Apple iPad 2: Verdict

The lighter design, A5 processor, cameras, gyroscope, and other enhancements increase the iPad 2's value over the iPad... at the same price.

But the original iPad is now £100 cheaper and Apple has had a full year to innovate further without really delivering much.

We really wanted to see some jaw-dropping new features. In actual real-world speed tests, the most common apps don't perform any faster... yet. Maybe that will change when developers start to optimise apps for the iPad 2's hardware. But for now, only a few apps truly benefit.

So where does that leave the iPad 2?

We liked:

When pressed into a corner, we have to admit that the new design is attractive enough to make anyone want to upgrade. It's simply gorgeous, and retains the solid, premium feel of the original iPad.

The lighter styling means more mobility, and even less reliance on a laptop. Steve Jobs talks about a post-PC world – we're not there yet, but the writing is most certainly on the wall.

The speed improvements for GarageBand, iMovie, and several games are noteworthy. As with Android 3.0 tablets like the Xoom, the iPad 2's best days are certainly ahead of it.

Will developers start to produce games and apps that make the most of the A5 chip inside the iPad 2? We'd like to think the answer is yes – but those same developers will not want to forget about about the 15 million people out there who already have a first generation iPad – so the extent to which games and apps will be optimised is unclear.

Will the limitations of the first iPad hold the iPad 2 back? Probably. How much, we'll have to wait and see. But this is almost certainly one of the reasons behind Apple's reluctance to really innovate with the iPad 2.

We disliked:

One thing's for sure - the iPad 2 is still not a great multi-tasker. As far as that particular feature goes, Android 3.0 has iOS 4 beaten hands-down. To even say that iOS supports multitasking is stretching it if you ask us.

The lack of widgets is also a drawback, and we can't see Apple introducing them to iOS any time soon.

The cameras are also very poor – and that's an area Apple could easily improve upon, but chose not to.

And that leads us into the real negative feature of iPad 2 - simply its lack of innovation. This is a refined iPad, with a few extra hardware features and a more powerful CPU.

Verdict:

For all the negatives, for now we think the iPad 2 is still the best tablet around.

It is much better for consuming media, has more compelling apps (especially for the larger tablet size), has a better app store ecosystem, and is light and useable.

Maybe the Xoom or some other Android 3.0 tablet can keep up…or maybe not.