PCWorld: First-look Review – iPad 3G Tablet
A review originally published at MacWorld magazine, mostly laudatory, detailing the differences, physical and in terms of functionality, between the Wi-Fi iPad released in April and the new Wi-Fi-plus-3G models.
“At last, the prophecy has been fulfilled: the second half of the coming of the iPad is upon us. I have in my hands (well, on my ottoman as I write this), an iPad Wi-Fi + 3G, which is Apple’s somewhat long-winded moniker for describing an iPad with cellular data access on AT&T’s network (here in the U.S. anyway). Having used a Wi-Fi-only iPad for almost a month, I can safely say that the $130 option for adding 3G is a big deal. But, in terms of how different this new, strange iPad is from the models we’ve already seen, let’s give it a rundown.
Judging a pad by its cover Outwardly, the 3G-enabled iPad looks mostly the same as its Wi-Fi-only sibling: all of the controls are in the same place, the screen is identical, and so on. The 3G model is a tenth of a pound heavier than the Wi-Fi model, but in my very scientific “hold-one-in-each-hand” test, I was unable to detect the difference.”