18: Nexus One 6]
• Power Consumption for Black: The Nexus One consumes no power when completely black, which is excellent. The Droid consumes less but still a considerable amount at 0.46 watts. [Droid 18: Nexus One 7]

The conclusion is 18 wins for the Droid and 7 for the Nexus One. Motorola’s Droid wins hands down. If you want the very best display on a mobile phone look no further than the Droid. For a more technically thorough analysis, hop on over to DisplayMate’s Google Nexus One versus Motorola Droid Display Shoot-Out.

Note: This post is 100% iPad, with Apple’s wireless keyboard.

I am currently using the WordPress app for iPad. Unfortunately it is not as robust as I would have hoped: it ate my rather long first attempt at blogging when I started messing around with adding pictures. I’m not going to do that again, not here anyway.

At 10AM I was one of a dozen people who entered the Apple Store. I promptly walked up to an iPad and started playing with it. It was certainly fast. The screen was beautiful. At 1.5 pounds it wasn’t featherweight but it was light enough. I then wanted to make sure I was able to type, well, on the virtual keyboard. I’m a touch-typist running at around 80WPM and I did not expect what happened. Typing on the landscape virtual keyboard was extremely difficult at best. I spent a good 10 minutes typing. I think there are two reasons why the experience was bad. First, there is no tactile feedback. When I’m using all 9 fingers (my left thumb doesn’t get much action) to type I need to feel the physical boundaries to the keys. Without that feedback I wasn’t looking at the content but at the keyboard and even then I wasn’t doing so well. Second, the virtual keyboard is small, around 80% of Apple’s wireless keyboard. Those two reasons convinced me that I wouldn’t be able to blog using the iPad without an external keyboard. Thankfully the Bluetooth wireless keyboard works with the iPad. I didn’t like the angle at which the iPad sat with the docked keyboard (too upright) so I decided to get the Apple case and the keyboard instead.

I wish I could show you a picture of my setup but I’m afraid: afraid that WordPress will eat this second version for dinner. The iPad is slanted up using Apple’s iPod case, but that’s not enough of an angle unless I want to strain my neck blogging. So what I did was use the wireless keyboard box to prop it up even more. Now it is angled just right, for me. I also use that box as a case for the wireless keyboard. No need to spend even more money on a keyboard case, though I’m sure some company will tempt me in the very near future.

The display is simply brilliant. 9.7 inches of supreme LCD technology. Gotta thank LG Display for what it has done with IPS (In-Plane Switching). Thanks to IPS viewing angles are extremely wide. Colors, contrast and brightness do shift but they are barely noticeable. Try that on your JooJoo. With an almost 132 PPI the modified iPhone OS UI is more than usable. The buttons and icons have been expertly tuned for the average finger.

Back at the store I wanted to import a chart made in Numbers into an email I was sending to myself. Actually it turned out it was Mr. Appleseed that sent that email. After experiencing it, I wouldn’t want to enter much data into Numbers. Creating a chart took many more minutes than I’m used to but then here’s the kicker: I could not, for the life of me, get the UI to pop up the thingamajig that allows me to copy it. I am sure many people walked by thinking I was a baboon in human clothing as I concocted my fingers every which way. Finally, after some bit of magic, I was able to copy it. Phew. I really don’t want to do that again. I’ll stick to text on the iPad for now.

I lamented the lack of tabbed browsing on Safari on the iPad and stated with confidence that blogging would not happen. Well, I was wrong. It is happening but you have to grind at it. Because you’re moving in-and-out of Safari and WordPress all the time it is difficult to have the source material in front of you. Always an optimist-wannabe I will take this opportunity to hone my memory skills. My wife will be appreciative. My short-term memory is terrible, and that is why you don’t see any hyperlinks in this post.

This is just a first impression of the iPad, especially as it relates to a bloggers primary tool. I must say the iPad is quite usable but in my case I must have a physical keyboard. Of course, the iPad is much more than just a blogging tool. I think I will enjoy the calendar: it has such a nice design you just want to look at it from time to time. Email will definitely help, but again, I’ll want my physical keyboard. The iPad does quite well as a surfer: the direct connection to the world’s information feels very different than when you’re mousing around. All in all, I look forward to spending considerable time with my iPad. One goal will be to use it as my primary blogging tool and a means to simplifying my life. I want less things to carry when stepping out the door.

Andy Inhatko:

Has any other company ever demonstrated a restlessness to stray from the safe and proven, and actually invent things?

Well, yes, many companies have invented far greater things than the iPad. I don’t consider Apple a company that invents new things; Apple is a company that perfects what already exists and creates something that seems to not have existed before. Take a look at the iPhone: all of the components were there including multitouch technology, high-end mobile LCD manufacture, baseband chips, enclosure manufacturing, etc. What Apple did with the iPhone was it combined existing components and perfected the phone. Apple is doing that again with tablets in slab form.

Walt Mossberg:

I believe this beautiful new touch-screen device from Apple has the potential to change portable computing profoundly, and to challenge the primacy of the laptop.

Unfortunately Mossberg doesn’t quite get the iPad. The iPad is something right in between the smartphone and the full-blown notebook. The iPad is not going to challenge the notebook’s primacy. I’ll tell you why… actually, Steve Jobs has already told us why. The iPad does a few things really well and these things don’t include editing videos, mastering DVDs, creating music, etc. These are all creative activities that once used to be dominated by desktops PCs and have slowly shifted to notebook PCs due to the incredible increase in mobile CPU capabilities. I’m also convinced it’s not that great for blogging as the Safari browser on the iPad does not support multiple tabs. The fact of the matter is the iPad is used primarily for media consumption with the ability for limited creative work. I do agree that the iPad is simply beautiful and beautifully simple.

Ed Baig:

At the very least, the iPad will likely drum up mass-market interest in tablet computing in ways that longtime tablet visionary and Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates could only dream of.

Baig ran off toward left field. The iPad is not about tablet computing per se. The iPad is a direct connection to media consumption. And a bit of creative work. Bill Gates probably still dreams of a day when tablet computing will happen with Microsoft’s Courier concept. I hope the company’s Courier concept becomes a reality as it really would convince me to drop my pad and pen.

David Pogue:

And the techies are right about another thing: the iPad is not a laptop. It’s not nearly as good for creating stuff. On the other hand, it’s infinitely more convenient for consuming it—books, music, video, photos, Web, e-mail and so on. For most people, manipulating these digital materials directly by touching them is a completely new experience—and a deeply satisfying one.

Pogue gets the iPad.

Tim Gideon:

But having used the iPad for some time, I can tell you that the device just makes sense.

Omar Wasow:

The rest of us (even most techies) will be thrilled that doing what we want to do on the iPad is generally effortless.

Wasow is quite an optimist. I wouldn’t assume any real techie would move away from specs and features and appreciate the iPad for what it is. I do agree the effortless interaction will be noticed internally even by techies but probably will not be publicly admitted with enthusiasm.

Bob LeVitus:

It turns out the iPad isn’t as much a laptop replacement as I thought (though it could easily be used as one). Instead, it’s an entirely new category of mobile device.

Mmm… didn’t Steve Jobs already mention this?

Xeni Jardin:

Just as the iPhone, Palm Pre and Android phones scratched an itch we didn’t know we had—somewhere between cellphone and notebook—the iPad hits a completely new pleasure spot.

That’s an interesting way to put it. I don’t quite agree about Android though. In my opinion the iPhone does everything that matters to ordinary folks much better than any Android phone can. WebOS on the Palm Pre is the closest thing to the iPhone OS and I appreciate the attention to the wonderful typography as well as multitasking. Oh and the QWERTY keyboard… there still is that something about a real mechanical keyboard. Source: Wired

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