iPad Replaces Netbook Completely

Over the last two months I can honestly say that I've used my iPad every single day. I take it with me to work, I took it with me on my vacation, I even took it out star gazing the other night. It is with me almost everywhere I go, much to the chagrin of my wife.

I've been moving, all-be-it unwittingly, toward this new iPad life-style for a few years now - starting with my 8.9" Acer Aspire One about two years ago, and progressing to an 11.6" Aspire One and then finally settling on my 13" Macbook Pro. The Macbook is a nice, fairly light-weight laptop, and I used to carry it with me every day.

When the iPad came out, I ordered one immediately, not just because I'm an Apple fanboy, but because I love new technology and the iPad is just so cool! Since the morning it was delivered, I rarely put it down. It's light, and allows me to do pretty much anything I did with my regular laptop. There was just one thing that was bothering me a little. Typing on the on-screen keyboard. It's totally fine for short periods of typing, but it gets pretty labour-some for anything much longer than one or two lines of text.

This all changed for the better the moment I typed in my secret Bluetooth code and my iPad recognized my new Apple keyboard. Since then it has opened up so much potential for my iPad! No longer does it take so much effort to just answer an email, and passwords - don't even get me started! Typing in a username and password is, honestly, kind of a pain in the butt with the on screen keyboard. Especially if your passwords are GOOD passwords. You know, the kind we are all supposed to use, with UPPER and lower case and numbers and symbols. Using the Apple keyboard, my left pinky finger can again take it's rightful place whacking that left shift key, making muscle memory passwords fast again.

The newest Apple Bluetooth keyboard fits perfectly in my bag with my iPad. I've started to carry it everywhere along with my iPad, just in case I need to do some real typing. What I can see now is that my iPad with the addition of this new keyboard IS a Netbook. There is nothing that I can't do with my iPad and keyboard that I couldn't do when I had my Netbooks. It's just in two pieces now. And I don't have to always have a keyboard to use it.

So, I now have the coolest Netbook with a detached wireless keyboard. Isn't technology wonderful?

App Review: iAnnotate PDF

iAnnotate PDF

By: Aji, LLC

$9.99

As the number of PDF reading apps continues to grow almost daily, a few stand out among the others. This app is one of them. Where-as most PDF reading apps will let you zoom in and out and, if you're lucky, bookmark, this app also lets you annotate as you go along, highlighting, underlining, and adding little notes.

This is the 'killer' feature missing from most of the other apps. If you're a student, of just like to annotate as you read, this is the app to be had.

The price is a little steep however. So you should really consider your PDF reading requirements before thinking about this one.

Free iPad Apps

I want to share a site I found that lists free iPad apps everyday. They're not all great, but there are some gems in there every so often. They just recently started listing iPad apps as well as regular iPhone/Touch apps. I check in every day just to see what's new.

You can check them out here.

More iPad owners prefer reading books on iPad

A new research study by Cooper Murphy Web, a UK copywriting firm has found that almost half of iPad users prefer reading books on the iPad, as opposed to dead trees. This research was based on a poll of just over 1000 UK iPad owners during the last two months. Where as 36% of those polled preferred reading books using the traditional medium, about 41% would rather use the iPad for reading.

Some other interesting numbers; 43% use their iPad more than 10 hours a week, and only 5% said they always left home with their iPads. Where-as 35% said that they rarely took the iPad out of the home/office. For 24% of respondents the iPad is their primary entertainment device.

Source

App Review: Take your iPad out tonight

Star Walk for iPad

By Vito Technology Inc.

$4.99

Tonight is a special night, so why not take your iPad out. Not on a date, but for some star gazing. Tonight the Perseid meteor shower will reach its peak. What a perfect time to take out your iPad with the Star Walk app. Just hold your iPad up to the sky and this app will not only find the constellations for you, but will point you in the best direction to see natures light show.

Grab it here.

Home-brew iPad

Witness this remarkable feat of engineering created to answer some of life's most important questions. The kind of questions that wars have probably been fought over. Questions that have probably kept men up late in the evening pondering. Questions like, "Is there any beer left?", "Is that beer cold enough?" and probably the most important question of all, "Who drank my beer?"

The fellows over at YELP engineering have created just such a device. A machine: half refrigerator, half iPad and all cool! This device can monitor who is drinking the beer, as well as how much they had to drink. It's very clever and something perhaps only a student would think of.

Check it out here.

iPad of the Tiger

I found this on TUAW today. It's a video remake of the Rocky anthem "Eye of the Tiger" created using only iPad apps. It's actually very impressive and sounds amazing!

Check it out here.

App Review: Bookman

Bookman

By: Takashi Kato

Free

You man argue that there are all ready too many PDF readers for the iPad. You may even be right. However Bookman is a PDF reader with a very cool difference. It can also display comic book files. (.CBR and .CBZ)

It's fast and works very well. If you have a digital comic book stash, you may want to check out this free iPad app.

Grab it here.

More great iPad wallpaper!

I don't know about you, but I love finding new wallpaper for my ipad. With that large screen, I just want to show it off with great looking wallpaper. I've found a link to a collection of over 70 designs.

Enjoy :)

Check it out here.

Rumours: iPad supposed to have a Gyroscope

According to an article from EE Times, it looks like the iPad may have been designed to posses a gyroscope, just like the iPhone 4 has. It seems that Apple may have been testing out a previous gyroscope chip in the iPad prototype. The iPad's circuit board has evidence of the position the gyro-chip may have occupied. Also the line tracings seem to follow back to the processor and line up with that earlier gyro-chips pin pattern.

So will the next revision of the iPad finally include a gyroscope? Probably, but we'll have to wait and see. One more rumour to add to the list.

Source