Well Mothers Day is almost here and the perfect geek present is to get an easy to use computing thing for a mom who doesn’t like technology, so the iPad actually offers some pretty amazing features particularly when paired with an AppleTV and a stand. Here is how we set it up:
- Picture Frame. I’ve always wanted to be able to easily push photos to the parents of the kids and have them get it automatically. It takes some work for the sender, but with one button you can do it. Here is the process. Create an iCloud account, use it to the run the iPad. Then create a separate account on your Mac for your mom and turn on Photostream. Then you just drag the photos you want into the Photostream and they will automatically appear. I just wish that the iPad would automatically go to slideshow mode. This happens with the AppleTV which is great. Net, net, you get pictures on your TV an don your ipad.
- FaceTime. Just like star trek, I’ve always wished that from the picture frame, it would just ring and you could just say, “Spock here”. We are not exaclty there, you still have to hit a button, but otherwise you are pretty close The main challenge is that it requires a Mac (there is no PC FaceTime), so I may swap this for Skype. But FaceTime definitely does work in full video mode.
- AppleTV with iPad as remote. With the iPad, this is an easy way to have a remote control so that they don’t have to figure out too much. With the new Airplay Mirroring, this is wonderful way to get started there.
The channel selection is pretty key as well
- Netflix. They really do have an easy to use application that you can just click on to view which is neat.
- Xfinity TV. Another pretty easy to use applications.
The big change was to take away most of the icons, so that they only see FaceTime, Safari, Mail and Photos on the bottom and then a collection of TV channels on the top.
