Hello! Consider me a 'lurker' until the holidays!

[w1ngman]

Hi! My name is Dave, and I anticipate I will be a lurker for the better part of the next two months. As much as I'd love to pull the trigger and purchase my :ipad-front: [today!!!!!!!]...I'm trying to be fiscally responsible ...and waiting for a couple months until I've: 1) Saved enough $$$, and 2) Built up more Best Buy 'Rewards' dollars . So I suspect I'll see a new iPad in my hands before Christmas (gotta have it in time to play with it Christmas morning...and make visiting family members jealous ).

Until then...I'm enjoying the many posts and learning where I can. FWIW, I've visited your FB page and bumped some 'Like' love there too . Seems to be a good community of respectful owners & enthusiasts alike. I'll look forward to adding my own experiences and advice as the community grows...and my own experiences mature with my iPad.

Oh, and if its of any interest...my own interests in the iPad are as follows (in no particular order...because I want 'em all! ):

- eReader (especially looking forward to daily newspapers, periodicals and ebooks)
- movies (I love portable gadgets for watching movies!)
- music (I have nearly 100GB of music...gotta figure out how to shoehorn that into a small storage device [ahem :ipad-front:] )
- web surfing (soo much to read; so little time!)

Although I'm not sure which 'size' I'll settle for, I strongly suspect I'll opt to get the 3G version...although I don't anticipate activating it immediately.

Best Regards,
Dave 'w1ngman' Parker

 

[iPadCharlie]

Greetings and welcome to the forum!

Until you get your iPad, you might want to download a copy of the iPad User Guide. It is available as a free PDF download from the Apple website --
Apple - Support - Manuals

This can (and should!) be saved on your computer and your iPad.

The answers to many questions, especially if this is your first Apple mobile "iDevice", can be answered by spending some quality time with this handy document.

I am in the same boat with my music and videos. I have nearly 500gb of Three Stooges shorts. I knew that 1tb hard drive would come in handy!

 

[w1ngman]

Thanks, I'll download that now. Yeah, on my PC I'm starting a 'grocery list' of apps/sites/accessories I'll want to add to my iPad. Along with mining the 'Active Posts'...I'm juggling time with the FAQ threads on this site as well -- between the two, I should amass a fairly deliberate list of 'must-haves' for my :ipad-front: .

Some of those threads will undoubtedly help me tackle my one underlying anxiety about this purchase (identifiying apps/means to juggle files between my PC/externalHD and the iPad). If and when I discover there is a 'golden bullet' that makes off-file management easy, that will likely help me decide just which sized (storage) iPad I'll purchase. By your sig/image I can't help but notice you seem to be managing fine with the 16GB wifi...no 'buyers remorse' there?

Thanks,
Dave

 

[iPadCharlie]

No remorse!

My iPad is not my primary storage device for my music or videos. Like you, my primary reason for getting an iPad is for reading and books actually take up very little space. My personal recommendation, get the free Kindle app and set up an account at Amazon. The Kindle app is a so-so reading app, but you can't beat the selection at Amazon.

I do use my iPad for some light "couch surfing" or while I am in the "throne room" (OK, that's probably more than you wanted to know!), but other than that, I don't use it too much at home.

If I didn't already have an iPod Touch (essentially an iPhone size iPad), I would probably have my iPad hooked to the HiFi in the "man cave" to listen to streaming audio. I don't even use the tuner any more since I can stream my local HD radio stations (and stations from other places) over my system. There are also other streaming audio sources out the like Pandora (my personal favorite) and Last.FM.