Tablet sales leap thanks to record iPad sales

[Simon]

Booming iPad sales have helped tablet sales skyrocket, but other firms are starting to see success too, analyst firms have reported.

IDC said tablet shipments were up 66% in the second quarter to 25 million globally, a jump from 15 million in the same quarter last year.

Much of the growth was down to Apple posting its best quarterly sales yet for the iPad, shipping 17 million - well above its previous record of 15.4 million in the last quarter of 2011.

However, other manufacturers are starting to see "solid growth", IDC said - that's without including sales of the Nexus 7, made by Google and Asus, which started shipping in the third quarter of the year.

Read more: http://www.pcpro.co.uk/news/376216/tablet-sales-leap-thanks-to-record-ipad-sales

[Niall]

I know several people with tablets and only one has an iPad, and I think he got it through his job, so technically no one I know has bought one! I do have a few mates that bought android tablets and recommend them, although I forget the name/make.

I'm waiting for surface. M$ seem to have put a lot of faith in windows 8, and that tablet. It really could be make or break time!

[talos]

I wouldn't be without mine now, not an Ipad (too expensive) but an Archos cheap & cheerfull , It will never replace my lappy or desktop but it is incredibly handy for checking Emails and updates when I sit watching the TV or something, it's slow but reliable, just like me

[Niall]

Yeah, I really want a laptop, but currently I can't afford the type I need. With that in mind, a simple tablet would be fine if I'm downstairs watching something in HD (I've even considered getting HD in my bedroom, but at £76 a month for the package I'd want, it's ludicrous). I want something so I can read digital versions of guitarist magazine, etc, and check email, look online at sites and have access to upload photos etc. There are some great guitar tutorials for the ipad too, so it'd be a good thing to have. In my room where I have my PC/Xbox/hi-fi etc it's very dark and I find the darkness makes it hard for me to be in the right mood to play guitar. So having a tablet to sit downstairs/outside, would be perfect.

I have to admit, I've come very close to getting an ipad through vodafone several times lately, purely for apps I do use. I've been through my iphone and deleted everything I don't or won't use and I'm still almost maxed out on storage, so now it looks like I'll have to delete some of my music collection to gain space. If the ipad is the same size, it will basically be a big phone!

[Steve]

I would argue that neither a tablet or phone are storage devices. I could easily fill mine up with music and or photos many times over but I realised a long time ago that for the majority of the time I'm just wasting expensive storage space. I see no point in having say three weeks of continual music in these multi function devices. I keep the archive elsewhere and load up a playlist when I require it.

[pctech]

I have to say I'm quite interested in the Surface Pro (The ARM one won't run anything written for x86) which will be powered by an Intel Core CPU so should run everything a PC does and has a keyboard of course.

I have been looking at laptops for a while but found them a bit heavy (I'm looking for a secondary machine I can put in my rucksack when I go to work to use at lunchtime away from my desk using the extensive Wi-Fi coverage)

[Niall]

I would argue that neither a tablet or phone are storage devices. I could easily fill mine up with music and or photos many times over but I realised a long time ago that for the majority of the time I'm just wasting expensive storage space. I see no point in having say three weeks of continual music in these multi function devices. I keep the archive elsewhere and load up a playlist when I require it.

This is where users happy with Apple, and users unhappy with Apple, diverge. I want all my stuff available at all times. I'm not paying for a cloud service so I can download it at any time. I want it on the device, and also I want it to have extra space for photography things too. If it was just to have a few songs on then my phone would be fine and I wouldn't even be considering a tablet at all.

[Simon]

I only have a 16Gb iPhone, so I tend to store new albums on it that I want to listen to, then after a while, select a few favourite tracks to add to my 'Music Mix' compilation playlist, which I have about 550 tracks on.  I wish I had bought the 32Gb version, buy I do begrudge paying £100 for an extra 16Gb of storage. 

[Steve]

My iTunes library of music is 167Gb, it doesn't matter whether I use Android or iOS no portable device has any where near that capacity. HDD are a cheaper and more reliable form of storage.

[Gary]

This is what dropbox is for, iCloud is not really proper storage but dropbox gives you loads of room to grab what you need that you cant store on your device or phone, and its going to become more and more the norm. I just dont trust it    as long as you have hard copies though on the move its a portable hard drive

[Glenn]

Buy a Pogoplug or something similar and host your own 'cloud'

[Simon]

My iTunes library of music is 167Gb, it doesn't matter whether I use Android or iOS no portable device has any where near that capacity. HDD are a cheaper and more reliable form of storage.

Most of my music remains on the CDs it came on.  There's no way I could sit and transfer well over 3000 CDs to a hard drive or any other type of digital storage, so anything on my hard drive or in iTunes is just 'best' stuff.

[Gary]

Most of my music remains on the CDs it came on.  There's no way I could sit and transfer well over 3000 CDs to a hard drive or any other type of digital storage, so anything on my hard drive or in iTunes is just 'best' stuff.

I did all mine over the years, now its huge but at least its on the machine and with my amp and speakers plugged into the iMac its a 200 watt stereo really with an 8" bassdrive

[Steve]

I converted mine to flac a few years ago using 3 dvd drives,dbpoweramp and a quad core processor. It really did fly through them. At least with flac you can go back to the original should you wish.

[Niall]

Incidentally, as you've mentioned it now, from what you're saying, you can select what music you have on the iPhone. How do you do this? I thought it just pulled in whatever was in iTunes. I know you can select to add videos, etc, which I don't (haven't got any!), but I don't know about selective music from iTunes.

Tell meeeeeee

[Simon]

I think you just untick what you don't want synced with your iPhone. 

[Niall]

Hmm, I shall make use of my 4pm finish today

[Steve]

Yes you can be selective which music you sync with iTunes.

[zappaDPJ]

My iPhone is testament to how much I love listening to music, it doesn't contain a single song I prefer to listen to music on vinyl, tape or [grumble] CD. We need a dinosaur smiley I think

[pctech]

I have to say I do like listening to DJ sets mixed with vinyl, it does have a certain 'warmness' about it although as Panasonic stopped producing the king of turntables, the Technics 1210 I would how long it'll last.