So having made up my mind, I'm tempted to go wait in the cold tonight/tomorrow morning (4AM should legitimately still be called tonight), but I've got a phone interview for grad school later that day.
Sadly, it's unlikely they'll have stock on Saturday (it's possible they get a shipment in Friday, but I wouldn't bet on it), so I'm SOL until next Tuesday at the earliest.
Yes, perhaps, as a (hopefully) soon to be grad student, I should save my money and use it for, say, gas or textbooks. But having patiently avoided buying the original iPad, I figure it's finally time to give in to temptation. (I'm not someone who makes Pro/Con lists for any purchase; when I started making one in the run-up to launch day that was when I knew I'd buy the thing)
Having read some of the other posts, it's tempting to continue to wait and decide that the "ooh, shiny" feeling will eventually wear itself out. That said, I've really missed out on being able to use apps like Zite and Flipboard. As a Pol Sci major with an obsession for knowledge, I spend more time each day reading the news on my desktop or iPhone than the average American does watching TV. For that reason alone it's a solid buy.
Secondly, I do not want to spend $1200 on a big TV. I'm perfectly content to watch movies & TV on a small screen, and the iPad is a nice compromise. (Any thoughts/comments on this use case would be welcomed)
Finally, there are just certain apps that, while they run on my iPhone, the iPad version is just a totally different experience. For an amateur astronomer, the addition of the gyro means the iPad version of Star Walk will work beautifully. Same thing with chess, Shredder/Scrabble works on my iPhone, but an iPad actually feels like playing on a board. Similarly, GoodReader is available for my iPhone but it just doesn't have the screen size for me to make any serious headway through a 50 page journal article (short PDFs are okay for my G2 Kindle, but it's a hassle to convert them, to say the least).
So yes, while it's a "Want" rather than a "need" item, the "ooh, shiny" actually has some solid use cases behind it.
I'd really appreciate feedback from current iPad owners (I'm already set on 3G (did I mention I like to read the news all the time) 64 GB (I'd really like to be able to keep the shows and movies I like without having to decide in advance if I want the Dark Knight or Annie Hall/The West Wing or Northern Exposure).
Like I said, feel free to destroy this argument; it'll save me some money if you do.
Sadly, it's unlikely they'll have stock on Saturday (it's possible they get a shipment in Friday, but I wouldn't bet on it), so I'm SOL until next Tuesday at the earliest.
Yes, perhaps, as a (hopefully) soon to be grad student, I should save my money and use it for, say, gas or textbooks. But having patiently avoided buying the original iPad, I figure it's finally time to give in to temptation. (I'm not someone who makes Pro/Con lists for any purchase; when I started making one in the run-up to launch day that was when I knew I'd buy the thing)
Having read some of the other posts, it's tempting to continue to wait and decide that the "ooh, shiny" feeling will eventually wear itself out. That said, I've really missed out on being able to use apps like Zite and Flipboard. As a Pol Sci major with an obsession for knowledge, I spend more time each day reading the news on my desktop or iPhone than the average American does watching TV. For that reason alone it's a solid buy.
Secondly, I do not want to spend $1200 on a big TV. I'm perfectly content to watch movies & TV on a small screen, and the iPad is a nice compromise. (Any thoughts/comments on this use case would be welcomed)
Finally, there are just certain apps that, while they run on my iPhone, the iPad version is just a totally different experience. For an amateur astronomer, the addition of the gyro means the iPad version of Star Walk will work beautifully. Same thing with chess, Shredder/Scrabble works on my iPhone, but an iPad actually feels like playing on a board. Similarly, GoodReader is available for my iPhone but it just doesn't have the screen size for me to make any serious headway through a 50 page journal article (short PDFs are okay for my G2 Kindle, but it's a hassle to convert them, to say the least).
So yes, while it's a "Want" rather than a "need" item, the "ooh, shiny" actually has some solid use cases behind it.
I'd really appreciate feedback from current iPad owners (I'm already set on 3G (did I mention I like to read the news all the time) 64 GB (I'd really like to be able to keep the shows and movies I like without having to decide in advance if I want the Dark Knight or Annie Hall/The West Wing or Northern Exposure).
Like I said, feel free to destroy this argument; it'll save me some money if you do.