ipad or tablet to show portfolio to brides

[Greg Fiske]

I was wondering if anyone was using an ipad or android tablet to show brides their work at coffee shops, etc. Is the ipad 2 the best for this, or are there any android tablets that are better?

[James Strange]

Bought an iPad for my last wedding show, went down great, especially when my stand was pretty busy, some peooe at the back might not have had a great view of the big screens, so id just walk up and give them the iPad to have a look at a few videos.

It ws really good at keeping grooms attention too.

Dont see any benefit of an iPad 2 over an iPad for this specific purpose, id say just get a cheap 2nd hand 16gb wifi only iPad 1

James

[Johannes Soetandi]

I agree. I bought the iPad 2 but now wanting to sell it for iPad 1 instead. The camera on iPad 2 is so bad I feel like bashing it up!

[Sigmund Reboquio]

i was actually thinking of buying an ipad. i found that the screen might be too small?for both the bride and groom to see, you might want to test that yourself or see it.

[Art Varga]

The screen is plenty big for use in a coffee shop setting. I let the couple hold it so they can move it around for best viewing angle. Video quality is exceptional. Either iPad 1 or 2 will work fine.

[Dave Blackhurst]

I'm experimenting with/testing some of the import Android pads at the moment, interesting exercise...

The import ones are sort of a work in progress, and you have to figure out what the actual specs are for what they are selling, BUT they so seem to have potential... 7" screen can go almost anywhere, 10" is a bit less portable, but easier on the eyes, still have to render some video into a format they will play back, but they loo fairly nice overall.

Original goal was to have something lighter than a heavy laptop... now wondering if a small netbook might not be almost as effective...

[Corey Graham]

I've been considering a Xoom for this very reason (and a few others . . .). I'm staying away from the iPad at all costs. I'll spare you my vehemently anti-Apple comments ;)

The Xoom is more powerful, has much better cameras and runs the open Android OS. The main gripes I'm hearing about it though is that the young OS is a bit buggy.

[Dave Blackhurst]

So I'm not the only one who thinks that drinking the Apple kool aid isn't a great idea - tried the iPad in the store, it DOES look really slick, but I found it strangely UN-intuitive... it's "sexy", so I'm sure one would learn to love it and use it <wink>.


As far as the Android OS goes, it's LINUX based, meaning there are LOTS of developers potentially... this is a good and a bad thing - good in that there will be LOTS of options for Android based devices, BAD in that each device seems to need a dedicated port/build of the OS, there is little "standardization" between devices I've looked at so far (although there is sufficient similarity to be "intuitive" to use), and well... sometimes not everything works as expected.

Coming from a Windows platform (XP and W7, plus prior iterations), I'm used to things breaking between versions, but generally pretty good compatibility for most devices and programs... Apple of course pretty firmly dictates the "Apple experience"...

Android represents a potentially great opening for inexpensive products not tied to an OS license, with lots of potential features and modifications... or you could say it's a fractured, unfocused marketplace with unpredictable features and options...

So far I'm still playing with the ones I've laid hands on, trying to decide if they are a useful tool or a "toy" - I love touchscreen, and the form factor, not so sure about the lack of compatiblitiy in some departments and certain features that are still "under construction".

[Chris Davis]

I bought the 1st gen iPad when they hit $350 at the Apple store (refurbished.) It has been very handy. I've always maintained they're not worth $500, but at $350 it's not a bad little device. I use it daily, which is more than I thought I would.

[Dave Blackhurst]

The tablet format changes things a lot - it's not nearly as flexible as a traditional computer, BUT it's a lot easier to have with you while you wander about, and once you see what they CAN do, you start getting comfortable with the idea pretty quickly.

The imports are pretty inexpensive (some are just CHEAP, both in price and features), in time this is a "new" market segment that will very likely expand quite a bit - I venture that most people wouldn't NEED much more in a computer... for me it's already a "laptop replacement" for most purposes!

[Corey Graham]

All things considered, I'm thinking this is more of a "want" than a "need" for me. Sure, it would be nice to have a light, thin, touch-screen computer that's very portable. But they still can't come close to the power/functionality of my laptop. But they're surely cool toys to have.

As I'm one of those technophiles, it's requiring an extreme amount of self-control to say this :)

[Dave Blackhurst]

Well, there's a nice little USB keyboard case that you can get for the Chinese tablets... and a USB mouse also works. I'm really torn, as a 10" pad will do so many things that a netbook/mini laptop would do, there are tons of apps available for free, others for cheap, and of course it's a tablet/touchscreen, all for around $200...

The Android OS is still definitely a "developing" platform, and I have some feeling that it's a little too fast and loose (unlike Win-duhs!), so sometimes things work a little less than "as expected". Still, for the price and capabilities...

Part of me says, "it's a gimmick", but the bloody thing is so easy to use that it starts to suck you in! Now to figure out exactly what the business angle is, so it's deductable!

[Greg Fiske]

Which model is that Dave?

[Paul Mailath]

I bought a couple of these:

http://www.aliexpress.com/store/8032...put-1080P.html

great for an on camera monitor and has USB input & a SD card slot - I just threw in an SD card with an MPG file and it plays fine.

[Dave Blackhurst]

Originally Posted by Greg Fiske

Which model is that Dave?

So far I've tried two, first the 7" with a dongle (that falls out) for USB/RJ45, I'd pass on that one, unless you can hack it... there's a more expensive (around $130) 7" model with the same ZT-180 1Ghz processor as the 10" pad I'm using, just 256/2G memory instead of 512/4G that the 10" has. Haven't tried that one, but it looks like it would be a better overall pad, and I'm happy with...

The second one I'm currently using is the ZT180 based 10" pad (around $200) - it's actually great for web surfing, my kids have downloaded a bunch of games, and overall it's pretty slick and mostly stable - Flash support is iffy, but I know they are still working on hacking it in, genuine Android market is working fine, and while it feels a tad slow sometimes, it's a fun little device. There's also a "Flytouch 3" 10" pad I'm tempted to try that adds GPS, but it's a different manufacturer, so don't know how good the Android 2.2 implementation is, but looks pretty decent, again for a sub $200 device.

I really probably ought to render out and load some video tests, but some things I looked at on the web displayed nicely, so I think it would do OK - the viewing angle on the LCD is not the greatest, so may have its limits for a "multi person" display, but for a nice screen that someone can pick up and watch a video, it works!

Put an OLED screen on, more processing horsepower and memory, refine the OS a bit, I'd say in a year or two these will rule the roost - right now the latest "bell and whistle" tech is still expensive, these use more basic configurations, but still I could see many people having something like this instead of a "regular" computer... If I were Bill Gates, I'd be trying to get a sub $200 Windows based pad developed ASAP - these WILL kill the computer market in relatively short order. When a 6 year old (and I've seen younger kids using these tablets too, and CATS!) can pick one up and intuitively start to do stuff with it, you've got a device that is going to become pervasive, and soon...