[PCWorld]

Post your comments for Apple's New iPad: 2 Missing Features here

[TerrenceNewton2zgr]

I think haptics, as it is, is overrated. It tells you that you're pressing something, but not what you're pressing. I don't see how it's any better than sound feedback (like the clicks when using onscreen keyboard). In most cases, on previous devices I've used, I've found the constant buzzing of haptics to be annoying.

And as for Siri, well I can understand how Apple would be hesitant to include the service on a device that won't even theoretically always have a connection. If you had a wi-fi iPad with Siri, you'd never be able to use it while say, in your car. This would kind of ruin the experience. I definitely don't agree that it's a "lack of effort".

And to say that this iPad is evolutionary and not revolutionary.. Let's see, a new screen the likes of which have never been seen on -any- consumer device, ever. The first Apple device with 4G.. I think that is pretty revolutionary.

I can understand that the author might be disappointed at the lack of more features.. but to say "Not only does it provide less incentive to purchase the new iPad, but it also hurts Apple’s brand and ecosystem." is kind of an empty statement. I'm sure that the sales figures will show the exact opposite.

[saleustione6sb1]

moan, moan, moan

[SierraHotel]

I will admit I was surprised that Siri was not featured in the new iPad. Knowing Apple, I am sure there were compelling reasons why they did not include it, but I am curious as to what those reasons are.

As for haptic display... it sounds intriguing... but is probably not ready for prime time. Apple is reluctant to include features that are not fully fleshed out. Siri on the iPhone 4S was a rare exception to this rule...

[BrianThorn]

"Not fully fleshed out"? Haptic screens have been around several years now. And you can mute the iPad to get rid of the annoying "click click click" while you type, but haptic will still give you feedback without annoying everyone around you. The "iPad 2012" will be nice and will sell like hotcakes, especially to iPad 1 owners who put off splurging on iPad 2. My locale won't get 4G LTE until 2013 at best, and I can count on one hand the number of times I've used my iPad 2's rear-facing camera. Retina is beautiful but that alone isn't enough to get me to upgrade from iPad 2 to the "iPad 2012". I'll wait until next year's "iPad 2013" when LTE will be much closer to fruition, Siri Mk.II is finally added to iPad, and one or two more sweeteners (like haptic feedback and a camera flash) have been added to the iPad.
""

[nonseq]

Another "pundit" who obviously doesn't understand product development at this level.

I listened to Jessica Dolcourt's live comments during the event and her lack of depth of understanding and her flippant attitude was very off putting.

I guess this article and others underscores an attitude pervasive among pundits that manufacturers should not devote the time and resources to perfect a sea change product like Siri before loosing it on consumers (once released, you can't get it back) and instead follow the lead of Google/Android and Samsung who, in my opinion, rushed products to market way before they were ready and don't see the big picture.

[browndamon]

nonseq, on 08 March 2012 - 07:45 AM, said:

Another "pundit" who obviously doesn't understand product development at this level.

I listened to Jessica Dolcourt's live comments during the event and her lack of depth of understanding and her flippant attitude was very off putting.

I guess this article and others underscores an attitude pervasive among pundits that manufacturers should not devote the time and resources to perfect a sea change product like Siri before loosing it on consumers (once released, you can't get it back) and instead follow the lead of Google/Android and Samsung who, in my opinion, rushed products to market way before they were ready and don't see the big picture.

So disagreeing with your perspective makes one not "understand product development at this level"? OK then.

[ginkessler]

SierraHotel, on 08 March 2012 - 07:20 AM, said:

I will admit I was surprised that Siri was not featured in the new iPad. Knowing Apple, I am sure there were compelling reasons why they did not include it, but I am curious as to what those reasons are.

As for haptic display... it sounds intriguing... but is probably not ready for prime time. Apple is reluctant to include features that are not fully fleshed out. Siri on the iPhone 4S was a rare exception to this rule...

Perhaps you are a new apple costumer or alzehimers is hitting you hard but apple has historically release many many products that are not fully "fleshed out" - going back to the Apple III, Hypercard, OS System 7, the eMate, the newton, the Apple TV, etc etc etc.

Like you said, apple did not include Siri because it is a program that is not fully "fleshed out" - the only place Siri works magically well is in the TV commercials - in real life it is not much of a difference when comparing it to the Microsoft Bob of the 1990's

And as for the haptic display - apple will probably include it in future versions of their devices because they always try to make gradual improvements to their devices so the isheep keeps dishing out their money - next year's model will be a Siri that works a little bit better, a magical USB port, and a fantastic SD card slot.

[crosswordbob]

The omission of Siri was a surprise to me, and a disappointment, but not a deal-breaker, as I don't expect to miss something I've never had too badly. Moreover, I don't see it as cut and dried that it won't become available later. The fact that voice dictation is included could suggest that all the necessary hardware is in place—including the Audience noise filter from the 4S' A5. Could the omission be simply because Siri is still in beta, and they're waiting for that to complete before rolling out onto the (new) iPad?

I hadn't previously considered the possibility that it was to do with an Internet connection (or lack thereof), but if so, wouldn't it have been smarter for them to provide it only on the LTE model, giving people an incentive to splash out on the more expensive option (I still reckon this is why they didn't support tethering on the 1st generation until it had been out for a while)? Also, do we actually know yet whether or not the dictation function will require the device to be online, as I believe is the case on the 4S?

I've not used haptic feedback enough to really comment one way or t'other, save to say that I seem to have completely missed the speculation about this that the article mentined.

[TechConc]

While I agree with the author on the lack of Siri, I disagree with the haptic screen concern. These screens are interesting for the first minute or two, but they quickly become annoying after a while. The iPad is better off without it.

That said, I don't think any of this matters. I'm not seeing any tablet come to market that poses a viable threat to the iPad 2 even. Especially with the reduced price. The retina screen on the new iPad is truly a very big deal. If anything, it's the one thing that needed improvement for eBooks, etc. This alone will keep the product in a class above the rest for some time to come. Given Apple's supply chain success, I doubt others will match Apple's screen quality for the next year or two. That's why I find comments like "Not only does it provide less incentive to purchase the new iPad, but it also hurts Apple’s brand and ecosystem." absolutely laughable.

[crosswordbob]

nonseq, on 08 March 2012 - 07:45 AM, said:

Another "pundit" who obviously doesn't understand product development at this level.

I listened to Jessica Dolcourt's live comments during the event and her lack of depth of understanding and her flippant attitude was very off putting.

I guess this article and others underscores an attitude pervasive among pundits that manufacturers should not devote the time and resources to perfect a sea change product like Siri before loosing it on consumers (once released, you can't get it back) and instead follow the lead of Google/Android and Samsung who, in my opinion, rushed products to market way before they were ready and don't see the big picture.

A touch harsh, no? Siri certainly felt conspicuous by her absence to me, and though I missed the speculation about haptic feedback, I can see it as quite a natural wish-list entry. For my part, I was disappointed to see them fail to add a landscape docking port for the third time.

If we could do our best to stick to commenting on the tech rather than each other, this forum would be a much nicer place (and before anyone jumps in, I'm well aware that my own posts have been slipping some way below this ideal recently, but I intend to amend this going forward).

[TechConc]

ginkessler, on 08 March 2012 - 08:34 AM, said:

Like you said, apple did not include Siri because it is a program that is not fully "fleshed out" - the only place Siri works magically well is in the TV commercials - in real life it is not much of a difference when comparing it to the Microsoft Bob of the 1990's

You've obviously never used Siri. It is actually very good. Clearly, Apple has work cut out in terms of handling strong accents and various different languages around the world. But, if you're speaking English, it's as good as advertised. I use it all the time to schedule meetings, set up alerts, sometimes with geo perimeters, to send texts, to read texts, to get directions and to do many things that I would have normally used Google Search for. Wolfram Alpha is actually a great source for much of this information. Is there room for Siri to improve? Sure. That's true for anything. But, when you actually use Siri as I've been doing over the past couple months and realize that my mobile phone usage has changed in a fundamental way for the better, calling it "magical" isn't that far off base.

[nonseq]

browndamon, on 08 March 2012 - 08:25 AM, said:

nonseq, on 08 March 2012 - 07:45 AM, said:

Another "pundit" who obviously doesn't understand product development at this level.

I listened to Jessica Dolcourt's live comments during the event and her lack of depth of understanding and her flippant attitude was very off putting.

I guess this article and others underscores an attitude pervasive among pundits that manufacturers should not devote the time and resources to perfect a sea change product like Siri before loosing it on consumers (once released, you can't get it back) and instead follow the lead of Google/Android and Samsung who, in my opinion, rushed products to market way before they were ready and don't see the big picture.

So disagreeing with your perspective makes one not "understand product development at this level"? OK then.

Nope, not at all. But Siri, on the iPhone 4S is still a beta product and there obviously is a great deal of work to do. It may be that Siri is so tied to the Apple backend that it is not useful on devices that are not constantly connected. Perhaps I was reacting to Jessica' flippant and superficial commentary (streaming video from CNET) that led me to believe that her perspective is that the need to perfect a product is not all that important and that to make something as complex as Siri deliver its true potential is almost trivial. Her comments also led me to believe that she sees Siri as nothing more than voice control with a few extras.

Y'all are right. I shouldn't besmirch the writers and commenters and I shouldn't expect too much from a blog. Mea Culpa.

[nonseq]

crosswordbob, on 08 March 2012 - 08:56 AM, said:

nonseq, on 08 March 2012 - 07:45 AM, said:

Another "pundit" who obviously doesn't understand product development at this level.

I listened to Jessica Dolcourt's live comments during the event and her lack of depth of understanding and her flippant attitude was very off putting.

I guess this article and others underscores an attitude pervasive among pundits that manufacturers should not devote the time and resources to perfect a sea change product like Siri before loosing it on consumers (once released, you can't get it back) and instead follow the lead of Google/Android and Samsung who, in my opinion, rushed products to market way before they were ready and don't see the big picture.

A touch harsh, no? Siri certainly felt conspicuous by her absence to me, and though I missed the speculation about haptic feedback, I can see it as quite a natural wish-list entry. For my part, I was disappointed to see them fail to add a landscape docking port for the third time.

If we could do our best to stick to commenting on the tech rather than each other, this forum would be a much nicer place (and before anyone jumps in, I'm well aware that my own posts have been slipping some way below this ideal recently, but I intend to amend this going forward).

So Bob, should Apple have delivered Siri to the iPad even if it wasn't ready for prime time? I know you don't believe that and I agree with your post elsewhere that it is more a software issue than hardware issue. Yeah maybe it's a little harsh and I was reacting to a perceived and I believe pervasive attitude on the part of tech pundits that the Apple development cycle should be more akin to the Android development approach.

I was not commenting about forum posters . but on two examples of the tech press who, in my opinion, missed the point. It seems that we should all stop commenting on anything other than the bits, bytes, and specs and in so doing miss the forest for the trees.

This post has been edited by bcappel: 08 March 2012 - 09:34 AM

[bigdav1178]

TerrenceNewton2zgr, on 08 March 2012 - 07:01 AM, said:

And to say that this iPad is evolutionary and not revolutionary.. Let's see, a new screen the likes of which have never been seen on -any- consumer device, ever. The first Apple device with 4G.. I think that is pretty revolutionary.

Yeah, ok fanboy! Because no one has ever seen a higher resolution display or next generation radio used in a new device. Do you actually believe the BS you spew, or are you just hoping there are enough people out there who do so you stock doesn't drop?

If you do truly believe that this is "revolutionary", I suggest you look up the definition of the word, or lay off the kool-aid for a while. Even your fellow fanboys out there are able to realize this is nothing more than a product refresh.

[crosswordbob]

nonseq, on 08 March 2012 - 09:19 AM, said:

crosswordbob, on 08 March 2012 - 08:56 AM, said:

nonseq, on 08 March 2012 - 07:45 AM, said:

Another "pundit" who obviously doesn't understand product development at this level.

I listened to Jessica Dolcourt's live comments during the event and her lack of depth of understanding and her flippant attitude was very off putting.

I guess this article and others underscores an attitude pervasive among pundits that manufacturers should not devote the time and resources to perfect a sea change product like Siri before loosing it on consumers (once released, you can't get it back) and instead follow the lead of Google/Android and Samsung who, in my opinion, rushed products to market way before they were ready and don't see the big picture.

A touch harsh, no? Siri certainly felt conspicuous by her absence to me, and though I missed the speculation about haptic feedback, I can see it as quite a natural wish-list entry. For my part, I was disappointed to see them fail to add a landscape docking port for the third time.

If we could do our best to stick to commenting on the tech rather than each other, this forum would be a much nicer place (and before anyone jumps in, I'm well aware that my own posts have been slipping some way below this ideal recently, but I intend to amend this going forward).

So Bob, should Apple have delivered Siri to the iPad even if it wasn't ready for prime time? I know you don't believe that and I agree with your post elsewhere that it is more a software issue than hardware issue.

I'm certainly not commenting on what Apple should or shouldn't do, since I am completely in the dark (beyond guesswork) as to why it was omitted and what its readiness (or lack thereof) is at present. But given that they have delivered a beta version of the service to another of their products, I don't think it was unreasonable to anticipate them doing so again.

We can, of course, speculate on the reasons why they decided not to. Off the top of my head I could offer a few possible scenarios:

• They're concentrating on completing the NLP part of the implementation on a single form factor (the phone) before they even start to work on the tablet interface,
  
• The tablet apps are currently in development and were not in a release-worthy (even beta) state for launch,
  
• They're still working on a phased rollout of the back-end, and didn't want to cause another spike by launching the service on a second device until they're confident it's ready for the extra traffic,
  
• They indeed don't see Siri on their tablet being worthwhile due to the need for an Internet connection,
  
• They reckon that having Siri on the iPad might make the iPhone 4S less attractive, and figure that by tying her to the phone they'll tempt more people to buy one of each (bear in mind that one - admittedly rather old - survey showed only something like 27% of iPad owners also carrying iPhones).
  
• They're planning to release a new new iPad with Siri and want to screw everyone into upgrading early.

As I said above, I'm not totally convinced by option 4 alone, given the fact that they already have features only available on their 3G/LTE models (GPS etc), so don't see why they wouldn't go down that route (also, it didn't stop them making iCloud available on all devices), and am disinclined to automatically assume the latter two (though wouldn't rule out the penultimate). And obviously there's always the "none of the above" option. But unless Apple decides to release a statement regarding their intentions for the coming months (yeah, right), we'll just have to wait and see.

This post has been edited by crosswordbob: 08 March 2012 - 10:12 AM

[bankerdanny]

Since Siri is on several million iP4S's at this point I don't see why they wouldn't have included it on the iPad3. Although, if an internet connection is necessary for it to really work, given the relatively low take rate for cell phone connected iPads, Apple may have just figured it wouldn't work that well for most iPad users and didn't want them to have a bad experience.

That said, Siri is software, not hardware right? They can add it to the iPad at any time once they think it makes sense or if enough customers want it.

[os2baba]

TechConc, on 08 March 2012 - 08:50 AM, said:

While I agree with the author on the lack of Siri, I disagree with the haptic screen concern. These screens are interesting for the first minute or two, but they quickly become annoying after a while. The iPad is better off without it.

That said, I don't think any of this matters. I'm not seeing any tablet come to market that poses a viable threat to the iPad 2 even. Especially with the reduced price. The retina screen on the new iPad is truly a very big deal. If anything, it's the one thing that needed improvement for eBooks, etc. This alone will keep the product in a class above the rest for some time to come. Given Apple's supply chain success, I doubt others will match Apple's screen quality for the next year or two. That's why I find comments like "Not only does it provide less incentive to purchase the new iPad, but it also hurts Apple’s brand and ecosystem." absolutely laughable.

I have been using haptic feedback on my Android phones for years. The default setting is generally too much. But a small feedback is excellent. For the person who thought it served the same purpose as the keyclicks, it's the keyclicks that get annoying. It's the first thing I turn off on a new device.

While I don't doubt, they will sell a ton if these, the ASUS Transformer Prime already creams the iPad2 in practically every single category. And while the retina display may indeed outspec the current Transformer Prime, it barely does so on the 700 series to be released this summer. But I am not so sure that would even factor into my decision. I found that display on my Samsung Galaxy S phone to be stunning compared to the iPhone 4. The blacks and the contrast just pop out on the SAMOLED screens. The iPhone display looks a little "faded" by contrast.

[EricPeszko]

TerrenceNewton2zgr, on 08 March 2012 - 07:01 AM, said:

And to say that this iPad is evolutionary and not revolutionary.. Let's see, a new screen the likes of which have never been seen on -any- consumer device, ever. The first Apple device with 4G.. I think that is pretty revolutionary.

It would of been a good response if you knew what evolutionary means. The definition of evolutionary is a follows (from Merriam-Webster);
a process of continuous change from a lower, simpler, or worse to a higher, more complex, or better state
The screen resolutions, like almost all consumer devices, have been improving yearly for consumer devices. And incorporating a 4G transmitter/receiver adds to functionality but it was already done by other tablet makers.
For it to be truly revolutionary, it would have to do something that no other manufacturer or OS maker has done, not just be new Apple product.

[DrDavidC]

Haptic display- are you serious. wahta load of BS. Apple has more patents on touch technology than any company on this planet. You don't need this because you can immediately see your results from screen touchs. Does your PC keyboard vibrate when you type? Apple even devleoped several new touch features for tehir reader so you can treat it just like a book, including holding your thumb in on page and scrolling others.. you can earmark a page, and several others.

SIRI- another - are you serious? IT's SOFTWARE wanna make a $10,000 bet it's added soon ?? SIRI does NOT require any special hardware. So you can put that in the next version of iOS 5. DUH !!!
David