Almost ten years ago, Apple changed the world as we know it their iPod. It ushered in a whole new digital era that saw traditional CD sales plummet and digital sales boom. Then in 2007, Apple changed the mobile industry with its iPhone and now it’s attempting something with their new iPad.

I set my alarm this morning for five o’clock. It’s not something I do often, but it’s not every day Apple announce a mysterious, all new product. Fumbling around for my mobile phone I stopped and thought for a moment if I really wanted to give up sleep for this Apple tablet. I reached over and grabbed my netbook from my bedside table, as I had placed it specifically there for this very event. Waking it up wasn’t a problem and its proper tactile keyboard acted as a base for the 10 inch screen, leaving my arms free to remain under the covers.

Moments later I was watching streamed flash footage of the event while engadget gave me a text based stream of events. The predications where right: Apple had announced a tablet computer. I stayed for bit, watching as Steve announced each and every little feature of the iPad. My excitement for the device was starting to wear off and I gave up half hour later, choosing to go back to sleep.

I awoke hours later to find that nothing else had changed. There were no extra surprises; it was exactly what I thought it was, a larger, oversized iPod Touch. It was a joke, and many others agreed with me. At the core level, there are three things wrong with the iPad- the name, the hardware and the software.

The Name
This is pretty much self-explanatory. Remember when Nintendo announced the name of the Wii? It was the butt of many jokes but can finally rest easier tonight as the iPad wins the award for the stupidest name. Before this tablet was even revealed, two names where fighting it out for the top spot, iPad and iSlate. While the iSlate could be (and would have been) interpreted as is late, it’s certainly a much better name then the iPad. It was also reported that fujitsu owns the rights to the name iPad, and as far as I know, it could be a whole Apple-Cisco debate all over again. What would be a rather entertaining outcome is if fujutsu refused to give up rights for the name, making Apple change the name of the tablet. Actually, it might be starting quicker then expected

The Software
In my opinion, running the iPhone OS on it was a big mistake. For starters, it can only run iPhone apps, which of course can only come from one spot – iTunes. Should anyone want to make an application for it, you must first submit it and await a response. If (and only if) Apple like your product, then you get to place it on the store. Should they reject it, all that hard work has gone to waste as there is no second distribution method. Furthermore, should you wish to charge for your work, Apple also get to take a slice of your profits.

While this is nice for some developers to get their work noticed, they can’t distribute their own software on their own website, and to be honest, I find this appalling. There is a long standing stigma that Apple likes to promote that states that Macs don’t get virus’s. Apple knows that this isn’t true, and as their market share continues to increase, so does the likelihood that their operating systems gets attacked. The only way around this is to give a total lockdown of the operating system, something that we’ve already seen with the iPhone and iPad. Time will only tell if this sort of lockdown will come into its main operating system, but I think that it will.

The other obvious shortcoming of this tablet is that it lacks the ability to multitask. Despite equipping it with a much faster processor, we are still limited to just one application at a time. This means that we can’t watch video and twitter at the same time. We can’t use iWork and surf the net at the same time (which can be incredibly handy when researching projects). Basically forget having two windows side by side. Unless your application has been optimised for the iPad, then you can either have the application scaled up to fill the entire screen, or have a black border surrounding the outside of your app. This fact alone makes Steve Jobs’ stab at netbooks pointless. If I had a netbook that could only do one thing at a time (without flash by the way), then of course it’s going to be fast. It will also beat the iPad at whatever it is its doing, mainly because I have 2 gigabytes of ram and a 1.6 GHz processor. At the end of the day, I’m happy with my current netbook running Windows 7.

Speaking of Microsoft, they attempted to do something similar to this with Windows 7 starter, by restricting the number of concurrent programs it would run, but it was met with anger and resulted in them removing that particular restriction. Why is Apple any different? The screen and processor can easily handle two applications at a time, with the possibility for even more, so why didn’t they do it?

The Hardware
Now we get to the biggest downfall of this fabled tablet- the hardware. Inside it does a average job, with a custom made 1 GHz processor powering the entire machine. It comes in 16, 32 or 64 gigabyte models with no mention of ram. It has Wifi (802.11n), Bluetooth and a ten hour battery.

Things start to become undone with the screen. It’s not the OLED that many were expecting, and it’s certainly not e-ink, so staring at it for long periods of time (like we tend to do with books) can become painful. Not to mention the fact that fingerprints and smudges may show up in low light requiring you to wipe down the screen every time you plan to use it for reading. Instead, Apple gives us an IPS screen, which apparently makes it easier to view at greater angles. To top it off, the resolution is only 1024×768; which is at a 4:3 ratio, so watching high definition video (or even a normal movie these days) anything else presented in 16:9 will give you lovely looking letterboxes along the top and bottom of the screen.

There’s no doubt that Apple likes things simple, and in this case they’ve crossed a line. This line was right at point zero, so anything they do now becomes less simple and more complex. The thing I’m talking about here is the connectors (or lack of). There is no USB, HDMI, memory card reader or even mini display port. Everything (and I mean everything) has to go through the proprietary Apple connector that’s visible on almost all iPods or possibly Bluetooth.

But here is where it gets crazy – the number of different docks you can buy for it. In addition to the standard dock (that acts as a stand), you can also buy a keyboard dock – a fully functional keyboard that connects via the dock. That’s right, unless your keyboard is bluetooth, you’ll need to buy another keyboard from apple to use it. Then there’s the camera dock, which allows you to connect a USB keyboard, or plug in an SD card and upload them to your new iPad. It seems another new phrase will soon emerge – there’s a dock for that.

The Potential
This device had the potential to be something amazing. It could have come with a proper operating system that allowed it to be used in many more professions, including Graphics, home automation, board room presentations (wireless display/remote), a front facing camera would have propelled video calls forward and many other ideas. All of those ideas went down the drain when Apple announced that it was running off a modified iPhone OS.

Apple could have easily made it into a netbook, without making it into a netbook. By simply putting the dock on the long side, and releasing a keyboard/touchpad combo with some form of hinge, you could transform a single screen tablet into a proper netbook. And when you’re finished with the keyboard (and its additional USB ports), simply disconnect it and it becomes a tablet again.

All in all, this was a pretty lousy product by Apple, and they should stick do doing what they do best. Instead of trying to create a new market, they need to pick and old one (CD/MP3 players, mobile phones) and come up with a new innovative decide that’s never been seen before.

I promise that this will be my final iPad related post for the intermediate future.