iPads On American Campuses? Maybe Next Year

Velcroman1 writes "Slashdotters have read extensively about the iPad pilot programs at colleges and universities: Australian schools are iPad crazy, we read yesterday, and thanks to the iPad's success, 2011 will be the year of the tablet. But on US college campuses almost half a year after the iPad's launch, it's a whole different story — at least so far this year. FoxNews.com reports that high-profile schools like Duke and Stanford are far more cautious about the device than has previously been reported. 'It definitely facilitates studying and recall because you don't get bogged down by all the paper,' noted first-year Stanford med student Ryan Flynn. But it's still a work in progress. 'The iPad isn't the best input device. Some people have gone back to paper and pencil.'"

Comments

Re:I don't think so

[jedidiah]

> iPad can already watch videos downloaded from TPB

No, not really. In terms of video, the iPad is like some ancient laptop at the used computer store from 1999.

It has a weak CPU and limited speciality hardware and is constructed to make it impossible for you to manage your own data or applications.

So it's unecessarily hard to get things on and off. You can't really connect to local networks. You can't even print easily.

3G sucks for networking, especially anything serious.

Something with a good keyboard and a wired ethernet port will run circles around it for real work. ...not even getting into that whole "compatability" thing.

Re:Budget

[rsborg]

Crippled ability to print anything -- you can buy the $30 Apple Camera Adapter to get some USB support, and/or simply email whatever you need to print to a computer, but what a pain.

You're not even trying... iOS 4.2 will introduce printing support. Also this app works wonders for me right now: PrintBureau.

Look, the iPad isn't perfect, and it is not a replacement for a netbook/laptop in a lot of cases (but does work better in some use cases). There are legitimate issues, so why do you pollute your argument with stuff that is no longer an issue?