Ah, you've hit upon the tricky area for me: I feel my laptop fulfils one role and my iPod touch fulfils another, but I'm not sure there is a gap in the middle in my particular case.
Guaranteed that you will find a gap in which to insert the iPad... Guaranteed. I'm taking a business trip to Dallas on Sunday night and have a day-long training class to teach on Monday, and I plan on leaving my MacBook (which has seen me through years of work and travel) at home for the first time. It's just the iPhone and the iPad this time, and I'm not even sweating about it. Even got an HD movie downloaded to the iPad for Sunday night to keep me entertained in the hotel.
[*]What would you say makes the iPad distinct from a larger iPod touch?
The fact that it's closer to a computer than a large iPod touch. The productivity apps (Pages, Numbers, Keynote) allow you to get REAL work done. I've gotten more done on my iPad in the last couple days than I've gotten done on my laptop. Rather than a large iPod touch, it's more like a smaller, more portable laptop... But still not a laptop.
[*]Do iPad versions of Apple's apps differ significantly from the iPhone/iPod touch versions?
Oh, hell yes. But you need to use them to actually do productive work to experience this -- not just play with the apps for a few at the Apple store.
[*]With being in San Antonio, have you encountered any of the reported problems with it overheating when using it outdoors?
It ain't hot enough here yet (we're in the midst of the 3 weeks out of the year when it's actually not just bearable, but beautiful -- I never realized greens could be so... green!), but I can say that trying to use the iPad in sunlight is challenging, and impossible with polarized sunglasses. My needs don't require me to do this, though.
Don't expect it to be a laptop (accessible filesystem, multiple apps running concurrently, etc.) and you'll love it... If you don't, I'll buy it off you.
Just remember: a bad carpenter complains and bitches that his hammer isn't the right shape or weight for the nails, while a good carpenter shuts the hell up, grabs the nearest heavy rock, and gets down to business. Which is to say: if you look for faults with the iPad, you will find them (as with any other anything). If you compare it to a laptop, you will be disappointed, because it's not a laptop. It is truly, in my opinion, a new kind of device -- halfway between here and there, and filling a niche I never knew needed filling.
I will say this: if you're frugal and/or on a tight budget, forget about it. I bought $50 worth of apps (Things, all three iWork apps, a few news apps, some productivity apps, a few drawing apps (Sketchpad is ridiculous!), etc.) in the first day and a half. So, if you're getting by with your iPod touch and/or iPhone and your laptop, the iPad may not be for you. If you want to explore a new avenue of productivity, and have $500 to spare, then by all means, I believe you will find it useful. It comes in VERY handy when a laptop is too big, and an iPhone is too small (I own both, BTW).
I went shopping for a case two days ago, and ended up getting the Apple-branded "folio" case. It's nice -- it doesn't add any bulk to the iPad, seems to keep it reasonably protected, feels good in the hands, and the different posable positions are actually useful. It doesn't feel like it's worth $40, but I'll be able to tell in 6 months whether it can stand up to my style of use. I welcome any suggestions on other cases to try.
You WILL want a case. The first time I put it down on a counter that I thought was clean and heard it rocking on microscopic dirt, I grabbed it back up and decided it's home would either be my hands or the box it came in until I got a case.
The iPad is just another tool in my arsenal, and I was quite surprised at how much more I use it than both my iPhone and my MacBook.
All of my replies on macosx.com were typed on my iPad since Saturday. Even typing "[ quote ]" and "[ /quote ]" -- no matter how many keyboard changes they required -- somehow didn't get in my way or seem annoying. That's how useful this damn thing is to me. It took me exactly 1 hour to become accustomed to the on-screen keyboard. Landscape mode is the "best," by far, but portrait mode is definitely "usable." Luckily, it seems that almost all the apps I use support landscape and portrait mode, unlike my first apps on the iPhone where most of the 3rd-party apps took a few months to support rotation.
Turn down the screen brightness and kill bluetooth unless you need it. I've charged my iPad one-and-a-half times since Saturday. The battery life is impressive... not ridiculous, but impressive.
I am one of the few experiencing Wi-Fi problems. My iPad likes to disconnect for a few seconds from my AirPort Extreme Dual-Band (one 2.4GHz/WPA2/802.11a/b/g network, one 5GHz/WPA2/802.11n network) every once in a blue moon (actually, a tad more frequently than that), but reconnects within a few seconds. Don't know what that's all about, but I have not experienced the same thing at my work, which employs only 802.11g/WPA2.
My only remorse is that I relegated myself to the lowest-end 16GB model. I can already see a need for 32 or 64GB, but couldn't justify the expense. I'm good at being space-conscious, though.
I was thinking of having a look with the other .5 at the iPads in La Cantera yesterday, but we thought it would have been just very full of people queueing for it (at least judging by how crowded Riverwalk was).