What have you loved doing with your ipad?

January 3, 2022 12:16 PM

I'm staring at pictures of larger black squares on my smaller black square, mulling a lockdown boredom ipad purchase, and am hugely torn on what size and model to get. Please impart any wisdom at all you can to me, based on your own experience and my unhelpfully rough requirements:

Please just tell me things you've loved using your ipad for?
Please tell me especially what you love your ipad mini for?
Please tell me if your larger-than-mini ipad was either great or terrible for ebook reading?
Please PLEASE tell me if you know whether or not Paprika is useable on the mini?

Ideally I would buy a magic ipad that could magically change sizes, but as that's not on the cards my rough forseen uses are:
Ebooks
Recipe organisation specifically with Paprika
Bit of video streaming
Note taking with...??? app when i sort my life out
Reading websites in a nicer way than on my phone, currently use my Flip chromebook for this
Possible eventual replacement for flip chromebook entirely, it's defintely looking wobbly
Tabletop gaming (pnp rpgs) somehow?
Tooling around with synth and sequencer apps looks fun

Quite literally any thoughts at all gratefully appreciated.

posted by ominous_paws to Computers & Internet (41 answers total)

Response by poster: Oh, also reading the odd comic. Like, an occasional indie recommendation rather than permanently plugged intontge netflix style subscriptions.
posted by ominous_paws at 12:22 PM on January 3, 2022

My iPad mini is great for watching movies/TV while on planes and at the gym. I have yet to find much other use for it, but I am not a Power User.
posted by sacrifix at 12:26 PM on January 3, 2022

Also not a power user. I really like it for watching movies, and in the old days, I took it on planes. I use it for social Zoom meetings and have also used it for Zoom fencing lessons.

What I really want to share is that I love this stand for it.
posted by FencingGal at 12:32 PM on January 3, 2022 [2 favorites]

I've had various models of the mini over the years. It won the size-weight/quality tradeoff for me for many years. Shortly before the pandemic, I was anticipating being laid up after a surgery and splurged on a regular 10.2" model. I was happy to have it, and, with my travel so restricted now, I've really gotten spoiled using it at the gym. However, if I went back to valuing a small size and light weight, I'd probably readjust to the mini without great suffering. For reading, I find it comfortable to hold a mini like a paperback, and the regular model not to be. So that means the mini is a lot better for a subway commute, somewhat better for reading in bed, and kind of a wash on a train or airplane where you'll probably be using the tray or a stand.

The latest mini supports one of the Apple Pencils, and I'd think that would be vital for note-taking and markup. The mini is too small for comfortable use of the relatively new split-screen options.
posted by praemunire at 12:41 PM on January 3, 2022

As I get older and more near-sighted, it's nice to be able to close my laptop, remove my glasses and curl up with an ebook or game on my full-size iPad. I think the bigger screen is valuable for digital board games so I don't have to zoom in to see the fiddly bits. And better if you want to watch a movie with someone.

It kind of depends on how close to your face you want to hold it! If at arms-length, you probably want the full size.
posted by credulous at 12:52 PM on January 3, 2022 [3 favorites]

I own the second generation mini (the first one with a Retina Display) and after I outgrew its limited storage capacity I bought a fourth generation mini with a lot more capacity. The older one now lives in our kitchen, where it is used for Paprika, NYT Cooking, and (when needed) Safari open to whatever (recipe) site. I have never had any complaints about Paprika on the mini-sized screen. I use the replacement daily, mostly reading news via the NYT and WaPo apps, browsing the web, and reading mail. I take it with me when I go for allergy shots, and as I sit in the waiting room in case of anaphylaxis I either read open tabs or do puzzles in the NYT Crossword app.

The Touch ID sensor in my newer mini failed a few months ago, and if I had a job I'd buy a new mini to replace it because the lack of Touch ID is really annoying once you're used to it.
posted by fedward at 12:55 PM on January 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

I like that my iPad mini fits in a jacket pocket, which makes it easy to bring to a bar or coffee shop when I want to sit and read.
posted by 1970s Antihero at 12:57 PM on January 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

Not a power user, but I inherited an iPad Pro. I mostly use it for sheet music, which it is great at (I love forScore!). Also nice for watching movies.
posted by mskyle at 1:02 PM on January 3, 2022

I've had both a mini and an 11" pro. If you're planning to primarily hold it in your hand and close-ish to your face (like for reading), I think you should get the mini. A full size iPad can get a bit heavy and definitely heavier/more difficult to hold than a paperback, especially with a case on it. My first impression is that a mini would not adequately replace a chromebook, but my mini is so old that it mostly just sits on my kitchen counter as a recipe book. A new mini would obviously be more capable.

I have the 11" pro for work and I use it often for note-taking, both typed notes and hand-written notes, which I use the Apple Pencil for. I love having the pencil because I'm really a pen and paper person who reluctantly went digital with her planner, calendar, etc. I use the pencil more than I anticipated for marking up documents, signing things, etc. I also use my larger iPad for entertainment (playing games, scrolling through social media, etc.), and I enjoy viewing/editing pictures on the bigger screen. Personally I'm not in the habit of watching movies on my iPad, but for me bigger would be better there.

Either way, I really like having a matte/anti-glare screen cover, and I strongly recommend it since it sounds like you're planning to use it as an eReader.
posted by kochenta at 1:09 PM on January 3, 2022

Also I can't address how a larger-than-mini iPad is for reading ebooks, but my own preference for most (pure text) ebooks is an e-ink reader because it's lighter and the text is easier for me to read (mine's an actual Kindle, but I probably wouldn't give Amazon the money now). I like cookbooks better on the iPad than on Kindle, but I like them even more on paper so I only buy cookbooks electronically when the price difference is worth the hassle. I'm not much of a comic book or graphic novel sort of person but the person I know who reads a lot of that sort of content likes the iPad Pro for it.
posted by fedward at 1:14 PM on January 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

I have an iPad mini and 10" iPad Pro. Overall I use the mini very little at this point. It was convenient for taking to work or out and about to read at lunch because it fit into coat pockets (or even back pockets), but for reading at home I prefer the 10" (I'm a man with large hands so the size and weight is fine).

I also have large fingers and wouldn't want to attempt fiddly things like synths on it. I tried playing some app versions of board games and typically found that the size was just a little too small when there were lots of tiny simulated pieces.

I do also have a 8" Kindle Fire which does get more use than the iPad mini, mostly as a device to throw into the travel bag and not have to worry too much about if it gets lost/damaged/stolen.

If what you really want is a large e-reader, you might also give consideration to one of the large format e-ink tablets such as Boox.
posted by Candleman at 1:19 PM on January 3, 2022

I have an oldish but big Pro, which was a gift, and I do love it. I don't tote it around in my daily bag like my friends do their minis--I use it for travel (it's such a great companion on a plane or train trip) or at home.

This Pro is a bit heavy, so I typically prop it up using a simple keyboard/stand thing I got with it. I often use it to watch video (apps for various streaming services, etc.), I play games (Stardew Valley, Plants vs. Zombies, etc.), I read ebooks, especially from the public library. I particularly love reading graphic novels on it! So easy to make the panels as big as I want, zoom in on details, etc. I've played board games on it, either alone or with a friend. I use it for web browsing, or light writing. Also it's been handy for hanging out in a Slack channel, or FaceTime video calls with family.
posted by theatro at 1:47 PM on January 3, 2022

I have a 10” iPad Pro. First gen of that model. I use it everyday. For reading feeds, TikTok, Reddit. I use it to read cookbooks and other books with pictures (I use my kindle for book books) I use it to write notes that share to my phone, pay bills, watch YouTube and play match3/solitaire simple games
My SO has the same and uses it at Chemo and at home to play games, stream movies/TV and read news, etc. We love them and I will buy a replacement when these are no longer usable.
posted by ReiFlinx at 1:50 PM on January 3, 2022

I've got a plain-old (and pretty old at that) iPad. I do a lot of reading on it, both in Apple's Books and in Instapaper. Also in my feedreader, NetNewsWire. I use it in the kitchen with Paprika--I'm sure a Mini would be OK for that, but having a little more elbow room on it is nice (I also use a different app for grocery lists, and having room for my list app to slide over Paprika is handy—I'm sure the Mini is capable of that, it's just an ease-of-use issue). I have it connected by Bluetooth to my stationary bike, and use it to control/track workouts and watch streaming video/listen to music during workouts.
posted by adamrice at 2:33 PM on January 3, 2022

I have the 2021 11 inch iPad Pro and the Pencil. I take it to work everyday and use it and take notes using the Apple Pencil in NotePlan3 to manage all my notes and to do lists for work. I also use Notability to keep my journal and keep up with my language classes. I use Zotero's new app to coordinate and take notes on any research I need to do for work or side projects. And I use Procreate almost daily to draw and paint.

When I'm working on a research project, Scrivner and the keyboard are awesome to use for writing but Word works fine too.

Then there's the surfing and watching Netflix or other shows. It's great for that. I use it for reading periodically but mainly for comics because I also have a kindle and I prefer to read text on that.

My only complaint is that it's a smidge too big for my favorite purse, but that's on me and not the iPad.

After listing all this out, it seems like I am a power user. :)
posted by teleri025 at 2:35 PM on January 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

ipads are really good for synching sheet music while playing modern digital pianos. They have good games for cats. That's pretty much it. Everything else is either a bad attempt to be a laptop or a bad attempt to be a phone.

(Buying an e-ink reader in order to avoid ever reading books or papers on an LCD screen is worth hundreds of times the cost to me. I'd personally buy that first.)
posted by eotvos at 2:56 PM on January 3, 2022 [2 favorites]

I've had both an newer 11 inch iPad Pro and an older IPad mini. I used my mini for reading novels, watching movies, surfing the web, and generally as an entertainment device. It fit well in my purse and even in large jacket pockets. I teach university; I got the Pro with a pencil in order to grade paperlessly, take notes, and mark-up pdfs more easily. The mini wasn't quite big enough for that. I find the Pro + keyboard can usually replace a laptop unless I need to do a ton of writing. I also still read for leisure using the Pro, altough its a bit too large and heavy for my purse and its not a device I take to the coffee shop or to the doctors . The notetaking aspect is actually really nice (great technology) but I still wind up using a notebook and pen most of the time. If grading and annotating pdfs weren't so important to me, I'd probably go back to the mini because it was the perfect size for reading in bed under the covers.
posted by frau_grubach at 3:11 PM on January 3, 2022 [2 favorites]

Everything else is either a bad attempt to be a laptop or a bad attempt to be a phone.

Maybe! I think this is useful criticism, but it's also very much an individual criticism and it speaks to what we want from our devices. I actually want my iPad to be not a computer, as it changes the way I focus on it and interact with it, but it's valuable to know what you're looking for and to consider whether your needs are better served with some other device. I love the iPad mini and I'd get a new one if I could afford it, but it's not the ultimate device for everyone.

If you're the sort of person who gets frustrated by tapping a screen and you want a keyboard most of the time, a tablet may be the wrong device for you. Even if you just want a keyboard some of the time, if you end up carrying that keyboard around all the time just in case you might be better off with a MacBook Air or a Chromebook or an Ultrabook because it might weigh less and it would present fewer parts you might accidentally leave behind somewhere. Don't get an iPad mini if you are frustrated by having a single app in full screen mode all the time. You can, technically, use the split screen functions on the mini but I almost never do that on purpose. For probably a year after such a thing was possible almost every invocation of it for me was accidental, and then I'd have to remember how to make the second thing go away.

So, if you want a tablet specifically, an iPad is an excellent one and I love the mini form factor. But if you aren't sure, maybe buy a used one or see if you can borrow one from somebody and figure out if it works better for you than another Chromebook would.
posted by fedward at 3:22 PM on January 3, 2022

The original Plants vs Zombies. It's a simple tower defense game that shows off the utility of the iPad's touch interface.
posted by SPrintF at 3:24 PM on January 3, 2022 [2 favorites]

I have the 10.9" iPad Air 2020 + Apple Pencil 2nd gen and one of my absolute favorite activities in the pandemic has been learning to use Procreate (with youtube tutorials - example1, example2). I tried transitioning to Illustrator on my desktop and honestly the user experience on the tablet with the Pencil is so much nicer for me.

Daily I play Cozy Grove, take notes (I'm still deciding whether I strongly prefer any specific note-taking app, though Evernote is my recipe-catcher of choice so I do use that in the kitchen on the tablet), use it for lightweight web-browsing, monitoring my grocery orders, and curating streaming playlists when I'm curled up on the couch, sometimes read on it (I swap frequently between tablet and e-reader), and I use it for distract-o-vision while I'm doing tedious chores. I agree that Plants vs Zombies is really good on the tablet, also the Room and similar puzzle games where you're turning and moving stuff. I don't know that you need an almost 11" tablet for all of that, but my middle-aged eyes appreciate the extra real estate versus a phone or Switch.
posted by Lyn Never at 3:30 PM on January 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

This is not revelatory, but I have the current basic iPad, which is 10.2". It lives on a bamboo stand on my kitchen counter, pretty much solely serving as a Paprika terminal and Sonos interface. It's a great size for that.
posted by mumkin at 3:40 PM on January 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

Reading magazines I’ve checked out from my library via Libby. It is a reasonable match in size so makes for good readability.

I also heavily use NewsBlur for RSS catch-ups.
posted by RyanAdams at 3:43 PM on January 3, 2022

I love my 11" iPad Pro. I use it to read books/epubs, write/take notes/annotate documents with Notability (but I hear there are lots of other good apps too), play fun computer games like Cozy Grove, occasionally watch TV, and read PDFs of comic books in full color.

The 13" iPad Pro would give me a bit more reading room for PDFs of scientific papers but honestly I think it would be so big it would be uncomfortable to use/carry around. Never tried a mini, wouldn't be big enough for me since I read so many PDFs. If your comics are optimized for mobile and aren't PDFs that might not be an issue for you, though.
posted by cnidaria at 4:05 PM on January 3, 2022

I have a mini that I love and use happily for:

- Reading, whether ebooks, comics, browsing the web, scrolling social media, etc. I have used my spouse’s larger iPad for these, and hate it; it’s too heavy, and with that much more screen it’s honestly too bright/close to being a laptop screen, and I don’t find that to be relaxing. The only hiccup at all is with comics—the mini is just a smidge too small to read the full page in portrait orientation, for me. I prefer to scroll down the page in landscape mode to see everything in more detail.

- Watching video, especially in bed or while traveling. Again I think the size is an asset here—it’s dimmer for before-sleep watching, and perfectly sized for seat back tray tables. (Sometimes my spouse’s is tricky to fit on some trays if the seat is declined.) The hiccup here is that it isn’t great for shared viewing; when we want to watch something together, we use the bigger one.

- Paprika. I have never found it anything but perfect for this. I think the larger size would just take up more counter space, honestly.

- Taking notes on documents and sketching with an Apple Pencil. If this were the only, or even primary, thing I wanted to use it for, I would probably consider switching to a larger model. It can be a little fiddly with the smaller screen. That said, I do use the pencil often and it’s more than fine (it would just be more luxurious with more space).

I am also a woman with smallish hands and a bit of tendonitis, and so for me the small size is realllllly beneficial—I simply can’t hold the larger iPad in my hands like a book for any length of time, and using it with a stand is far less cozy. I also love that I can toss it in any purse or bag I have without worrying about it fitting or being too heavy.
posted by CtrlAltDelete at 4:09 PM on January 3, 2022

Quite literally any thoughts at all gratefully appreciated.

Well, OK, then . . .

Please tell me especially what you love your ipad mini for?

iPad mini 2

Remote control of various digital audio mixing desks. And also as a playback device for canned music via Spotify or various iTunes (Music) playlists loaded onto the pad for before & in between bands.

A+++. Even in a protective case the mini is the right size where I can keep a firm grip on it with one hand while wandering around a stage or audience area, and there's plenty of screen space to tweak controls as needed. And when it's used as playback device and parked in one location it doesn't take up a lot of real estate. I've seen guys try to do this with the ginormous iPad Pro and they can't even keep hold of the damn thing, I'm watching them almost drop it every 15 seconds, and then they try to find someplace to put it down and I'm like, "Dude, I got nothing, I don't have like 2 square feet of flat empty space for your shit, this is a rock show not a formal dinner with tables."

IOW, if you want a handHELD device, mini is the way to go. IMO & E.

Tooling around with synth and sequencer apps looks fun

I've got GarageBand (of course), MiniMoog Model D, and AudioKit Synth One. These are excellent, useable apps. I don't use the sequencing/recording elements of GarageBand, I use it as a sound generator that then gets recorded in another program (Reaper).

I'm old, so playing keyboards on a touch screen is kinda "ehhhhh" for me - and it's the touchscreen part, not the size of the screen that bothers me - so I bought an iRig Keys 2 as a physical controller, and it integrates seamlessly with iPad apps.

For sheer weird noisemaking fun I've got the Korg Kaossilator and Nebulous Theremin Synth.
posted by soundguy99 at 4:24 PM on January 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

I have the current basic iPad. It was also a lockdown boredom purchase. I didn't put any social media on it to help me tear myself away from all that, at least sometimes. I use it for watching movies and TV, games, some reading, and taking notes. I love taking notes on it. I always had multiple pads of paper all over the place, which is kind of useless for ever finding anything again. I use Goodnotes, and being able to search handwriting is wonderful. I would buy a Pro instead of a basic if you're going to be using a stylus/apple pencil a lot. The basic iPad's screen isn't laminated, and writing on it makes a lot of tapping and clicking noises.
posted by Mavri at 4:34 PM on January 3, 2022 [1 favorite]

I have the 11" inch ipad pro (or maybe 10, can't remember exact size). I love it. I use it for reading ebooks, watching movies/TV shows, playing games, annotating pdfs, taking notes and doing other work related stuff in Notability. I also like using sketch apps for drawing. I actually really love the ipad for that. I have the magic keyboard with trackpad which I also really love, but I don't use that very often currently. Oh, and I also use it for sheet music when playing the piano. I don't use it for these things all the time, but I definitely use it daily. I also have a regular laptop, which I use for work and internet browsing, but for everything else, I've come to really prefer the ipad.

I read books lying in bed with the ipad on a stand. I have mobility problems which mean even with a smaller device, I wouldn't be holding it for long, so that's less of a concern to me. I do find it to be incredibly lightweight. It fits easily in my small daily bag/purse.

For me, the ipad mini would be a bit small to do my readings/annotations, and I also don't think I'd love watching things on that small a screen.
posted by litera scripta manet at 4:50 PM on January 3, 2022

I have a 4th gen iPad, 9.7 inch screen, with 64GB. It still has 40 GB empty because while I use it almost daily, I don't load much onto it.

I use it to read book, hundreds of books over the years. I use it to browse the internet or watch TV shows while in bed, because my laptop lives in the living room. In the before times, I would load knitting patterns onto it to work on while meeting with knitting friends in cafes. I use it as an alternative when my husband is using my laptop.

I took it with me on a 2 week trip to Europe in 2019, in place of a laptop and to supplement out phones, and it was great for that. I could download routes from google while we had wifi in a hotel, and then use them in the car. Especially glad I had it after one of our phones went swimming in the sea, and we were down a device.

It occupies a niche between my laptop and my phone - I've never read a book or watched a show on my phone - too small. My phone is 6.5". I ordered a new iPad a few weeks ago because a lot of the apps on mine can't be updated any more. I didn't consider a mini, not sure why.
posted by See you tomorrow, saguaro at 4:50 PM on January 3, 2022

I adore my 11“ iPad Pro. I have completely stopped using my laptop for anything other than doing my tax returns. I had a full size iPad in the past and found it too unwieldy and heavy and a mini and the screen of that felt too small on balance. The small pro is big enough to function as extended desktop at a push, using an app, which makes it great to take to work when I know I‘ll be stuck in a meeting room as opposed to desk with monitors. It’s small enough to hold comfortably in my small hands.
posted by koahiatamadl at 5:20 PM on January 3, 2022

My son displays sheet music on his iPad while he plays guitar.

I turned a Bluetooth numeric keypad into a foot pedal through the use of some workbench scraps, and he used it in the church band for a couple of years (until COVID).
posted by wenestvedt at 7:05 PM on January 3, 2022

My 8 year old iPad mini? That I cannot find, after the burglary Thursday?

I have to confess, I've mostly used it as a Kindle reader, a device for watching Sopranos clips on YouTube, and as an alarm clock. Sometimes as a metronome.
posted by thelonius at 7:09 PM on January 3, 2022

I've had several sizes of ipad and am currently running a Chromebook tablet that I got at the urging of a friend who's a chromebook evangelist. I use it for reading and not much else.
My favorite ipad was an early generation mini. I put photo editing software on it and hooked it to an external hd to edit photos on the fly in remote locations. It worked well. I also loved that it fit in my motorcycle jacket pocket and could take it all kinds of places. My roommate has it now, he mostly streams movies & TV on it. I will have another, I love that size and that device.
posted by evilDoug at 8:03 PM on January 3, 2022

I have a 4th gen iPad Air and I use it for.... just a ton of stuff, really. Including Paprika 3, btw, it works great. (My ONLY complaint is that the screen "saver" function blanks the screen too fast; I wish it stayed live even when I'm not touching it regularly, because sometimes I don't want to touch my electronic recipe repository with my gross raw-chicken hands. If anybody knows a way to fix that I'd love to hear it.)

I read extensively on it, with a variety of e-readers and also from web sites. I write on it - I bought the Magic Keyboard case when I bought the iPad itself and the combination is amazing for writing. I watch Netflix on it, play random games from the app store on it (I play the hell out of Stardew Valley on it and I'm just longing for the day 1.5 comes to iOS...) When Alexa is acting up I use it as my nighttime white noise generator, I control our house lights and central heating/air from it, I color on it using the Pigment app and my Apple Pencil, which is fun, because it's like being artistic for folks who have no "real" art skills. I have zoom meetings on it, I have doctor appointments on it, I use it for slack and texting and email... I'm basically never more than 3 feet from this device at any time because it's so useful.

I've thought a few times about getting something slightly bigger for watching stuff and playing games, but I find the Air is really right at the sweet spot for me.

I use this stand for reading in bed, btw, and highly recommend it.
posted by invincible summer at 9:44 PM on January 3, 2022

Consider what type of ebooks you're reading, too... I've discovered that I tend to read pdfs on my (regular-size) iPad that are obnoxious to read on anything else tablet-sized. I don't know what reading pdfs are like on the mini.

I want a smaller and more portable ipad, but the mini is too big for me to comfortably hold (tiny hands) and I'm not quite willing to give up my android phone apps... I really wish they were still making the iPod whatever that were basically an iPhone without phone stuff. I've seriously considered getting a used later model iPhone and using it without phone service, lol.
posted by stormyteal at 11:14 PM on January 3, 2022 [2 favorites]

Side note for invincible summer: Paprika has an “always on” mode! Go to settings, scroll down to “Appearance,” and toggle on “Keep screen on.”

It’s a lifesaver for when my hands are covered in sticky dough. (It will also completely kill your battery if you forget your iPad on the counter after you’re finished cooking, but hey—definitely worth it.)
posted by CtrlAltDelete at 8:25 AM on January 4, 2022 [1 favorite]

Paprika does great on my phone and full size iPad. The one thing I can’t do is drag a recipe into a tag. I will save a ton of recipes at once with no category and then go to Uncategorized to sort them on my PC. To do that in iOS, you have to edit each one alone as far as I can tell.

iPads now do a decent job at OCR, so you can copy text from a screenshot into Paprika.

I read ebooks and pdfs on my full size iPad and just ebooks on an old nook. The nook is close to a mini iPad in size and the ebooks are very readable. You can also size up the font. I’ve read exactly one book on an iPhone and will not do that again.
posted by soelo at 9:53 AM on January 4, 2022

Audiobooks, especially from the free library app Libby, are another thing iPads do well. Your phone can run them too, but sometimes I want to use my phone for something else and not switch back and forth so much.
posted by soelo at 9:54 AM on January 4, 2022

I just dropped my ~2014 iPad Air 2 on the tile floor. To replace the screen will cost over $200. There is something about the Airs in that the LCDs are in the glass instead of a separate layer or something... I don't know these details, but I know that I didn't shell out the money. But my wife's store also had an extra iPad regular 10 inch or so sitting around that she could give me. The technician at the screen replacement shop said that the regular iPads (we didn't talk about minis) would be significantly cheaper to repair.

I use a Kindle for ebooks, but as fedward said I wouldn't give Amazon the money anymore, no matter how much I love it. And as cnidaria pointed out, I wouldn't go any smaller than 10ish inches for reading and annotating pdfs.

But having a keyboard case is amazing. When I travel I leave my laptop at home and just take that. I can write papers, watch movies, do the social media things, all in one, and it fits in my murse with my headphones, water bottle, and documents. That portability makes me very happy, whereas a larger version might require a bookbag or something slightly more cumbersome.
posted by Snowishberlin at 12:35 PM on January 4, 2022

I've been using the Goodnotes app for taking notes and am really liking it. In terms of additions, having a "paper-feel" overlay for the screen makes a big difference. There are various brands; I went for a cheaper one than the name brand and am very happy with it. My spouse recently got one, based on my recommendation, and keeps telling me how much of an improvement it is.

(Just checked my Goodnotes files. Currently at 112+ pages of handwritten notes for the class I'm focusing on now.)

This assumes you're using an Apple Pencil or other stylus. I would really not want to try to take handwritten notes via finger.
posted by Lexica at 5:27 PM on January 4, 2022

10.2 iPad here. I have a Kindle for reading books, otherwise…

I use it to learn guitar:

* It’s great for tablature.
* I use it for Yousician
* YouTube tutorials
* Justin guitar app - I also subscribe to his theory class, and use the apple pencil to mark up the quizzes he has
* metronome app
* tuner app
* ear training app
* fretboard training app
* I have some guitar eBooks (pdfs) and use that a lot
* I hear great things about the forscore app, so I’ll get that as I advance

Other things:

* learning a language - my library has a free subscription to Mango
* Udemy app for some programming stuff
* YouTube viewing
* when I travel I bring an adaptor to hook up to tv for watching Netflix or whatever - I don’t watch a ton of tv/movies on it otherwise
* Instapaper read it later service
posted by backwards guitar at 6:16 AM on January 5, 2022

invincible summer, when I want to wake up my iPhone without touching it I say hey Siri, then say cancel.
posted by ellieBOA at 9:25 AM on January 5, 2022