From an article on the expected surge in tablet usage:
The research also highlighted the “instant on” functionality and all day battery life of iPad, features that can make it more attractive to businesses than notebooks. “This is in sharp contrast to existing PCs,” Goldman wrote, “which typically take 15-60 seconds to resume from a standby or sleep state.”
This has always baffled me. When I lift the lid on my MacBook, it turns on. When I close the lid, it turns off. Nearly instantly. This is the way Mac notebooks have always worked, for what… nearly two decades now.
And yet Microsoft and its partners have never managed (or bothered) to match the same basic functionality.
I don’t want to start a Mac vs. Windows flame thread here, but what’s the deal? Is it a patent thing?
Technical…To do this…you have to have the state ‘saved’ on the device (it’s already booted and the contents of ram are saved onto the disk). An iPAD is designed for this and they’ve streamlined this. Computers require a bit more work.
Now that said they’re actually 2 ways. Sleep and hibernate. Sleep, the computer is running (while off) to keep ram powered and working…resume from sleep is usually 1-5 seconds. Hibernate…where ram is dumped to disk…requires reading ram from the disk..which is 1-4GB on todays computer…takes a bit more time. Currently 1 vendor has demonstrated 4-5 seconds hibernate wakeup with their hardware and lots of hardwork.
In short…requires software + hardware smarts and lots of testing.,
I’ve been a Windows user for over 20 years. I’ve written code and managed development projects and you’ve hit the nail on the head with this issue.
On paper, Windows has sleep and hibernate capability, but it’s never been solid in my experience. My laptops frequently woke up in a confused state and I usually learned to just not close the lid while it was running. This led to having to shut it down and reboot several times a day, with each cycle adding minutes of wait time that seemed to stretch forever. I grew used to this and just thought it was one of those things I had to put up with.
When I bought by Macbook Pro last summer, it was a completely different experience. Just like you noted, I just close the lid when I’m done working and open it when I need the computer again. And it’s instantly back on, with open windows and pending work right where I left them! This has completely changed the way I use my notebook. I often go months without rebooting it.
In practice, a windows-based laptop can get a lot worse in the business settings.
That’s because of the level of security the I.T. deparment loads onto the things. In my company, any laptop which connects to our network in any way, can’t use Wi-Fi but must use a cell-phone type connecetion and several layers of security. It takes ten to fifteen minutes, and eight different steps, to log onto the computer and our network in a usable fashion.
But that’s not the end of our troubles. The cell-phone type connection card doesn’t work in Japan and some other locations overseas, and roaming charges would be horrendous anyway – so then you are at the mercy of the network connection at hotels or other offices, which might have their own levels of security (or in the case of hotels, different ways to extort more money from you).
It may also be related to the engineering. Apple makes the hardware and the OS so they can tailor the startup code to the platform. With Microsoft they have to deal with dozens of hardware manufacturers, and they would need some sort of reference platform to get all boxes working the same.
# 4: Perhaps the third-party software also causes some problems? It seems everytime I load a new program on a P.C. it wants to attach itself to my toolbar, install itself in my boot-up sequence and as the default over all similar programs, and install icons on my desktop. Opening the task bar and seeing all the programs which are running in the background can be an enlightening experience.
I opened my HP this morning and it was on. Same as a Mac.
@RHP6033: Your IT department sucks. If I built systems like that I’d be canned.
@Don: A mac is a commodity PC now. Apple doesn’t do much engineering on the hardware side. I’ve had MacOS running on HP laptops and a variety of desktops.
And seriously folks… Win7 is hardly a change from MacOS… Except that it’s easier to use and likely more secure. If you don’t believe it check out who gets smoked first every year at Pwn2Own.
# 6: Some of it isn’t their fault, it’s required by some dinosaurs in our international headquarters. But only some of it.
Hmmm, I’ve been using the hibernate functionality of my Compaq laptop for years, with hardly a bobble. I do have to press the power button to turn it back on after opening it, but I’m usually back up and running lickety-split.
Many times, I’ve closed its lid with a Firefox window open. When I turn the machine back on, that window is still there, and I’m still connected.
I remember reading an old story about Steve Jobs being excited that they had found a way to shave off a second of the boot up time. And something about extrapolating it out across all MACs and saving 2 years of user time a year or something. Fast boot up has always been a passion for him.
PCs are like grabbing your pencil and paper and having to wait 2 minutes to be able to start to take notes or draw.
If something comes on instantly, it wasn’t really “off.” The same goes for televisions as computers.
I tend to agree with 6 Pndscm, except that there was definitely something wrong with Sleep mode in Vista (though perhaps not on every brand of computer, though I’ve spoken with doezens who have experienced it), but it has been fixed in Win7.
But just set your close lid/open lid options to Sleep, and you’ll see the same thing as the Mac.
In this case, it appears Microsoft has been beaten at its own best game. It’s long-standing “embrace and extend” strategy has always entailed buying, borrowing or stealing an idea originated elsewhere, elaborating upon it and then doing a great job of creating and dominating a market for it.
Chairman Bill was ballyhooing “tablet computing” ten years ago. Somehow, Redmond got distracted with other things, and in the meantime, Apple ran with the idea and marketed it like nobody’s business.
PC boot process:
BIOS takes the processor out of reset and does some amount of processing.
BIOS reads MBR (master boot record) to find OS
BIOS loads OS boot code
OS boot code executes the policy in place, e.g, cold boot, warm boot, etc.
The Mac is faster because the boot code is a lot faster (it is not a PC style BIOS) and because the OS is structured to support fast booting. Most instantiations of Windows are not purposely made for fast booting.
The longest delay in booting (and computers in general) is the head seek time on the hard disk. Instruction times are sub nanosecond, but head seek times are around 10 milliseconds. If the OS is doing a lot of page reads from disk and they are not well organized (which I suspect is part of Windows’ problem) head seek times can really slow things down.
Also, Windows tends to have more delays associated with the network stack. It seems that there are delays associated with waiting for responses from the network stack.
I can second, third, and fourth most of this,
I do not want my laptop set to sleep because I want to save battery and usually have no reason to boot very fast. My desktop .. sits in sleep and touch to the keyboard and it is on.
Of course, there is one usual issue, running Macs cost huge bucks. I currently have and use 4 PC and a Nook. They are so cheap (as little as $200 for a netbook) that it is easier for me to just leave one where I need it.
As for the iPAD, if you are using one for ebooks .. for $200 B&N sells the Nook.
The Nook weighs half what an iPAD weighs and has roughly 1 week battery vs 6-8hrs for the Apple gadget.
Monthly charge for AT&T access … $0. A huge library of books in free formats for … $0. Read ANY book for 1 hr at the omnipresent B&N stores … $0. Oh yeh, if WiFi is available, browse the web for …$0. cost/mo .. ZERO
Now it is true that the Nook is pretty poor as a computer .. no physical keyboard, no color, and only a tiny touch screen. So ..
Here is what I advise:
nook .. $200,
netbook ..$200
monthly fees .. 0.
or you can buy an iPAD!
@SJ,
Aren’t you aware that the cheaper iPad uses wifi only and doesn’t require any contract with AT&T? Didn’t you know that in addition to presenting ebooks (iBooks, Kindle, Kobo, B&N etc), playing music, and showing videos the iPad runs hundreds of thousands of other programs (many of them free or ad-supported), does email and surfs the web? It does a lot more than the Nook, I’m saying, for $0 in monthly fees.
The iPad isn’t superior in all things — I sure as hell wouldn’t take one to the beach to read, and if the Nook and (hardware) Kindle drop down to $99 they’ll survive for just that reason — but it’s singlehandedly reviving the moribund tablet form factor that Microsoft and others have lost billions on.
It’ll be interesting to see what impact the various wannabee rivals to the iPad will have. I suspect as long as they’re chained to Windows they’ll be just as successful as before, so the tablet based on Palm’s WebOS that HP is supposedly bringing out will be the real test.
SJ @13,
According to Apple’s specs, my MacBook draws about 1.5 watts in sleep mode, and 0.75 watts while off. (Yes… if plugged in, computers draw power while off.) So energy savings aren’t really the issue.
@12 The whole BIOS concept was intended to make it easier to port the Windows NT code base to the multiple processor architectures Microsoft initially supported because the IT marketplace was queasy about depending on a single hardware source. As Intel grew and the x86 architecture matured and achieved decent performance, Redmond pulled the rug out from under the other CPU makers, one by one. Of the initial alternate choices, only the Power PC architecture remains, and that’s used by IBM only for “enterprise” Unix servers.
11. ArtFart
I really think you’re wrong about tablets (along with BP @ 14 and his “moribund tablet form factor”)
Apple has created a very good and very cool “media tablet,” if you will. It is not a tablet computer. You can watch movies, send mail, play games, or listen to music on it. You can’t do any work, though. As Technologizer points out, “the iPad isn’t a traditional PC –- it’s more of an appliance. You don’t tinker with your television; you turn it on and consume services.” They’re not even competing with tablet PCs.
Tablet PCs, however, are alive and very well, thank you. 4 million tablet PCs are sold annually according to Paul Peng, executive VP of AU Optronics’ global business unit, and Endpoint Technologies’ analyst Roger Kay.
Here are just a few examples of this “moribund form factor:”
Acer TravelMate C100/C200/C210/C300/C310
Asus R1F
Asus R1E
ASUS Eee PC T91 and the derived multi-touch T91MT (8.9″ Netbooks)
Averatec C3500 Series
Dialogue Flybook V5
Dell Latitude XT/XT2
Fujitsu LifeBook P1610, P1620, P1630 (8.9″ Ultraportable)
Fujitsu LifeBook T4020, T4210, T4220 (12.1″ Thin and Light, Business)
Fujitsu LifeBook T1010 (13.3″ Thin and Light, Consumer)
Fujitsu LifeBook T2010, T2020 (12.1″ Ultraportable, Business)
Fujitsu LifeBook T4310 (12.1″ Thin and Light, Consumer)
Fujitsu LifeBook T4410 (12.1″ Thin and Light, Business)
Fujitsu LifeBook T5010 (13.3″ Thin and Light, Business)
Fujitsu LifeBook T900 (13.3″ Thin and Light, Business)
Fujitsu LifeBook U810, U820, U2010 (5.6″ Ultraportable)
Gateway C-140X (aka S-7235/E-295C)
Gateway C-120X (aka S-7125C/E-155C)
HP TC4200/TC4400
HP Compaq 2710p
HP EliteBook 2700 series
HP Pavilion tx1000 series
HP Pavilion tx2000 series
HP Pavilion tx2500 series
HP TouchSmart tx2 series
HP TouchSmart tm2 series
Kohjinsha SX3 (8.9″ Netbook)
Lenovo ThinkPad X41 Tablet
Lenovo ThinkPad X60 Tablet (known popularly as “X60t”)
Lenovo ThinkPad X61 Tablet (12.1″ MultiView/MultiTouch XGA (1024×768) TFT)
Lenovo ThinkPad X200 Tablet (12.1″ WXGA (1280 x 800)) Released September 2008
LG XNote C1
LG XNote P100(C1 Upgrade Model)
LG LT-20-47CE
MDG Flip Touchscreen Netbook (8.9″ Tablet Netbook)MDG Flip
Panasonic Toughbook 19
Toshiba Portégé 3500/3505
Toshiba Portégé M200
Toshiba Portégé M400/405/700/750
Toshiba Portégé R400/405
Toshiba Satellite R10/R15/R20/R25
Toshiba Tecra M4/M7
DL @ 17
Well, four million tablet PCs a year is four times as many as I expected. But obviously the iPad is no threat, since Apple sold only three million iPads in 80 days. That means they’ll probably sell twice as many tablets as all the others combined by the end of the year.
I notice you got your list of tablet PCs from Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tablet_PC), but you listed only the ones that were convertible (that is, those that had built-in keyboards), not the slate-shaped ones that are closest to the iPad. Also, I spot checked the prices on a couple of them and got prices ranging from twice to three times the cost of the iPad.
My impression of the tablet PC market is that it’s very much a niche market, aimed at workers who need an ultraportable PC, such as doctors and salesmen. I live in Seattle, and I’ve only ever seen one tablet PC in the wild in ten years. I’ve seen more Zunes than that!
I think you’re right about the iPad being a different kind of computer, even if you’re unaware of the various drawing and music-creation programs, or the word processing and presentation programs, that people can use to create new work with one. Magazine covers have been drawn on an iPhone, so no doubt there’ll be a fad for those drawn on an iPad as well.
goldy, i have no trouble w/ my laptop and sleep…but i can’t seem to catch the bus in the right way. its never on time, or some bus shows up halfway between the posted times and maybe its early, or late. then i don’t stand in the right spot, or push the light button fast enough.
you need to out the bad UI on our bus system.
@14 Bruce
Hay!!
I know a nook isn’t an iPAD. I also know there is a lot of stuff ..esp games, you can get on an iPAD ..
but .. the iPAD is very expensive as a book reader and not very useful as a computer.
The iPAD is .. a novelty, kinds sorta like a pet rock unless folks find them very useful.
OTOH, for about the same price you can have a Nook and a netbook .. a LOT more useful than an iPAD.
@15 .. goldy
Energy savings are very much an issue when I am traveling and do not have handy plug in. I don’t want my battery going away.
Hay, you pay 2X e as much as we do for a machine that makes you feel good. Why should I complain?
Hell why do I choose to drive a Ferrari?
Bruce ,,,
Folks who eat at McDonald’s, drive Prius’s, watch cop shows, buy barbie doll eyes for their dotters, vote for Bush, think God works for them, buy hula hoops and monkey music, go to ocncerts at $300/head and spend $150 to watch the Mariners loose …. …
so why not spend a grand or two (wi monthlies) on an iPAD?
The real issue is whether there will be a killer app for the thing. W/o that it is another toy.
Did you buy a 3D TV yet?
SJ @ 22:
In reverse order —
No, I haven’t bought a TV in my life, much less a 3D one. How many have you bought?
I’m not too worried about the iPad needing a killer app. The popularity of the iPhone and the iPod Touch (which like the wifi iPad doesn’t need an AT&T contract to be useful) seem to show that a portable touch-driven device with an excellent screen and ample inexpensive software running on CPU about as powerful as a circa-2000 PC is its own killer app.
As I’ve noted before, there are three models of iPad that are wifi-only and don’t require a contract to be useful. They’ve got everything else but the 3G. Just like my own iPod Touch, you’ll never need to give Apple or AT&T another cent, if you’re satisfied with a device that will play music, show movies, do email, surf the web, use Google Maps, check the weather forecast or stock prices, etc.
Your attempt to describe a demographic is so incoherent and self-contradictory (as well as pretty racist — you really think black people are monkeys? or just the musicians?) that it fails even as a rant or unconscious self-projection and seems more i proportion to your blood alcohol level. Please try better next time.
…That would be, “in proportion”. Sorry for the error.
I see my new i7 laptop wakes up in 1 second. I know that mine cost 950, and the same hardware in a mac starts around 2400. They look cool, but there isn’t much difference on the wake up nowadays.
Hi Goldy.
Macs come from a single source, with less variation, so they’re more likely to work correctly. Most of the Windows robustness is up to the hardware integrator/vendor.
Back in the day, doing the same kind of work, running the same software, the HP box had to be rebooted 4 times a day, whereas the DEC Alpha never segfaulted. DEC just cared more.
Today, I use a work-issued Dell laptop. It sucks. I get angry just thinking about it. I had to fuss just to get proper drivers installed. Sleep and hibernate don’t work with the dock, which I need for the second monitor, etc.
Whereas my personal Mac just works. Most of the time.
rhp @ 3
My employer’s IT dept is similarly screwed up. At times, it seems their job is to prevent us from doing our jobs.
There’s two things that save you running Windows: require admin password to make changes (equivalent to Unix’s sudo) and control physical access. If there’s a remote exploit, well, you’re just kind a screwed regardless. So stay patched and turn off extra services.
Everything else is moot. Especially the useless, wasteful anti-virus stuff. Virus authors QA their work using the anti-virus tools.
The situation is a bit like how over prescribing antibiotics breeds super bugs, putting everyone at greater risk.
pndscm @ 6
Huh?
I love that feature on my macbook. Open it, password, and I’m back to where I was.
On Windows, for many years, I turned almost all power-saving and hibernation features off because I had nothing but problems with them. I had an HP that would come apart if it went into hibernation.
However, I gotta give Microsoft credit for finally fixing it. My new Toshiba laptop with Windows 7 does hibernation perfectly. I use it just like the macbook…shut the lid when I’m done, open it to start working again. Windows 7 finally got it right.