I think Apple's manufacturers can't produce enough iPads to make it a "risk". Apple just tells them "make as many as you can".
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Apple Sells Out of iPad Launch Day Supplies in U.S. Online Store, Now Quoting March 19 Shipping
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I think Apple's manufacturers can't produce enough iPads to make it a "risk". Apple just tells them "make as many as you can".
Hate to be a naysayer...
But I think that all of these people who are seeing "shipped" and that the item is already at a FedEx station in the US are really seeing their smart covers, etc.
I bought mine at the same time as two people in my office. They showed a shipped status, then got their smart covers within a day. Now their order shows preparing to ship. Same as mine, and I didn't order the smart cover.
But I think that all of these people who are seeing "shipped" and that the item is already at a FedEx station in the US are really seeing their smart covers, etc.
I bought mine at the same time as two people in my office. They showed a shipped status, then got their smart covers within a day. Now their order shows preparing to ship. Same as mine, and I didn't order the smart cover.
Mine says the same thing. It's about 2.5 hours away! It also says Future Delivery Requested on the fedex page. Hopefully they will ignore that
I ordered a 64 gig WiFi only and the dark gray smart cover, the day the New iPad was released. I received the cover yesterday 3/9/12 and my iPad has been shipped. My confirmation email states it will be delivered on or before 3/16/12.
Try more like online gets what's left after they divvy up to the stores. They know they will get crazy lines so they send the stores big batches. And with stores like 5th Ave who can do 10k units that day themselves, that means there's not as much left for online. So they run out.
It's not really a problem for Apple because they know folks will wait.
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We've had that for a year already.
I suppose it could be a revamp of that adapter, it wasn't the prettiest piece of work. seemed dumb to me that it had any length of cable for example. Seemed to be asking to be broken
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I suspect if they do reservations it will be for the launch day only or maybe the first week tops. After that it's risk it or order online prepaid and pick up in the stores. It's really smarter for Apple because they can get you in and out faster cause you already did 99% of the 'paperwork'.
My only fuss is when they do reservations they tend to set aside some for walk ins that didn't know they needed a reservation. To me that is wrong. They should do reservation only and advertise it. Send out emails to all their Apple ID holding folks, put it on the website etc. Have staff in the stores talking it up. Then at like noon the day before let folks start making them for launch day. And no holding back amounts. Sucks if someone comes that day without one but there should be enough talk that there's no way they couldn't know. ANd have someone out at the line from early on making sure folks know they have to have a reservation, they have to have an ID and only the person that made the reservation can pick it up. So if Mom came but Dad did the reservation they know at 5am not 4 hours later after they have been waiting. And no changing their minds. There's no extra stock and everything is reserved by someone so what you ordered is what you get or go home and try again in a few days.
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Yeah for them.
But some folks have small kids in the house who will pick up things they have been told not to. Some folks use their iPads in the field for jobs where accidents happen. Etc
This Apple Care is for them. Not you or your parents. Believe me, my boss is thrilled. Replacement of the 4 3g iPads that were broken on set this year was $369 plus tax each. Even if we break them twice in the two years that's just $200 for those two times. Huge savings for us.
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Not what he said, not even close.
Folks really need to get over that schtick. Jobs never said there was zero use for a stylus or that no one should want to use one. Hell the original iPhone did work with a stylus as has every other phone and iPad and Touch.
People love to quote that one line out of context and put words in his mouth and it's annoying. He was talking about previous phones and PDAs that required a stylus or you couldn't do anything. You couldn't use that handy handwritten notes feature, sometimes you couldn't even dial the phone. You were screwed until you went and bought another, very overpriced piece of plastic because you had to have it. He thought that was ridiculous (and it was) and said to his designers that the only stylus iPhone users should NEED is their finger. And that's how they did it.
Reading through the different experiences people are having with their iPhone orders, its pretty clear that Apple has employed a number of different strategies to ensure: a) That as many people get their iPad the day they expected; b) they get the lowest overall shipping costs; and c) that there is sufficient stock on hand at each store, and in each market, to minimize the sort of shortages and scalping that has marred previous product intros.
First off, its pretty clear to me that Apple has already shipped massive quantities of iPads to some destination countries. If you are a US customer who ordered on the announcement day, its pretty likely your iPad is already in the US, and its just waiting to be delivered to UPS/FedEx for delivery - or for delivery to your local store (if store pickup was available.)
Why would Apple do this? Answer, it probably was a lot cheaper for them to airfreight iPads in bulk from China, rather than shipping them one at a time. Also, its a lot easier to get customs clearance. This way Apple is only paying domestic delivery charges, rather than International. I figure you can get between 80,000 and 100,000 iPads on a single air freighter - bringing the unit cost of getting each iPad into the USA about as low as possible - maybe as little as a dollar or two each.
Secondly, its quite interesting to see which cities have Store pickup available. Neither of the Apple Stores in my city have store pickup available. That says to me that Apple is reserving a lot of their local store delivery capacity for the legions of fans who'll be in line outside on launch day. Also, by NOT making store pickup available, it reduces the amount of work store personnel have to do, freeing them up to serve walk-in customers.
In smaller national markets, places where Apple doesn't have distribution partners, it looks as if many iPads ARE being shipped International AirFreight.
Lastly, it looks as if Apple's ordering system has a tremendous amount of flexibility built into it. And that as stocks of various models run low in each market shipping and delivery dates change to reflect that reality.
First off, its pretty clear to me that Apple has already shipped massive quantities of iPads to some destination countries. If you are a US customer who ordered on the announcement day, its pretty likely your iPad is already in the US, and its just waiting to be delivered to UPS/FedEx for delivery - or for delivery to your local store (if store pickup was available.)
Why would Apple do this? Answer, it probably was a lot cheaper for them to airfreight iPads in bulk from China, rather than shipping them one at a time. Also, its a lot easier to get customs clearance. This way Apple is only paying domestic delivery charges, rather than International. I figure you can get between 80,000 and 100,000 iPads on a single air freighter - bringing the unit cost of getting each iPad into the USA about as low as possible - maybe as little as a dollar or two each.
Secondly, its quite interesting to see which cities have Store pickup available. Neither of the Apple Stores in my city have store pickup available. That says to me that Apple is reserving a lot of their local store delivery capacity for the legions of fans who'll be in line outside on launch day. Also, by NOT making store pickup available, it reduces the amount of work store personnel have to do, freeing them up to serve walk-in customers.
In smaller national markets, places where Apple doesn't have distribution partners, it looks as if many iPads ARE being shipped International AirFreight.
Lastly, it looks as if Apple's ordering system has a tremendous amount of flexibility built into it. And that as stocks of various models run low in each market shipping and delivery dates change to reflect that reality.
Just got my Fedex tracking number, and it is shipping from Ontario CA, so I reckon it could make it into my hot little hands prior to the 16th!! Sweet!!
just checked the status of mine and its already in Nashville. It's to be delivered to my house in Alabama. What is interesting is it has a comment "future delivery requested" I wonder if that is code for " hold it until the 16th" event though it could get to my house much sooner?
Location: US
Order date: 8th March 10:30 am
Description: 32GB wi-fi with engraving
Status still shows 'Processing items' with a delivery date of March 16th. Hope they don't bump me off to a future date. Fingers crossed.
Order date: 8th March 10:30 am
Description: 32GB wi-fi with engraving
Status still shows 'Processing items' with a delivery date of March 16th. Hope they don't bump me off to a future date. Fingers crossed.
I've read more than a few stories regarding those early orders that end up in the hands of their respective buyers ahead of Apple's delivery date. Has anyone ever got their shipment early?
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; CPU iPhone OS 5_1 like Mac OS X) AppleWebKit/534.46 (KHTML, like Gecko) Mobile/9B176)
I wonder how many they made?
I wonder how many they made?
My iPad shipped, will be here on 16th the latest (and for that they'd really have to hold the delivery somewhere...) and I did not order a smart cover or anything. Only the iPad.
My order of 32gb WiFi iPad 3 is also shipped and is currently in Pennsylvania. wouldn't be surprised if it's even delivered ahead of launch day. Interesting how differently Apple is handling online preorders this time around. I remember last year with the iPad 2, they didn't even take online orders until release day, and even then, you had to wait almost a full week since they had the shipments coming directly from China. for iPad 3, it seems like Apple already stocked up the iPads at shipment locations ahead of time with possibly a larger stock available on launch day.
Horrible customer service to not make the new iPad available worldwide at the same time. The history with the iPad, iPad 2, iPhone 4, etc. is just repeating itself.
Here in Norway it is not even available for pre-ordering.
Lame!
Here in Norway it is not even available for pre-ordering.
Lame!
Not necessarily, I didn't order a smart cover and my iPad is currently in Pennsylvania (which isn't too far from NYC). However, on the FedEx status page it says "Future Delivery Requested". So it has shipped but Apple put a hold on when they would like it to load on the truck. Probably will receive it Thursday (there have been early deliveries in the past) but definitely at the latest, Friday.
What does "Preparing for shipment" mean?!?!?!?!?!?!?!
DAMMIT WHATS HAPPENING?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!
DAMMIT WHATS HAPPENING?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!
Yes, they have. I take it to be more a Fedex office deciding to do it, not Apple. The only time that Apple said they'd release early is the iPhone 4.
Horrible customer service to not make the new iPad available worldwide at the same time. The history with the iPad, iPad 2, iPhone 4, etc. is just repeating itself.
Here in Norway it is not even available for pre-ordering.
Lame!
This is one of the fastest worldwide roll outs in Apple history. Last year, it was several weeks after the US launch before anyone in Europe was able to order. The factories have only so much capacity.
If you hover over the little arrow next to "preparing for shipment," you'll find out. Don't worry, it is still on time and if you ordered it on Wednesday or Thursday, you'll still get it next Friday.
Mine is showing "picked up" in Nashville with overnight delivery ... however there is an entry under Details: "Future delivery requested" which makes me think it will be held at the destination for delivery on Friday Mar. 16 as shown as the delivery date.
My guess is that they pre-shipped large quantities of units from China to warehouses scattered around the country which are equipped with label printers. They then send the shipping label data to the label printer at the warehouse nearest to the purchaser's destination. The packages are then transported by normal FedEx transport to the final destination where they are held until the "big event" Friday when they will be delivered to your door (with signature).
This would be why my unit "originates" from Nashville ... that was where the actual label was printed and attached to a box to be sent to me.
Thus, they don't bog down the delivery/transport system ... and everyone gets their iPad on the same day.
My guess is that they pre-shipped large quantities of units from China to warehouses scattered around the country which are equipped with label printers. They then send the shipping label data to the label printer at the warehouse nearest to the purchaser's destination. The packages are then transported by normal FedEx transport to the final destination where they are held until the "big event" Friday when they will be delivered to your door (with signature).
This would be why my unit "originates" from Nashville ... that was where the actual label was printed and attached to a box to be sent to me.
Thus, they don't bog down the delivery/transport system ... and everyone gets their iPad on the same day.
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I ordered at 1:00pm. I think they sold out of the launch day batch around 10:30am yesterday. If only I wouldn't have debated between the wifi only or wifi+4g. Haha.
Mine is showing "picked up" in Nashville with overnight delivery ... however there is an entry under Details: "Future delivery requested" which makes me think it will be held at the destination for delivery on Friday Mar. 16 as shown as the delivery date.
My guess is that they pre-shipped large quantities of units from China to warehouses scattered around the country which are equipped with label printers. They then send the shipping label data to the label printer at the warehouse nearest to the purchaser's destination. The packages are then transported by normal FedEx transport to the final destination where they are held until the "big event" Friday when they will be delivered to your door (with signature).
This would be why my unit "originates" from Nashville ... that was where the actual label was printed and attached to a box to be sent to me.
Thus, they don't bog down the delivery/transport system ... and everyone gets their iPad on the same day.
That's what mine says too. I think they have improved their supply chain management. Don't forget Tim Cook is a supply chain guy and he knows how to work this - Not that he has been doing this for while. I might just get it before March 16th.