Apple began taking orders for its redesigned thin-and-light iPad Air in the United States, Canada, and Europe at midnight Pacific Time, after the tablet launched earlier today in several Asia Pacific countries. Supply of the iPad Air has been plentiful, with multiple worldwide stores still listing shipping times of 24 hours.
The iPad Air, available in space gray/black and white/silver can be purchased directly from Apple via the Apple Online Store and through the Apple Store iOS App. [Direct Link] The Apple Store app is often the most reliable way to place an order, as it circumvents web traffic. For the first time ever, Apple is accepting Personal Pickup requests in the U.S., allowing customers to reserve an iPad Air online for pickup at a local retail location.
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Initial orders from the Apple Online Store will ship within 24 hours for all colors, carriers, and capacities in Canada and Europe. U.S. online orders list a delivery date of 11/4 rather than a shipping estimate.
In the United States, Apple is selling the 16 GB Wi-Fi only iPad for $499, with incremental storage updates available for an extra $100 and Wi-Fi + Cellular models available for an additional $130. T-Mobile is offering the 16 GB iPad Air for $0 down and 24 monthly payments of $26.25 (additional storage requires a downpayment of $99 for 32 GB or $199 for 64 GB).
Walmart is selling the iPad Air at $479, a discount of $20, and Best Buy will be price matching Walmart's $479 price tag. Target may also be offering the entry-level 16 GB version for $479.
European countries seeing the launch of the iPad Air today include Austria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macedonia, Montenegro, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK. Apple's retail stores located in some of those countries will open at 8:00 AM local time to begin selling the device.
In the United States, the iPad Air can be purchased from the following retailers:
Apple:
Apple Online Store
Apple Store iOS App [Direct Link]
Carriers:
AT&T
Verizon
Sprint
T-Mobile
Third-Party Retailers:
Walmart
Target
Best Buy
RadioShack (In-Store Only)
Top Rated Comments
The only caveat is that if you buy from Sprint, those MIGHT be locked given Sprint's really restrictive policies. And buying an iPad from a GSM carrier MIGHT mean that there's no CDMA enabled. Time will tell on this though, once people get their hands on them and start swapping SIMs around.
Also, if you're buying from the Apple store at least, then you ARE buying at full device price. There are no contracts offered for iPads. This might be different though if you buy from the carrier itself.
If you want to be absolutely sure you have an unlocked iPad, get a Verizon model. Per the deal they made with the FCC for LTE spectrum, all their LTE devices have to be unlocked.
One last thing: it looks like according to Apple's LTE page for iPads (http://www.apple.com/ipad/LTE/), there's only one iPad Air model number for basically, all carriers everywhere. So this hopefully means that they crammed all the electronics they ended to cover all the bands and networks into a single model this time around.
The stores aren't open yet. Go back to sleep. :)
You guys married the wrong woman....I told my wife I ordered it and she said "when do I get my Retina Mini?" I knew she was the right woman when I told her I was getting a new TV and she asked what size screen....after I answered, she said "get a bigger one"....beauty and brains (her, not me)
Now, I'll have to eat Kraft Dinner for a few weeks.
Any chance your wife might have a sister that is single? :)