The iPad UK price will be announced on 10 May, Apple has finally revealed. But picking up Cupertino’s long awaited tablet may set you back more than just the company’s conversion of $499 and a few pounds on iPad apps. If you want to get the full experience Apple intended with the iPad, you’ll have to shell out for a lot more besides. Read on, and we’ll break down just what – it could cost you nearly a grand.
For our calculations we’ve worked with US prices over the course of a year, as though UK prices for some of the products and services listed here are known, several crucial ones aren’t. We’ve totted everything up in dollars and converted it for a final estimate, which should give us a ball park figure for the surplus you’ll need to pay for everything come the iPad UK launch.
Storage space
At $499 (£323), the bottom end 16GB Wi-Fi iPad is a veritable bargain for the size, software and processing power stuffed inside. But let’s put things in perspective here: it’s got as much storage space as an 18 month old iPod nano. It might play 720p HD video, but it won’t store much. If that’s your game, you’ll want the 32GB or 64GB iPad models, but you’re looking at an extra $100 or $200 (£65 or £130) respectively, and we’d expect replicated price bumps on the iPad UK price.
iPad 3G extras
If you want to use your iPad on the web on the road, you’ll be adding a hefty sum to the iPad UK price. Upfront, there’s a surcharge for the 3G model (Which also includes GPS) of $130 (£85). And then there’s the monthly price for all that data on-demand. So far O2, Orange and Vodafone have announced plans to sell dedicated iPad deals, though what those might be remains to be seen. In the US though, AT&T will sell you 250MB of data for a month for $14.99, and unlimited for $29.99 (£9.70 and £19.40 respectively). Over 12 months, that works out as $179.88 or $359.88 (£116.64 and £233.35 respectively).
MobileMe
Apple’s MobileMe cloud syncing service stuffs in plenty of useful extras, including iDisk to access files on your Mac or PC, push email and Find My iPad to hunt down your slate, heaven forbid it goes missing. Unfortunately, it costs a full $99 (£64) per year to subscribe to in the US. The UK MobileMe doesn’t currently list iPad support, but assuming it will, you’ll add a full £59 to your iPad UK price to get it.
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iPad keyboard dock
Apple’s touting the iPad as a whole new type of computer, but if you intend to type anything longer than an email on it, you’ll want a keyboard to type with. Apple’s iPad keyboard dock will help you there, letting you blaze through documents on Pages at WPM speeds equal to anything you can manage on an official Mac keyboard. The only thing is, you’ll have to pay $69 (£45) to get it, which puts the real iPad UK price above that of most netbooks.
iPad camera connector
Considering Apple’s bigging up the iPad as a new way to view media, it could really have done with an SD card slot for your camera’s memory card. Even the MacBook Pro has one now. But no, you’ll have to pay a quite substantial $29 (£19) for the opportunity to slot one in through a dangly dongle.
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iPad case
You might be able to live without an iPad keyboard dock, but you will need an iPad case, that much we’ve learned from our time so far with an iPad in the UK. You’ll want to take it with you, but you won’t want to scuff that beautiful back, or the capacitive touchscreen. On the budget end, you can get a silicone sleeve on Amazon for $7.26 (£4.70), which won’t add much to the iPad UK price. But if you want the official iPad case, with a fold out lid that gives the tablet elevation for typing, that’ll be $39, please (£25).
iPad UK price: real cost total
For a 16GB, 3G iPad with MobileMe, the cheapest data contract for a year, a budget case and a dock and camera kit, using the examples here you can expect to pay around $515.54 ($130 for 3G model, $179.88 for data, $99 for MobileMe, $69 and $39 for dock and camera kit, and $7.26 for a case totals $514.54) in the first year over the $499 base iPad price. That translates to around £333 on top of whatever the base iPad UK price is for the 16GB model.
If you want the works though, you’re looking at an even higher iPad UK price. A 64GB ($200 extra) iPad 3G ($130) model with MobileMe ($99) and unlimited data for a year ($359.88), plus a keyboard dock and camera kit ($69 and $29) and Apple’s official case ($39) will rack up an extra $925.88 – that’s £600 on top of the base 16GB iPad model solo.
Given we expect that to be around £390 based on previous Apple price conversions on its store, that points to a total minimum price of £723 to kit yourself out, and enjoy all the features of it for a year but with limited data, capacity, and a cheap case. And if you want everything on tap, with unlimited data, 64GB of storage and Apple’s official case along with everything else, you’re looking at about £990 in total in the first year. Yup, the true cost of ownership of the iPad in the first year could be nearly a grand.
Did we mention this is before you’ve even bought any apps? Still, if you’ve seen our iPad UK review, you’ll know that given just how well iPhone OS runs on it, it might just be worth it. Let us know if you’ll be pre-ordering an iPad come 10 May.
