iPad 2 is a laptop killer.

The iPad 2 was released to international markets on Friday. The lines were just as long or longer than the U.S. launch of iPad2. Turns out that a lot of buyers are replacing their laptop or netbook computer in order to take advantage of its easy portability, light weight, and long battery life of the new iPad 2. iPad 2 is proving to be an industry changer that will leave Apple reigning as king and Blackberry, Microsoft and Samsung possibly with a massive failure of “Zune” proportion. However, there are also some, particularly those who use their computers as production workhorses, who have bought iPad 2, but report that they hardly use them after the initial novelty wears off. We find this hard to believe.

So obviously, it is possible to replace a laptop or netbook with an iPad 2, and be happy with the machine’s level of performance and capability since most people just need light computing capabilities for web surfing, email and light gaming. I’m able to be productive on my iPad 2, but for serious video rendering I need my MacBook Pro. However, if you currently use a laptop, netbook, or even a desktop computer mostly for email and social networking, web-surfing, video and photo viewing, music listening, viewing and light editing of digital photos, and occasionally for composing letters or other written documents, you’ll love the upgrade to iPad 2. A survey of 3,000 iPad 1st gen. owners found that the number 1 missing feature was a USB port (48%), followed by Flash support (44%), and an optical drive (42%).  Apple chose to address none of those shortcomings with the iPad 2, which was a substantial disappointment for those who’d been hoping for USB and Flash especially.

Multitasking support was added with the iOS 4 release last year, but it’s still not comparable to the real multitasking capability you get with any laptop or desktop computer these days. The iPad 2 is a huge product refresh and for those who waited for iPad 2 you’ll love it. Here’s the bottom line on why iPad 2 is rocking the world! It’s the Apple app store ecosystem. It’s all about getting the best iPad 2 apps. Yes Apple always hits a home run with their design and technology. But without the iPad apps it would not have reached rock star status.

Audiotorium Notes for iPad

The future of note taking is here right on your iPad and iPad 2! With the Audiotorium iPad app you’ll be amazed at all the note taking features. One that we really like is how it is integrated with Dropbox support. Now you can easily Dropbox your notes and they will be backed up to the cloud and available instantly, anywhere, to any device with internet. This iPad app is a great way to record, organize, review and share your audio and text notes from your meetings, classes, and conferences. We highly recommend this iPad app to all heavy note takers. This iPad app is as useful as it is brilliantly stylized with its beautiful interface and unique approach to organizing notes by Category and Subject, you’ll always be able to find the notes you want, fast on your iPad.

Letterman is addicted to iPad 2

The Naked iPad 2

The iPad 2 goes on sale today at 5pm at Apple Stores in the U.S. This new strategy by Apple to take off the iPad’s clothes is surprising. How many times have you seen an iPad without a full cover or case covering up every part other than the screen? Now Apple is telling us to take the covers off and go with the naked iPad 2. Does that mean that the iPad 2 case is more scratch resistant? Nope, it means Apple has shifting their marketing and are now creating a new revenue stream. It looks like the Smart Covers are shipping and are expected for delivery ahead of the iPad 2’s that they are going to cover. What are you guys going to do with your Smart Covers until your iPad 2 arrives? You could try them attaching them to your car door. That would be a real head-turner at the traffic stops. You might try them as refrigerator magnet also. What are you thoughts about these nifty little screen protectors?

iOS 4.3 for iPad Released

The newest installment of the iOS operating system for Apple mobile devices is out. Some of the new features that will impact your iPad and iPad 2 are the following:

• FaceTime video calling will now takes advantage of the new iPad 2 and it’s dual cameras. The iPad and iPhone fans will now be able to connect via FaceTime also. Woo hoo!
• This iOS update brings  faster web browsing speeds thanks to Safari’s new Nitro JavaScript engine that will be amazing on the new iPad 2.
• iPad users can now access all their iTunes media content via WiFi using the new iTunes Home Sharing feature.
• The AirPlay feature has been improved so that all iPad apps can push video or photos out to any AirPlay ready device like the Apple TV.  The feature even allows websites to push audio and video via AirPlay.
• As was mentioned earlier, users can now select whether to set the iPad 2 switch to lock screen orientation or act as a mute button.
• Photo Booth finally makes it to iOS and this opens up a whole new world for the new iPad 2 owners.  iPad 2 users can select from lots of photo effects to capture and edit their photos taken with their new iPad 2 camera.