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It is upon us! What you ask? Possibly the greatest invention ever since the iPhone - the iSlate iPad! This superfantabulous product, which was slated by the entire tech rumour mill to be a revolutionary tablet computer device, was launched on January 27 2010. Despite the fact that it is lacking a camera (and certain other features, which is why it is also being touted as one of the world's biggest ever betrayals), Steve Job deemed his love-tablet worthy of as much (or possibly even more) hysteria and excitement as a certain tablet inscribed with a certain ten commandments that was brought down from a certain mountain by a certain Moses. 

Image: Courtesy of Apple

Thus after the magnificent Jesus Phone, Apple launched the iPad, a tablet computer that looks like an iPhone on steroids. Up until the launch, Apple, in its usual stance towards the media, had refused to comment and stuck with its secretive methods, which was fine, except for the fact that most of the world had already guessed what was coming. The entire event was solely held to unveil the iPad, which will be available to the world and passing visitors from other galaxies in a matter of two months from the launch date. 

Some of the main questions on everyone's mind before the launch were: Will the iSlate iPad match up to the revolution that was the iPhone? Will it be as successful as its smaller communicative sibling? How much will it cost? What will the battery life be like? Will it tap dance for me? The answers to all these questions, and more, will be addressed towards the end of this article, so don't go away!

Before actually delving into details, tech and otherwise of the iPad, the company responsible for creating Android and becoming Apple's newest and most formidable rivals, Google, has had a thing or two to say about Apple's latest tech child. Eric Schmidt, CEO of Google (previously also a CEO of Apple), is not very impressed with Apple's latest product. When asked by a reporter for his thoughts on the iPad, Eric wryly replied, "You might want to tell me the difference between a large phone and a tablet." Considering Google and its employees have always been known to avoid poking fun at rivals, this may as well be a big sneaky knock to Apples solar-plexus. Keeping in mind that Android, Google's mobile device operating system, is also designed to run on tablet devices like the Dell "Streak", which is yet to see the light of the consumers' halo's above it. 

As part of his keynote, Steve Jobs mentioned - before actually telling the world what it was (thus upping the curiousity quotient of all those who had their breaths held) - that Apple had been trying to develop something of a Franken-Apple in between cellphones and laptops, and that he wanted to make a device that would be a lot more intimate in your hand than a laptop and still allow enough power while providing the comfort and manoeuvrability of a cellphone. Thus Apple was looking to create a hybrid. At this point in the keynote, everyone obviously knew what it was, except the immediate details of this magical device, even if the whole world did call it by another name.

The main difference in the iPad models will be the choice between either having just wi-fi (N technology) capability or wi-fi plus 3G (Micro SIM card technology). The problem of a micro SIM card within Australia is that none of the cell phone carriers actually offer the technology yet, which is why Optus, Telstra and Hutchison Vodafone Australia are already scuttling to get a piece of the iPad pie (according to a report on The Australian's website).

Earlier in this article, Eric Schmidt told us what he thought of the iPad, now you have the opportunity to tell us what you think in the comment box found below this article, after reading some of the features that are available on this revolutionary new piece of technology.

First Appearance: The iPad in appearance as you can see from the image above, is not only just styled like a really big iPhone, it also comes with a similar home button, common to all iPhones and iPod touch models to date. It also has a similar slide to unlock feature to, well, unlock the screen. Other familiar and physical features of the iPad include an on/off or sleep/awake button, a mute button, and volume up/down semi-split button, in the exact same spots on the device as the iPhone. 

User Interface: The iPad seems to provide the same user interface experience as the iPhone, in the general sense that it has the same looking home screen where you have a bunch of App icons in front of a very soothing landscape wallpaper. A very big positive, possibly the biggest factor giving the iPad that extra lift in that shiny new toy craving sort of way, is that it allows a lot of already pre-existing and pre-loved iPhone apps, about 140,000 of them right off the same App store that was created for the iPhone. You may choose to use the Apps in fullscreen or even the standard size as it would be on an iPhone. Soon enough, there will be official iPad specific apps too. 

iStyle: For those who are fashion oriented and are interested in the style quotient of the iPad, it is only available in one set of colours: a black frame with a 9.7 inch (Diagonal) multi-touch capable screen on the front and the silver Macbook Pro lid styling scheme at the back. But as we have seen before on Macbook Pros, laser sketching on the back is always available to those eager to personalise their iPads. It is still unclear if the Apple logo at the back will glow like it does on all Macbooks.  

iPhysical-Size: The height of the iPad is 9.56 inches (24.28 cm) which makes it as tall as two iPhones* standing on top of each other. The width is as much as 2 and a half iPhones* lined up side by side at 7.47 inches (18.97 cm). At 0.5 inches(1.27 cm) the iPad is as thick as an iPhone*, a really big achievement in the product design department to keep the iPad as slim as its smaller communicative sibling. 

iWeight: With the Wi-fi model being 1.5 pounds (0.68 kg) and the Wi-Fi plus 3G being 1.6 pounds (0.73 kg), its not really that heavy and could really cut into the perfect waltz, unless its processing power and battery life have been compromised.

iStorage: The iPad will be available in three sizes 16GB, 32GB, and 64GB, all of which will use flash technology. 

iBattery: A rechargeable lithium-polymer will power this baby, so you could watch up to 10 hours of wi-fi fuelled streaming videos or movies.

iTapDance: Not really, but it would've been a helluva show.

iProcess: At 1GHz Apple's very own custom A4 processor may allow plenty of basic processing, but it is yet to tested to be worthy of comment. 

iDont-have: A camera! Apple forgot to put in a camera and it may have turned a lot of consumers away from a prospective purchase of this wonderful slab of tech. This may still be in the works for the second wave of updated iPads. Also the next wave of iPads may be able to multi-task and have the ability to use flash programs, who knows maybe even have a better name!

iPrice: At a starting price of $499 USD (Approx. $560 AUD) for the 16GB wi-fi only model, ranging to $829 USD (Approx. $932 AUD) for the higher end, 64GB capacity iPad with Wi-fi and 3G, the price may be a turn off to many Australians, especially if Apple decides to hike up their prices by a large amount.

iAccessories: Some of the accessories that will be available separately are: a synthetic case, a charging dock with a built in audio jack output, a keyboard dock so you may choose to not use the onscreen keyboard and a camera connection kit that allows you to connect a camera via USB or through an SD card. Whether this Camera connection kit will allow other devices like hard-disks or to transfer other data off the SD card like movies or music, we have yet to know.

iConclude: Even though the iPad is a great piece of technology, with its accelerometer, built in speaker, microphone, assisted GPS, digital compass and 3.5 mm headphone jack, making it almost just like a large iPhone, it seems a little under-developed by Apple's standards. Impressive as it is that Apple managed to provide the Software Development Kit to developers wanting to try and take a crack at the platform, and a specialised version of iWork for the productivity gurus amongst us is all really impressive.

The positives for this device are that it will be really useful for doctors, engineers, artists, film makers, architects and a lot of other fields that would most definitely benefit from the use of the iPad, not to mention the advantage it will give students of all the above mentioned fields. As for those looking for a device that is capable of running home automation systems like the one shown in the 2008 superhit flick with Robert Downey Jr.: Iron Man, they may need a change of lower body apparel already.

The fact that it will come without a camera and use a proprietary micro SIM card technology in the 3G capable models will turn away a lot of promising buyers. Also, the overpriced plans of currently available data plans forewarn that cheaper data rates are some of the things which Australian TELCOs clearly won't offer initially as they attempt to milk this cow to death. On a good note, even though Eric Schmidt and some others may not agree with Apple's latest product, it has made itself worthy of being on top of many people's Christmas lists of 2010 just by being the first of its kind in the market. Thus, kudos to Apple for putting it out there and being the market leaders that they are so used to being. Watch NewsHit.com.au for further coverage, analysis and opinions on the iPad. 

Note: If you would like to watch the Apple Keynote, an official version may be found on the Apple website. To recreate the excitement of the iPad launch make sure you are up at 5am EDT when watching that video.

Tech-specs information: Courtesy of Apple.

*iPhone model used in comparison is iPhone 3GS.