Review
Ipad Air Update.
By Christopher O'Meally.
Not long ago I wrote an article about the first couple of days with my new Ipad Air.
I have noticed many new things about it, and I got a really good case to boot. So Lets get started.
Needless to say I still love Apples newest Ipad, and even though I own a MacBook Air, the Ipad Air has become my main device. I perform most functions on it. Word processing, spread sheet creation, presintation creation, video editing, music composition, Netflix, skype, And the list goes on and on. My point is, multi tasking is amazing on this device with the help of the Ipad specific multi tasking gestures. Having the capibility to swipe my hand across the screen to change from one application to another saves lots of time, and its rare that I ever use the little round thing at the bottom of the screen. What's it called again? The five finger pinch, or four finger pinch saves lots of time.
When it comes to productivity, The Ipad air itsself is up to the job, but having a blue tooth keyboard makes it so much faster. I know people who are pretty fast using the on screen keyboard, but untill Apple gets its butt in the game and adds Fleksy as a secondary keyboard, I just cant use the on screen keyboard as a perminant solution. I have one of brookstone's keyboards that came with a case that I use when I know my Ipad will not leave the desk. I explained the workings of this case in my first Ipad Air Review, so I won't go into a lot of detail here, but the Ipad just sits down in to the case, you can prop it up, and the keyboard is held in to the case pretty snugly, but you can remove it. Anyway, I will talk about the case I have now later. If you own a Mac of any kind, using the keyboard will work just about the same. Of course the interface is different, but the voice over keys perform all of the same functions unless you have additional scripts, and come on, you know you should. Quick nav works the same, and you have a function key to perform functions like locking and unlocking your device, using the app switcher, controlling playback of media, and changing your screen brightness. Just as a hint for those who use Netflix, if you start a video and move to another application, press your play btn on your keyboard and you can listen to movies while in other applications. I am listening to flight while I write this article. Well... I wouldn't really call it an article, its mor like a rambling that I was too lazy to spell check. sadly audo correct does not work with my keyboard and I am not sure why. actualy, let me check on that one mor time . hold on . almost done . nope, doesn't work. I did how ever add a bunch of shortcuts while I was in settings, like both of my twitters. like @accesstechmedia or @christopher2236 lol. Man that saved so much time.
So moving on to my new case. If you are going to spend that much money on a new Ipad, you should put down a bit of dollar to protect it. You have quite a few options, but the three that stood out to me are auter box, Life proof, and griphin. I decided to go with the griphin survivor case. Its thinner than the auter box, thicker than the life proof, and cheeper than both. I found this one on amazon priced at about 40 U.S. dollars. It provides 2 layers of military grade protection for your easily scratched bundle of joy. You have the inner hard shell that serves as the backbone of the case, you have the outer rubber shell that gives you a lot of shock protection, port protection, speaker protection, home btn protection, camera protection, and microphone protection. Finally you have the screen protecter that snapps on to the front in six different places to insure a secure connection to your case. Keep in mind this is not water proof, only water resistant. Anyway, the survivor does not add a lot of weight, though it does double the thickness of the device. Choices choices right? It does hinder audio recording a bit, as moving the case creates quite a bit of extra noise on not one but both of your microphones. If you want to scan something, or take a picture/video, you have to swivle the camera protecter out of the way, but an update over griphin's other cases, you don't have to open a section of the case to listen to your speakers.
So just a few random thoughts about using the Ipad air. If you have large hands like I do, Using the Ipad air on its own, you may have a bit of trouble holding it because of its design. Also i you can, I would avoid getting a case with sharp corners, as it also makes the device hard to hold. Getting a case with a border around the edges of the screen can help with voice over users, as sometimes its hard to locate the edges of the screen because you have no physical indication. It also helps when two hand typing with fleksy in landscape, as again if you have large hands, you do not hit your home btn with your pinky.
Hope you liked my update, and if you have any questions, feel free to comment here, or follow me on twitter and ask me there. .