I know it's a loaded question and it really depends on what you like. Personally, I've always liked Apple products. I'm intrigued with Siri on the iPhone and and it should better yet on iPhone 5. This AI really makes it easy to do a lot of things hands free.

Well, we have two iPhones an android phone and an iPad in our house. The iPhones are my wife's and my daughter's. The iPad is mine and I use it mostly for work in lieu of a laptop and also for playing Battle Academy. My thinking is the Apple has better apps, a better store for buying them and is generally a better product. The android phone was (past tense) better for email. However, I don't use it literally at all anymore since I have the iPad for that purpose. All it is useful for now is a phone. I may as well have a 1994 Motorola flip phone. I used to be one of those people that said Apple fans were like a cult. I think the kids are. However, I am apparently now one of the biggest fans because I love those things having used both Apple and android. It isn't even close. When it comes time to renew our phones at work with Sprint we will be insisting that our firm get iPhones rather than the android HTC phones we have now which basically are unused or many times replaced by the employee. I just haven't bought an iPhone for work because I can stick it out for a year with the HTC EVOs until we can replace them. There will be about 320 new people having iPhones when that year comes.

Note I used the past tense for the email. That is because the voice recognition software on the iOS is much, much better and I wrote, for example, this entire post using the Apple iOS voice recognition software and not typing.

Good info Airdrop. I'll wait for the iPhone 5. Thanks for your detailed reply.

I just reread your post and that is really cool! That voice recognition software really takes accurate dictation. Can you do a lot regarding work on the iPad? Does it have a virtual keyboard? Sorry, I don't know much about them.

As an IT professional who works for a retailer of cellphones, I would second Airdrops sentiment. A computer of any sort is only as good as it's software, and at the moment this is Apples real strength. Android is a mixed bag, and no matter what handset you choose, you can guarantee that it wont receive the same number of post sale updates that an Apple device will, if it receives any at all. The proponents of Android tout it's "openness", but typically this "openness" is not above board with the carriers or handset makers, meaning you basically have the Internet community and no-one else to look to for support. Honestly, I would recommend a Windows Phone, such as a Lumia 900 over Android at this point.

...and yes, the iPad has a virtual keyboard, as do all these devices, it's a necessity of the form factor. As for getting work done on one, you'd be surprised. I can Remote Desktop into Windows machines at work (I am a server guy) and essentially do anything I need to, albeit not always as quickly, but in many cases the portability makes the trade-off worthwhile. Personal work, such as photo and movie editing is easily done as well. The tools are there, but be prepared to spend a little on applications in order to achieve your goals.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts here sinner. I've decided to wait on the iPhone 5 release (hopefully this Fall) and check out the iPads in the meantime. I like the idea of how portable they are. More so than my laptop.

+1 for the iOS devices. Holding out to replace my 4 with a gimpy home button.

Would you be using the iPad for work sSnakeeyes? If so, how? Just curious.

As sinner said, if it can be done on the device you can probably find software to do it if you spend a little bit. And really, for $15.00 being on the expensive side for app store apps the productivity ones that work for you are usually totally worth it.

I'm not sure because I don't know what the iPad's capabilities are. I'll need to do some research. I use Microsoft Office for work. Will an iPad run it? It may not be practical to use an mobile device like that for intense office applications.

Office applications are not terribly demanding on modern mobile hardware, you just have to remember how most modern office workstation computers are overkill for tasks like web browsing and punching out word docs. If you are doing sophisticated finance spreadsheets or scientific computing inside of a spreadsheet (probably not the greatest tool for that) that's a different story. Hardware wise, modern tablets are probably capable of doing 95%+ of what a non-technical/specialized office worker does now.

Currently Apple's iWork office suite runs on iPad, as well as a few office apps put out by smaller developers. Supposedly MS will be releasing Office for iOS/Android in ~ 6 months (http://www.bgr.com/2012/05/23/microsoft-office-ipad-android-launch/), which would align with Windows 8 stuff coming out I think.

I use Splashtop and iTap RDP so I can always have a remote session with my home, or work pc. At that point, I can do pretty much anything a Windows computer can do, caveat being that I must be connected to the Internet on my iPad. In my case, wi-fi is always available via my phone. But, as Vertial mentioned, the app to do what you want very likely exists. You can pair a Bluetooth keyboard up as well, if you plan to do heavy duty typing. I've never felt the need, an iPad produced this post without trouble. Honestly, I'm not a huge fan of Apple, but I did have the iPad2, and currently have the 2012 iPad, and think is great. This is one of those rare cases where the market leader is also the price leader and capability leader. No brainier, IMO. Do a little homework and you will find out there is some neat stuff out there. I used a site called AppAnnie, to see various categories and charts to help figure out what apps exist and make comparisons.