Apple’s new iPad has caused some big ripples in the world of technology. The iPad seems to be a new category of high tech devices. It isn’t a phone. It isn’t a laptop. It isn’t a netbook. Now that we’ve ascertained what the iPad isn’t, in this review we will investigate just what the iPad really is and how it performs.

As might be expected from Apple, the iPad comes in a very sturdy, unassuming cardboard box, shown in Figure 1.

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Figure 1: The iPad box.

Inside the box, as shown in Figure 2, you will find the iPad itself, a USB charging cable, a wall charger that connects to the USB charging cable, and a small single sheet that shows the location of the iPad’s four buttons. The back of the sheet gives a three-step process for setting up and syncing the iPad and the web addresses for getting more information and for downloading the User’s Guide.

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Figure 2: The box contents.

Apple’s “less is more” mentality is obvious in the packaging and the included instructions.