Sorry, I don't do impressions, but I'll tell you what I think of it.

Size - Very nice and light.

Screen - very sharp! Much easier for me to read it than my iPhone..but that's to be expected. I haven't seen or experienced any Some Reports of Backlight Bleeding on iPad 2. Perhaps I got a good screen manufacturer?

Camera - Just took 2 pictures, both indoors with 2 overhead recessed lights with 45W bulbs in each. You tell me...but I don't particularly care for the quality.

Front camera:
Click for large view

back camera:
Click for large view

Speed - I can't compare to the original iPad, but dang, it's fast! Faster than my 3Gs iPhone.

Mail app - I really like how it handles the mail. Much more easier and better than the iPhone one, probably due to the size of the screen to allow more options?

Safari app - Again, I like how this handles multiple windows over the iPhone version, and I'm sure it's due to the screen size.

iBooks - Of course I figured I would like this. MUCH better than the Kindle!! I was so tired of clicking on the navigation buttons just to turn a page. And what's cool is that my Kindle books synced up with the iPad Kindle app and it acts just like iBooks for the most part! So with the iPad, you get the best of both worlds - Apple & Amazon books!

Pages - Pretty neat, haven't really played around with it much.

We bought one game RealRacingHD, and wow...it's very cool. We'll try more later once we figure out which ones are good.

Nightstand app - got this based on Leicaman's suggestion and I like it. But since I didn't get the dock (again, based on Leicaman's suggestion), not sure how many times we'll use this.

Planets app - wow..MUCH better on the iPad! And we got it just in time...one of Dusty's Science project is a paper on Saturn.

CNN app - I like this one! Very well done.

What I would like to do is find a good news source that gives local news too so that we can drop our local paper. Also, the comics...gotta read my daily comics! Any ideas?

Thinking of getting Garageband & iMovie. I don't do keynote things right now, so no need for that.

iPhone apps on the iPad - (Facebook, etc) - why don't they make these for the iPad? Blowing them up 2x is a bit on the ugly side.


Periphials - all I got was the hdmi connector just in case. I also picked up the gray Smart Cover. It's pretty cool.


We have the original AppleTV, so I can't do airplay and I don't have a compatible airprint printer. How can I set that up? I thought I saw a thread on it, but can't seem to find it.

AS far as the camera quality.. that's almost to be expected from a camera of that quality. They just don't do low light very well. Take a pic in strong lighting and it's a completely different story....
At least that is my experience with the iP4 camera... which must be a close cousin if not identical twins.

Yeah, the cameras are pretty crappy for pics. (Same ones used on my iPod Touch 4G …bright light is your friend!) They are perfectly good for video though.

Does your paper have a twitter feed for their stories? You can use Flipboard (Free) for a kick-ass news reader. It also works with google reader if you have an account (for RSS feeds) Oh, and it works with Facebook too. I use it most of the time for FB.

I bounce between Flipboard and Reeder (Awesome RSS/Google Reader App) for my news.

THanks for the review, John.

Yeah, I don't get why Apple installed such crappy cameras, when the competition has better ones. Oh well must be part of Apples upgrade path, you know iPad3 will have 5 mega pix cameras The back camera shoots 720 p HD, I guess thats in video mode only ? ?

Well, you are probably right but you know what? I am fine with it. The iPad 2 serves my needs just fine. I could wait around and get 500GB HD, super hi res monitor, 6 core processor, and 8GB ram.....OR....I could get one now and enjoy what I have

The iPad 2 serves my needs just fine.

Thats all that matters John - enjoy.

Hey, try and see what the HD video, is about ?

[quote=carp
Hey, try and see what the HD video, is about ?[/quote]

What do you mean? 720p is HD

I mean the back camera is supposed to shoot in 720, video - still shots are -via- the 1 pix camera mode.

See if the HD comes out in the video - compare that to the still shots you just took?

WHO is that unMasked man !??

My iPad doesn't have any cameras, and I couldn't really be happier with it. It's become my daily computer. Poor iMac goes days without being touched.