Apple shows off guided video tours of the iPad

It’s almost impossible to ignore the looming iPad and Apple continues to whet our appetites by releasing a series of videos showing off the tablet’s capabilities.

Obnoxiously, the videos aren’t on Apple’s official YouTube channel, so I’ve watched them all and will give the nitty gritty. The videos aren’t exactly revolutionary but they do cover how Mail, Safari, photos, videos, YouTube, iPod, iTunes, iBooks, Keynote, Pages, and Numbers will work on the iPad. It’s not anything mind-blowing but there are some neat instances where you realize how much the screen real estate can help. I’m talking about Mail and Numbers in particular, which look like programs that just can’t be done as efficiently on an iPhone or iPod Touch.

Other than that, there’s not too much to get excited about. The iBooks works as you would expect and, like the Kindle, you can look up any word in a dictionary at all times. While the page turning motion is cool to look at, I think it’s actually a waste of motion. The rest of the apps work as you’d expect under super ideal conditions.

My opinion has slowly changed on the iPad, as I first thought it was just a rich-kid plaything but am beginning to think it could play a practical role in my life. The lack of Flash and true third-party multitasking leave a bad taste in my mouth, but it does look like an elegant piece of semi-mobile computing. I’m not one of the hundreds of thousands to pre-order, but I may consider plopping down $500 once the smoke clears and I’ve had some more hands-on time. We’re going to be covering the hell out of this thing this week, leading up to our live-blog launch on Saturday. Let us know what interests you about the iPad or if we need to take a break.

[Via Apple]