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Finally last week Steve Jobs, Apple CEO announced the launch of Apple’s brand new product, the Apple iPad.  Rumours have been developing for months now on the Internet and now that the product has finally been revealed is it a good as all the hype built it up to be or should we be disappointed?  Well a little of both maybe, so lets have a look.

My first disappointment was that it was exactly the product that everyone had been suggesting with the rumours.  Therefore Apple either did a really bad job of keeping it a secret or they were not that bothered about it leaking in the first place.So what is the product and why is it different?  Well essentially it is a large iPhone, although Apple will not like me saying that.  It has a multi touch screen just like the iPhone and it is the same sort of size apart from much bigger (that doesn’t sound right but you get what I mean!).  It will run all the Apps that you have purchased for your iPhone and of course it can take advantage of all the Apps on sale in the Apple App store.  It will play music like your iPhone and connect to the iTunes store to purchase music. You can view photos and also browse the web and it even plays video.  All this sounds great, but I was left thinking, well what is the difference between this and the iPhone?

Well there are a couple of differences (other than size).  Firstly there is a new store the Apple are launching which is called the iBook store.  This is where you can buy books to then read on your iPad.  The iPad is very much a magazine size and therefore they are pushing the ‘eReader’ market.  As well as the reading aspect Apple are launching iWork for the iPad so that you can use Keynote, Pages and Numbers on the iPad.  I am not convinced about these but time will tell I suppose.

So Steve Jobs told us that it will fill the gap between the smart phone (your iPhone or Blackberry) and the laptop.  Trouble is, is that I am not sure that there is a gap to be filled.  Steve Jobs says that it is the best device for browsing the web and emailing, but again I am not so sure.  I am usually browsing the web in order to find something or research something and therefore inevitably I will be wanting to have available all the other programs that my laptop contains at the same time.  The same when sending emails, I need my other programs open to action what the emails are saying.

I suppose what I am saying here is that I don’t need one and therefore I will not be buying one.  I mean it will never replace the smart phone because it is too big and it will never replace my laptop because it doesn’t do enough.  But the thing is you see, I am going to buy one!  Why?  Well they are just so cool and imagine showing off your portfolio to a client on an iPad?  That has got to have a good impact.

There is one main reason why I will most probably purchase an iPad and that is simply the price.  I think that everyone was expecting Apple to price the iPad at about the $1000 mark.  However at $499, assuming it will be the same or similar in the UK it is a very inexpensive device.  So will the iPad be a hit or will it be a gadget that everybody buys and then it phases out.  I am not entirely sure, but we won’t need to wait long to find out.