UK iPad 2 Launch Still on Schedule for Friday

[gszedlak]

Bristol

According to my local Apple Reseller, the iPad 2 will be going on sale at 5pm.
With me finishing work at 1pm on Fridays, this is perfect - hopefully not too much queuing!

Hey! I'm at Bristol too Are you going to the Cabot Circus Apple Store? How do you know they start at 17?

See you there!

 

[iKrl]

If everything on the UK web site is still correct as of now, when are they going to start taking "Pre-Orders" seeing as the launch is 4 days away?

I really don't think they'll have pre-oredrs, they didn't have them for the US so I wouldn't expect them to have them for other countries.

In Mexico some premium resellers will start selling the iPad 2 at the stroke of midnight of the 25th. Therefore I don't think they are bound to start selling them at a certain time, although (obviously) on the 25th.

 

[iZac]

MacBook Pro went back to pre-VAT increase prices (£999 instead of £1020), which makes the MacBook (not updated, still higher price) particularly unattractive at this point in time.

That was my thinking too. Plus the Pound / Euro is a little stronger against the Dollar than it was last April, which was why I was wondering about that nice perceptively low £399 price point.

 

[FranksWildYears]

Shame about the 5pm launch...My money will probably be going elsewhere if stock is gone by the time I finish work, but still, I really hope we don't see a 'first hour' sell out.

 

[johnnymg]

What does this mean for the US consumers who havent gotten their hands on one yet? Anything?

International sales => potentially fewer "straw buyers" in the US.

 

[Piggie]

I really don't think they'll have pre-oredrs, they didn't have them for the US so I wouldn't expect them to have them for other countries.

In Mexico some premium resellers will start selling the iPad 2 at the stroke of midnight of the 25th. Therefore I don't think they are bound to start selling them at a certain time, although (obviously) on the 25th.

Well it's specifically says "Pre-Orders" on Apple's UK Web site and they will email you when it is available for "Pre-Order"

Pre-Order means, being able to place an order BEFORE the official launch date of a product.

I know Apple have tried to change the meaning of what "multitasking" means. Do you think they will now try and change the meaning of the phrase "Pre-Order" also?

They have had weeks to remove this phrase if they don't mean it.

Read it for yourself: http://www.apple.com/uk/ipad/notify-me/

 

[dvoros]

iPad 2 and available date

They can post March 25th all they want. We placed orders for iPads before the March 11th available date and our ship dates have now been postponed twice.The latest says they will ship April 4th. Good luck everyone.

 

[Piggie]

Given the Amount of people here, who will probably be taking their iPad's back for exchange due to the backlighting issue's we all know about.

I'm surprised at the number of people that will be buying from Non official Apple stores, that won't give you the 14 day no quibble warranty that you get when buying direct from Apple, and the possibility of having to deal with "other" members of staff in these stores, when arguing that you are not happy and want it swapped for another one.

I don't envy this situation.

 

[Schizoid]

They can post March 25th all they want. We placed orders for iPads before the March 11th available date and our ship dates have now been postponed twice.The latest says they will ship April 4th. Good luck everyone.

Just overheard a conversation saying words to the effect of, "some (UK) stores already have them"

How many though is unclear...

 

[TJIrwin]

Lot of reports coming in from Resellers suggesting stock in the pipeline has been delayed - the 5pm timeline suggested earlier up the thread is probably more akin to reality.

http://www.pcr-online.biz/news/36000/UK-iPad-2-launch-delayed PCR (trade mag in the UK) are quoting sources suggesting some discontent in the Reseller community. They are usually slow to the story, but accurate in their reporting at least.

Remains to be seen...

 

[Taylorj3]

5pm

My sources say Apple Stores will close around 3pm and then re-open at 5pm and stay open later than normal to accommodate the sales. Looks like it will mirror the US sales strategy completely.

 

[Piggie]

My sources say Apple Stores will close around 3pm and then re-open at 5pm and stay open later than normal to accommodate the sales. Looks like it will mirror the US sales strategy completely.

Apart from the fact the Americans were actually told the price before hand.

 

[IanWaring]

5pm it is

Local iStore (Premium Reseller) in Basingstoke says 5pm Friday. Still debating on whether to queue there, or make a dash to one of the two Bristol stores - or even Southampton. Largely decided that the scrums around Covent Garden, Regent Street or Bluewater will be large and probably have people upfront buying multiple units... although it'd be nice to see a limit of 1/customer at a time.

 

[Taylorj3]

Apart from the fact the Americans were actually told the price before hand.

Good point, although it could point to a price drop on the basis they are waiting to see what the exchange rate is at launch.

£399 for the 16gb WIFI only will be far more attractive to £429...

 

[Piggie]

Good point, although it could point to a price drop on the basis they are waiting to see what the exchange rate is at launch.

£399 for the 16gb WIFI only will be far more attractive to £429...

I fully agree, £399 sound a LOT less than the rather messy price point of £429

 

[FlameofAnor]

Can't find them locally and it's a 4-5 week wait online, but its good to know they have enough for the overseas market.

I went to Target today and asked them if they would be getting new iPad 2's in anytime soon. The manager said they have had exactly SIX since the launch. Five on the opening day, and one since then. The local Best Buy has a full waiting list and no idea when they will be getting any new stock.

If you didn't order online early or lineup early the first day, you'll have a tough time finding a iPad 2 anytime soon.

 

[chercm]

man ! they should have added un Singapore at least one Asian country should be in

 

[ten-oak-druid]

All the ipad 2 lines should join up and do hands across america. Hands across europe too. But they could call it ipads across america.

Actually that would be pretty cool if there were another hands across america and everyone had a device that ran apps and took pictures. Everyone could download an app that takes pictures on each device in oder of geographic location along the route and immediately uploads the photo. The images could then be put together to make a movie that goes along the route.

 

[Superdelphinus]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_3 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/533.17.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/5.0.2 Mobile/8F190 Safari/6533.18.5)

How long does it usually take after launch until you can just walk in and buy one without having to hang around turtle necked bo ridden hmongonoids for hours?

 

[Reddmanz]

Wow, so annoyed that I get paid on the 31st...

 

[GoKyu]

How dare Apple share the allocation of iPads around the world. Don't they know that US consumers are so much better than everyone else. Why should they have to wait ?

+1

I'm in the US, and I was lucky enough to be in a short line for the first iPad - this time around, I didn't have the money for it at launch, and so I have to wait a month for it to come in.

No big deal, my iPad 1 will hold me for a lousy month until the new one comes in - let the UK get their iPads on time!

 

[Dr McKay]

Ok, which flange voted negative?

Probably an American who cant get hold of one

 

[Muscleflex]

i have just sold my ipad last week - so i have money... but i am holding out.
gonna go out and get me a nintendo 3DS instead this Friday!!!

 

[Foggy]

Am not overly keen on the 5pm concept. I also have to buy from an apple store as I have a whole wodge of apple gift cards people have bought me to go towards it. Looks like I'll be queueing in Kingston then.

 

[speedriff]

No Offense

No offense to my mates on the other side of the pond but this is total B.S. I stood in line for 4 hours only to have the guy two people in front of me get the last 64 gig iPad. I went home and ordered a 64 online...on launch day. Every day Apple ships units to stores and apparently if you don't work or work some other shift than days, you can get one. That is IF you don't mind camping out for 4 hours or so. Here is my beef: My unit doesn't even ship until April 1st. WTF is up with that? They can start and ship thousands to the U.K. and keep sending units to their stores but tough **** if you ordered online. Don't waste your time ordering an iPad online. You will wait longer than anyone else apparently.