The entry level iPad costs $399, not $499. That makes it twice as expensive as the N7, but it also has twice the screen area.

http://store.apple.com/us/buy/home/shop_ipad/family/ipad/ipa...

> twice the screen area

I have never understood this way of thinking. (Nor, likewise, the idea that the right way to compare laptop screens or monitors is by how big they are across the diagonal.)

The Nexus 7 has a smaller screen area than the iPad 2, but it has more pixels. If for some purpose the physical size is the limiting factor for you, you can hold it closer to your head.

Of course this stops being true at the point where you can't easily focus on it any closer (which gets further and further out as your eyes age), or where having it closer makes touch interactions uncomfortable somehow. But is either of these really the limiting factor for a lot of tablet users?

(I'm in my 40s -- some way above the median of the market for these things, according to the stats I've seen -- and for me a 7" screen at the closest point where I can easily focus occupies about the same amount of my visual field as my (home) desktop monitor at normal operating distance.)

Devices with capacitive touchscreens are made to be operated with your fingers. Once a target is smaller than 44x44 points, it becomes very hard to hit accurately. That's why screen size is important for tablets. A 10" tablet can simply accommodate more UI elements than a 3,5" or 7" screen, and thus you can use more complicated programs on them.

That's a fair point. But in practice the target sizes on typical iPad apps aren't close to the lower limit of practicality, and the UIs of such apps are constrained more by not being ugly and confusing than by how many touch targets can fit on the screen.

Hence, e.g., all the speculation that Apple will produce an 8" tablet that's basically an iPad 2 scaled down somewhat, to have the same pixel size as the (old) iPhone -- whose target sizes don't seem to be too small.

I agree and Gruber wrote a good post about that [1]. However, if Apple releases a smaller 7.85" iPad, it will still have a 40% larger screen area than 7" tablets do [2].

[1] http://daringfireball.net/2012/07/this_ipad_mini_thing

[2] http://a.yfrog.com/img615/4234/6j2n.png

Spot on I'm my opinion. I have both, and the nexus is great but I prefer the iPad in so many ways. The price point for the nexus is the thing that initially made me buy, and if it wasn't for the price I would never have gotten an android device at all.

I feel the exact opposite. I've had an iPad for a couple of years, and the Nexus 7 for a few days now. I always loved my iPad, but after just a few days with the Nexus 7, I vastly prefer it. The 7in form factor feels much more comfortable to use, while still being big enough to be practical (vs. the smaller form factor of a phone). I'm also loving how customizable Android is. Even just being able to set up a home screen that provides some useful information via a couple of widgets, instead of just a collection of icons is a bonus.

I used the nexus 7 for a few hours and I found the transitions and ease of use difficult. Not as intuitive as the iPad. Playing around and sending content to the TV and it's not as smooth as airplay. I found the actual screen size awkward. I didn't know how to navigate or read pages. Do I place both hands behind the device and use my thumbs to navigate? Or do I place one hand behind the device and use the other hand to drive? Guessing I would quickly get over that with more use, but it was refreshing to try something different...

I'm guessing I have smaller hands (female) which I suppose could make a real difference in how it feels to hold/use the device and is probably at least part of why I find it more comfortable to use than the iPad.