Need iPad help

[ChgrSteve67]

Well the wife talked me into buying her a iPad today.

Question
What apps should I load on it to make it usefull?

I downloaded USA today, Sound Hound, Facebook, barcode scanner, find near me and angry birds.

She dosen't read books or listen to music so I don't need ebook readers or pandora.

Sugestions?

So far its a $800 paper weight.
I can't believe you can't attach a USB drive to it.
After two hours I figured out how to get it to print. God bless Google.

Guy at the store said I got the last 32GB 4G LTE one they had. Probably tells everyone that.

-Steve

[Ponch ®]

thats what I hate about ipads. No usb or hdmi slots and no sd card expansion slot. In order to print from it you need to have a printer that is ePrint friendly.  you then just download the app for that particular manufacturer. HP and Canon have a few of those for $150>

[ChgrSteve67]

I found a utility I was able to load on my Windows computer to emulate a airprint printer that I can have the ipad print too.
The suck part is the computer has to be on the wireless just like the ipad. I have a home server but its hardwired and the ipad can't see it to print (since its not wireless). I really hate Apple and their crappy unroutable proprietary protocols.  Why can't it use a standard UNIX LPR print queue like the rest of the world. I guess it all just works if you willing to pay twice the price for nothing but apple hardware.  And all of the big brother crap drives me crazy. People would never put up with it if it said Bill Gates on the box.

Anyways enough ranting.

Anyone got any good apps to recommend?

[Ponch ®]

Anyone got any good apps to recommend?

grindr 

[ChgrSteve67]

Funny Ponch but I'm pretty sure my wife would not be interested in that app.

[Just 6T9 CHGR]

Gotta get Temple Run...pretty addicting...also Words With Friends & Dice with Buddies are good also 

[ChgrSteve67]

I found a lottery app that tells me I didn't win so I don't have to go to the store to find out.

[Ponch ®]

Funny Ponch but I'm pretty sure my wife would not be interested in that app.

Old Moparz just looves it.

[twodko]

We bought an iPad2 late last year and, for us, it's a god send. My dear wife is sliding ever faster into the abyss of a rare and awful disease that, among other things, often steals her ability to speak. We looked at laptop based assistive speech devices and all were several thousands of dollars. Then we found an assistive speech program, EZ Speak, based on this iPad. The software is incredible, she types what she wants to say and touches a "speak" button and the iPad speaks for her! When it became apparent we might not be able to communicate verbally anymore, it was terrifying thought for us.
She takes with It her when she's out with friends or family and it's nice for her to be able to take it out on the patio and surf, email etc.
We were disappointed that we needed a wireless AirPrint modem to print on our basic HP printer. Other that that it has been a wonderful tool for us.  

[jb666]

thats what I hate about ipads. No usb or hdmi slots and no sd card expansion slot. In order to print from it you need to have a printer that is ePrint friendly.  you then just download the app for that particular manufacturer. HP and Canon have a few of those for $150>

Not any more... There's now an app that allows you to turn ANY printer on your network to an e-printer... I've been using it for about 6 weeks and LOVE it. The only "requirement" is that you're on the same network and the computer it's hooked up to, of course, has to be turned on.

As for USB or HDMI.. You're right.. But the SD card ?? There's a plug for that , too.. $20 and you're in business, you can view/import/edit any pictures on a car directly from your IPad.

[twodko]

Jb, tell me more about this printer application. We have ATT U-verse in our home for HS Internet, TV and phone. The Gateway device they install is the wireless modem. So what you're saying is this app will let me print to my basic HP printer?

[ChgrSteve67]

It lets you print to a computer that is on the same wireless network as the ipad. That computer then acts as a proxy to send the print job onto the printer.  Its pretty hokey and I had to do some reg changes to get IOS5 to work.

[twodko]

Thanks Steve. Bump.......how you guys doing? The new Chally Still have that new car smell?

[ChgrSteve67]

Lots going on.
Working on getting the Charger ready for Spring Fling next month. Its tax season for the wife and the Challenger has been getting its share of mods, in fact its new front lip spoiler just showed up on my door step. It turned 11k miles the other day.

I know we need the rain but I wish it would rain durring the week so I can work on the cars durring the weekend.

[Inked_Ghandi]

I would have went with an Android based tablet. I did and I feel better about myself. Even though it barely made it through my deployment. I just can't stand apple products.

[ChgrSteve67]

Wife wanted it and I said "Yes Dear"
She dosen't know about the new chin spoiler for the Challenger yet.

Personally I'm waiting for Windows 8 and a Notebook with a touch screen.
I have a Thunderbolt HTC for e-mail and crazy little apps.

[Dino]

We bought an iPad2 late last year and, for us, it's a god send. My dear wife is sliding ever faster into the abyss of a rare and awful disease that, among other things, often steals her ability to speak. We looked at laptop based assistive speech devices and all were several thousands of dollars. Then we found an assistive speech program, EZ Speak, based on this iPad. The software is incredible, she types what she wants to say and touches a "speak" button and the iPad speaks for her! When it became apparent we might not be able to communicate verbally anymore, it was terrifying thought for us.
She takes with It her when she's out with friends or family and it's nice for her to be able to take it out on the patio and surf, email etc.
We were disappointed that we needed a wireless AirPrint modem to print on our basic HP printer. Other that that it has been a wonderful tool for us.  

I am sorry to hear about your wife.  My thoughts are with you.
My wife dedicated much of her life to care for patients with ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease), and she also found that these tablets can do the job of a speech computer at a fraction of the cost.  The fact that you can also surf the web, watch a movie, or listen to a tune is a nice bonus!

[Charger RT]

I don't have an ipad but we have 4 ipod touches in the house. I see the ipad as a big touch. I would jailbreak it first to give you more control on how it functions. http://gizmodo.com/5530906/jailbreaking-your-ipad-how-you-can-and-why-you-should it will void the warranty if apple finds out but as long as you can restore it before warranty work they should not find out. It gives you more freedom to how it works and an outlet to apps apple does not approve of.

I have a complex wireless network in the house. (3 desktop computers, 1 laptop, 4 ipods, 2 xbox 360, 3 xbox original, 1 ps3, 1 smartphone, and one 100 dollar HP wireless printer)

Here are things we do with the touches and smartphone you should be able to do with an ipad. We all have a free texting app. So the kids and me all communicate for free. My smart phone will still work on a 4g network with the app touches are restricted to wireless network.

The kids have the facebook app.

ebay app also notifies me of shipping updates or outbid notices.

the local tv station has a weather app i can get a current radar map in 25 seconds.

2 local supermarkets have an app so I can view sale items without having to get a paper.

there is an app to print to the wireless printer.

if you have videos, tv shows, or movies on the hard drive of one of your computers a program called tversity running on that computer will let you stream it to your ipad. http://tversity.com/support/quickstart-iphone/

games there are all kind of apps the kids and I play monopoly at least once a month. We are all over the house when we play. I had surgery in January and didn't work for 8 weeks. In that time I built a zoo, raise and sell fish, got a farm, and a railroad.

This is just the start of things you can do. Well got to go milk the cows and i bet something was born at the zoo or a train needs fixed.
Tim

[GT]

I have an ipad2.  You can get a fairly cheap cable/dongle from apple and you can output to HDMI (I do it all the time) as well as read USB and SD cards.  You just cant store stuff on the USB/SD card... but there are ways around it (they want you to use itunes/etc. to move around data.

Several manf (eg. seagate) sell wireless HDD's that you can use to store data on for your ipad.  i plan on picking up a 500Gb unit before i go to hawaii to transfer/store pics to so i can review them on my ipad (I can also store movies/etc. on it).

Apple certainly does not make it easy to store R/W devices to the ipad - near impossible to "write" to an external device (this in intentional to get you to use their other services).

I use mine at work all the time - read corporate email/exchange/etc.  we also use citrix app (free from itunes store) to login into our corporate citrix farm to run any app we have there...