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Category: Personal Computers
Brand: Apple
Model: MC981LL/A
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Apple MC981LL/A Customer reviews
Apple MC981LL/A Review by A. Lleras (Fajardo, Puerto Rico)
The iPad is an invaluable travel companion if you are a frequent travelet.
Why do I preffer black vs white? If what you mostly do is watch videos on your iPad you want it with the black bezel because the video will blend with the black bezel and look larger than with the white it becomes kind of a distraction, this is the reason why most TV's in the market have a dark or a black bezel.
Portability of this thing is amazing, Its light and its easy to lug around when you are traveling. Also the battery life is exceptional, I'm bad at keeping my devices charged up and I have done a couple of 8 hour trips and my ipad was stil kicking when I landed and a few days after, Im truely surprized.
For those of you debating between the 3GAT&T, 3GVerison or the Wifi version, it depends on where you go to. I had the original 32 wifi only and I was very happy with it I noticed I got Wi-Fi access at a lot of places and I could also use the wifi hot spot on my phone to connect however, in recent travels I have been sent to middle of nowhere america where AT&T has no 3G coverage and hotels have no wifi (yes they are out there, hotels that still have no wifi) after I returned from my last trip to said location I decided I should get the Verizon iPad simply from the coverage perspective and since the 3G service is not on contract and the Verizon plans have more options I decided that was my choice. Now is this the best option for everyone, no! I think the 3G is just for a small amount of users the vast majority should be fine with a 16GB or a 32GB, if you know your way around the app market place and apps like Air Video Server and tools like DVD Fab and TVersity you dont need that much storage space on your iPad you can simply stream everything. Besides, I have a 32GB and I have 57 videos loaded in that 32GB iPad which if I watch 10-12 on a trip it is an overstatement, I'll watch a few on the plane but the rest, Im streaming from my Media Center at home or from NetFlix. When talking to people in line I was shocked at the number of people looking for the Verizon version when they do not travel, people if you are home most of the time just use your wifi, its cheaper and its faster! Another thing to note is that if you are an international traveller and want 3G the Verizon iPad is NOT Global wireless (so no 3G anywhere outside of the US) however wifi will work just fine.
You will see people complain about resolution and such and honestly, I think the resolution is perfect, the iPad is not meant to replace your laptop or your desktop or your TV, if it was why they would have bothered with airplay? If you are expecting to dump your laptop because you got an iPad think again, if you just use your laptop for browsing pages and playing games then you might get away with it however if you expect to do Office on these, think again, until MS gets their act together and decides that IOS is another venue of revenue for them I will still need to carry my laptop around to do word/excel/ppt files. Lack of flash support has not bothered me, yes I wish I could see some pages however, Im not in to the too flashy stuff (no pun intended) I rather get the straight text and keep going my only gripe would be that when Im conected via WiFi I would like to get full pages and not the mobile version however that is not an iPad problem it is a server problem.
Overall my score goes as follows
Comfort and portability A+
Battery Life A+
App Diversity and usability A+
Interface A+
Expandibility C (I dont need a USB port or anything like that however it is annoying that if I ever needed and expansion either I have to pay for an adapter or its not available)
TV Out Support B+ (simply judging that for HDMI you have to buy the dongle)
Cammera Quality C (who needs a cammera in their iPad anyways? Face time sure, rear facing meh)
Other thoughts:
Get a screen protector, I tried the Invisible Shield for my Gen 1 and hated it, the material removes the slickness of the screen and makes it harder to interact. I like the Splash screen protector, it is like its not there and it does make cleaning a bit easier.
Get a case this thing is beautiful but if you would like to maintain its resale value get a case that cover both front or back or separate covers, I think the Vapor case hack is pretty interesting.
Investigate tools like DVD Fab Video Converter (excellent for making iPad versions of your DVD's and BD's and it does take care of EVERYTHING for you from conversion to the right format to importing to iTunes) TVersity and Air Video for content streaming.
Be realistic on your expectations, I know Apple calls their products magic and their user interface and experience is fenomenal however there are limitations as to what these things can do so try to make an informed purchase that you are happy with instead of rushing and then having something that doesnt meet your expectations. For me I was debating between this and a mac book air however for me since I have to lug around my work computer anyways this won.
Apple MC981LL/A Review by A (Seattle, WA USA)
I have purchased both an iPad2 and Xoom for different family members. I thought it worth comparing the two devices for anyone interested. Many of my comments are subjective so bear that in mind when reading the review.
External appearance and feel:
The iPad2 screen has a different feel from the Xoom screen - the iPad2 is a bit slicker, less likely to stick when moving short distances. The screen on the Xoom tends to show fingerprints more than the Ipad2 for some reason. Everyone in this family thinks that the iPad2 looks sharper than the Xoom.
Both weigh 1.6 lbs. Subjectively, the Xoom feels heavier than the Ipad2, but it's an illusion perhaps caused by it's slightly smaller size. UPDATE: I need to learn to use the scales - the Xoom is about 3 ounces heavier than the iPad2.
Both have a similar size screen, measured diagonally. But the aspect ratio is different - 4:3 for iPad2, 16:9 for Xoom. This means that the iPad2 actually has a larger viewing area, and this makes a real difference when scrolling through a web site. The iPad2 screen is brighter than the Xoom screen.
Hardware performance:
The Xoom feels a bit faster than the iPad2, and the specs show that it is faster. Both have dual core processors based on ARM designs. The Xoom seems to be able to handle graphics better than the iPad2. As far as connecting to Wifi networks, both seem to have this one down pat - they both just work.
User Interface:
The iPad2 is just like a big iPhone. Whether this good or bad is subjective. For me, it's good - polished, flexible and can be customized to my needs. The Xoom user interface is totally new, and unfortunately it shows - there are many rough edges. Some examples: moving icons around to group programs together is not intuitive and they keep moving back; you can see the first 5 applications running on the Xoom and select one, but the list doesn't scroll so applications that don't show in the list can't be selected; you can't close applications (except by a force quit that can lose data) as the Xoom decides when to quit an application; customization is possible but more difficult than the iPad2. In short, the Xoom user interface is a work in progress - great potential but currently quite flawed.
Operating System:
The iPad2 uses Apple's IOS. It works, but it uses cooperative multitasking which (in theory) is less effective than the full multitasking on the Xoom which uses a version of Google's Android designed for tablets. In practice, they both work fine and I doubt anyone would notice the difference.
Applications:
iPad2 has 70,000 apps available from the Apple App store and it also runs the 300,000 apps available for the iPhone. Xoom currently has around 60 apps and it can run Android phone apps (but they are stretched in one direction which makes them look strange). Some of the iPad2 applications are pretty impressive - GarageBand for example. There are many games on the iPad2, and just a few games made for the Xoom. If this doesn't improve quickly, the Xoom is sunk. After all, applications are generally the reason people buy these devices.
Browsing:
Because of the screen aspect ratio that I mentioned, I prefer browsing on the iPad2. The Xoom has Adobe Flash and the iPad2 doesn't, but so far I haven't come across a single instance where this has been an issue. I'm sure there are very many sites not compatible with iPad2, but I haven't browsed to one of them yet.
Camera:
I don't use the camera much, and I'm not really sure if either is better. In the family, the Xoom owner says the Xoom is better, the iPad2 owner says the iPad2. The Xoom has flash and iPad2 doesn't which is a win for Xoom, but the Xoom seems slower to take a picture.
Speakers:
The Xoom has two small speakers, iPad2 has one slightly larger speaker. The sound is somewhat better quality on the iPad2 and the Xoom cannot achieve the same volume as the iPad2. But they are both pretty poor - use earphones or an external speaker if you want decent audio.
Battery life:
Difficult for me to give an exact comparison, but based on family usage it seems the iPad2 has the edge here, but not by much.
Internal storage:
The Xoom has 1GB of RAM and 32 GB of flash storage. The iPad2 has 512MB of RAM and 16GB, 32GB or 64GB of flash storage - I bought the 64GB model.
External storage:
The Xoom has an external card slot that supports SD cards, but the software was not ready in time for the product release. The slot is inoperative until Motorola releases an operating system update. The iPad2 has no external storage support.
User Experience:
The iPad2 was up and running quite quickly. I connected the device to iTunes and it automatically updated to the latest version of the operating system. I was then able to select and download Apps immediately and start using them.
The Xoom was not so easy. For some reason, I was not able to install the latest version of Google Maps or Adobe Flash. I was able to download the apps, and the install process appeared to work without errors, but the new apps just were not installed. After some time trying I finally returned the Xoom back to the factory settings and started again, and this time both the installs worked. Of course, this wouldn't be a good solution if you had a ton of applications and/or data on the device.
Support:
Apple has their retail stores. You can get a huge amount of help from these stores from people whose only job is to support users. Both iPad2 and Xoom users have web sites available that support their products but you have to spend the time digging for the sites and digging through the sites. You can also purchase an Applecare support package which gives you a couple of years extra support for the iPad2.
Bottom line:
I believe the Xoom hardware may be slightly better than the iPad2 (apart from the screen aspect ratio and the speakers), but the software is terribly lacking. The Xoom was released FAR too early, it's just not ready for primetime.
If I had to pick just one, I'd pick the iPad2 - less hassle, apps for everything, better browsing experience, better support options. The Xoom needs less buggy software and more applications; it has potential but it's not there yet. And by the time it gets there, there will be something better available.
Update 7/5/2011
We have now had the two devices for over 3 months. During that time Motorola released an update to fix some of the issues with the original Xoom. It's somewhat faster, the problem of only seeing the first 5 applications is fixed, there are some extra capabilities for USB, and most importantly, the Xoom doesn't crash every few hours.
However, the biggest issue with the Xoom is still the number of applications available to run in native tablet mode, as opposed to running Android phone applications. I've read that there are 300 applications available, but it's hard to find them. The Android Market doesn't distinguish between phone applications designed for a small screen and tablet applications. You have to read the description of each application to see what it is designed to run on, and finding 300 apps in 200,000 is very time consuming. Apple claims to have 100,000 iPad specific apps in their store.
Another problem with the Android Market is the complete lack of supervision. I understand that anybody can put any application there without any review, and I've read there have been a few problems with malware. Recently I saw an article that claimed there are spyware applications on the store, which worries me a little. I'm not saying you can't get malware from the Apple store, but Apple does look at the apps first - I'm not aware of any malware getting into the Apple store.
The iPad2 does have some downsides I wasn't aware of when I wrote my review. It would be nice to have a general purpose USB connection and a card slot. There is an extra-cost adapter available from Apple that supplies HDMI out and a limited function USB connector. Also the keyboard attachment made for the original iPad doesn't work on the iPad2.
For us, the iPad2 is the winner. The Xoom is sitting on a shelf and I don't think it's been used over a week now. In contrast, iPad2 is in use every day and continues to be a big hit. The primary problem with the Xoom is the lack of tablet-based applications.
Update 7/7/2011
The Xoom has been sold to a colleague who wants an Android tablet. I think the Xoom is better than most of the Android tablets currently available. However, the Honeycomb software feels so unfinished, and the paucity of available tablet-based applications was a major issue. I lost several hundred dollars on the sale, but nobody wanted to use it and there was no point in letting it lay around unused. I'm already under some pressure to buy another iPad2, but I want to wait to see if the rumors of another iPad version in September are true.
Apple MC981LL/A Review by Anjana Nigam (Minneapolis, MN)
My primary reason to buy an iPad was both work and home use. At work I wanted to stop printing the powerpoint decks and reports to read, and just read them on an iPad in meetings/on the go. For home I was tired of not being able to get to all my magazines and never having them on me when I wanted to read them. I also wanted to watch some TV/movies in bed/around the home so that I did not have to switch on the big living room TV. The iPad 2 has been a perfect solution for all these and more. I'm kicking myself that I went with the lowest 16GB version as I find myself downloading more content and apps everyday! It's not a laptop/desktop replacement either at home or work, but it's a great media consumption device and more.
I already used my iPhone 4 constantly due to the multitude of apps and games available for it. Fewer apps are available for iPad but it's still thousands, and I have already downloaded 200+ to try, most of them free.
The hardware itself is very slick. Very light so you can hold it in one hand, especially if you use a cover - otherwise it tends to be slippery. But it's not so much about the hardware, which other reviews have detailed anyway. It's all about being able to do what you want to do with a device. With the best technology the device itself should disappear and allow you to create, read, connect - whatever it is you want to do. That's what iPad 2 is doing for me, like a netbook never could. Using it is so intuitive and seamless, that despite having the iPhone 4, I am amazed with how much more I can do to be productive. I regret not buying it sooner!
Like the previous devices Apple has created the genius is in the apps available for it. The PressReader apps allows me to read newspapers and magazines from all over the world. I can now read some favorite magazines that were so difficult to get in the print version and newspapers too. Apps like the Flipboard and Zite make magazine content come alive. Favorite magazines like Bloomberg Businessweek and Wired are available free as iPad versions to print subscribers. Also, all news magazines are now featuring interactive content, so I'm reading the news article and looking at static images, and then just as easily click on a video to watch it. The Daily is a good interactive made for newspaper but I'm looking for even better interactive journalism!
"The Civil War" shows us what history books of future should look like with its interactive content and a daily log of events as they happened 150 years ago. Netflix streams nicely and I can watch the content I want to that bore my family to tears - like documentaries. I also download all my PDF reading materials on it and can read and annotate and highlight. Powerpoints are so easy to read and I can scale the screen to look at the graphs better. iMovie is so simple to use, and I've already created several home movies with music and subtitles. GarageBand is great for novices like me, it has a multitude of instruments that I can play and even has smart versions to create music. With penultimate and UPad I've been trying to completely do away with paper notepads, but that's not the perfect solution yet.
With apps like Dropbox and Box you can drop your files into the cloud and access them from your iPad. Chatting over FaceTime or over Webex is simple, although it's entirely dependent on bandwidth. With other apps you can access your remote desktop and use every program on your computer or pull any file. I am using TeamViewer which is free for individuals to log into my home PC from work and check my files or run some programs remotely. It shows you your PC screen on your iPad and you drag your finger to move the mouse cursor and click. It's pretty seamless once you set it up, as simple as opening the app. I opened it one day from work to see my kid watching Youtube and surprised her at dinner when she told me she had been doing home work (ha!).
Another made for iPad app I use a lot is the Tivo Remote. When I turn it on it automatically shows the program I'm currently watching on the iPad screen with more details and upcoming episodes. I can use the remote buttons or explore like programs, set my season passes, etc. And when I'm not home I can use it to record programs remotely. Xfinity from Comcast also allows you to schedule and watch your onDemand content. HBO GO is simply a delight, I am thrilled to have all the HBO shows available to me anywhere I go!
I have been reading much more since I got iPad 2. Especially blogs, magazines and newspapers. That alone makes it worth it for me. And it's SO much easier to stream content like TED Talks, Lectures from YouTube, movies from Crackle and Netflix. I would have never wanted to sit down with my heavy and hot laptop for such prolonged periods to watch this content. There are some fun games available too, and every day more apps get launched which make me wonder how did I manage without this before!
Facetime has been fun too. There are Qik (from Skype) and Tango, and several other apps available that will let you do video chat but since Facetime is integrated with email, you can just click on a contact's name and choose to connect through FaceTime. I can not only check on my kid on video through this feature (all they need is an iPod Touch and wireless) but also connect with friends overseas for free. And I can click their pics while they're on the call with me. Again this feature is dependent on video quality but as a multi-tasking mom it's been great to be able to connect any time in video from work to home. My kid will be listening to music on her iPod Touch and my FaceTime call comes in - and we're off talking face to face. VLC Player has been a great app to watch .avi and other videos. I had slightly lower res version of a TV series in AVI format and the VLC player allowed me to watch it on iPad, I prefer that screen to my HP Pavilion 17 inch which has worse resolution and tends to get too hot in my lap anyway
Battery life was a big surprise for me. Mine lasts 10-11 hours on the WiFi model with full usage. That is amazing, I never carry the charger as it goes 2 days without charging. Love it! None of my laptops can compare!
The frustrations I experienced with the iPad 2 was its inability to play Flash, which will not come any time soon due to Steve Job's dislike of that technology. However, a genius of an app called iSwifter has found a way to run flash on iPad 2 and I have been using it to watch video on websites that have flash content. However, it's still not as seamless as I would like it to be! The other is a more seamless way to store and organize photos and files. I can do this through apps but why not make this more seamless. If I have to delete photos there should be a select all feature to delete a whole folder.
If you're on the fence about buying an iPad 2 go ahead and make the leap, you won't regret it. If you already have an iPad then hold on for iPad 3 as this version gives you some enhancements (faster, improved graphics, thinner, cameras) but nothing that is so extraordinary that you can't wait another few months!
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Apple iPad 2 MC981LL/A Tablet (64GB, Wifi, White) NEWEST MODEL:: Features
- Apple iOS 4 and to store Apple?s App.
- 1 GHz dual ? core processor, Apple, A5, custom designed
- Forward facing and rear facing cameras.
- 9.7-inch (diagonal) LED ? backlit, it shows the results of the Multi ? Touch screen, widescreen IPS technology
- Apple?s newest generation of iPads
- Item Dimensions: 7 x 10 x 0 inches; 4 pounds
- Brand: Apple
- Model: MC981LL/A
- Product Type: Personal Computers
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