Still Trying to Get an iPad 2? Tips & Tricks

April 19th 2011

A few weeks have passed since iPad 2 hit the streets and you might be one of the lucky ones and have your iPad 2 already, you could still be deciding what Tablet PC to get or you could be walking the streets hopelessly like some love sick puppy looking for the one that got away. Where are you, where are you? You feel like that too, right?

We have spoken with some Apple staff and also other retailers and they are all pretty much saying the same thing – “We don’t know when stock is coming in, it just arrives.” When we asked “Have you been seeing any more iPad 2′s arrive on any particular day?”, we were told that they really don’t know.

If you’re still trying to get an iPad 2,  here are a few tips for making sure that you’re checking all the bases:

Apple Online Store: Click Here

Courtesy Of Apple

We first saw the online store shipping dates at 3-4 weeks, then it dropped to 2-3 weeks but don’t think that paints the whole picture. We placed on order about 10 days ago and when we checked our shipping date, it was still over 4 weeks away. Not cool.

If you’ve had no luck  trying to get your iPad 2, you could always place your order so you have it locked in and then continue your hunt to keep trying to snag your iPad 2 elsewhere to improve the date of arrival. You can always go back into your order and cancel it. That’s what we did.

Apple Pick Up & Reserve: Click Here

Courtesy of Apple

This approach needs a heads up: it’s for the quick and the dead. You reserve your iPad 2 the night before at 9pm for the next day pick up, but be super quick because it took us nearly a week to get one, but it did cut out the 3 weeks of waiting at the online store. The most stock seems to be around Wed night, Thursday & Sunday nights. The white iPad 2 stock is very limited and there seems to be more Wifi stock then 3G. This all depends on the day, so just keep trying.

Courtesy of Apple

To improve your speed I would familiarise yourself with the reserve layout and keep in mind that just because it’s in your cart does not mean it’s yours. You need to reserve it fast. I would start trying at about 8:59:30pm. Have your Apple ID ready in a text file and already copied by clicking ctrl + C , then once you have clicked available on your iPad 2 choice,  it loads into your cart, then click reserve. Sign in with your Apple ID click ctrl+V to paste your username, type your password and hit confirm as fast as you can.

If you are lucky enough to get one, you should see your reservation is confirmed. We did see a glitch where once we actually had reserved our iPad, we could actually go back and start the process again and still apparently still see stock remaining, so we tried to reserved another iPad 2 and turns out we confirmed our second iPad 2 at a different store.

Apple Authorized iPad 2 Resellers: Click HERE

Courtesy of Apple

The next option in your search for iPad 2 is to try the resellers, we’ve had success in Harvey Norman from a walk in purchases to over the phone confirmation.  Be noted that not all Harvey Norman stores are outright purchases, some are post paid, so call ahead to double check. If you’re walking by and you see one, that can only mean one thing. It’s chosen you.

The best way to find out is to call ahead, you can find the details and locations of resellers nearby by clicking this link.

eBay – iPad 2 Listings

All I am going to say about eBay is, expect to pay more than $100 than the retail price – probably a lot more. What’s really frustrating is to see people buy up iPad 2 stock to sell them to make a profit, I get the idea, but really? $200 more for a 16gb Wifi. There are some legitimate sellers so support the stores, not the individuals, and we can hopefully weed out the scalpers.

If you can be a bit patient, you can save your money and get one elsewhere. But if you really can’t wait and money is no option then eBay has plenty of stock.

I hope you find your missing love and live happily ever after, well until iPad 3 comes around anyway and we play this cat and mouse game all over again.