I was on the fence about this product for a while, but now that I have had time to think about how it will effect my day to day life (what it can do for me, as aposed to what it can do), I realize it's a fantastic piece of electronics to have in my home.

I am going to NZ on May 1st, and what I want is something I can take with me that will do the following things:

• GPS
• Skype (not paying long distance from NZ)
• Personal and work Email
• IM
• Web browsing
• Twitter
• Facebook
• Take photos (this one is lacking, but I have a 12 mega pixel camera for that)
• wireless data access from anywhere
• take notes
• listen to music
• watch movies

Aside from taking pictures, the iPad does all those things. I have an iPhone 3GS that takes decent pictures, but when I want to take a photo of something, I use a camera, so the lack of camera on this device does not change my lifestyle regardless. For almost anything, I would not use it. Plus, for home related stuff (not when I am in NZ), I will always have my phone in my pocket, so what do I need a camera for?

The only thing now to worry about, is will this thing be released with 3G before May 1st (and can I get one). :)

You know, I'm reading your post, and I'm not really seeing the difference between this device and a computer...

Just remember that you can't just plug in a us device into the mains in other countries. If you're truly going to move to a new country wouldn't it make more sense to buy one that works natively there?

How about the diference between this device and my iPhone? In fact, my iPhone has more features.

The big advantage of this device over my iPhone, is of course, the screen size and the cpu speed. Plus, if I am in the car listening to music for 4 hours while I browse the web, it's a much better experience, and I don't use my iphone battery. Plus for NZ, the thing is unlocked (unlike my phone), so I can just buy a sim card in NZ and go.

As for a computer... size, and again, user experience. When you say computer, I asume you mean netbook (most full size laptops don't have gps and cellular modems in them). The thing that most people hate about the iPad, is what I love about it.. linked to the app store.

Think about it like this.. if you could own two cars.. one did 200 mph with 2 mpg, and the other would not go over 90 mph, but got 60 mpg, what car would on a day to day basis be the best for you? I will take the 60 mpg.

To use an example of just one thing that happened to me. I have a high end DSLR camera (the one in my avatar actually), and I wanted to geotag the photos I took with it. I spent about 2 hours on my PC looking for options. After reading a lot of reviews, and looking for the best thing, i found this device that was a gps in a keychain that you synced the time in your camera with, and then you plugged your the keychain and the memory card from your camera into this box, and it would write the meta data to the images. Slick thing, but it cost $100. Right before I clicked buy on the website, I thought to myself "I wonder if there is an app for that". So, I picked up my iPhone, searched for GeoTag, found an app, read the reviews on my phone, saw that it did the exact same thing, and clicked the buy now for $3.99. 30 seconds later I had that capability in my hand.

The thing that was so powerful about that to me, was the time it took for me to think "I wish I could do X", and the time I was doing it, was literally seconds. I did not have to find a review site, find the store with the best price, find my credit card, wait for it to ship to me, and then install it. I just did it all in a few moments.

This is the power of the iPhone model, and the iPad is just taking that experience, and putting it on something faster, with a much larger screen. To me, that's a great thing.

iPads are USB charged. So it does not matter where you live.

I have 3 macs and a 2 PC in my home. All work in any county as well.

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Wow, jumping straight in with the most expensive SKU. That's brave.

I'm interested, but I hate paying the price of early adoption. I'll at least wait a few months for them to shake the jitters out of the manufacturing process. I think the base SKU will satisfy my wants, too, but then I don't travel much. I can see the appeal of taking lots of media and cellular internet with you overseas.

I'm with you on the App store. It's amazing how many problems you can solve by applying the right software to that one little piece of hardware.

Well I stand corrected. Didn't even consider that it would be usb powered.

Just an FYI.

Only the 3G model has GPS. Not sure if GPS means anything to you, but just wanted to make sure you knew that.

As far as power supply goes, I haven't had a laptop/netbook in the last 10 years that didn't have universal power supply (meaning you only need the correct attachment, and those cost close to nothing).