Rick Stawarz (@rickstawarz) wrote an excellent pair of posts about his experiences with the iPad as a laptop replacement. We definitely have some overlap in our “needs”, but he also brought to light some other great points I missed.

The Inability to “Create”

I’m not looking to edit Photoshop files and, frankly, I don’t even want to edit videos with the new iMovie app. Those things should be done on a computer with a mouse and keyboard, but I feel there are a few significant barriers blocking the transition from consumer to creator on the iPad.

Emailing

As I mentioned in my last post, it’s not possible to do something as simple as add an attachment to an email within the Mail app. That’s just not acceptable from a device that would replace my laptop.

Printing

Let’s be honest, there is no printing support for the iPad.

I know there’s AirPrint, but should I have to buy an HP printer? I already have a Brother printer that I love. I understand that Apple doesn’t want to mess with the thousands of different printer drivers out there (Trust me, I used to be a Linux-only guy), but isn’t that just a bit of a cop out?

There are also printing apps in the App Store. I haven’t tried them myself, but the reviews are very mixed. I have to believe it’s a bit of a kludge if it may require me to install software of my desktop computer to make it work.

I don’t print a ton even with my desktop or laptop, but when I need to it’s usually for a good reason and I need it now (concert tickets, receipts, meeting notes).

No Personal Storage Area / Home Folder

I would like to have a home folder that serves as a place for file storage. There are currently various apps that facilitate that storage (both locally and in the cloud) like Photos, Dropbox, Evernote, and GoodReader, but why not natively?

Common Data Storage Area

I’d like to have an area where I can dump a file and not require an Internet connection to access it. This folder would also serve as a common storage area where other apps could source files (much like Twitter and the Photo Library do now). For example, I’d like to download an image from a website and upload it to Twitter or send a stored Word document to someone through Skype.

Replace the USB Drive

When I plug in my iPad to a computer, it should mount like a USB drive. Loading or unloading the iPad should be as simple as drag and drop…no iTunes required, please.

This would allow a person to work on the file at their desk, load it up on the iPad at the end of the day, compose an email on the train ride home and send it off as an attachment. That easily matches the convenience of a laptop.

User Accounts

Although not at the top of my list, the iPad should have user accounts. Here are some cases where it would be nice:

• Perhaps my wife doesn’t want her apps arranged in the same manner as I do. Maybe she doesn’t want an app to show up on her screens at all. My wife uses the iPad entirely differently than I do.
• Two different people usually have different email accounts and mingling the two gets messy and confusing. I’d prefer separate instances of Mail.
• Maybe I don’t want to get work emails over the weekend, and likewise don’t want to be distracted at work with Push notifications from Word with Friends that remind me of the slaying Chris Bowler is administering.
• I’d like to play Angry Birds and beat all the levels myself, but am forced to share with our friends 5 year old who is giving me a run for my money.
• All apps with personalized logins require using shared accounts or logging out and back in each time a new person uses the iPad. Way too much hassle!

Is Apple telling me that my wife and I both need our own iPads? Perhaps. At their current price point I can get three or four iPads for the price of one MacBook, but then of course I’d have to buy all the apps twice. “They’re only $0.99,” you say. Unfortunately, that doesn’t hold much weight with the guy that will make a U-turn for the gas across the street that’s 1 cent cheaper per gallon.

The bottom line is that I really enjoy the iPad and it’s great for most of what I do. I feel like for Apple to take it to the next level and rightly deserve the label of the “go between” device it has to function somewhat more like a laptop and slightly less like a smartphone.

I’d really enjoy hearing your thoughts and responses on Twitter. Hit me up @gstjohn.

I discovered this unfortunate circumstance this morning as I was trying to reply to an email with a screenshot from my iPad. I could have sent it from Photos, but that would have required me to write a new email and the recipients weren’t in my address book. I would also prefer to keep the screenshot associated with the original email for context. No such luck, though.

What about sending non-photo attachments (like a document)? Also, not possible. There is an app called GoodReader that (among other things) will allow you to send files as email attachments, but no such functionality is built into iOS. Do I really want another app to enable such a simple process? And for $4.99?

I love my iPad for 101 reasons, but how can we really call the iPad a “go between” device or “laptop killer” if it can’t natively do something as simple as send an email attachment. I think this discovery just reinforces for me even further that the iPad is a consumption device and isn’t suited for creation/productivity.

“Customers around the world are experiencing the magic of iPad, and seem to be loving it as much as we do,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “We appreciate their patience, and are working hard to build enough iPads for everyone.”

At $500 a pop, I’m thinking Apple definitely sees the “magic of iPad”. Now to get my hands on one…