It is inevitable that Amazon might lose its portion of the market share to Apple after the debut of the iPad device. This is not something that Amazon wants to experience, of course. Therefore, Amazon is currently attempting to keep up with Apple iPad. One of the steps Amazon is taking is the acquisition of a company that happens to be known as Touchco.

Touchco can be considered a newcomer in the industry of touch screen interface. Amazon and Touchco reached a deal last Wednesday (4th February 2010).

By aquiring the Touchco company, Amazon is intending to make their Amazon Kindle a more powerful device than it is at the moment. Amazon happens to be one of the pioneers of digital books. The company has sold 1.5 million units of the Amazon Kindle and they have become affiliated with loads of publishers as well, including the New York Times, in order to publish hundreds of thousands of digital books and articles that can be read on an Amazon Kindle device. Now, this step is exactly what Apple is also trying to take.

However, it is bad news to Amazon that the technology powering the Apple iPad is more attractive. The Apple iPad does not come with a black on white screen like the common digital book usually does. The device is also capable of supporting multi touch just as the iPod and iPhone do. Thanks to these kinds of technology, people can easily zoom in or zoom out with a few simple movements of their fingers.

Yet, the reason Amazon took acquisition of Touchco is to equip the Amazon Kindle with this multi touch technology. Touchco will be collaborating with the staff of the Kindle division, Lab 126, to achieve this goal. However, we cannot obtain further information since Amazon and Touchco prefer to stay quiet about it.

Word on the street is Touchco is using interpolating force-sensitive resistance technology. This technology will make it possible for users to give instructions to a device by simply touching it. Moreover, the screen is clear besides economic. For a screen that measures around 30 square centimeters, the cost is figured to be around $10 or less.

Touchco is also able to support multi touch which makes it possible for the company to identify which touch is slight and which touch is heavy. The company is planning to stick this screen onto an LCD just as Apple and Hewlett Packard exactly do. Another feature that Amazon is considering is a colorful screen.

Donalr Norman, a professor at the Northwestern University, tells New York Times that to compete with the iPad, Kindle came up with a lot of breakthroughs. The E-Ink technology that is being used by Kindle can be a superior factor over an iPad due to its proven durability for battery life. With cheaper a price, he is quite confident that Amazon is able to keep up with Apple. The next thing Amazon might need to do then is offer users a device that can accommodate multimedia applications.

The Apple iPad may have been an ingenious product, yes, but long before it made its debut to the public, there was another massively impressive product. A product which readers all around the world would scramble to purchase. This product was known as the Amazon Kindle, or more simply put: the Kindle.

Most would know that there are many of these electronic book-readers on the market, but the Amazon Kindle is set far above any other reader. One who holds this Kindle would closely relate it to holding something approximately the thickness of a magazine because the Kindle is nearly 1/3 of an inch! No longer will one have to cramp their hands to hold down the pages of a book or have to worry about pages ripping or tearing.

The Kindle takes advantage of a vast 3G network to wirelessly download nearly any e-book on-the-go. One may be already sold on this product, but it gets even better! The e-book can be downloaded anywhere in over 100 countries in 60 seconds or under! Can’t quite grasp this concept? Say one was driving a long drive through Montana and just finished their book. In less than 60 seconds, that person can get their own copy of thousands of books without making a stop! No PC is necessary for these downloads!

The reader’s eyes are the most valuable items when reading a book. Depending on the comfort of their eyes they can determine how much the book is enjoyed. That’s the beauty of a Kindle, it is designed so that there is no glare, even when bright light is shone directly upon it.  

Possibly one of the most intriguing options for the reader is the option to choose Text-to-Speech. With this option, one can simply listen to the device as it reads the book to the reader. That way, no matter what the reader is doing, it is a hands-off activity! 
All right, now let’s take a look at a new product: the iPad.

The iPad can also be used to read e-books just like the Amazon Kindle. Just like the Kindle, one can browse through thousands upon thousands of e-books that they can download.

They have all this at the tips of their fingers (literally!).

The Amazon Kindle connects using a 3G network, some might say that the iPad is a step and a half ahead due to the capable of a Wi-Fi network along with Bluetooth. There are many types of connectivity that the iPad allows so the ready can always be connected!

The Amazon Kindle, and iPad both offer an outstanding 9.7 inch viewing screen. Each one has its own pluses and minuses: The iPad is a touch-screen, however, it is not meant to be a book-reader so it does not eliminate that pesky glare that readers hate. This does not mean that it does not offer a quality screen.

Not only does the iPad offer a great screen for the user to maneuver with their finger-tips, but it also allows the user to output the viewing screen to en external device such as a TV. This is especially great for the business man, or college professor.   
The Amazon Kindle and iPad both offer a wide spectrum of uses, advantages, and disadvantages. It is simply up to the user to determine which one fits their personal needs best.

The long wait is finally over. After 8 years of rumors and speculations, Apple has finally opened the floodgates and announced the arrival of the Apple iPad.

Just how good is the Apple iPad, anyway?

Was the patient wait in vain, or are we being treated to yet another innovative product from the great Apple?

Most people would think that it’s a giant iPhone or iPod Touch, and they’re not wrong either. The design is almost identical except for the fact that it’s, well… BIGGER?

Other than the design, the look and feel of the operating system would be strangely familiar for iPhone and iPod owners. This is no surprise especially since the iPad is actually running on iPhone OS 3.2. Yup, that’s right. This doesn’t just look like a giant iPhone, it even runs on the same system!

That means anything you can run on your iPhone and iPod, you can run it here. Unfortunately, that also means no multitasking and no Flash capabilities. This is really a letdown, seeing it’s running on a 1GHz Apple A4 custom processor.

Everything runs incredibly fast due to the powerful yet underutilized processor on its gorgeous 1024 x 768 pixel resolution on a 9.7 inch screen. As expected of Apple, they made good use of their touch technology, although the virtual keyboard could have been made much more responsive.

The iPad will come in 16GB, 32GB and 64GB flash drives. It’s estimated to have a 10 hour battery life when used to surf the net, play music and watch videos. This is truly very impressive and perfect for those always on the go and do not have the luxury of having a place to plug in their charger wherever they go.

One very interesting implementation on the iPad is its ebook reader. This is possibly the closest thing you will get to reading a book without actually having the book in your hands. The combination of touch screen and page flipping animations makes reading an ebook on the iPad a unique experience not found elsewhere.

With the inclusion of the iBookstore, you will be sure to find plenty of ebooks to download and enjoy.

There has been an increase in the demand for portable ebook readers that allows you to carry it around and reading it like you would a normal book. Amazon had come up with their Kindle reader with moderate success. But Apple looks to dominate this market with their iPad and iBookstore. Unlike Amazon, Apple looks towards giving their users the experience – a common theme in all their products which have given them an extremely high level of success.

The iPad is set to be sold at $499-$699 and its 3G capable unit starting at $629-$829. The higher end 3G model is rather pricy, considering that a much more powerful Macbook costs $999. 

So the ultimate question comes down to this: is it worth getting an iPad?

It’s a rather tough question to answer, but if you’re always on the move and wish you had a bigger iPhone with you, then definitely get the iPad when it finally gets shipped to stores in March.