College Student's Guide to the iPad

College Student guide to Ipad

In all of the College Student Articles I will tell you what you want to have, why and I will give some extra tips. I am trying to supply the college students of today with a little bit of help for their first "college experience".
Check out the other one; College Student's Guide to the Macbook Pro

What is it?

I will go into more depth throughout this article, but as an overview; the iPad has more helpful business applications than most people realize. First and foremost, the effectiveness of the Email, Calendar and Contacts applications on the iPad is endless. For any college student it is a great accessory to have. The word document applications are also, after a short learning period, quite easy to use.

Why buy it?

For those of us who cannot afford the $1000 Macbook or the $1400 Macbook Pro, the iPad is the next best thing. Althought, some of the newest users, including Fox News' Clayton Morris, would say that the iPad is almost better than the laptop. According to a lot of iPad users, the iPad has replaced their laptop. For the rare college student who is using a lot of photo editing or other major memory eaters, it is not necessarily a great replacement. However, for the average college student it is perfect.

The 1.5 pound body, .5 inch thickness and 9.7 inch screen are the frame for any college student's dream device. The touchscreen is easy to use and incredibly effective. If taking the iPad to class, you can attach any of a number of various devices. You can attach a keyboard and dock, so that you have a real keyboard. You can even attach a microphone to the dock connector and record the lectures.

The biggest complaint among users thus far is the lack of a 3G network. Though there is a 3G iPad, it is almost $150 dollars extra. That being said, most college campuses have a wireless network. Being that the iPad does have wireless internet, it would be easy for a college student.

Other Benefits

Even though not many of us will admit it, most college students strive to have the latest and greatest in technology. Whether it was the iPhone or now the iPad, we want it. So the fact that it is incredibly affordable for a portable computer, which is basically what it is, is just an added bonus.

Another great thing is that the application possibilities are endless. There is everything from word processing to Scrabble to video games to infinity and beyond. These are helpful in many ways; one of which is the Epicurious application. This application is a cookbook for the iPad. I bring up this specific application because most college students, living on campus, get fairly sick of the dorm food fairly quickly. Epicurious helps students to make food with ingredients that they have, or ingredients that they can buy. Once a recipe is found a shopping list is created, so even a college student is able to make sure they have all the ingredients.

Another helpful app is the "Things" app. This is basically a to-do list for everything in life. You can add many things to your to do list. You can even add events or projects that have to-do lists inside of them. It is like an endless to do list application.

There are also apps geared directly to college students including iStudiez Pro and Evernote. iStudiez Pro is another interactive planner, except this one is geared specifically to students. It keeps track of lecture hours, due dates and exam times. It also allows you to imput holidays, specific classes that have been cancelled and even where the class is and who teaches it. Evernote, on the other hand, is for the in class aspect. Evernote is the best selling note taking application for the iPad. It stores as many things as you would like, by month, as thumbnails, making them incredibly accessible.

Helpful accessories

Being that a number of college students do live in dorms there are a few things that I would call essential to the well-being of a college student's iPad. First, and probably most important, buy a case for the iPad. You need a case to carry it to class or around campus, or even just for storage. This is necessary because it is an expensive thing that is very light and easy to lose.

Furthermore, a dock/keyboard attachment would probably be nice. Even though you probably do not need a laptop or desktop if you have an iPad, you may want to have the feel of a real computer. This is a perfect attachment for a college student, especially for those long essays; because no matter how much we may love the touch screen keyboard, it is nice to have an external one.

For those of us that enjoy use of our laptop/phone/iTouch and now iPad at all times, a Ziplock bag might come in handy. On various sites they suggest a one gallon Ziplock bag as an alternate iPad cover for a wet situation. Though it muffles the sound a little bit it creates a waterproof package for the iPad. Amazingly enough, according to multiple accounts, the iPad touchscren still works. This also makes buying a real case for other times much less difficult because there is an extra covering, just in case.