[maercsrats]

In my case, I was caught in the flood of Nashville and lost all my electronics. The next day I bought an ipad to do email, get on the internet, play a few games and read whatever books I had saved in dropbox or my work computer. I even was able to find some youtube videos on how to (try) and repair some of my stuff. Still couldn't save my motorcycle, though. The ipad has been fantastic and only $500.

There is the argument of "Why not just buy a netbook for $200?" To that question, I suggest you go try out an ipad and remember that you aren't going to do any coding on it. It's a pretty fantastic machine.

That being said, I am a computer programmer in a Vanderbilt research department. At some point I will have to pick up a laptop just to do some real coding work (and SC2 when it drops). For everything else, I love my ipad.