I think iPad (1 or 2) is going to be obsolete sooner than the iPhone or iTouch. The tablets that are coming out now are more powerful, feature-ready, and flexible than the iPad2. And the iPad as a book-reader is outrageously expensive. [/quote]

That may only occur to you if you actually think about it. There is a fairly big fanbase, which may be reluctant to turn away from "The Gawd" himself soon, as even if some other tablet is more powerful, etc., their iPad will still be the iPadest

True the fanbase is large and loyal. It's enough to keep the iPad relevant, but not a superpower.

Looks fairly good to me.

I was thinking for a long time about buying a mini-mac, but now that the IPaD2 is coming, I think it might be a better buy. It runs garageband, accepts MIDI and a Pianoteq port has been announced. Plus, it's portable and has a wide range of functions I wouldn't use the mini-mac for.

[quote ] [color="#1C2837"]Looks fairly good to me.

I was thinking for a long time about buying a mini-mac, but now that the IPaD2 is coming, I think it might be a better buy. It runs garageband, accepts MIDI and a Pianoteq port has been announced. Plus, it's portable and has a wide range of functions I wouldn't use the mini-mac for. [/quote]
I would still much rather buy a Mac over an ipad.

I thought that iPads were pretty pointless until I got one for free through work. It doesn't do very much all that better than a laptop other than a few things -

1) Lighter weight / more compact design
2) Quicker start up
3) Better battery life

It is great for surfing the web, checking my e-mail, making shopping lists, Google Maps, and playing games on the go. There are a few things that bug the heck out of me about it though:

1) No Flash. I don't know why Apple and Adobe hate each other so much, but seriously, I can't just hop onto nbc.com or syfy.com and watch an f-ing show. Netflix has a lot of stuff on it to help compensate this, but come on?
2) No forward facing camera. It just screams at me that it SHOULD be good for things like Skype video chatting. They did fix this with the iPad 2, but why in the hell didn't the first one have it?
3) No USB slot on it to plug in a headset, USB stick etc. Not quite as annoying as the first two, but still annoying.

No forward facing camera. It just screams at me that it SHOULD be good for things like Skype video chatting. They did fix this with the iPad 2, but why in the hell didn't the first one have it?[/quote]

My bet would be that it's a highly desirable feature - so why have it right away in the already feature-loaded first evo -> make it one of the 'price-justifiers' for the next gen (and in case someone can't see a better reason to buy a new gen, well.. there you go;)