Apple iPad Rumor -- If Accurate, It Will Kill The Competition -- Absolutely Nothing About the Bakken

Link here to MacRumors.

The company is developing a new tablet with a 7.85-inch screen that is likely to sell for significantly less than the latest $499 iPad, with its 9.7-inch display, according to several people with knowledge of the project who declined to be named discussing confidential plans. The product is expected to be announced this year.

If accurate, this could blow away the competition. An iPad the size of a Kindle and about the same price?!

If it is "too cheap," the Justice Department will investigate.

***************

On another note. But related.

I brought up a computer issue with a close family friend who is in charge of buying PCs for a fairly large southern California company.

The issue is this: we have a relative, on a tight budget, looking to buy a new computer, and absolutely wants an Apple. All she plans to use the computer for is a) occasional e-mail; and, b) make flight reservations and print airline tickets, rarely. 

Seriously that's it.

She is on a tight budget, and $300 is a lot of money for her to spend on any one item of anything.  Right now she has dial-up and rarely uses her computer. With her new computer, she will get cable internet at home.

She absolutely wants an Apple. Personally, I won't buy anything other than Apple, and have had Apples only in the house since my first home computer in 1984 (actually I had a TRS back in 1978, I think it was).

But I can't justify a $1200 Apple computer for someone on a  limited budget who plans to use it for occasional e-mail and occasional flight reservations when one can do that with a $300 Lenovo.

So, I brought that up with our close family friend who grew up with PCs, is a bit of a computer geek, and doesn't like the way Apple restricts one's ability to get "inside" operating system to modify it for one's one use. But after years of buying computers for the company she works for, without hesitation, when hearing the above, she said: iPad.

Only problem: printing. An iPad is really part of an Apple eco-system and an Apple computer is necessary even for those who want only a tablet.

She agrees. But even with all that she still sticks with recommending an Apple computer.

I pressed the argument -- Window PCs are practically identical to the casual computer user these days, but still our friend, a huge PC user wouldn't budge. For neophytes and occasional users of the internet, the Apple iPad or Apple laptop is still her recommendation. I was quite surprised.