Oh I agree. In other posts elsewhere Ive been an advocate that a tablet (Apple or Android) is much more for casual 'pick up and go' use .... basic web browsing, casual gaming etc. There are still things I need to use a laptop for. Serious Gaming used to be the realm of the PC. That has now been taken over by the PS3/XBOX generation. Casual Browsing/gaming used to also be a PC thing but that is now where the tablet fits in.

Im just saying that i didnt think the iPad was 'cheap for what you get' with regards to its competitors.

I'd be thinking, rather than a laptop AND an iPad, I'll get a Transformer Prime.

I have to agree. I originally bought my iPad with 3G almost as much for the GPS as for the cellular support. This is because I am really into maps and GPS technology (I developed an early satnav for cars in 1995) and I couldn't see how I could possibly live without GPS support. However in reality I never use the GPS on my iPad, it turns out that all the GPS based apps I use make much more sense on my iPhone.

What a shame.

I don't think Microsoft have made a version of MS Access for Android.

Do you really think that the increasing market share of other devices is down to the iPad not having a GPS. No, the real reason is the opposite. The average man in the street is totally technically non discriminating and sees a tablet at two thirds the price of an iPad and automatically buys it on price alone. Indeed I bet in a lot of cases they even think they are buying an iPad.

Whilst I no longer use Access, I do have a need for spreadsheets, word processing and photo editing, all of which I can do through a browser, or with apps.

As for Access, try this:
http://www.zoho.com/creator/migrate-...-database.html

you really are out to cause trouble arent you

no i dont think that the market share swing is down to GPS .... its down to a variety of features/facts.

a) More people have android phones now. many will want to stay within a single ecosystem
b) There are more Android tablets on the market now
c) Android covers a wider price range than Apple
d) There is now a choice of feautures available for buyers (INCLUDING whether they want GPS or not)
e) some people just dont like Apple

If you think that someone buying an Archos (for example) thinks they are buying an iPad then I hope you mean a tiny minority

thats like me saying that there are loads of people buying iPads because they dont know other options exist ....... possible/probable but you'd hope not many .....

I do wonder how many people buy an iPad and then wonder where they plug their memory stick in, or where the HDMI port is, or how they get SatNav going ......

Good job Apple knows whats best for everybody

Totally agree the GPS feature on tablets is pretty much irrelevant for most people.

If you only have a budget of £200 or less then the low end Android tablets do a good job and I can see the market share for Android increasing in this area.

But for the top end I think the iPad with the new display has too many benefits for most users compared to the high end Androids and will probably dominate this market for some time.

I had an app published for the iPad a couple of years back, I've ported it over to android but it's a real mission to deal with the fragmentation so I think this puts of a lot of developers off android, especially tablets

Right now, I imagine its a lot less people, than people who buy an Android tablet, and then wonder where all the great apps are.

The app thing is as age old as the flash debate. I've had a transformer for 12 months and found about 5 apps from my phone that weren't compatible.....

How many tablet fart machines do you really need??

Working in retail, I've sold a fair few Android tablets for customers who then moan that is doesn't work as easily as the iPad (buying down to a price with a resistive screen, or slow processor) to the apps looking crap on the low res screen. It's fragmentation like this that is meaning Android tablets are slow in gaining traction in the market. While the ecosystem is there, it needs developing further with more uniformity.

I don't know about anyone else, but I don't need any tablet fart machines. I'm starting to think its a waste of time posting links of people aren't going to read them, and miss the point completely instead.

It mentions lots of tv apps, required on ipad as their websites are presumably incompatible. Whereas the Android tablet you just go to the abc/hulu/4od site. There is a need for a good selection of apps. I'm not convinced there's a need for separate versions of apps for tablets, or an app for every website. The wikipedia app it mentions is particularly pointless. I've yet to hear of any specific gaps of apps on android tablets that can't be overcome using either a website or an android phone app.

My friend came round to mine with his today and it would only work over wifi if he sat right next to my router.He felt a right numpty.He spent an hour trying to connect.

By triangulating on cell towers and wifi hotspots ?

Mine is only WIFI only and never leaves the house so again how does it work ?

Oh I read the link you had found ......

Some apple apps look lovely. Never a doubt about that.

But there are still hundreds of thousands of apps that work on Android tablets. My point is that in both stores there are many thousands of useful apps and the rest tends to be rubbish (fart machines are an often referenced example ).

I have a few hundred apps that I have used on phone and tablet. I'm guessing most don't even have that many. Beyond that the fact there are 100000 or 5000000000 apps makes no difference to me.

.....I have never downloaded a fart machine.

Anyone buying a Galaxy Tab 10.1 would have the same issues, as that also has a proprietary dock connector and requires adaptors for HDMI, SD cards, and USB.

It's not just Apple


... while people who buy a Transformer Prime will have that problem


Also: If someone buys a WiFi-only iPad, and then wonders how they get the satnav going, they only have themselves to blame. A quick and easy bit of spec-checking beforehand would inform any potential buyer that they need the 3G model if they want GPS.


As for the change in market share. I wouldn't call it a "swing", as to me that implies a large shift in the other direction. Sure, Apple's share has decreased, but only because the market itself is bigger and there are now many, many competitor devices at different price points. But sales of the iPad continue to grow every single quarter, and it continues to sell far more than all the competition combined. No one has come anywhere near Apple's sales, and aside from the Kindle Fire, and to a lesser extent the Tab 10.1, sales of the competition have been abysmal.

No swing at all..
http://www.bgr.com/2012/02/28/samsun...nts-wont-help/
Tablet sales for android are sad.
http://www.tech-ex.net/2011/07/poor-...les-shown.html
Even more recent charts
http://www.androidtapp.com/tag/poor-...-tablet-sales/

You're reading these wrong, they're comparing smartphones, a mature market, vs, tablets, a relatively new market. More importantly, they (and you) are wrongly making the assumption that 2.x = phone, which is not the case. Go into PC world, there are plenty of 2.x tabs for sale. (e.g. the most popular Android tablet in the US, the Kindle Fire, runs 2.3)

That's not to say they're flying off the shelves, but those figures have no relevance to tablet sales.

We can all provide links ..... and much more recent ones ....

http:// http://m.engadget.com/defaul...sic&postPage=1

Anyone who thinks one company can keep the market share on such a variable product is a little blinkered .....

As for phones people are predicting 70% android share this year.

A single product will always struggle to compete with such a variety of features and prices elsewhere .....

Surely the reason the iPad market share (as a %) is falling is because a few years ago it virtually had the market to itself. As soon as any other competitors come into that market, Apple's market share was always going to reduce. Nobody can keep a 100% share. I think the fact that the numbers by volume of the iPad are increasing are more important numbers to look at.

Agreed..... the market is increasing but apples share is decreasing.

OK - although the article does say a bit more than the fact that some Apple apps are very nice, and that there are many more apps for iOS than Android. But we can ignore all of those points if you like.

what points from it would you like to discuss?

A quick whiz through - "it's hard to find a list of tablet apps on Android Market/Google Play". Yes, if you're only desire is to install/review each and every tablet app. No, if you want to search for e.g. a weather app.

Then goes on to focus predominantly on apps that are substitutes for websites (ABC,Disney,CNN, ebay, Facebook,Google+, Wikipedia, Linkedin) - which I don't understand - if the tablet size is suitable for lots of info, just go to the site.


So why do you need a Linkedin app on a tablet? Just go to the Linkedin site.

A fairer comparison would be to include screenshots of the equivalent website on an Android tablet. Also the screenshots are taken in landscape format which exaggerates the effects as the apps are clearly intended for portrait.

Perhaps if you were clearer about what points you think are relevant in the article, we would be better able to respond to them.

Sorry - I would have thought it pretty obvious. And whatever else, clearly not limited to Apple's own apps, or the relative numbers of apps.

Specifically about the difference between a lot of apps, many of which, in the case of the iPad have been redesigned from their phone counterparts to take advantage of the extra real estate, compared to Android apps which haven't been.

With the App stores, I'd say its useful to browse tablet only apps, as I'd imagine they'd be the ones tailored to tablets. But perhaps that's less of an issue if so many of them are simply bigger versions of the phone versions.

And I think that in many cases apps instead of websites work well, because people use and interact with tablets in a different way to the way in which they use and interact with a desktop or laptop.

This is really the same as it often is with things like bottom line specs. There are two schools of thought - one which is all about the spec (or in this case merely whether or not something is available), and one which gives more credence to the look and feel of the overall experience.