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Saturday, February 19, 2011

Top 4 reasons iPad 2 will outsell other tablets in 2011


The iPad 2 doesn't exist in the market at the time I write this. The Honeycombs tablets are already here and I must admit that the Android team has done a wonderful job for a tablet OS. I have always believed that iOS isn't as feature rich as Android is. In other words, Android is the real OS. Real multitasking, real voice control and real notifications. iOS always pretends to do what it actually doesn't. The iPad (1st gen) gets away with all its flaws because its a first. Its the first tablet which created a revolution. Just like the iPhone, the iPad is the first device of its kind. Its been a year now since its launch and things have changed. The Androids have arrived and its getting sweeter in an alphabetical order. As we talk, we are getting closer to the iPad 2's launch. Lets analyse what will make it stand out from the rest and create a splash once again.

Android is a sweet candy with a bitter coating:

 As I said before, Android is an amazing OS. No second opinion about that. Coming to tablets, its not just about the OS. Its much more than that. Its about the ecosystem. Apple ensures that everything the end user gets is of ultimate quality. Be it the apps or music content or books, the user is never in the dark about anything. Everything is plain simple in Apple's world. If something is available, it works. I really mean the last two sentences I wrote. Just open up iTunes on your PC and go to the iTunes store. You search for an app, buy it and download it. You can download it to your PC if you dont have your device around and then sync it back later. Dead simple. Now go to the Android market ( http://market.android.com). One of the first things you would notice is that Google hasn't given much attention to designing the store properly. Layout is fine, but its not visually appealing. Now who is the loser here? The developer. And to an extent, the user.

      Android market is confusing. The picture  below will tell you why. Search for need for speed shift in the Android market. There are two results of the same app, they cost different and there is no indication whatsoever about what is what. Pure Fail.



The Hardware:


  In terms of Hardware, Apple has always been late to implement a few components into their devices. The iPhone got flash for camera only in its fourth iteration. The Androids on the other hand, have a lot to boast about on their spec sheets. 3D Android tablets are already on their way as we talk now. But this difference has never hampered Apple’s success. Their approach is a step by step incremental one where they keep adding better features every year on a strictly followed schedule while others try to play catch up.
          The main advantage of such an approach is a consistent form factor over generations of devices; thus avoiding inconsistency. Android's messy approach spoils the whole ecosystem. Not all apps work on all devices. On the contrary, Apple’s ecosystem is not an unsorted mess. Apps are neatly categorized as “iPhone and iPod touch”, “iPad” and “Universal”.  The one size fits all strategy works really well for them.
 
 iPad 2 will get at least 3 major iOS updates; without fail:
 
    Ah, here we are talking about Fragmentation once again. Google is never going to solve this one. At present, different Android devices are running  at least 4 different versions of Android. Every quarter, there is a new version of it and people are stuck with an old version of Android thus feeling completely helpless. What’s the use of such amazing hardware when you don’t get the latest software updates?  Only a handful of devices are running the latest Gingerbread version while many are still using Eclair or Froyo.  Again, this leads to incompatible apps, buggy experience and an unhappy user.
      Apple handles software updates in a very planned manner. There’s an iOS update every year around July and they give a preview of the upcoming OS in march. This schedule has been strictly followed since the very beginning and they have never failed to deliver the updates at the promised dates. The user is never in the dark and gets an update via iTunes without any hassles. Whereas Android users are always kept waiting for their updates.
 I am pretty sure that  iPad 2 will at least get iOS 5 ,6 and 7 updates till the hardware gets too old to run an iOS version.

Lots of  magazines and tabloids will tie up with Apple in 2011:

 The latest announcement of “The Daily” on iPad showed the rich experience of a newspaper on the tablet. Since the iPad is a more successful product, and an established one at that, many mag publishers will have more faith in Apple than anyone else. This will be just another reason why people will consider going for the iPad and not the honeycombs.

         Android is growing and its becoming too difficult to manage. There are too many manufacturers jumping onto the Android bandwagon. Android is a powerful OS, but its the ecosystem and the roadmap which they don’t get right.  They will eventually outsell iPads in the coming years, but there’s no denying that for the time being, iPad 2 will be a runaway hit.        

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