Nope, not at all. Just a simple office drone.
I use the iPads mainly for entertainment which was exactly the same function my laptop used to serve.
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iPad as a laptop replacement
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Nope, not at all. Just a simple office drone.
I use the iPads mainly for entertainment which was exactly the same function my laptop used to serve.
Is the PDF mosly for colleges or university? As 500+ print outs every month and PDF is lot if you not in school or running a business.
If 500+ print outs every month and PDFs readings just for hubby pleasure time is lot. If you are not studying for some thing or running a business.
Same here, although I have to say I do use a laserprinter every now and then when I’m tired and/or have really complex stuff I need to understand that spans over several pages with lots of scrolling and/or multiple documents.
How do you keep all of these devices synced/up to date/logged in with passwords/2FA?
500+ isn’t that much. Back in the day the big office printer would hold 2500+ pages in one drawer and it had several of them. It was filled several times a day for a team of 7 paper-pushers like me.
Just a situation I still encounter sometimes: people print and file every email they get. If you get re:re:re:re emails the last one might be 6 pages long and it might span 10 replies. So e.g. that would be 3 pages on average over 10 replies equals 30 printed pages. And people send out dozens or even hundreds of these “chat” emails.
But also different version of draft documents. If you print them once a day and the report is 80 pages that’s just another 80 pages. But I usually work on several project plans at any given time and 80 pages is a really short one. A serious or complex projectplan is easily 500+ pages. And up until 2010/2012 every application had to be send to the government in writing (paper) and in 3 or even 6 fold. Then there was a working file copy and a archive copy in our office, the client wanted two copies as well. So 7 to 10 copies *500+ pages of the final documents with all autographs, LOI’s, accountant reports, forecasts, etc. etc.
It really adds up.
Even for our small office of 7 there would be a euro-pallet of paper delivered every so many weeks. Laser (color) toner was automatically send when the printer noticed it had used up a drum.
I once had a work emergency break out while I was on vacation with my family and had to take calls and meetings for a few hours as well as address any urgent emails, calls, and texts pertaining to the situation that day. I did not bring a MacBook or iPad on the trip, just my iPhone X, AirPods, and Apple Watch. Those three mobile devices were my "office" during that entire ordeal and it was actually fine as long as nobody was expecting me to sit and type out gobs of email while I was supposed to be on vacation. The only limiter was battery life, which was a major consideration for the iPhone X. It wasn't great on that phone, or the OG Apple Watch I was rocking at the time either.
These days though, battery wouldn't be a problem for me on either of those devices in that same situation. When I leave the house, whether it's for a day or a week or a month, the question is always the same: what is the most efficient screen or set of screens for me to have available on this trip?
I've gone on extended vacations many times with just an iPhone/Apple Watch/AirPods. You'll rarely see me sitting at my kids' piano lessons, which are 20 minutes from our house, without an iPad or MacBook.
Just curious, though, what sort of work do you do? Sounds like almost all of what you can do can be accomplished on an iOS device. I'm in a similar boat.
yes, the wife was adamant I didn’t need to spend more money on iPads Pros when I had a perfectly functional laptop. She forgot I can be quite accident prone. ?
Much of the blame for the “iPad as laptop replacement” mental model can be laid at Apple’s feet. When I bought my first iPad (iPad 2) I saw it merely as Steve Jobs described it: a middle ground device between an iPhone and a Mac. It was only when Apple released the iPad Pro in 2015 and Tim Cook was running around giving interviews asking “Why would you ever buy a PC?” that I began to think this could be a thinner, lighter MacBook. Lots of people were excited by this idea but were disillusioned when Apple did not cross that final bridge by releasing pro Mac apps for the iPad Pro as was rumored for last year’s WWDC.
That splash of cold water awakened us to the hard reality that Apple always intended for iPads to be complimentary to Macs. While there is significant overlap between both devices, the fact remains that there are things that the Mac simply does better, just as there are things that iPads do that Macs can’t do at all. So, ideally (for Apple) you should buy both. The recent M1 Pro and M1 Max MBPs to me have reduced this overlap. These laptops have far more power and (surprisingly) better battery life than iPad Pros, which ironically have reached MacBook Pro price levels.
Given the above, perhaps it’s dedicated iOS aficionados (example: Podcaster Frederico Vitticci) who Apple is aiming at with its top-end iPad Pros. For these customers, the IPP isn’t a replacement for a MacBook because they weren’t interested in buying one to begin with.
That splash of cold water awakened us to the hard reality that Apple always intended for iPads to be complimentary to Macs. While there is significant overlap between both devices, the fact remains that there are things that the Mac simply does better, just as there are things that iPads do that Macs can’t do at all. So, ideally (for Apple) you should buy both. The recent M1 Pro and M1 Max MBPs to me have reduced this overlap. These laptops have far more power and (surprisingly) better battery life than iPad Pros, which ironically have reached MacBook Pro price levels.
Given the above, perhaps it’s dedicated iOS aficionados (example: Podcaster Frederico Vitticci) who Apple is aiming at with its top-end iPad Pros. For these customers, the IPP isn’t a replacement for a MacBook because they weren’t interested in buying one to begin with.
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I agree. The iPad was always intended to be a tablet first and an "in-between" device that sat between an iPhone and a Mac. I believe there are people that can be very productive with a desktop for heavy lifting and an iPad for mobile computing. So, in this way, an iPad can replace the need to own a laptop.
There are plenty of folks using iPads as complementary devices, but I just don't know very many people that work or study (i.e. college students) using an iPad alone. They might be out there, but I rarely see iPad alone at our local "remote work" coffee shop. It seems to me that the laptop is still king in the office/college productivity environment.
For those people who don't think the iPad has any real limitations I have a new scenario that I just encountered.
The publisher Tor occasionally gives away free ebooks. This week they gave away an ebook that was three ebooks concatenated together. The really nice thing about Tor is that they always publish DRM free. That means you can use a tool like Calibre to edit meta-data or even edit the book itself. In the case of this three volume ebook that is exactly what I wanted to do.
First, I already own one of the books. No need to keep two copies and the standalone version is much more convenient with its own recognizable book cover. I also wanted to split the other 2 books into individual books. Using Calibre this took about 10 minutes. I was also able to use the embedded book cover jpeg files to replace the front cover for each of the 2 ePub files that I created.
The obvious question, how would you do something like this on an iPad Pro? I'm not saying it isn't possible just that I don't have any idea how to do it. Is there a book editing app that would allow me to edit a DRM free ePub into 2 separate ePub files?
The best part is that when I was done, I imported the new ePubs into Apple Books and they showed up instantly (approximately) on my iPad mini. The mini is a much better reading device than a Mac but I don't think an iPad alone as a laptop replacement could have accomplished this task. A unrestricted OS like macOS made this pretty easy to do albeit because someone spent the time to create and maintain Calibre. But could something like Calibre even be allowed on the iPad App Store?
The publisher Tor occasionally gives away free ebooks. This week they gave away an ebook that was three ebooks concatenated together. The really nice thing about Tor is that they always publish DRM free. That means you can use a tool like Calibre to edit meta-data or even edit the book itself. In the case of this three volume ebook that is exactly what I wanted to do.
First, I already own one of the books. No need to keep two copies and the standalone version is much more convenient with its own recognizable book cover. I also wanted to split the other 2 books into individual books. Using Calibre this took about 10 minutes. I was also able to use the embedded book cover jpeg files to replace the front cover for each of the 2 ePub files that I created.
The obvious question, how would you do something like this on an iPad Pro? I'm not saying it isn't possible just that I don't have any idea how to do it. Is there a book editing app that would allow me to edit a DRM free ePub into 2 separate ePub files?
The best part is that when I was done, I imported the new ePubs into Apple Books and they showed up instantly (approximately) on my iPad mini. The mini is a much better reading device than a Mac but I don't think an iPad alone as a laptop replacement could have accomplished this task. A unrestricted OS like macOS made this pretty easy to do albeit because someone spent the time to create and maintain Calibre. But could something like Calibre even be allowed on the iPad App Store?
I don’t really understand all these people who say iPadOS is basically dead/incapable for productivity. I’ve replaced my MacBook Pro with an iPad Pro and Magic Keyboard, and I really have zero use for macOS anymore. It would be wasted on me. I use my iPad for learning, taking notes, word processing, document editing, scanning, spreadsheets/numbers, calendar management, to-do lists, editing photos, editing videos, drawing/making art, music production, and writing. Multitasking works great for me, and I’m easily able to get done almost anything I want to get done on iPad. A lot of the limitations and walls I run into with iPad have been eliminated over the past couple years, whether it’s Safari extensions, Shortcuts, Adobe Flash being discontinued, or performance and ram increasing.
That’s not to say iPadOS is perfect or perfect for everyone. I totally understand having special software needs from macOS. Even I have a few use cases where I need a desktop software every couple months. If you deal with a LOT of windows and need external monitors, obviously iPad isn’t for you. I use Windows at work (not my choice), and I think if I had to use an iPad for work instead, I could do it, but it would get frustrating because I do need a lot of windows open and screen space to be most productive. If you need to take any online test that requires proctoring, iPad won’t be able to do that for you. Obviously iPadOS isn’t going to work if you do music or video production with a lot of plugins. You can’t even manage your own music library for Apple Music in iPadOS. The fact that I don’t have proper external monitor support with iPad is disappointing. Also, going to the 12.9” size definitely makes the iPad less enjoyable to use as a tablet alone.
I get it. I do. But this idea that iPads are just total no-gos for productivity just isn’t accurate. The iPad is able to replace 99% of my [consumption and productivity] uses outside of work. I find that a lot of things can be more easily done, for less money, and in a more enjoyable way on iPadOS than on macOS. Also, buying a 12.9” iPad Pro, Magic Keyboard, and Pencil was $500 cheaper than it would’ve been for me to get the MacBook Pro with the same bright, high-contrast mini-LED, 120Hz display, and $800 cheaper than buying a MBP and the base level iPad ($900 cheaper with the Apple Pencil). And I’m not replacing two devices every 4-5 years, only one device now.
That’s not to say iPadOS is perfect or perfect for everyone. I totally understand having special software needs from macOS. Even I have a few use cases where I need a desktop software every couple months. If you deal with a LOT of windows and need external monitors, obviously iPad isn’t for you. I use Windows at work (not my choice), and I think if I had to use an iPad for work instead, I could do it, but it would get frustrating because I do need a lot of windows open and screen space to be most productive. If you need to take any online test that requires proctoring, iPad won’t be able to do that for you. Obviously iPadOS isn’t going to work if you do music or video production with a lot of plugins. You can’t even manage your own music library for Apple Music in iPadOS. The fact that I don’t have proper external monitor support with iPad is disappointing. Also, going to the 12.9” size definitely makes the iPad less enjoyable to use as a tablet alone.
I get it. I do. But this idea that iPads are just total no-gos for productivity just isn’t accurate. The iPad is able to replace 99% of my [consumption and productivity] uses outside of work. I find that a lot of things can be more easily done, for less money, and in a more enjoyable way on iPadOS than on macOS. Also, buying a 12.9” iPad Pro, Magic Keyboard, and Pencil was $500 cheaper than it would’ve been for me to get the MacBook Pro with the same bright, high-contrast mini-LED, 120Hz display, and $800 cheaper than buying a MBP and the base level iPad ($900 cheaper with the Apple Pencil). And I’m not replacing two devices every 4-5 years, only one device now.
I think your experience matches that of many here. Outside of work it’s getting there, but as a sole or main work platform many will run into limitations.
This really isn’t an either/or thing. I used to try to follow Frederick Vitticci’s lead in going iPad-only to run his website and business. He started doing so while undergoing cancer treatments and was too weak to use a MacBook (and this was BEFORE iOS 11). It can be done, but it requires some complicated steps that I (and most people) aren’t willing to take. Even HE bought a Mac mini for the heavy-lifting tasks that are easier/better on a desktop OS.
As I said in an earlier post, Apple never intended for iPads to replace Macs. As much as I enjoy iOS (and I really do), I started out on a Mac and there are still many things I love about it. So, I don’t consider it a failure of iOS if I sometimes go back to the Mac to perform tasks better suited to it.
The thread however isn’t about Apple’s intentions with the platform but about what users accomplish as far as replacing one with the other is concerned as time passes and things evolve.
I fail to see why it couldn’t. It is just an editor for a specific file type, and there are plenty of those in the App Store.
Part of Calibre’s common use is to use plug-ins. Some of those plug-ins are used to remove DRM. Neither of those features would be allowed I don’t think.
But plug-ins are generally not available for most apps in the App Store, or have you come across apps that allow third party plugin installation on iOS?
Exactly why I said I didn’t think it would be allowed in the store. Without Calibre, I couldn’t have managed to convert the single book into two.
The only plug-ins that I’m aware of is for music and recording apps. Apple allows them using the Audio Unit API.
Edit: And of course Safari content blockers.
Sure, but you didn’t require any such plugins for the task you performed, right?
What I meant was that there is no reason an app that does what you needed it to do couldn’t be in the App Store, not necessarily that the full-featured version of Calibre as it exists on the Mac could be in the App Store in its entirety.
You are correct since it was already DRM free and I’ve never installed any de-DRM plug-ins anyway. It was meant as a passing thought and not really tied to the rest of the post. It should have been at least in a separate paragraph.
I would love a iPadOS Calibre replacement. I don’t know if you’ve ever used Calibre but it is a cross-platform Python app with a horrible UI. Maybe I should look into how much effort it would take to port just the book editor portion to Swift.
Hello all, I was thinking about the whole laptop replacement thing.
My friend gifted me a ZAGG iPad Pro 11 keyboard laptop dohickey case because I had mentioned I was going to buy an iPad for art portfolio work. I was initially thinking of the base 64GB iPad but since getting the case opted for the 2018 iPad Pro 11 256 version with refurb + education discount because I take a whole 1 class a year.
I'm planning for this to be a compliment to my 2018 Mac Mini and HP Envy 13 laptop. I am transitioning away from all Adobe products and am getting more in tune with the Affinity line up. I haven't used iOS since maybe 9 on my old iPad Mini 4 which I gave to a friend.
What can I do with the USB C port? I have several hubs, can I plug in my Samsung T7 ssd and work from that on the go with my Affinity files? Can the iPad Pro handle large RAW and TIFF files?
What is the best "portfolio" app out there? I dont want to mix my art files with my personal photos in the Photos app.
Thanks!
My friend gifted me a ZAGG iPad Pro 11 keyboard laptop dohickey case because I had mentioned I was going to buy an iPad for art portfolio work. I was initially thinking of the base 64GB iPad but since getting the case opted for the 2018 iPad Pro 11 256 version with refurb + education discount because I take a whole 1 class a year.
I'm planning for this to be a compliment to my 2018 Mac Mini and HP Envy 13 laptop. I am transitioning away from all Adobe products and am getting more in tune with the Affinity line up. I haven't used iOS since maybe 9 on my old iPad Mini 4 which I gave to a friend.
What can I do with the USB C port? I have several hubs, can I plug in my Samsung T7 ssd and work from that on the go with my Affinity files? Can the iPad Pro handle large RAW and TIFF files?
What is the best "portfolio" app out there? I dont want to mix my art files with my personal photos in the Photos app.
Thanks!