Yesterday I experienced the Apple Store for the first time. No, not a fruitier, but the home of Apple tech products, this one the Plymouth branch.
I'm not a fan of Apple products, you see, and never have been. I think they're overly expensive, and once caught in their net, it's difficult to extracate yourself from it. The products are good, and are easy to integrate with other Apple products, but the whole Apple empire lacks the diversity to keep things competitive. All that said, Grandad John wanted a new iPad, to match Grandma Jill's iPad and their iPhones (see what I mean about getting caught in the net?), so off we went to Drake's Circus Shopping Centre.
Far from being thronged by bright young things, the majority of customers in the Apple Store that morning seemed to be of the more mature variety, although the staff of the store were, of course, just out of school. DW checked in with someone, and we had a browse around while we waited to be served. I had a play with a basic iPad, and all seemed OK, despite the eleven-inch screen model being significantly more expensive than my fifteen-inch Android tablet. But then that's Apple for you.
Anyway, the sales assistant turned up, took our order and tried some gentle upselling, but didn't protest too much when we declined. She logged in Grandad John's iCloud account, had a look at his old iPad (which we'd brought along) and his iPhone and declared all was good to go, even though the old iPad didn't qualify for a trade-in. No surprise there. A new iPad box appeared on the table and we were directed to the "Setup Area", where young Katie took us through the set up on the new machine, and set the transfer of the data from the old iPad in motion. Now this is where Apple really do well, getting ordinary folks in and sending them on their way with a new device that is 100% ready to go, complete with everything that was on the old device. Katie was a star, dealing with a handful of customers at the same time, and making sure that we didn't leave until everything was ready. Well done Katie.
Back at the ranch, we fired up the new iPad and it connected to the home wifi without us having to do anything like find the router or the login details; a real boon where passwords can be a pain in the bum. It looked and felt much like the old iPad, but was faster and less clunky. Surprisingly, Apple seem to have moved some of their interface tools to match those on Android systems, which I thought was a turn up for the books.
Anyway, Grandad John is very happy with his new device, especially after we connected it to his fancy Sony speaker. I was impressed with the Apple Store, and its staff, chiefly because they made it all very easy. I still won't buy Apple products because I think they're overpriced, but for those that are smitten, and can afford it, they're pretty darned good.
