At the moment, there are lots of Youtubers unboxing and reviewing 1700£ iPads and 20,000£ Mac towers, it is easy to get swayed by that, but what is the suitable option for the casual user. I recently had this question come up by few I know asking me if they need a laptop or an iPad.
So lets see what is suitable .. and when I mentioned casual user, this is going to exclude developers, designers, gamers and other power users who require lots of processing power and storage.
Most casual users need a computer or a tablet at home for the casual day-to-day stuff. This article is the direct result of a retired couple coming up to me and asking me if they had an option just to buy one device, what would that be — an iPad or a computer.
Wish there was a straight forward answer and if it were up to me, I would have recommended to buy both as they would get the best of both worlds… but the option was only to choose one. Lets see if this article will help in making the decision.
First, lets look at the basic task list of casual users:
1) Surf the internet, shop online and read articles
2) Watch movies and YouTube videos
3) Send/receive email and office stuff
4) Video/voice chat
5) Connect various devices via USB including printers
6) Be mobile, i.e. ability to take it places with you
Lets consider the device options, note that the main requirement is to keep the cost as low as possible without sacrificing on quality.
On the tablet front, will go for the iPad Air costing £479 giving you 64GB storage. I could have considered the entry level iPad but the specs are bit dated and the entry level storage is too low to recommend it. We are looking for something which should last at least 6 years and the A12 processor in the iPad Air is much more future proof than the A10 chip in the entry level iPad.
On the computer side, lets consider PC as at the below £500 price point you will not get a Mac.
So for a price below £500, you would get an Intel Core i5 processor with 8GB RAM, with about 256GB of SSD storage running Windows home. Trust me, you do not need Windows Pro as this is not needed for home users and it will only bump up the cost by an extra 100–150£.
You can get Windows laptops for sub 300£ price with Intel M process or i3 process but again, Windows 10 is most comfortable at i5 level with 8GB RAM and that it why I recommend those as the minimum specifications.
The HP laptop in the above image costed 400£, comes with 8th gen Intel i5 processor, 8GB RAM, has 3 USB ports, SD card reader and HDMI port.
So, we have our devices, now lets look at those day to day tasks and see how both the iPad and the laptop handles them.
First is Surf the internet, shop online and read articles.
The best place for doing these activities is on a couch or whilst relaxing on your bed. I know the loo is also a popular option, but for now, lets stick to the living/bed room.
The iPad here wins straight up as it was meant for that. There is an inside Apple talk that the iPhone/iPad came in existence as Steve Jobs wanted a device so he could check and reply to his email while he’s in the loo. So you see, the iPad was built for that.
You could take your laptop as well, but doing any kind of web surfing on it, which will weigh at least 1.5 kilos, blowing hot air through the vents is not going to be ideal. The laptop was a perfect option when we still had huge tower PCs but it cannot compete with iPads now in terms of ease of use.
Moreover with iPadOS now, you get full desktop websites instead of a cut down mobile versions giving you that complete desktop class browsing experience.
And for reading articles and news, the iPad is going be the perfect device.
Second point .. watching movies and YouTube videos.
Again, the iPad is brilliant for watching movies and videos offering battery-life which windows laptops cannot compete. Take the Dell 2-in-1 Inspiron ultra book 7000 series for instance, it costs over £1,200 but still has terrible battery life. Whereas on the iPad, I could watch the entire Lord of the rings trilogy in one full charge.
One thing I have to mention even though it is a bit outdated, laptops still offer the option of having a DVD drive in them. So if you have a huge dvd collection then you still can watch them on laptops without having to convert them into mp4 files.
Next is Sending receiving emails and basic office stuff
For emails, a physical keyboard giving you that tactile feedback is much better than typing on glass screen. Saying that you can also get physical keyboards for the iPad, both expensive from first party or cheaper alternatives from third party providers.
Then for basic office stuff like using Word or excel spreadsheets or PowerPoint , the laptop was built for this. You can get Microsoft office suite for the iPad or use apples version of the same like pages, keynote etc. But nothing really beats the native mouse pointer and keyboard support which the laptop provides. So for such stuff, the laptop is the most comfortable option. You can make do with the iPad as long as you are ok with the limitations of using on-screen or Bluetooth keyboard for typing and then using fingers or an expensive Apple Pencil for mouse pointer type precision.
Just a thought here, Microsoft office suite is not included with a PC but you can get it for relatively low cost from third-party resellers.
Next is video and voice chat.
The iPad again is the most convenient solution for this. Its lite to carry around, you just need a case to prop it up, there are plenty available from third-party sellers for about 10£ and you can position it anywhere in your house. Plus you have plethora of apps available on the app store, both from Apple and third-party like Skype, Google Hangouts, Slack, etc. making it perfect for voice/video calls.
Next is an interesting point. Connecting various devices.
The iPad OS opened this up and you can hook up all sorts of accessories like USB pen drives, SD cards, wireless game controllers and even a wireless/Bluetooth mouse.
However it’s not all perfect here. First You need a dongle, the Apple ones are a bit expensive but third party ones cost only about tenner. Secondly, portable hard drives which require more power will need a powerful adapter to support them. Apple sells one for about 40£ but you can again look at third party for cheaper options.
Laptops on the other hand still retain all ports so you do not need a dongle, the HP one which we considered has 3 USB ports and SD card slot. Plus there is not limit to what you can plug in here. Pen drives, portable hard drives, USB lights, fans, coasters .. anything which has a USB or other compatible port works perfectly fine with the laptops.
Which brings me to the other important accessory which we all need, a printer. Even if you do not use it for office work, you might need it for printing flight or cinema tickets or posters like me. Thankfully both the iPad and laptop work fine here. The iPad will only support wireless printers but the cost of wireless printers now-a-days is hardly more than standard printers, so ideally even if you get a laptop, I recommend buying a wireless printer as it is very convenient.
Finally, be mobile.
There is no competing with the iPad in this category. The iPad was built for being portable and that small form factor makes it easily to carry around. Even the laptop is portable back when it’s granddaddy, the tower PCs were popular and even if you spend over 2000£ and get one of the ultra thin notebooks, they still weigh about 1.2 kilos compared to the 456 grams of the iPad Air. And at the under 500£ price tag, you are looking at a laptop that will weighs at least 2 kilos.
Few more points to consider.
For the laptop you need to subscribe to an anti virus software and this ranges anywhere between 10£ to 50£ per month. With the iPad you really don’t have to worry about this as the iPad locks you down from installing anything that is not approved via the App Store. This is restrictive but is really good as it keeps all the junk out of the device.
For the laptop you need to buy a mouse, they are relatively cheap but for the iPad you need to buy at least a case and a screen protector. Again, you should find decent ones for about 10£ each.
So in conclusion, where do we stand. Ideally, I would still recommend to buy both the devices but if you have to choose one then here’s the deal — If portability is your main priority along with ease of use & long battery life, at the same time you are willing to live with the restrictions of iOS operating system, then the iPad is the way to go. But if you like versatility, need a proper work oriented device with bigger storage and better integration with third party accessories, then the laptop is the way to go.
Both the devices have their limitations and the best way to choose one is to consider what tasks you would perform using the device and see if you can put up with its limitations.
And if you can stretch your budget and get both of them, then you defiantly will not go wrong. You will get the best of both worlds and the configuration which I mentioned above will last you at least for the next 5 years.
So that’s it for now guys, hope this helps in making the right decision.
