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New iPad released, and why you should wait on the purchase
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The Right Click
Just as we have come to expect, hundreds lined up at stores around the world as the much anticipated new iPad hit the shelves today. It's the kind of fever that has become synonymous with an Apple product launch, yet despite all of the hype, the crowds gathered in certain cities seemed a little more barren than normal.
The queues amassed along Fifth Avenue, the site of Apple's flagship New York City location, were nothing compared to previous years. Just ask Peter Brown, a small business owner who travelled all the way from London: "I came by at midnight and nobody was here."
From what we can gather, there could be a handful or explanations. Perhaps the bulk of those who were super excited had already ordered theirs online, helping Apple to achieve a new record for iPad pre-orders. Maybe at $519 a piece, the price just isn't right for the aspiring tablet owner. Or maybe Marc Saltzman's blog on why it doesn't always pay to be an early adopter has convinced a global audience.
Yet whatever the logic may be, there are at least three good reasons to hold off on grabbing that new iPad.
The perils of early adoption
Saltzman's piece didn't focus on a particular gadget or company, but the piece could have easily been written solely for Apple. Many of his key points — working the bugs out, the inevitable price drop, buying into the hype and an upgrade just around the corner — apply very well to the tech titan and its products.
"What's the lesson here?" Saltzman asks. "Unless you thrive on being the first on your block with the latest and greatest gadgets, it often pays to wait a bit."
The iPad 2
Shortly after Tim Cook took to the stage to reveal the new iPad, Apple dropped the price of the iPad 2, much like the discount on the iPhone 4 after the 4S hit the shelves.
"The iPad 2 may be a year old (a lifetime in the gadget world, I know), but there's plenty of power inside that slim package, and it all comes at a cheaper price," shares Kent German in a CNET blog. "No, you won't get to savour the superior screen or the faster 4G speeds, but the iPad 2 isn't that different. You still get two cameras, FaceTime video chat, a zippy dual-core processor, and HDMI-out support."
Windows 8
Microsoft conducted a Windows 8 "consumer preview" — don't call it a beta — just two weeks ago at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain. The consensus seems to be that it's great, and tech pundits are very excited for its potential in the tablet industry.
"Windows 8 is a breeze to use," says Seth Rosenblatt of CNET. "It's tricked out with social networking and synchronization, it's robust enough to handle Photoshop, it gracefully moves from touch to keyboard and mouse, and it's got some top-notch security."
The complete version of Windows 8 is expected to drop this summer, and though we have little to report on a launch date for a Windows 8 tablet, a true tech junky will want to keep this in mind. As the Kindle Fire and the Samsung Galaxy Tab have already shown, there really are a growing number of viable alternatives to the iPad.
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