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New iPad buyers face online delays as Apple struggles with demand
New iPad buyers face online delays as Apple struggles with demand
(14 days later)
People pre-ordering Apple's new iPad online to avoid the release-day crowds at stores will have to wait longer to get their hands on the devices.
People pre-ordering Apple's new iPad online to avoid the release-day crowds at stores will have to wait longer to get their hands on the devices.
Apple says that due to high demand, it has been forced to put back delivery times for online buyers.
Apple says that due to high demand, it has been forced to put back delivery times for online buyers.
Those ordering online will now be restricted to a maximum of two devices, and will have to wait until Monday 19 March, rather than getting deliveries on the launch date of Friday 16 March because demand for the new version of the tablet is "off the charts", according to an Apple spokesperson.
Those ordering online will now be restricted to a maximum of two devices, and will have to wait until Monday 19 March, rather than getting deliveries on the launch date of Friday 16 March because demand for the new version of the tablet is "off the charts", according to an Apple spokesperson.
Unveiled by chief executive Tim Cook on Wednesday 7 March, the new iPad boasts what Apple calls a "retina display" – meaning that when held at normal reading distance the individual pixels in the display cannot be discerned.
Unveiled by chief executive Tim Cook on Wednesday 7 March, the new iPad boasts what Apple calls a "retina display" – meaning that when held at normal reading distance the individual pixels in the display cannot be discerned.
The new iPad also includes superfast LTE connectivity for mobile broadband, though the wide range of frequencies used throughout the world, and Apple's focus on the US, means that the first models will apparently not be compatible with LTE frequencies allocated for the UK.
The new iPad also includes superfast LTE connectivity for mobile broadband, though the wide range of frequencies used throughout the world, and Apple's focus on the US, means that the first models will apparently not be compatible with LTE frequencies allocated for the UK.
The announcement of the three-day delay in shipments for online orders may increase crowds at the company's retail stores ahead of the launch. However Apple is still selling its iPad 2, now a year old, on which it has reduced the price – from a starting price of $499 down to $399 in the US, and from £399 to £329 in the UK.
The announcement of the three-day delay in shipments for online orders may increase crowds at the company's retail stores ahead of the launch. However Apple is still selling its iPad 2, now a year old, on which it has reduced the price – from a starting price of $499 down to $399 in the US, and from £399 to £329 in the UK.
Would-be Apple buyers can be impatient. In January, enraged Chinese shoppers pelted Apple's flagship store in Beijing with eggs and shoving matches broke out with police after customers were told the store would not begin selling the iPhone 4S as scheduled. The company is believed to have halted sales there after determining that many of the buyers were aiming to sell them on directly for a markup.
Would-be Apple buyers can be impatient. In January, enraged Chinese shoppers pelted Apple's flagship store in Beijing with eggs and shoving matches broke out with police after customers were told the store would not begin selling the iPhone 4S as scheduled. The company is believed to have halted sales there after determining that many of the buyers were aiming to sell them on directly for a markup.
The demand for the iPad may raise Apple's share of the tablet market beyond the 60% share it already enjoys, according to some analysts.
The demand for the iPad may raise Apple's share of the tablet market beyond the 60% share it already enjoys, according to some analysts.
IMS Research forecasts that approximately 70m iPads will be shipped in 2012, which would represent a 71% year-on-year growth.
IMS Research forecasts that approximately 70m iPads will be shipped in 2012, which would represent a 71% year-on-year growth.
Gerry Xu, PC market analyst at IMS Research, says: "There is a large customer base loyal to Apple products that have been waiting for the latest tablet.
Gerry Xu, PC market analyst at IMS Research, says: "There is a large customer base loyal to Apple products that have been waiting for the latest tablet.
"Many owners of the iPad 1 are also expected to upgrade to the latest release. In addition to this consumer demand, growth is also forecast as a result of sales into enterprise and education."
"Many owners of the iPad 1 are also expected to upgrade to the latest release. In addition to this consumer demand, growth is also forecast as a result of sales into enterprise and education."
IMS Research is forecasting that Apple's share will rise to 70%, while that of Android tablets will actually fall, from 35% in 2011 to 26% this year, as new tablets using Windows 8 become available in the latter part of the year.
IMS Research is forecasting that Apple's share will rise to 70%, while that of Android tablets will actually fall, from 35% in 2011 to 26% this year, as new tablets using Windows 8 become available in the latter part of the year.
Comments
94 comments, displaying first
12 March 2012 8:47AM
It's always amusing to watch any Apple launch, there are always two queues of people. One queue is of those people anxious to buy it as soon as possible and the other queue is of people lining up to write messages about how little they care about that product.
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12 March 2012 9:17AM
Does anyone remember those strange, paid-for 'newspapers' that would fall out of the paper Guardian occasionally? - the topic usually being some remote, third-world country and how it was now stable and 'open for business' or whatever.
Unveiled by chief executive Tim Cook on Wednesday 7 March, the new iPad boasts what Apple calls a "retina display" – meaning that when held at normal reading distance the individual pixels in the display cannot be discerned.
The new iPad also includes superfast LTE connectivity for mobile broadband
Link to this comment:
12 March 2012 9:17AM
All these new and exciting ways of watching web content seem a bit samey to me.
Link to this comment:
12 March 2012 9:36AM
And then there's the queue of pre-emptive Apple fans lining up to write messages about how nobody is allowed to comment unless they like said Apple product.
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12 March 2012 9:38AM
I wonder how long the constant churning-out of consumer gadgets can continue? We learn on one hand about evidence about future shortages of resources - housing, energy, food & water. Yet every year millions & millions of this stuff, that is very desirable (but possibly not a necessity) is manufactured, shipped, and old is replaced for new. Do Apple, Samsung or Asus make any forecasts about the sustainability of this industry? What will the IT gadget boom of the early 20th century look like in 50 years time?
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12 March 2012 9:43AM
One queue is of those people anxious to buy it as soon as possible and the other queue is of people lining up to write messages about how little they care about that product.
Therefore:
Four whole days?! NOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!
Either I'm genuinely outraged or I'm ironically commenting on hypothetical outrage. The great thing is that people can interpret it either way depending on their own needs.
For iPad 1, I ordered in advance, and then on the day it was supposed to arrive it still hadn't shipped. I wandered into town and found that PC World had lots of them, and no queues. I used one of their display computers to cancel my order. It's like shopping on the internet, but not.
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12 March 2012 9:51AM
4 whole days!?!
Anyone complaining about this needs to man the f**k up and just use their iPad 2 for 4 more days....
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12 March 2012 9:56AM
I wonder how long the constant churning-out of consumer gadgets can continue? We learn on one hand about evidence about future shortages of resources - housing, energy, food & water. Yet every year millions & millions of this stuff, that is very desirable (but possibly not a necessity) is manufactured, shipped, and old is replaced for new.
It's because the predictions of shortages are oversimplified - not totally untrue, but usually misinterpreted. For example, food is very short in some places, but almost always for political reasons (civil war, or government-imposed collective farming). Globally, food has never been more abundant and all the indicators are that it will continue to explode in abundance.
Then there's the way markets respond to resource scarcity by putting up prices and consumers respond by economising on their consumption of expensive resources. Energy effectively becomes more abundant every time we find a way to use less of it, and each new generation of gadgets is more energy efficient. People often complain that smartphones only last 24 hours on a charge where their old cellphone lasted a week, but it's a stupid comparison paying no attention to the capability of the device. You don't have to go back very far to find PCs that were only about as powerful as iPhone 4S, but they would only have run for a few minutes on a battery that tiny. Things we used to do with big hungry boxes are now moving into tiny efficient devices. All progress is towards low energy consumption - precisely because energy is expensive.
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12 March 2012 10:03AM
Four whole days?
Will the Samaritans be adding extra staff to their phone lines?
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12 March 2012 10:03AM
Stage-managed to pump up the product's appeal. Oldest trick in the book.
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12 March 2012 10:06AM
It makes sense from Apple's point of view to feed this kind of thing to the media because it grows the hype that this is a must-have object. I wouldn't be surprised if it's entirely fabricated and they have plenty of them available and are just throttling the supply - it's not as though the demand was unanticipated.
Marketers to the end.
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12 March 2012 10:09AM
It was probably Apple hammering their own web Store on the day of launch too.
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12 March 2012 10:21AM
I bet all the other tablet makers wished they had this problem :-)
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12 March 2012 10:34AM
Yet another pointless Apple article. Buyers has to wait an extra 4 days for their iPad!! Others has said this in the past, and it is hard not to agree... this paper surely has an Apple bias. The sheer amount of Apple articles is staggering. It doesn't become any better by the fact that most of them are rather pointless to start with (like this one) or that they are doing no more than dealing with rumours involving Apple. Is it impossible to find tech-writers that aren't total Apple fanbois?
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12 March 2012 10:38AM
Good point, (though feeding future populations is a big concern due to climate change affecting food production - haven't you noticed food prices going up?). On the subject of computer gadgets we have more efficient powerful devices now, but usually in addition to what we had before -Don't most smartphone/tablet owners also have a laptop &/or desktop as well? It concerns me that mountains of this stuff that ends up getting dumped (it can't all be recycled, and those processes also use energy) in the annual replacement of last years model for the latest thing, and that our material resources are finite.
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12 March 2012 10:38AM
People ordering Apple's new iPad online face a four-day delay due to overwhelming demand for the device
How exactly is a 4 day delay newsworthy? 4 days is within the margin of error for most shipping operations!!
Charles, if youre going to create an article based on a non-event, presumably for publicity purposes you could at least try and hide it a little better.
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12 March 2012 10:41AM
I bet all the other tablet makers wished they had this advertising :-)
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12 March 2012 10:49AM
re Gaudie, I bet that in reality there are no queues at all, just Apple hype to get people panicking (about what?)
If it's true, what happens to all those ipad1s, and 2s?
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12 March 2012 10:49AM
@Charles
I thought launch day was Friday 16 March, not Thursday 15 March...
Link to this comment:
12 March 2012 10:52AM
The Apple Store says ships in 2-3 weeks.
So if you ordered now you would probably have to wait 4 weeks, rather than 4 days.
Also, it would be inefficient to produce enough stock to satisfy day-one demand, so they were always going to sell out.
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12 March 2012 10:58AM
think stores open at 23:59:59 on thursday for people who desperately need them.
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12 March 2012 10:58AM
Also, I bet hardly anyone is throwing away their old iPads, it's much too valuable.
I sold my iPad 2 to a recycling service for £245. Making my new iPad cost a grand total of £155.
So much for overpriced Apple stuff.
And as far as I know, the recycling service sell on the devices as refurbished, so it's not like they go into landfill.
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12 March 2012 11:07AM
As of 30 seconds ago, the order I placed last week is still showing March 16th as the delivery date. I did order the day they were announced though, so maybe it's just those who got in a little later who're being delayed.
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12 March 2012 11:16AM
As you say, that the raw materials for all these gadgets have to come from somewhere, and with such a rapid cycle of obsolescence there is no time to re-cycle the previous generation even if anybody was interested in doing so. Instead, ever-expanding raw material extraction leads to massive environmental damage and habitat loss, and fuels corruption and conflicts e.g. in the Congo. There has to be a certain irony about the Guardian in particular being so keen to hype this constant turnover of gadgets.
Anyway, how important is your gadget in your life that you absolutely have to dump it for another one only months after you bought the first one?
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12 March 2012 11:18AM
Poor things having to wait 4 days. Apple are very good at doing this to create panic in the braindead Apple device must have followers.
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12 March 2012 11:23AM
A Gentlemans Rant on the new new iPad.
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12 March 2012 11:25AM
A Gentlemans rant on the new new iPad
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12 March 2012 11:30AM
Good point, (though feeding future populations is a big concern due to climate change affecting food production - haven't you noticed food prices going up?).
I have, but I've also noticed governments across the world pumping new cash into their economies to deliberately cause inflation! This is the result. Food prices are predicted to go up about 5% this year, but then so are all prices on average. (NB I should say this is not necessarily a bad thing, before you mark me down as some kind of nutcase obsessed with hoarding gold. Inflation is a tax that disproportionately targets those with more money than they can think what to do with: good!)
Don't most smartphone/tablet owners also have a laptop &/or desktop as well?
Not at the same time, I suspect, so the energy consumption per person is falling. More and more people are getting access to capabilities they never had before, so more energy is being diverted to information technology, but that is surely a good thing in context. Farmers in the 3rd world now use networked devices to make/receive payments, giving them the secure trading environment that their corrupt governments would never supply.
It concerns me that mountains of this stuff that ends up getting dumped (it can't all be recycled, and those processes also use energy) in the annual replacement of last years model for the latest thing, and that our material resources are finite.
Energy use is the key, yes. But as for the solid material resources, an iPad contains a lot of silicon (including the glass screen) and aluminium, two of the three most abundant elements in the earth's crust, also very cheap to recycle. But I don't think much of this stuff gets scrapped, not directly anyway. The most common way for old tablets and phones to be recycled is far more efficient, like this (link), which means that there is a kind of pipeline for technology accessibility via a secondhand market. These days the timespan from "cutting edge" to mass market is extremely short. Half of American adults now have a smartphone. God knows what the proportion is in Japan. If you don't need the very latest one, you can save a few hundred quid and still get a very good one.
A widely aired concern these days is that economic development cannot be compatible with a finite planet. Which suggests to me that we should teach in schools how and why new things are invented and manufactured. The foremost concern of economic development is economy, that is: efficiency, doing more with less, finding simpler, quicker, easier ways to get more valuable stuff into more people's hands. Money doesn't measure stuff by weight, but by value. If you can think of a way to use the same stuff you already have, then you make it more valuable. All the most spectacular exponential economic growth in history has been of that form, rather than simple linear scaling up of existing activity.
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12 March 2012 11:52AM
I seem to recall that Apple Stores open an hour or two early, they don't typically open at midnight. I think that's reserved for Harry Pooter books and console games.
Also, it's unlikely that Apple would deliberately create a shortage and delay orders. Why would they? They have production ramped up to the max and they still can't keep up with demand. It took a couple of months for supply to meet demand for the iPhone 4s, for example.
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12 March 2012 11:57AM
I cannot see anyone doing this for as Droid! Good for Apple!
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12 March 2012 12:04PM
There are two types of people on this board. One has already ordered an iPad and the other would like to but can't afford one so is bitter and anti Apple.
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12 March 2012 12:19PM
@Cossiee There are two types of people on this board. One who thinks hating a company that you want to buy products off makes and ounce of sense, and the other type who wouldn't post such nonsense.
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12 March 2012 12:19PM
FOUR DAY DELAY?
What are these factory workers doing? Stopping to eat? Sleep?
Unacceptable.
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12 March 2012 12:20PM
There are two types of people on this board. One has already ordered an iPad and the other would like to but can't afford one so is bitter and anti Apple.
Not necessarily.
I'm still happily using my iPhone 3GS, just over two years old. It does everything I need, no need for an upgrade. I also have an unlocked HTC Wildfire I use when travelling, I can just pop a local SIM to save money.
I have the original iPad, still going stong. No need for an upgrade unless it breaks, which probably means dropping it. I had a Xoom for a while last year, kind of stopped using it so my son has borrowed it. So I will never see that again, I guess.
I will probably get the next iPhone, get an unlocked one in the USA to save money.
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12 March 2012 12:25PM
By the way did you know if your iPhone 3GS is on O2, you can get it unlocked here. And they don't sell unlocked iPhones in the US. The do in the UK though.
I think the other UK networks unlock iPhones too, but I got my 3GS unlocked using the above-linked method a couple of years ago.
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12 March 2012 12:34PM
Sadly I'm with Vodafone and foolishly got a very long, low price plan with another six months to go before I can unlock.
Actually they do sell them unlocked in Apple Stores in the USA and from the online store, for full price. Started doing it last year, I brought one home for a friend in November.
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12 March 2012 12:50PM
@ Charles Arthur
This article is odd; it gives the impression that those who successfully ordered on the day will be getting theirs four days later than the actual release date. This is not the case; my order still says delivery by the 16th and indeed no Apple product i have ever preordered has ever arrived so much as a day later than the release date; often they arrive the day before.
The delay is for people who have yet to order, and in fact it's actually 2-3 weeks, not 4 days; it's been like that since Saturday at least.
Can you clarify, Charles?
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12 March 2012 12:51PM
I neither want an ipad and as I can easily afford one nor am I bitter - goes to show you know Jack Sh#t really doesn't it?
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12 March 2012 1:13PM
Actually they do sell them unlocked in Apple Stores in the USA and from the online store, for full price. Started doing it last year, I brought one home for a friend in November
So they do! I knew they sold them contract free but hadn't realised they were unlocked too.
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12 March 2012 1:17PM
There are two types of people on this board. One has already ordered an iPad and the other would like to but can't afford one so is bitter and anti Apple.
Or maybe they just don't want one, like me. Personally I find iOS quite boring. I'm considering a MacBook Pro though which I hope demonstrates that I am neither anti-Apple nor poor and could an iPad several times over.
Not everyone wants what you want.
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12 March 2012 1:20PM
I'm off to the states in a few months, and three friends have asked me to pick up an unlocked GSM iPhone 4S for them.
Hmm, looks like the link to buy the unlocked phones is busted on the US store...
Link to this comment:
12 March 2012 1:20PM
What delay ?
Just got Apple email saying I'm getting it 2 days ahead of official Launch date.
Apple email pic here
Link to this comment:
12 March 2012 1:25PM
The MacBook Pro line should be getting an update in a few months to faster processors, et cetera. And possibly MacBook Air style design.
So it may be worth hanging on a few months, unless you want the current style Pro. With DVD drive.
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12 March 2012 1:28PM
I am still waiting for my Buzz Lightyear to arrive
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12 March 2012 1:35PM
You ordered Friday, the delay is for new orders. As is mentioned in the title of the article...
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12 March 2012 1:35PM
There are two types of people on this board. One has already ordered an iPad and the other would like to but can't afford one so is bitter and anti Apple.
Absolutely True. Well said.
Link to this comment:
12 March 2012 1:44PM
something about kebabs arrive quicker, but who'd want a kebab or something else just as nonsensical
Link to this comment:
12 March 2012 1:49PM
Ah, astroturf comments in a sponsored article about an engineered shortage. This is so damn meta.
Link to this comment:
12 March 2012 1:52PM
Oh dear. To both of you.
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12 March 2012 1:54PM
Apples are the BMWs of Pcs. I don't mean that as a compliment.
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People ordering Apple's new iPad online face a three-day delay due to overwhelming demand for the device
People pre-ordering Apple's new iPad online to avoid the release-day crowds at stores will have to wait longer to get their hands on the devices.
Apple says that due to high demand, it has been forced to put back delivery times for online buyers.
Those ordering online will now be restricted to a maximum of two devices, and will have to wait until Monday 19 March, rather than getting deliveries on the launch date of Friday 16 March because demand for the new version of the tablet is "off the charts", according to an Apple spokesperson.
Unveiled by chief executive Tim Cook on Wednesday 7 March, the new iPad boasts what Apple calls a "retina display" – meaning that when held at normal reading distance the individual pixels in the display cannot be discerned.
The new iPad also includes superfast LTE connectivity for mobile broadband, though the wide range of frequencies used throughout the world, and Apple's focus on the US, means that the first models will apparently not be compatible with LTE frequencies allocated for the UK.
The announcement of the three-day delay in shipments for online orders may increase crowds at the company's retail stores ahead of the launch. However Apple is still selling its iPad 2, now a year old, on which it has reduced the price – from a starting price of $499 down to $399 in the US, and from £399 to £329 in the UK.
Would-be Apple buyers can be impatient. In January, enraged Chinese shoppers pelted Apple's flagship store in Beijing with eggs and shoving matches broke out with police after customers were told the store would not begin selling the iPhone 4S as scheduled. The company is believed to have halted sales there after determining that many of the buyers were aiming to sell them on directly for a markup.
The demand for the iPad may raise Apple's share of the tablet market beyond the 60% share it already enjoys, according to some analysts.
IMS Research forecasts that approximately 70m iPads will be shipped in 2012, which would represent a 71% year-on-year growth.
Gerry Xu, PC market analyst at IMS Research, says: "There is a large customer base loyal to Apple products that have been waiting for the latest tablet.
"Many owners of the iPad 1 are also expected to upgrade to the latest release. In addition to this consumer demand, growth is also forecast as a result of sales into enterprise and education."
IMS Research is forecasting that Apple's share will rise to 70%, while that of Android tablets will actually fall, from 35% in 2011 to 26% this year, as new tablets using Windows 8 become available in the latter part of the year.
