14 DAY TRIAL // In accordance with Apple’s recent confirmation that the iPad International launch was on track to commence on March 25th, Apple’s New Zealand and Australian online stores have begun listing availability of the tablet computer.
“iPad 2 will be available at Apple retail stores and select Apple Authorized Resellers at 5 p.m. local time, and online through the Apple Store (www.apple.com) beginning at 1 a.m.”, the company said in a March 22 announcement.
As it is already past midnight in the aforementioned territories, New Zealand and Australia residents can go online at store.apple.com and secure themselves an iPad 2.
Sadly, shipping will take somewhere between two and three weeks, and this is just for initial orders.
Shipping push backs are expected to occur everywhere, as Apple is struggling to source components and assemble enough iPads to fulfill what Steve Jobs described as “amazing demand” for their post-PC device.
Shipping in both White and Black form, the iPad 2 starts at NZ$799 and at A$579 in New Zealand and Australia respectively.
Countries next in line to receive shipments of the next-generation tablet computer include Austria, Belgium, Canada, Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Iceland, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and the UK.
In addition to these territories, which Apple had confirmed as early as March 2, this week the Cupertino tech giant also announced that all models of iPad 2 would be available in Hong Kong, Korea, Singapore and additional countries in April.
iPad 2 builds on its predecessor’s success retaining the same price point for all available configurations, as well as the 10-hour battery life, adding dual cameras, the much faster A5 chip with 512MB ram and 9x the graphical processing power, as well as a sleek new design, and the pre-installed iOS 4.3 with apps like Camera, Photo Booth, and FaceTime.