Its why i love my Transformer to be honest ... best of both worlds - options for netbook or tablet.

I was in a meeting in London and one of the execs was muttering about disliking his iPad and said "this will be the future" and put his ipad on his laptop ...... everyone turned to look at me as they knew i had the transformer on the desk in front of me .....

its a great form-factor regardless of hardware/OS/manufacturer discussions.

These "faults" are largely non existent though.

There is no charging issue. I haven't noticed it running at all hot. 4G is obviously down to availability of suitable 4G networks wherever you are. The quality of the screen is a good thing, not a fault.

Adding "etc etc" sounds good, but what is "etc etc"?

The new iPad does have problems (you really cant bury your head in the sand all the time).

Google "new ipad problems" and you will see issues that some people are having.

However .... google any product and you will find problems. Nothing out there is perfect and to suggest otherwise is very silly.

Android tablets have some technical issues. iPads have some technical issues. Android phones have some techncial issues. iPhones have some technical issues. Android/Android apps crach occasionally. iOS/Apple Apps crash occasionally.

I didn't say it was perfect. I said that the supposed, particular, problems that people have been making a song and dance about are essentially non existent.

Google "ipad batter problems" and you'll find loads of sites reporting those non existent problems, all originating from a single, incorrect source.

What happens when you Google "Asus transformer problems"?

oh you will find Asus transformer problems. if you read my post i made that quite clear.

With the iPad ....
Some people are finding over heating a problem.
Some people are having software issues
Some people are finding their smart covers cant cope with the extra weight
Some people are having wifi problems

If you arent having any problems then great

I can list the Transformer problems, or the samsung problems or the Kindle fire problems if you want but I made it very clear that every new piece of hardware tends to have issues.

Google my TV and i will find problems
same with my car
my boat
my hifi
my wifes car

etc etc

Of course all products will have a small number of people who have issues.

But that's different from what's being said here - for example that there is an inherent design flaw in all iPads with the way in which the battery charges.

well neither you or I know whether these are design flaws or simple quirks yet.

time will tell whether these are genuine issues that Apple admit too (similar to the iPhone 4 signal problem) or whether there is a software update and the problems magically disappear or whether its just 'one of those things' (eg faster chip, more pixels = hotter unit).

but to clarify (again) this isnt a situation that is unique to Apple.

We do know that its not an inherent design flaw, because it has been explained how it works, and that whoever wrote the original article had not been aware of how it worked, and so used incorrect assumptions to reach his conclusion.

The heat issue is possibly interesting, as ours doesn't get warm at all, so it may be that there is an issue with some that is causing it to run warmer. Although judging by some reports, and actual comparative testing, it sounds like another gross exaggeration.

What does seen to be unique to Apple these days is that any issue whatsoever is blown up out of all proportion on the internet.

thats simply due to the volume of Apple users these days ......

whats equally unique is that Apple buyers will defend wholeheartedly a product that DOES have issues (and im talking about previous hardware) and STILL buy it in numbers ....

Apple users aren't usually the ones blowing things out of all proportion.

I wouldn't be so sure that people continue to buy Apple products in spite of problems. More that they continue to buy Apple products because they realise the problems have likely been blown out of proportion.

You said yourself earlier that all products have problems. And yet presumably everyone - yourself included - continue to buy products that you know to have problems. You've been defending your Asus Transformer for example, even though its known to have "problems".

So its a nonsense to suggest that "Apple users" are somehow unique in that respect. (Because they're dumbass Apple users.) They're mostly and probably no different to you, or anyone else.

Ahhh but I bought an Asus Transformer prior to people discovering its issues. Same I guess with you and your iPad. However if anyone asks me whether to buy a Transformer I will happily discuss pro's and con's and discuss issues. To be honest I havent experienced any of the issues that other people have found (to my knowledge) however I would never state that such issues do not exist just because I dont have them (or havent noticed them).

The one that sticks in my mind was the iPhone 4 reception issue. There WAS a problem. Even Apple admitted this. To me the main use of a smartphone is to make calls. If this was compromised I would look elsewhere. Millions of people ignored the issue and carried on buying the product 'because it was Apple' ..... Maybe not you but I know many people who did.

So now that you are aware of the apparent problems with the Asus Transformer, would that stop you buying another Asus product, or made you regret your decision?

With the reception issue, although Apple fessed up, I still think the issue was exaggerated.

well every time i buy a product i shop around and find the best package for me. I loved my HTC Desire but when i was due an upgrade I purchased a Samsung Galaxy Nexus.

If/when i change my tablet i will look at all the products available and weigh up pro's and con's. There tends to be much more 'brand loyalty' with Apple than any other tech company (although Samsung Galaxy S2 owners are getting almost as passionate ).

But going back to the reception issue ... Apple confessed there was a problem (which was admirable) and said you needed a rubber cover (to ruin the apparent sleek lines and design) yet people still thought the iPhone was the greatest phone ever. I just cant understand the concept of buying anything purely because of the brand.

Has it occurred to you that the main reason for that brand loyalty is that people actually like the products, have no problems with them, and find they work well? You still seem to labour under this notion that significant numbers do buy just because of the brand.

you are forgetting one of the biggest reasons for brand loyalty...image. People will buy a product because of the image, no matter how rubbish the product is.

I like my car. it works well. i have no problems with it. When i change it i will look at various other makes/models though.

Brand loyalty is key to Apple's model and forms a huge part of their current success. Its not just me that thinks this:

http://www.forbes.com/sites/marketsh...les-success-2/

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technolog...and-loyal.html

http://www.thetechherald.com/article...-the-iPhone-4S

Maybe they will, maybe they won't. Either way, Apple products aren't rubbish (IMHO), so the point here is moot.

I don't dispute that brand loyalty plays a part in Apple's success, and obviously perception of the brand plays a big part in that. But I would dispute that that brand loyalty is largely blind, and people are buying and putting up with inferior products, because brand is the only, or most important, thing to them.

Given that Apple repeatedly score highly in customer satisfaction surveys, I'd suspect that a big part of any brand loyalty is down to people actually liking the products, having no problems with them, and finding they work well.

Brand loyalty can only go so far. People will soon abandon a brand if they are mucked about or the devices don't work.

Brand loyalty also does not explain the iPad's ever increasing sales.

no .... that will be the increasing market .... of which their share is decreasing ...

really ! keep up

Of course Apple's share has decreased. The market is bigger, and the iPad is no longer the only tablet available.


But... as mentioned before, sales of the iPad are going up and up and up every quarter. The iPad continues to sell more than any single competitor in the tablet market (and in the last quarter even sold more than any computer manufacturer sold PCs, even the big boys such as Dell, HP, & Lenovo), and it continues to sell more than all tablet competitors combined.

None of the competition has made any kind of dent in the market, apart from the Kindle Fire and Galaxy Tab 10.1.... and their sales still utterly pale in comparison to the sales of the iPad. No one has come close, at all.

Given that the Asus Transformer has just 2,000 per orders, and plans to ship just 80k units worldwide for release , it's not going to have that much of an impact!

where have i ever said that the transformer was cutting into market share ???

The big dent will come from the kindle fire (which IMHO looks like a poor tablet as you are simply swapping the apple ecosystem for an amazon one).

It will be the same as the phone market - a gradual build up from a number of phones. Eventually one tablet might become equally popular (as per the Galaxy S2 phone has).

As stated ... a single company with a single annual product will quite obviously start to lose market share to dozens of companies producing a whole range of items to suit every need and every pocket.

Having said that the Transformer suits me perfectly (and has won several awards). The Transformer Prime seems to have had some issues and, for me, i felt no need to upgrade my original TF to a newer model. Its my equivalent of the iPad2 to 3 decision ..... faster and a better screen but my current unit does everything i need .....

Sadly nobody else has produced anything in the tablet/netbook form factor.

I agree that the big dent will come from the Kindle Fire. It has price in its favour, and it also has something none of the other competition has: the ecosystem.

It's already done very well (3.9m in Q4 2011, higher than any other non-Apple tablet... but still a lot lower than Apple's 15.43m in the last quarter, plus Apple recently sold 3m 3rd gen. iPads within only a few days of lunch) and continues to do well. It does seem so far though that it's affecting other non-Apple tablets more than it affects the iPad.

I still don't see the tablet market going the same way as the phone market, though. They are not the same.

Most people get a smartphone on a contract, where the phone is free / cheap due to subsidies...with Android phones coming in cheaper than the iPhone, even high-end Android phones.

With tablets, the majority buy them outright, they don't get them subsidised with a data contract.

As such, price is not such an issue as it is with smartphones, because the iPad is the one Apple product that isn't overpriced compared to the competition. The high-end competitors all cost the same, or near enough the same, as the iPad (except of course for the ones that massively failed and subsequently had huge price cuts in a futile attempt at generating sales).

The start of the market is also different. Apple did not create the smartphone market like it did with the tablet market, it jumped into an established market populated by existing big boys (at the time) like Nokia & RIM and tried to push its way in. It never dominated the smartphone market in the way it currently dominates the tablet market.