From what I am hearing, The Apple iPad is THE ultimate gift for many of you this year.

So now that you have this amazing device, you may be asking yourself – what are some cool apps to check out?

Here are some of my favorite apps. Many of them are NOT free – but you may find that they have free trial versions. Also, many of these programs will have iPhone (smaller screen) and iPad versions. You will want to look for a notation on the description screen (in the app store) to confirm that the version you are buying is for the iPad. Some apps will have ‘HD’ in the title meaning that it is an application designed for the iPad.

In no particular order (I use these daily or at least once a week):

• Wall Street Journal – You’ll pay a premium for the digital/iPad version of the WSJ, but it beats having to go out in the cold to dig your print edition out of the snow.
• Kindle – (Free) It is so awesome that after having a kindle and bying my books for it, that I can read those on the iPad. I personally like the Kindle app better than the competing Apple iBooks app. Both are free and you can download a lot of books for free (for both apps).
• DropBox – (Free) Wondering how you can get files from your PC to your iPad? Before I had this application, I was emailing them to myself. You install Dropbox on your computer and the app on your ipad, save files to the dropbox and now you can open them on your iPad – awesome! Free 2GB of online storage.
• Flipboard – (Free) A very cool way to view your social media content.
• Netflix – (Free) Requires a Netflix subscription, but allows you to watch instant movies and manage your dvd que from your ipad. This app isn’t perfect (for TV Shows, you can’t jump from one episode to the next), but it is better than nothing and plays movies just fine.
• ABC Player – (Free) Watch recently aired programs from the ABC TV Network on your iPad
• Friendly – The Facebook app available for the iPad is the same as the iPhone/iPod one in that it does not take advantage of the larger screen which is a bit disappointing. Friendly solves that issue – but it does cost a few bucks. Worth it, in my opinion.
• Some games that I’ve spent time playing:
• FlightCtrl HD – Land planes before the crash into each other. Simple to learn, hard to master.
• Dominion HD – A take on Risk, I play this game a lot and love it.
• Angry Birds HD – The most popular mobile game of 2010. Hours and Hours of fun.
• Plants Vs. Zombies HD – Zombies are going to invade your house unless you deploy plants to take care of them – another fun game.
• Crosswords – I never thought crossword puzzles could be so fun. This app allows you to play many different puzzles it downloads every day. Things like hints and real time correction make this fun yet challenging.

Honorable mentions:

• Chipolte – (Free) Its fun to order your favorite burrito and have it ready when you arrive at the store. Skip the lines! More food chains should do this!
• Kayak HD – (Free) A great way to find flights with a TON of search parameters. I love just scrolling through the map and watching the fare prices automatically update.
• OpenTable – (Free) Make dinner reservations quickly and easily.
• Perfect Browser – I was frustrated by the performance of the built in web browser so I use this one which also allows you to force websites to show you the non-mobile version.
• eBay – (Free) I’ve had some problems with this app not showing all of the same auctions from the website, but it is OK
• x-Plane – A fun flight simulator for iPad. Lots of planes, but I don’t get a lot of enjoyment out of it. I think this application really pushes the limits of the iPad and the number of plans make it fun, but I find it a bit difficult to control.
• Chopper 2 – a fun helicopter flying game.

Here are two other posts I made about the iPad this year:

Hello from my new iPad

The Apple iPad ialmost idoes it iagain

Add a comment below with your own thoughts/reviews of your favorites!

For those of us who have not checked everyone off the list yet.

iPad; who would open this gift and not smile?  And, for the price (about $500), not a terribly expensive gift, but a big enough price tag for it to be the front runner of this years pile of gifts.

Samsung Galaxy Tab;  the iPads competition. It has some features that the iPad currently lacks such as dual cameras and support for flash. (about $600)

Flip video; sleek design and fool proof to manage. Films in HD with up to 4 hours of continuous recording . 3 inch widescreen touchscreen works great for the novice videomaker! A perk for this is that you can make it personally designed for the gift receiver by downloading a favorite picture or design for the casing, and it can be as original and unique as the person who receives it.  Starts at $149.99

Kinect;  for the special one you know who loves their Xbox. You are the controller (as their slogan suggests), play games simply by moving around.  Its motion sensing capability also allows navigation of the Xbox 360′s menus with swiping gestures and the built-in microphones work with voice recognition to enable voice command for basic functions. $149

Nook; for the one you love who loves to read.  The displays text is as crisp and clear as a printed page and offers great contrast with no glare or backlight so you can read with ease, even in bright sunlight.  There are over 2 million books available to download wirelessly in seconds and can hold up to 1,500 books.  It has an extra-long battery life so you can read for days.  Exclusive LendMe lets you share reading with friends for up to 14 days. $149

iPod Nano Touch;  iPods newest Nano has a 1 ½ inch square touch screen.  The new nano is a smart, fast, capable player that should please a lot of people looking for something new this holiday season.  $149

LG BD300 Blu-Ray Player;  for the movie/tv lover.  This fully functioning player plays both Blu-Ray and standard DVDs.  It also has the ability to stream from online sources such as YouTube, Netflix and Hulu. $129.99

PENTAX Optio W90 Camera;  for the rugged photographer.  Completely durable as it is waterproof, shockproof & coldproof.  It also features a digital microscope mode with LED lens lighting.  12.1 megapixels. $279.95

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About 20% of our clients request that employees use a specific password for their computer/email or that they let managers know what their passwords are and they keep a list of employee passwords. The reasons for this seem logical – managers want quick access to their employees emails or files when they are out of the office. But the effects of this type of policy can be harmful to the health of your business.

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