Apple iPad 2 (64GB, Wifi + Verizon 3G, White)

At first it seemed like a brilliant piece of hardware to bring on a bike trip. It’s always connected, easy to show people when asking for directions or trying to communicate, it charges with only 5 volts, and it’s capable of doing most of the things I would want a laptop for.

But as I traveled I found that there were common situations where a laptop did a much better job. The biggest one was working with photographs. Aperture and 4GB of RAM and a real CPU just beat the pants off any low-power iPad setup. The second biggest was correspondence. A trackpad and a responsive keyboard with no Bluetooth lag made long letters and journal entries and chats much easier. The third situation was trip planning. I could open many browser tabs of maps, plus Google Earth, and drag route markers and points all over them, and cut-and-paste notes, rapidly and easily. The only unique advantage the iPad offered was that I could put it inside a waterproof bag and use it safely in the rain. … But I have a phone for that.

Don’t get me wrong; I love the iPad and use it in many situations in my “normal life”. But on long bike trips where I was passing through civilization, and guaranteed to find electricity and a room out of the rain, it was frivolous.

Away from civilization it’s a different matter. Unlike a laptop, you can charge an iPad with a meager portable solar cell, and it can be charged with the same cable you use with your phone. You can put it in a very nice case to protect it from impacts, and it can be used easily while still inside a waterproof bag.

Elsewhere I’ve done even more dithering about the iPad / no iPad travel decision.