After thinking about it for quite some time, I finally bought a DodoCase for my iPad. I never had the chance to look at one or to hold one in my hand before placing the order. So I had to base my expectation on reviews / tales from sites like Twitter and Tuaw.
Now I had my case for 2 weeks, here are my observations.
First, this is probably the best looking case you can find for your iPad. I love the Moleskins design and this case is probably the best breed that would come out of mixing an iPad and a Moleskin. They are quite the same. So, it’s a nice design, well done, does a great job in protecting your iPad and it has the best look of any case that I found.
But…. Yes, there is a but.
I don’t think that the finished quality / quality assurance is up to my expectation. As you can see from the picture below, there is some glue that bleeded from gluing the wood crate that holds the iPad. It’s in the seem and it will stick to the other part of the case when closed. I’ve only took one photo, but there is visible glue on almost every side.
Other than the glue problem, the wooden crate kind of slides when you store the case upside like a book on the shelf. It might be due to the hot weather, but I didn’t take my DodoCase outside in the sun and my house has AC and the temperature is 22c. It does so in time as I can’t move it by myself. If I want it to slide back in position, I need to put it upside down and live it like this for the night.
And third, my small pads in the corner that keeps my iPad in place are lifting… It looks like I’ll have to glue the, back as they don’t hold anymore.
So that’s the issues I’m having at the moment. I don’t have any case of warping or my iPad beginning to loose hold in the crate. But it’s only been 2 weeks. These problems aren’t that bad. The case is still the best I could find. And you have to take in order that it’s made by hand. I’m only concerned about quality since they are beginning to ship case faster than before. I hope they don’t cut on quality. I’ve bought this case for 85$ including shipping to Canada. For that amount of money, I never tought that I would have those problems. And I’ve waited some time before buying it. So they sold a lot more before I got my case. They should have had those problem fixed or have had the time to work on their manufacturing process.
That’s it, I’ll keep you posted and see if anything happen other then what I’ve just mentioned.
*UPDATE*
So, I’ve contacted Dodocase, since I was looking at my options. I’ve told them about my problems and sent them a link to my blog post, this post. They offered, up front, to send my a replacement case. So far, I think this is great service. I hope the quality on the new case will be better.
Like I said earlier, I’ll keep you posted and will update this post when I’ll receive my new case.
iPods, Apple TV, the line almost got a full refreshment.
It’s nice to find FaceTime integrated with the new iPod Touch. That is really logical. Because my mom would never use an iPhone. She doesn’t have a plain cellphone. But an iPod touch could be really good for her to speak with her grand children’s. It will make a really nice present.
As for the Apple TV, I’m a bit disappointed. It has the exact same same interface as the old one and it does the exact same thing. I don’t know if I’ll buy a new one. The one I already have does what I need.
Since I discovered “Archetype”, my iPhone battery only last half a day. I must say that I have a lot of free time on hand.
So I bought a new iPad yesterday. I wanted to get the 3G model. My previous one worked great, but I needed to use it while not in a wifi coverage area. Having the 3G gives me a lots of freedom.
I’ve been using it for 2 days and I already passed the 250 megs cap… A good thing that I took the 5 gigs data plan. I never thought that I would use that much data.
I’ve had my iPad since launch day. I’m in Canada, so I bought one from a fellow who went to the States to get one.
I didn’t have any protecting case for 2 month. I didn’t wanted to order one online and I was able to wait for supply to come to Canada. In that time, my iPad mostly stayed at home that whole time. I did find some pretty nice cases on the net. One of the best cases that looks like a Moleskine and without any bad reviews is the DodoCase, a real nice book kind of case that are made by hand in California. They cost 50$US, almost the same price as other well built case. but the thing is it takes 4 to 6 weeks for delivery. And I can’t wait that long! ;-)
So I went out and bought Apple’s own case. It protects the iPad ok, it’s thin, it converts to a typing position. It’s well built… BUT… I don’t like the way the edge are finished. It doesn’t look like it was made by Apple as some details are not well polished. And it cost 45$CAN which is almost the same price as the DodoCase.
I don’t exactly know if I’m going to keep Apple’s case. I might buy a DodoCase and wait for it to arrive. I do have protection at the moment that should help me to wait.
But I still need to think about this.
I might start making posts about iPhone / iPad apps that I’ve bought. I don’t normally buy a lot of apps, but these apps are so good and are cheap that I don’t see why I wouldn’t buy them.
Reeder - Best iPad news reader app. It sync with your Google reader account, nice interface.
AirVideo - Best way to share video from your computer to your iPad / iPhone, it does conversion on the fly.
Logmein - This one cost an arm… But It’s so much valuable. If something doesn’t work on the iPad, I can always connect to one of my computer, fast and works great, way better than any VNC apps out there.
Photogene - A cool picture / photo processing app. The iPad should include something like this.
Photo Transfer App - Creates a wifi network so you can transfer photo from your iPad / iPhone / computer wirelessly. Take a picture from your iPhone, send it to your iPad for processing.
Instapaper Pro -I’ve used the free version on my iPhone, but they haven’t done any free version for the iPad. The new interface is nice and you can send article from mobile safari.
Pinball HD - In need of some entertainment, this is a cool and fast casual game.
Color Splash - An other picture / photo processing app. Turn your apps B&W and only add color to an object.
As of right now, I’m only missing an IM app. There are a lot of apps for the iPhone, but none too tempting for the iPad. I’ve only seen Beejive IM, but at 10$, I would like to have more choice before taking a decision.
I do have more apps installed on my iPad, but for now, this post is about paying apps.
“Android Land” will probably be a series of post regarding my finding / hints on Android based phones.
I just purchased a new Nexus One. It’s my second one as I had the T-Mobile, aws band version when it got out. I now have the AT&T version that has 3G working in Canada.
With my first one, I had some anoyance with the fact that SMS notification didn’t vibrate at all. I had look everywhere in setting to find nothing. Well this morning I found where to look for. As this is not really intuitive and kind of proves that Android was built by engineers. Here how you enable vibration with SMS.
Open “Messaging” -> Menu Button -> “Settings” -> Vibrate option is at the bottom of the list.
Oh, and this is a pattern, same thing for email. You need to go in the email settings to enable vibration for incoming email.
Open “Gmail” -> Menu Button -> “More” -> “Settings” -> Vibrate option is at the bottom of the list.
