iPad: It's Apple or the Rest of the Brands

So the iPad is finally on sale 3 April, and it brings a new hope to the world hunger for beautiful technology. I have not owned anything Apple yet (except for the first-gen iPod Shuffle 512MB). I think I am getting rather tired about rationalising why Apple product seems to be so popular and so sought-after. To me, it's quite simple.

Products are entirely Apple. There is no third party OS or hardware. Apple controls everything and takes responsible for everything. Software and hardware developers only have to ensure compatibility with Apple. Not the case for every other computing device. Laptop brands running on Windows include HP, Lenovo, Acer, MSI, Toshiba, Fujitsu, the list goes on. If you want Windows, you have to decide which brands offer the best price with the most suitable hardware and software. If you want Apple, there is only Apple.

In other words, it's Apple or the rest of the brands.

Let me walk you through an example of my thought process. As you know, HP Slate is coming out, and in every way, the spec far surpasses iPad. Would I buy the Slate? Yes I would like to, but before I sink my dollar in, I would wonder if there are better Tablet models from other brands at a cheaper price or with a combination of features that I favour more, including after-sales support and battery life. On the other hand, the iPad specs will never change for the next 12 months, nor will you worry about a competing model coming out in 2-3 months, or whether the price will drop. It's either you buy it or you don't. You would justify about the lack of some hardware features on an iPad, and you wouldn't care, because if the other 700,000 iPad owners can do without, so can you. If anyone is laughing at your iPad, they're laughing at the 700,000 other owners too. That's not the case if you bought the HP Slate. Someone would come over and say, "Why Slate? XXX model has better features and cheaper." And you would hope you had not bought the Slate.