When I ordered my iPad a few weeks ago it was a tough call deciding between the wifi only version or the more expensive wifi+3G version. Sure Apple assured everyone that the $25 monthly to AT&T was for unlimited bandwidth but then, these are the same people who promised the still yet to be seen tethering on the iPhone.
So I opted to get the wifi only version and get a Mifi from Verizon at a later time. Looks like I made the right choice. The Unofficial Apple Weblog is reporting that in their initial tests VOIP applications like Skype won’t work over AT&Ts 3G. They’re disabled in fact. What’s nice about the Mifi is that not only can you make calls without worrying that you’re on wifi or 3G but you can also use up to 5 machines at once. Have your iPad, your wife’s laptop, your sons iPod touch and your daughters laptop all on wifi while you’re driving cross country on the family vacation. If you only had connectivity on your iPad if you were on vacation and had to email a document from your laptop to the boys back at the office from your campground you’d have to drive miles looking for an open wifi connection.
The moral of this story is, until AT&T and Apple follow though with the promise of iPhone tethering or Apple dumps AT&T in favor of a better service provider, I won’t be purchasing anything that uses 3G from Apple.