9 to 5 Mac notes that Apple appears to have made a minor last-minute hardware change to the iPad, replacing what was previously described as a mute switch just above the volume rocker on the side of the device with a "screen rotation lock".

As reported, Apple has begun accepting pre-orders for the Apple iPad in the U.S. Apple Store. While U.S. customers can pre-order any of Apple's six iPad models (three Wi-Fi and three Wi-Fi + 3G) beginning today, only the Wi-Fi models will be ...

As information on the iPad continues to spill out from Apple in the wake of the launch of pre-orders in the U.S., more screenshots and feature information on iWork applications for the iPad have surfaced on Apple's site.  Announced alongside the iPad...

With today's launch of iPad pre-orders in the U.S., Apple has also released additional information about the device and associated services.  While 3G-capable models of the iPad will not be available until late April, Apple has provided an overview o...

Apple:

You can check your data usage in Settings on your iPad anytime. And iPad will even let you know when youÕre running out. YouÕll get three alerts as you near your 250MB limit Ñ at 20 percent, 10 percent, and zero. With each alert, you can choose to add more data or wait and do it later. Tap Now and iPad opens the Cellular Data Plan window so you can update your data plan.

The orientation lock should be useful for reading while lying down. (For those curious: I ordered a 32 GB Wi-Fi model, the case, and the dock.)

Need some 3G? Buy some 3G! Macrumors has some shots of the interface that will appear when you need to add data to your iPad data plan. You can either add 250MB for $14.99 or change to an unlimited plan for $26.99 a month. You can also cancel your plan right from the iPad, an fascinating concept.

From Apple’s website:

So if you have a business trip or vacation approaching, just sign up for the month you’ll be traveling and cancel when you get back. You don’t need to visit a store to get 3G service. You can sign up, check your data usage, manage your account, or cancel your service — all from your iPad.

Man. I don’t know if I want to get the 3G one now. Feh.

When Apple first introduced the iPad in late January, we noted with much disappointment that the device had no way to lock the screen orientation. This is apparently no longer the case, however—according to an updated iPad specs page, there is now a screen-rotation-lock switch on the right-hand side of the device, seemingly replacing the mute switch that was there when the media first played with it.

In January, Ars confirmed the lack of a screen-lock option with an Apple representative at the iPad event. At that time, the Apple rep reminded us that individual apps give users the option to lock the screen into portrait or landscape mode (which is already the case on a number of third-party iPhone apps), but that the iPad itself had no universal control like on the Kindle or Nook.

As a serial in-bed Kindle and iPhone user, this was disappointing to me and a number of other readers. There are few things on earth more annoying than trying to type on your iPhone at a strange angle and have the screen rotate four times before you're finished.

Apple apparently heard our cries. 9 to 5 Mac first pointed out the difference in specs this morning, which is now reflected on the official iPad spec page. Yep, that sure does say "screen rotation lock," and that option was definitely not there when Ars played with the iPad on January 27.

For those of you who forgot, today is iPad preorder day as well. You can now reserve one to be picked up in-store on April 3 (WiFi only) or you can preorder either the WiFi or 3G versions to be delivered to you. As usual, you can count on Ars to have a review up not long after the iPad launch!

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People may be able to buy their iPads today, but they won’t actually get their hands on the much-anticipated devices until early next month, and later if they opted for 3G connectivity. But Apple isn’t without a heart, so the company revealed some new specific details about the tablet on the iPad micro-site, according to MacWorld.

Included in the informational appetizer are details regarding the 3G data plans available for the device, the iBooks application and how it will work, a small hardware change that should make a pretty big difference, and a couple other eyebrow-raising late-game additions.

Data Control

The iPad benefits from having to deal with only two available data options at launch in the U.S. Because it knows exactly how much data you should have, it can provide much more useful usage information. You get access to an iPad Cellular Data Plan window on the 3G-enabled devices, from which you can modify, sign up for, or even cancel your AT&T data plan.

The iPad will let you know when you’ve got only 20 percent and 10 percent remaining of your 250MB if that’s what you’re working with, and when you’re completely out. From there, you can top off by adding more data, or even upgrade to the full unlimited plan at $30 a month. Sure beats sitting on hold waiting for an AT&T representative. There’s also evidence that you’ll be able to manage an international data plan from the screen in the future, but Apple hasn’t revealed any details regarding this yet.

iBooks

The actual iBooks app won’t be installed by default on shipping iPads, probably owing to the fact that it might not be available at all on international versions of the device, at least if the lack of a mention of the app on the iPad pages in other countries indicates anything. Instead, you’ll be able to download it from the App Store.

Good news for public domain fans: any free ePub format books you download from elsewhere can be synced to the iPad via iTunes and read on your device. And Kindle fans will appreciate the ability to highlight and look-up any word in any book, either on Wikipedia, the dictionary, or via web search, just by touching and holding.

Screen Orientation Lock

I absolutely hate using the iPhone while lying in bed for a lot of things because many times, a screen lock is a software feature and isn’t necessarily available for all applications. That means that it’ll constantly switch to landscape mode, despite that not being at all what I want it to do.

The iPad solves that problem via a hardware switch above the volume controls on the side of the device that locks the screen’s orientation into whatever mode it’s in currently.

Accessibility

More accessibility options have been added, including the ability to switch audio to mono and route it through just one headphone for users who may only have hearing in one ear. iBooks are also apparently covered by VoiceOver, so that users can have them read to them by Apple’s emotionless robot drones.

AVI Support

Perhaps the biggest little detail added in the iPad’s specifications is support for AVI videos, using the MotionJPEG format. Resolution for the files supported is 1280×720, which is HD, and PCM stereo audio is also part of the deal. Best of all, the data rates supported run up to 35Mbps, which is well beyond even the Apple TV’s standards. Looks like Apple has really big video plans for this capable little device. Wonder if this has anything to do with all of its recent talks with TV studios?

So now you’re more informed about that pre-order you’ve made or are thinking about making. And now I only feel more keenly the still-distant international ship date for the device. Thanks a ton, Apple.

Related GigaOM Pro Research:
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Now that the iPad is officially available for pre-order, the question that we want to know from our readers is: Will you pre-order? The Wi-Fi iPad will be available on April 3, 2010, and the Wi-Fi + 3G models will begin shipping at the end of April.

You can choose to either reserve a Wi-Fi model for in-store pickup on the third or opt to have it delivered to your house. If you pre-order the Wi-Fi + 3G model, it will ship directly to you once it comes out.

So, to pre-order or not to pre-order — take our poll and then let us know why you are (or are not pre-ordering) in the comments!

Apple wouldn’t be Apple if it didn’t offer some totally hot, yet totally over-priced accessories to accompany a new product launch. If you pre-order an iPad for home delivery, you can add some accessories to your order. These include a dock (with and without keyboard, a protective case/stand, an extra power adapter and a VGA connector. Are you adding any of these items to you pre-order? Let us know!

Tags: apple, ipad, ipad pre-order

Wait! Stop. Before you hand over Apple your credit card and pre-order the iPad, you may want to check out the other touchscreen options available now and in the near future. The iPad isn’t the only game in town. Sure, it might have a fancy-pants interface, but each of the follow seven tablets win the hardware fight, which is just as important to a lot of consumers.

Of course the hardware only tells part of the story. The iPad has a leg up on all of these options because of the user-friendly iPhone interface, but it’s not like you’re dropping $600+ on a tablet for your parents, right?

Currently available

ModBook

The ModBook is the original Apple Tablet — besides the Newton of course. Except it’s not made by Apple proper, but rather Axiotron who has been making them since 2007. Prices start out at $899, but customers have to provide a pre-polycarbonate unibody Macbook making the total price closer to $2,000.

Advantages over the iPad

• Full OS X
• Multitasking
• Flash support
• Built-in camera
• Built-in optical drive
• 13.3-inch screen
• 120GB hard drive
• Windows compatibility

Disadvantages

• No 3G modem
• No multitouch
• No access to the App Store

Viliv X70

Viliv came out of nowhere last year — South Korea actually — and introduced a round of sleek portables with the X70 heading up the tablets. This widescreen 7-inch tablet has nearly every piece of hardware missing from the iPad. Prices start out at $597.

Advantages over the iPad

• Windows
• Flash support
• Multitasking
• Unlocked 3G GSM modem
• GPS
• SD card slot
• Camera
• USB slot
• Haptic-feedback touchscreen
• Video out
• 128GB SSD

Disadvantages

• No multitouch
• No access to the App Store
• Only a 7-inch screen

Archos 9 PC tablet

Archos has been a major player in the MID market since it started. The Archos 9 PC Tablet is the company’s largest slate device to date. It also proves that Apple isn’t the only one to out beautiful looking devices. Prices start out at $549.

Advantages over the iPad

• Windows 7
• Flash Support
• Multitasking
• Two USB slots
• SD Card slot
• Webcam
• A kick stand
• Optical trackpad nub

Disadvantages

• No multitouch
• No access to the App Store

Upcoming

Viliv S10 Blade

The S10 Blade is Viliv’s first product of 2010, and it’s a looker. It has a 10-inch multitouch touchscreen in a convertible notebook setup that’s not much thicker than the iPad. The Viliv S10 is shipping soon at a starting price of $699. (We just got our review sample yesterday so look out for a hands-on shortly)

Advantages over the iPad

• Windows 7
• Multitasking
• Flash support
• Unlocked 3G modem
• Webcam
• 2 USB ports
• SD card slot
• Video out

Disadvantages

• No access to the App Store

Notion Ink Adam

News about the Notion Ink tablet broke late last year and many chalked it up to a fanboy dream. But it’s real and supposed to be coming this spring.

Advantages

• Android
• Multitasking
• Nvidia Tegra 2 platform
• 10-inch Dual-mode display (full color to ePaper)
• Rear-facing trackpad
• USB and HDMI ports
• Unlocked 3G modem

Tie

• Android Market to Apple’s App Store
• Multitouch

HP Slate

We joked that CES 2010 would be full of tablet computers. It wasn’t and only a few major players like HP and Dell showed off prototypes. Both take a totally different approach too as the HP Slate (the unofficial name, btw) opts for a Windows with full flash support. It should hit the market this year at a rumored price of between $500-$600.

Advantages

• Windows 7
• Multitasking
• Flash support
• Camera
• USB ports

Disadvantages

• No access to the App Store
• No 3G modem (at least not yet)

Dell Streak

While HP decided to go with Windows, the 5-inch Dell Streak uses Android. The 5-inch Streak is clearly meant for a different market than the 9.7-inch iPad, but it’s also possible that we’ll see a larger version sometime soon, too. At least we hope we do.

Advantages

• Android
• Multitasking
• Front and rear facing cameras
• USB ports
• Dual microSD slots
• Rumored unlocked 3G modem

Tie

• Android Market for the App Store
• Neither support Flash

Disadvantages

• Smaller screen
• No 3G modem

I’m a sucker. It’s true. As much you guys think we rail against Apple, we’re like abused puppies, slinking back to our master’s hard ankles, shivering and awaiting praise. Why did I pre-order the iPad? Well, first I’m a gadget blogger. Second there is no certainty that mother Apple will grace us with an early review unit so I want to hedge our bets. Third? I want to see where computing is headed.

Bear with me here. Apple is not the bringer of fire to a benighted world. Far from it. In my recent writing I’ve been struck by a few parallels with Steve Jobs to Abraham Louis Breguet, a French watchmaker who lived in the 18th century. He was a mechanical genius, to be sure, but he was also a salesman. While the rest of the benighted world was sloshing around in an admixture of feces and mud in the streets of Paris and telling the time by whether the pikemen were stabbing them for being out after curfew, Breguet was selling watches that would not be out of place on the wrist (had they had straps) of a whale in Las Vegas. He invented secret anti-counterfeiting measures but made them part of the allure and not part of a DRM scheme. He designed elegant and beautiful watches in an age of rococo designs but wasn’t above creating a “subscription” watch for the masses who wanted to own a piece of the good life without paying an exorbitant sum of money. Other watchmakers were making commodities and following Breguet’s lead. That’s what’s happening here.

Like Steve Jobs, Breguet knew what his hipster, nobler-than-thou audience wanted and he supplied it. Sure it was expensive and sure it wasn’t generally popular but he made a boatload of money and in the end moved on to explore new avenues of inquiry, improve the general perception of scientific precision, create new forms of telegraphy, and his kids even became pioneers in airplane design. Linux and Windows geeks often put Apple down for locking things up but I say I can do more in the OS X command line terminal than I ever was able to in the Windows DOS window. I usually installed Unix tools under XP just to get any work done when I ran Windows.

Look at the watch above. It was one of the most complex watches in the world when it was made. It came with two dials – the crystal one you see and a while enameled on that hid the innards. If you put the white enamel dial on that watch, you’d have four visible hands. That’s it. It was as austere and beguiling as an early iPod. You saw it, you knew what it did, but there was nothing to get in the way of reading the time or, the the case of the iPod, playing your bluegrass albums. Behind it – complexity – in front – elegance.

I’m also not saying the iPad is the Marie Antoinette Watch of our day. It’s definitely not. I would wager that our current business climate does not allow for the sort of advances in the state of the art that the MA represents. Sure, there are better watches right now, but the MA was finished in 1827 using tools little removed from what was available in the previous three centuries and by 1900 watchmaking was a dead art and is now, at best, relegated to shoe repair bodegas that also specialize in watch battery replacement. The MA wasn’t just a watch, it was that generation’s mechanical moonshot and the ultimate steampunk artifact. Nothing Apple has done is worth that level of praise.

Also nothing – and I mean nothing – about the iPad is particularly new or particularly appealing to the geek in me. It’s a slate that I’ve seen countless times running an OS that is underpowered at best with a trade dress that we’ve seen a thousand times. But the whole is great than the sum of its parts. Apple is about to change how I browse the Internet in the bathroom, on the couch, and on the train. I bought a WiFi enabled model because I figure I’ll have WiFi more often than I’ll have 3G coverage with AT&T (HAR!).

So anyway, flame on, flame warriors. I’m sticking by my decision. Did you pre-order?

Apple (AAPL) just re-opened its online store and is now taking pre-orders for the iPad, which will be delivered on April 5.

Go! Go! Go!

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See Also:

• Why Isn't The iPad Shipping With A Calculator App? Steve Jobs Didn't Like The Way It Looked
• New Proof That Expensive iPhone Apps Can Sell Like Crazy
• The iPod Touch Is Now Available For Just $51!

This is just a friendly reminder that Apple is now accepting orders for its non-multitasking,Êclosed OS-equipped,Ênon-SD card slot-sporting,Êoverpriced,Êsorry attempt at a tablet. You know it as the iPad. (you can’t flame the truth)

Finally, the day is here. Well, one of the days is here, as you won’t be taking home an iPad today, but you can get in line and preorder one starting at 8:30AM ET this morning. Need something to keep you occupied until it arrives by courier? We highly suggest leaving grandma’s basement and finding a job (editing battlestarwiki.org doesn’t count).You only have 22 days to come up with at least $499 before applicable taxes and it’s highly unlikely she’ll be willing to give you her tax credit just so you can mess around with the Star Trek Communicator app on a 9.7″ display. Tick-tock on the clock, fellas. Let us know if you preorder one and which one you grabbed — Wi-Fi or 3G!

Read

Kelli B. Grant / SmartMoney:
Should You Pre-Order an iPad?  —  OWNING A CUTTING-EDGE gadget has a certain cool factor, but early adopters rarely get a great deal.  Some observers say Apple's (AAPL) new iPad, available to pre-order Friday for an April 3 release, isn't likely to be an exception — though there will probably …

I wonder why?

Update: The Apple Store is back up, and yes, you can now pre-order the iPad. We haven’t seen any other significant changes in the Store.

It’s finally here; the moment where the iPad actually comes into some sort of contact with the market. As we announced before, iPad pre-orders begin at 5:30 a.m. PT (in about 1:30 hours), and the Apple Store is currently down, indicating that pre-order forms will be available when it comes back up (and possibly something more — you never know.)

Of course, users won’t actually be able to fondle the device until April 3, but (besides giving fans and enthusiasts a chance to be one of the first people to own an iPad), this moment is exciting because from now on, Apple (and, hopefully, the media) will have some idea how well this thing actually sells.

Although the iPad has created an enormous hype, one mustn’t forget that the jury is still out on whether it’ll be a huge success or a complete flop. It’s not only a new device, it’s a new type of device, and we’re eager to see what kind of ripples it’ll do to the IT market.

Tags: apple, ipad

Apple fanatics will be able to place their iPad orders at 5:30 a.m. PST (8:30 EST) tomorrow, Friday, March 12. The pre-orders will be available through Apple.com, and are expected to ship in the United States next month Ñ April 3 to be precise.

The Unofficial Apple Weblog learned about the pre-order time after it asked Apple for the information in an e-mail.

Let’s assume you’re the sort of person who wants an iPad; if so, you can still wait for the launch date and pick up an iPad at your local Apple store (or at Best Buy a little bit after launch). However, there’s a possibility that it will sell out and you’ll be left hanging. If this scenario worries you, you’ll want to place your order online to be sure you get one before your friends and colleagues. You know, if you’re into that kind of one-upmanship.

But if you’re the sort of person who thinks the device is more hype than substance, you can go ahead and sleep in tomorrow.

Are you going to be up bright and early for the iPad pre-order? Let us know in the comments.

Tags: apple, Apple Tablet, ipad

Continuing with a very source agnostic digital book strategy, Barnes & Noble has announced it will soon be offering an e-reader app for the Apple iPad.

The app will be designed specifically for the iPad’s tablet form factor, and will join B&N’s existing e-reader app family already available for Mac, PC, iPhone , iPod touch, and BlackBerry.

In other words, although the company is selling its own Nook e-reader device, it doesn’t want to lock potential book customers into a single platform or device. The company says that the goal is “providing consumers any book, anytime, anywhere.”

Like the other existing apps, the iPad app will give users access to the Barnes & Noble e-bookstore with more than one million e-books, magazines and newspapers, plus access of course to its existing digital library. The company expects to officially launch the app around the same time the iPad will be available, which should be April 3 if the existing rumor has any truth to it.

As publishers continue to flock to the iPad, what’s your current take on the e-reader versus tablet war that’s brewing? Can the two form factors coexist, or will tablets like the iPad steal the thunder from e-readers?

Tags: barnes & noble, e-readers, ipad