<p>Sooo my H just gave me an ipad. I do not have an iphone. My only apple experience personally is an nano. (My kids own itouches and iphones.)</p>
<p>I have small (13 inch) computer that I use at home and take on trips. Do I need an ipad? And if/so a wifi only or 3G wif?. He bought me a wifi only because we are planning to upgrade to better smart phones. Our thoughts are that when we travel, if we have smart phones, we will be covered. </p>
<p>Any suggestions/ideas? Should I keep my ipad?</p>
<p>I love my iPad and it is go great for travel. Email, music, watching movies, reading books, surfing the net…keeping up with CC…and it just slips in my bag.</p>
<p>My DH loves his iPad. I don’t know what kind he has, but he reads the newspaper (NYT and WSJ) on it every morning on the train to work and he watches tv on it at night.</p>
<p>On mine now…well it was DH but when he got the iPhone I stole it. Perfect for Internet while sitting on the couch, lots of fun apps. Our whole family loves words with friends which is basically online scrabble. Kindle app is great, great for reading news, etc. Great for travel, I no longer lug my laptop. We have wifi version. The 3G is more expensive and requires data plan. We have found there is wireless almost everywhere now.</p>
<p>I have a 3G iPad. I went back and forth, back and forth on whether to get a 3G. I changed my order twice. Finally, two people I trust both told me that they really wished they had bought the 3G model, so I went for it. I really like having the 3G. I pay for the $15 a month plan and that’s generally enough data for me. I get a message when I’m getting close to exceeding the data limit. I tend to use it in places like the doctor’s office waiting room and while I’m a passenger in a car. One night the power went out at our house and I was still able to access the internet with 3G. Know with the 3G you don’t have to sign up for a monthly plan. You can buy the data plan one month and then cancel it the next.</p>
<p>When I figured out how much we pay for wifi when we travel (seems like a lot of high end hotels now charge you for access and as well as most airports) I figured the extra $130 for the 3G would pay for itself within a year or so. I also have a smart phone. I don’t see them as 100% interchangeable. Nor is an iPad a substitute for a laptop. Different devices, different usability.</p>
<p>I have iPad II wifi version. I take it with me where ever I travel internationally. I don’t feel like I miss 3G. I have magazines on iPad, so I no longer need to buy a hard copy ( very green). I down load movies, pictures, and music to my iPad, so I am entertained on plane when I travel. </p>
<p>We are getting one for D2 for Xmas. She is the only one without an iPad now.</p>
<p>I have the 3G but have never activated it since I have an iPhone. DH uses his 3G al the time…his work is 24/7 and mine is not.
I looooove my iPad. Haven’t fired up my laptop in weeks.</p>
<p>I am on husbands…I got it for him for fathers day…yeah, right. Keep it!</p>
<p>You will love it. I’m with oldfort. No 3G. I have iPhone, so that covers me when I can’t get iPad wifi. I consider my iPad indispensable.</p>
<p>I’d love to have one. Can you use it (3G) as an iPhone?</p>
<p>I love mine!!! And I am not a techie and I hate cell phones. But you will find the iPad is great for checking ACT scores at 12:01 am and similar types of activities that parents with kids applying to college find themselves doing. Great for the college road trip, too. I have a wifi 3G but I only activated the 3G during the road trip so far. I think you’ll really like it.</p>
<p>Love my iPad II–wifi only. It’s very handy. I don’t have any need for the 3G option.
Hotels usually have free wifi when we travel. My home has a wireless router.</p>
<p>If I need 3G when I’m not around a wifi signal, I can use my iPhone 4.</p>
<p>I got one for my husbands birthday. No really…he went out and bought me one! Non more sharing his laptop!
I love it. No 3G…to expensive and unnecessary. Though i am looking forward to an iPhone . I do love apple product.!</p>
<p>Most campus have wifi now, even high school. D2 still has an iPhone with US phone service even though we live outside of US. She has been carrying it around at her high school, using wifi to get text messages from her US friends via wifi for free. More and more places have wifi for free, I don’t really miss 3G on iPad.</p>
<p>If you buy the iPad with 3G capability you do not need to buy a 3G plan until you need to use it. Then you can just buy a plan for a short time period. You do it right through the settings feature. It is very easy. You only pay for 3g when you need it. But if you don’t buy the iPad with 3G capability you cant upgrade later without buying a whole new ipad. </p>
<p>capability, you can’t</p>
<p>H of PMoS bought me an ipad a few months after they came out. I absolutely love mine. Most of my needed computer capability at my finger tips wherever I go. (I also have an iphone.) Now the reality is you dont really need an iphone and an ipad. When the iphone dies, I’ll likely go back to just a plain old functional cell phone, and upgrade to the then newest ipad. ;-)</p>
<p>IPad wifi owner here…we have not felt the need for 3G. In our experience, almost everywhere we travel there is FREE wifi someplace. </p>
<p>In addition to magazines, movies and the like…don’t forget books. I have both the Kindle and Nook apps on my IPad. It makes a very nice ereader in addition to all else it does. Larger screen than the Nook/Kindle. </p>
<p>You don’t NEED an IPad, but once you get to using it, you will likely love it.</p>
<p>Thanks all. ^^Of course I do not “need” one. But you all made it sound like it’s a good product to have. </p>
<p>Still not sure about the 3G. Travels have shown that US airports do not have free wifi. Recently stayed at a Hilton in Puerto Rico and had to pay for wifi. Also interesting that you can activate the 3G when you need it, ie-no contract.</p>
<p>But, as I stated in my original entry, if you have a smart phone, do you really need 3G?</p>
<p>I suppose if I have an ipad, I should certainly get an iphone instead of a droid when I upgrade my cell. Would you agree!?</p>
<p>Plan to buy H an ipad as well. Still not sure what to do. But from your comments, I am leaning towards no 3G.</p>
<p>I love my iPad, though I don’t have the 3G, I just use the wifi at home, at work or at hotels with internet service. I’ll often be at my work computer and run something else off the iPad. It resides in our family room most days and becomes sort of a “household computer” for us to use when we are watching TV, etc.</p>
<p>Since I have an iPhone, if I need connectivity, I can use that. For example, I got my hair cut / highlighted this weekend; I’ve been watching a certain movie that’s been cut up and put on YouTube, so I watched it on my iPhone. I would have appreciated the iPad with 3G then, but the iPhone was fine for my purposes.</p>
<p>We have a WiFi and a 3G though we bought the WiFi first. The 3G is really nice to have while traveling and I take it along to places where I will be sitting for a while where they don’t have WiFi. I took it recently to the eye doctor where I had to wait for ten minutes and it was useful for going through email and checking the news. It’s nice for car traveling too as you can zoom in and out to map the larger picture of your route. We have a GPS too but it shows far less detail than the iPad mapping application shows. We don’t have smartphones so the iPad is like a big smartphone when we’re on the road.</p>
<p>I like that you can turn the 3G on and off (paying for it that is).</p>
<p>The iPad 3G was an incredibly useful during the recent power outage. It was about the only way to get information about what was going on in our area.</p>