Best Buy opens second store amid iPad frenzy

iDogma

Best Buy made a pragmatic decision today - the day it opened its second UK store. Nothing rivals major Apple product launches in terms of hype and Best Buy has promoted the news that it's stocking the iPad above even news of the store, in acknowledgement of the iPad's far superior pulling power.

Just as with the Thurrock opening, Best Buy has a bunch of opening weekend offers at the store, including the chance to get all your money back on the purchase of a TV that costs £499 or more if England wins the World Cup. In fact, so many retailers seem to be offering this kind of deal it's quite possible that the UK economy will suffer a fatal blow if England wins the thing.

Of course there are no incentives or price promotions for the iPad, which has attracted the customary overnight queuers at the flagship Regent Street store - the person at the head of the queue having been there since 2pm yesterday. The Daily Mail has a thorough summary of all the iPad mania, including an opinion piece entitled "Why I hate Apple, the infuriating cult making people smug bores".

Such is the polarising effect of Apple, celebrity Apple-lover Stephen Fry has been moved to blog on the matter. As you would expect, it's quite funny and perceptive. Here are some choice bits:

"The causes that lead some to hate everything Apple are complicated and various, but they are certainly not rational. Hate never is. Nor indeed is love. We are dealing with emotions here, not thoughts. Apple divides people in tribal, primal and almost frightening ways.

"The fact that I will have turned off my website's comments facility or moderated it into effective silence is even now driving some of my readers (a tiny minority I'm happy to think) insane. They are dreaming up insults about me and the iPad and dripping with cunning clever remarks to show what a fool, what a pretentious idiot, what a preening, posturing pseud of a lame waste of skin I am to champion Apple and their controlling commercial ways, their over-proprietary software, firmware and hardware and their whole corporate style.

"It is their right and their need not just to disagree with me but to grab me by the scruff of the neck and push me face down in their prose until I squeal for mercy and admit that the iPad is a failure and a disgrace, that I am a fool and a nothing for falling for it and they are supreme and knowing and right, dammit, and why won't anyone listen???

"One hurtful, mean-spirited, vicious or intemperate comment ruins everything. Absolutely everything. One turd spoils the whole bath. You cannot say to someone about to lower themselves in, ‘Don't be a wimp, it's only a small turd, the rest of the water is crystal clear.' So I would rather have no comment at all. Call me weak, call me pusillanimous, call me craven, call me anything, only don't do it here."

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GOD DAMNIT! Why oh why cant they open a store in Plymouth? Seriously all thats around here is Pcworld/currys/comet and one or two tiny shops, I would like to go into a electronics store and be able to pickout good prices please :P. I only go in the above stores if theres one of them massive sales/random discounts and thats about it however i would rather have a scan store or something here :P.

Fry makes the point that the “hate boys” are inclined to going a bit over the top and that the negative emotional reaction against all things Apple has, perhaps, overtaken the positive emotional reaction that the fan boys have been getting on everyone's nerves with for some time now.

I can't fully understand how things became so polarised and heated, especially when all dedicated Windows users I know seem to despise Microsoft and all Mac users I know concede that their loved products are consistently overpriced. There are doubtless other concessions, which would be made by both parties as long as they did not feel overly compelled to do so.

We don't HAVE to be the Sharks and the Jets. There is more than enough space and common ground for open-minded discussion and compromise.

I like Stephen Fry - but he really doesn't offer a balanced view on things-with-fruit-logos in all honesty. There's much to love about Apple but (like anyone) they're far from perfect and it's nice to have a more neutral assessment of their products and so I don't really give him much reading when I want to know about new products like the iPad.

Me, i'll be getting my hands on one in-store and having a go. But I don't really want one anyway.

I personally think the Apple notebooks and desktops are great although somewhat expensive.

However when it comes to the iPad there are other alternatives like the Dell Streak too so people should not be pulled in by the fruity marketing too quickly! ;)

If you have done your research and the still want it fine but many people are probably pulled in by the marketing so it is important they actually know what they are getting.

It would not surprise me if many people will buy this device thinking it will replace a notebook for general usage.

Quoting Agent from another thread:

"We have a guy at work with a shiny new iPad who insists on flashing it about at every opportunity. Thing is, he doesn't actually do anything on it apart from the odd bit of browsing (keyboard + mouse please! :)). He bangs on about how cool X and Y apps are, but their real world use is minimal - with laptops / netbooks / desktops beating it in the situations he mentions.

Look at the app market - some cool stuff…..for 10 mins. At which point you'll quickly realise that the number of apps you'll use day in, day out is tiny and a laptop / netbook would probably be better suited for.

Of course, all IMO, but I'm yet to see the iPads killer app."

http://forums.hexus.net/small-form-factor-portables/186524-ipad-alternatives-what-they.html#post1929646

The iPad is basically an iPod Touch with a 6 bit IPS screen and a bigger battery!

http://www.chipworks.com/Apple-iPAD-Teardown.aspx

From the article:

“Apple has relied on tried and true technology for the first generation of this device. In some cases, technically speaking, Apple has even gone backwards from what we saw in the latest generation iPhone that we have torn down.

Case in point, Apple is not using the do-all touchscreen controller from Texas Instruments that it used in the iPhone 3G, but has instead gone back to the three chip solution seen in the iPhone 2G. Of course, the same space limitations aren't there in a large device, and so we would speculate that the three chip solution had a lower overall cost. You can see from the image that, relatively speaking, the iPad is basically a giant battery with a tiny board attached to it (outlined in red), with some space left over for a future 3G mobile communications board.”

I drove past this the other day while going to the Sainsbury's at Hedge End and thought I was seeing things, because I was sure there was only one store, and it wasnt there.

Phew, I'm not going crazy!

Best Buy opens second store amid iPad frenzy

iDogma

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