Hasta La Gadget!

In appearance, the iPad is little more than a 9.7-inch, 1,024 by 768 pixel touchscreen with a few control buttons along the edges and a home button at the bottom. In other words, a giant iPod Touch.

But sometimes size does make a difference, and our first look at the iPad suggests that its modest features might add up to more than the sum of its parts.

Let’s put that to the test. We’ve got several iPads here at Wired now, and we’ll be testing them today and reporting back to you in real time.

What do you want to know about the iPad? Ask your questions in the comments here, or send them via Twitter to @gadgetlab, and we’ll do our best to update this page with the answers.

@free_dob: Is there already a support for Flash video or is it still native QuickTime?

The iPad has no support for Flash, and we get the notion that most people care about how this affects streaming video. Fortunately a number of Flash-based video websites, such as YouTube, have been rewritten with HTML5, which is supported on the iPad. And some video websites, such as Netflix, have created iPad apps. Even so, without Flash we’ll still be missing out on a chunk of the internet — sites that haven’t rewritten their video playback with HTML 5 or created iPad apps — and we’ll just have to wait and see how many websites hop into the “iPad-ready” boat.

@talkhalakath: Can you put the Android OS on the iPad? I’d buy one then.

No. The iPad is a closed, proprietary device that is limited to running Apple’s iPhone OS. If you’re hoping for a more open system, the most you can do is jailbreak the iPad. Supposedly hackers will be pushing out jailbreak solutions for the iPad soon.

@gotha52k: Are any available?

New pre-orders are shipping “by April 12,” according to Apple’s website, so it looks like the current batch of units reserved for pre-orders is sold out. Those who reserved iPads a few weeks in advance are able to pick it up between 9 a.m. and 3 p.m. today. Any reserved iPads not retrieved are up for grabs at Apple stores. Plenty of people were able to get iPads without a reservation earlier today, but by now we’d say the chances of getting one today without a pre-order or a reservation are pretty slim.

@gotha52k: Is it really worth $500?

Considering it’s basically a computer, $500 is a pretty good price. We would recommend you try it in a store before committing to purchasing one, however. Also, we generally recommend against the $500 16-GB Wi-Fi model, because it’ll get filled up pretty fast. iPad apps, music and movies will fill up a 16-GB model pretty fast, so we’d push for the 32-GB model. See our buyer’s guide to choose the right iPad for you.

As with most tech products, prices will come down after it’s been out for awhile. In a year, it will probably cost less. At $300, the iPad would be an excellent deal.

@jeperkin: What is the main or best use of the iPad? Why would I buy one? (No, I’m not being cynical – so far I just don’t “get it”)

Nobody needs an iPad. It’s a brand new category for a casual, lifestyle computer. In its current state, the iPad is going to be the computer you use to veg out on your couch: It’s best use is consuming media (watching movies, browsing the web, listening to music, etc.). Just like with the iPhone, however, what will make the iPad more interesting are the apps made by third-party developers. Imagine the iPad replacing textbooks for students, or X-Ray charts for hospitals, or real-time 3D modeling for architects. We’d say, you don’t have to buy one today, but keep your mind open, because it may be something you really want later.

@oneofthejoshs: Battery life. How long does it really last for video, Wi-Fi, music etc?

We just got our hands on iPads a few hours ago, so we haven’t had time to do thorough battery testing. However, early reviews of the iPad say it gets up to 12 hours of battery life playing video, which is far longer than most laptops.

@SamuelCouch: Unlike the iPhone, does the iPad allow you to use a stylus?

Both the iPhone and the iPad actually are usable with a stylus. Theoir capacitive touchscreen does detect input from styluses. Apple doesn’t ship iPad or iPhone styluses, but third-party companies do.

@superbarker:  Is there any native way to print (from Pages, or any other for those matters)?

No. Apple has not created a native, systemwide printing freature for the iPad. Currently what you can do is use iWork to export to File Sharing, or e-mail the document to yourself, and then launch the file on a Mac or Windows PC and print from there. We’re betting third-party developers will be quick to deliver a more streamlined printing solution, however.

@FrostyBlonde2u: WHO will one have to sign up to in order to go online? If it’s AT&T, gag me with a spoon, they suck!

The iPad 3G, which is releasing late April, is an unlocked device. However, the iPad only supports MicroSIM cards, and AT&T is the only U.S. provider using MicroSIM cards. So for right now, you’re stuck with AT&T for 3G service on the iPad. You can, of course, still go online using a Wi-Fi network.

@BikerMike: Does it have a microphone?

Yes. But keep in mind the iPad does not ship with a native phone app or voice recorder, so you’ll have to download third-party apps that make use of the microphone.

@buttonsarentoys: I wanna know if you can use it portably as a hard drive from a dongle…specifically, can I connect a CF card & unload RAW images?

Apple does sell a dongle to connect an SD card reader to the iPad. It doesn’t appear they sell a CF card reader, but third-party companies will likely come out with a universal card reader if Apple doesn’t first.

@TeresaKopec: Dumb question: how is the audio without headphones on the iPad? Wondering about sharing video etc. with kids in the car.

Not a dumb question at all! The audio without headphones, when cranked to max volume, is pretty loud, provided there’s not a lot of background noise. In the office here, it’s plenty loud enough for several people to hear while watching a movie together. But with background noise, it gets harder to hear. It might be a challenge to use in the car, unless your ride is very smoooooth.

@talk19: Can you stream photos over the network to the iPad or must all pictures be stored locally?

No, not natively, if you’re talking about iPhoto. Your iPad can only display photos synced to the device, meaning you can’t pull images from your iPhoto photo library over Wi-Fi. You can, however, handle photos using cloud services such as Evernote or Dropbox.

@skaltnerd: How far will the iPad fall before it shatters? #evilgrin #Blackberry #FTW

Hah! If the demand is great enough, we might consider performing a “stress test” on the iPad. But the iPad sports a scratch-resilient screen similar to the iPhone’s. So unless you’re a complete clutz, we doubt you’ll break this gadget easily.

@pielak: can i connect my stereo bluetooth earphones, hear music and navigate through the internet?

We don’t have a set of stereo Bluetooth headphones handy, so we can’t test this out for you. However, Apple says that the iPad supports Bluetooth 2.1 + EDR, so your stereo Bluetooth devices should work just fine. Incidentally, you can also use Apple’s Bluetooth keyboard with the iPad — you don’t have to wait for the Bluetooth iPad dock accessory that will be coming out later.

@buttonsarentoys: I know about the dongle, but can you use it to unload files the iPad won’t recognize (i.e., can you use the iPad as a harddrive?)

The camera dongle accessories — which let you connect a camera or an SD card to the iPad’s dock connector for uploading photos — aren’t available yet either, so we can’t test those. It’s a good bet that they’ll only work for uploading photos and videos, but that’s just our best guess at this point.

@beankssiduous: does the released iPad have a built-in camera? ..When will it be sold here in Abu Dhabi? ;]

The iPad does not have a built-in camera, and the 3G version that’s coming out later this month won’t either. There’s a small spot near the top of the screen that some people have thought might be a webcam, but it’s actually an ambient light sensor. It’s what the iPad uses to auto-adjust the screen brightness based on how bright it is where you are.

We don’t know when the iPad will be available in Abu Dhabi, England, or any of the other countries you have asked about. Sorry!

@Chris1982: With the iPad, will I be able to quickly & easily upload and read .pdf/.doc/.txt/etc?

Yes. The easiest way to do this is simply to e-mail the documents to yourself: We did this, and found that the iPad displayed all three of the above formats with no problems. It can also display non-DRM restricted EPUB books, via the iBooks app.

For academic papers, you might check out Papers. We haven’t used it, but we hear it syncs and displays .pdf files nicely.

If you want to edit documents, you’ll need the $10 Pages app, part of the iWork suite. It can import Pages documents from your Mac as well as Microsoft Word files. Pages can export documents as .doc and .pdf for printing, although — as noted above — you can’t print directly from the iPad; you’ll need to do that from another computer.

MichaelBurns: When you synch to iTunes first time does it transfer iPhone settings and apps?

Yes, but it’s not automatic: you can manually choose to transfer your iPhone apps, movies, music and photos to the iPad. It’s in the sync options that appear in iTunes when you connect your iPad to your computer via USB.

arepera: Will all the paid apps I have on my touch work on my iPad? Meaning, will purchasing one license allow me to have two instance installed on two different devices?

We tested this with Tweetie 2, and it worked just fine: The app we’d purchased on an iPhone transferred to the iPad, where it worked just fine.

jimmyjj: Does the e-mail on the ipad have a built in spam filter as on the macbook pro or is it essentially the same as the iphone relying on the mail program such as gmail for spam protection?

There does not appear to be any spam filtering on the iPad. Like the iPhone, there are no mail filtering rules at all within the Mail app.