| Last week OverDrive tech writer and blogger Quinton Lawman detailed his top picks of this year's crop of new devices in Quinton's geeky holiday device buying guide (Part 1) (Part 2).
Now it's my turn.
Conspicuously missing from the list were two iconic devices, the iPad Air, and the iPad Mini with retina display. The iPad Air boasts the most powerful tech specs in any iOS device to date, yet comes in the most elegant package ever. That's up to 128 GB of storage in a one pound device that fits in the palm of your hand! (For some fun perspective, that much storage back in 1980 would've set you back a cool $25 million dollars, and forget about the weight of it!)
While the iPad Air ranges from $499-$799, its smaller cousin, the iPad Mini with retina display, packs all of that goodness into a smaller and more affordable package. Each respective storage capacity, 16GB, 32GB, 64GB, 128GB, is a hundred dollars less than the iPad Air.
Both models feature the best camera we've seen on any iPad. With 5 megapixel photos, Autofocus, face detection and a five element lens, it's perfect to capture those precious holiday moments with friends and family.
But these devices are about more than just great hardware. With the release of iOS 7, the iPad's newest operating system, Apple did something quietly amazing: they made their entire suite of productivity apps free. Keynote, Pages, and Numbers, collectively known as iWork, are the Apple equivalents of PowerPoint, Word and Excel and create files compatible with their Microsoft Office counterparts. What's more is that iCloud.com, utilizing the same HTML 5 technology that powers OverDrive Read, offers a web-based version of each app that is accessible from virtually any computer with an internet connection, which will sync with the projects you have on your device. (But let's face it, even if people don't want to work on their iPad, at least now they can.) Of course, despite all of those useful free apps, I will probably still spend most of the time on my iPad this winter listening to audiobooks on the OverDrive Media Console.
Hot Holiday DevicesDue to overwhelming demand, we are now at capacity for the December 5th session of Hot Holiday Devices. But we still have room for you to register for our December 4th session at 7:00 PM EST. We'll be discussing these devices and many more, focusing on how they can be used with the OverDrive service. You can register for Hot Holiday Devices from the Learning Center on the Partners Portal: http://partners.overdrive.com/learning-center/live-sessions/. And don't forget to use our handy time zone converter to find out when the session starts in your part of the world.
We look forward to connecting with you then!
For those of you who can't attend a live session, check back in at the Learning Center after December 6th to hear the recorded session and download our resource-packed presentation slides.
Anders Brooks is a Training Specialist on the Knowledge Services Team at OverDrive.
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Monday, December 2, 2013
Anders’ not-so-geeky holiday device buying guide
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