"Seven-inch tablets are dead on arrival"
-Steve Jobs

I can buy TWO EQUIVALENT ANDROID TABLETS for the apple fan-boy price of one mini. Apple fan bios are MORONS.

As far as I can tell, the Mini is exactly $200 more with no real advantages.

*more than the Nexus 7.

I really need to pay more attention to my posts...

Nope. No use. Have a new smart phone and a nook already.

Nook? Gross.

I don't understand the ipad or ipad mini, all I need is a different size magnifying glass and an itouch...

@Ghug It was a birthday gift. Wasn't going to turn my nose up at it.

Honestly, I find both the iPad and the Mini to be very uncomfortable form factors. How anyone can comfortably type on them is beyond me.

I have not, and will not buy any Apple products besides my iPod. Security on Apple products is atrocious.

http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2012/08/apple-amazon-mat-honan-hacking/all/

@goldfinger, I skimmed the article, so correct me if I'm wrong. The article said the security is in the customer service, right? Not in the products themselves?

Okay, now I've read the whole thing. It's not the products that have atrocious security measures. It is a relatively isolated incident of someone on Apple's staff not following protocol, and a rather poor security system on the part of Amazon. The other security issues (Gmail double verification, "Find My Mac") were the author's own fault for not using or using (respectively). Further, his Apple ID was compromised only because he used the @me.com account as his backup email. That was his Achilles's heel in this particular instance.

You'll have to supply better evidence in this case, goldfinger. One of Apple's most attractive selling points is security, and the Wired article specifically says they couldn't crack into an account when they tried later on.

That was an extremely particular case that has since been resolved. Really not a good reason not to buy Apple products. Much worse things have happened to many other companies.

Its a poor system with Apple too though, if it can be exploited that easily. Its not solely Amazon's fault. The whole concept of "Find My Mac" or "Find My IPod" means that someone who gains access to your account can remotely wipe your device at will, or just go in and steal your stuff. As for the me.com address, how many emails does everyone have? I have three and I consider that about as much as I can handle. If you're going to do a backup, you'll likely include one of them. Besides, its not hard to find someone's email address. Just spam variations of their name until one doesn't bounce back to you.

And security is their biggest selling point? Hardly. My information technology teacher spent pretty much a whole semester telling us Apple has an insecure OS. Is it safe? Yes. Is it secure? No. That is a very important distinction.

http://news.cnet.com/8301-27080_3-10444561-245.html

A very good article. There are opinions on both sides, but the main conclusion is this: Macs aren't safer because they're designed better. Macs are safer because hackers have less interest in hacking Macs. If you look at it on a per capita basis, Macs are actually slightly worse than PCs.

Another funny thing I found. http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9129978/Researcher_cracks_Mac_in_10_seconds_at_PWN2OWN_wins_5k

Ten seconds. That's all it took to hack a Mac. Ten seconds. Now, he did it through Safari (which is the least secure of the major web browsers http://internet-browser-review.toptenreviews.com/) so I guess it isn't really a hit against Mac OS X itself. PC's were hacked too, but I'm sure it took longer than ten seconds.

But that's based off of old stuff. Lets see what the newest Microsoft gear has in store.

http://www.itproportal.com/2012/07/31/will-windows-8-be-the-most-secure-os-in-town/

Unhackable. The only OS that was unhackable during the conference. Microsoft now knows (after the sloppy security XP had) that it's the biggest target, so it now has the biggest security. To complement that, IE 10 is the safest web browser (about to be) on the market (or so the experts say) slightly ahead of Chrome.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/49153613/ns/technology_and_science-security/t/internet-explorer-brings-added-security-windows/#.UIl0xYZ-7SA

But where I will hand it to Apple, they know how to do security on iPhones. They're second only to Blackberry.

http://www.neowin.net/news/android-security-criticised-as-blackberry-7-rated-most-secure-mobile-os

That is, if they can prevent their Apple accounts from being hacked.

I'm not saying it wasn't apple's fault. It clearly was. I'm just saying it was such a specific situation (he was specifically targeted) that that alone is not a good reason to not buy Apple products

Cost and proprietary technology and lack of certain features are much better reasons, IMHO.

Why android tablets are better: Not locked for life to iTunes. Expandable memory/Usb ports. Not locked for life to iTunes. Does the same thing as an iPad for far cheaper. Not stuck with iTunes. I bought 2 refurb tablets from woot or 1saleaday - Toshiba's, look great, work great, replaceable battery...for less than on iPad. My wife loves her tablet, and I love it much more than I thought I would....but it will never replace PC gaming.

Apple products have become little more than status symbols the tech spec's and overall user experience when compared to competitors matter's little to those purchasing them. While a small segment of their customer base genuinely prefers an apple product to a competitor most of their consumer's do not shop around, and are largely unaware of flaws or inferior aspects of an apple product when compared with a competitor.

Lately apple's policies against it's competitors as well as relatively high price point, and fragility of their phones, as well as several PR fumbles has led to their loss of majority market share in smartphones, and may very well lead to their loss of market share in the tablet arena.

The current lead apple has in notebook sales is largely due to the high number of young, relatively wealthy college aged consumers. In both enterprise and public sectors apple's performance remains lack luster due to the high cost (relative to specifications) and incompatibility with old IT infrastructure.

The meteoric rise of apple to the number #1 tech company in the world over the last ten years, is in my opinion coming to an end. The problems with their supply chain as well as continuing focus on hardware margins for the primary source of profit, not to mention the rise of Google and Samsung as primary competitors and a dogged resurgence by Microsoft indicate that the age of apple is reaching its apex and will begin an ignominious retreat back to relative obscurity.

@abge - certainly security isn't my main reason for not using Apple. It is a reason though. Mainly I just dislike the company, don't like the OS, and prefer the flexibility a PC gives me for a better price.

@puddle - decline, I agree. Retreat to obscurity? Not quite. Give it a year or so and then I'll be taking short sell positions on Apple stock though.