The Netbook does, what the iPad can't

The freaking thing hasn’t even shipped, and the Apple iPad has already divided the Internet community into believers and haters. We won’t join in that direction — as far as MacPCWiz is concerned, jury’s still out on whether in the Apple tablet is a “gadget to beat” or not.

Steve Jobs' newest baby - the Apple iPad

Most people are in agreement, though, that somewhere down the road the iPad is gonna run right smack into the Netbook. As the two gadgets clash, more and more people will make that decision on whether the iPad is indeed “the death of the Netbook“. Steve Jobs, smug as he was on the day his iPad baby was launched, said this about netbooks, and we quote: “they’re not better at laptops than anything, they’re just cheaper.”

Contender for best bang-for-the-buck netbook - The ASUS Eee PC 1201N

Look at our ASUS Eee PC 1201N review here to check why we’re skeptical about the iPad’s netbook killing credentials.

Unlike Mr. Jobs, we’re not about to diss the netbook that easily, as if the main technology of 2009 was something to be cast aside so cavalierly. We’re not defending the netbook just because we don’t like the iPad, no. But here, Mr. Jobs, are some actual things where netbooks are pretty good devices to have — which the iPad (as was handled and reviewed at time of launch) would probably flop at.

• Multitasking – A netbook admittedly has less resources to multitask your heart away, but at least IT CAN MULTITASK. The iPad runs on iPhone OS, and as such runs on a 1-app-at-a-time rule. Nope, you can’t listen to music while browsing. Sucks big time. HUGE oversight on Apple’s side.
• Video chat – Even the cheaper netbooks of today have a cursory webcam so that users can do video chat over Skype or other such chat applications. The iPad = no webcam. We feel this might have been one of the iPad’s strongest features, but Apple left it out. We don’t believe it’s a cost structure breaker as well — most netbooks under $500 manage to include one.
• Adobe Flash content – Said Mr. Jobs, “The iPad is the best web experience you’ve ever had.” Said the real world – almost 70% of all multimedia and interactive content on the web is based on Adobe Flash. So yeah, no Farmville for you — unless it’s on an app you downloaded from the App store. No Hulu, no YouTube. We don’t understand how this is, if at all, a good browsing experience.
• Upload photos on the go – No (native) USB ports on the iPad mean no connecting cameras or other peripherals on the fly. If I were a blogger… wait, I actually am… this would be a constant headache, since I can’t even hook up my trusty point-and-shoot to it, to post pictures and other data. Netbooks have at least 2 USB ports standard. The iPad does have a dongle adapter to allow photo and video uploads — but when you’re mobile, which would you really prefer?
• Store data more than 64GB – What’s up with the capacity? 64GB? That makes it just slightly better than an iPhone. The most basic netbook has at the minimum 160GB of space. To make things just that much worse, I can’t even hook up my portable hard drive to it. Sucks.
• Install CD/DVD media (other than from the App Store) – With the convenience of USB ports, connecting an external DVD drive can allow disc-based software to be installed on a Netbook, even without an optical drive built in. Netbooks can also install files off USB drives, or via any other input method. The iPad just wasn’t designed with this kind of flexibility in mind, and we start to wonder why.
• Upgrade - Netbooks can upgrade their RAM–albeit slightly–and with a little effort. Hard drives can be swapped, batteries upgraded from 4-cell to 6-cell to 8-cell models. The iPad is a fixed entity, so there’s no going back, like, once you’ve picked 16, 32, or 64GB of storage space, that’s yours for life.

So you see, we feel the iPad has a ways to go before being touted as a genuine netbook killer. We concede, as a luxury plaything, the iPad has a lot of potential. For more utilitarian purposes, Apple will probably need to go 2nd or 3rd gen, before they finally convince us.