If you plan to use the iPad exclusively, or primarily from your home office, or some other location--like a Starbucks--where you know for sure there will be a wireless network connection available, the 3G is sort of irrelevant. But, if you want to be able to use it to access online resources while in transit--like in a cab, or on a train--you may wish you had the 3G connection.

But, that brings us to the second point. If you already have a 3G or 4G portable Wi-Fi hotspot like the Verizon MiFi, or you already have an iPhone or some other smartphone capable of acting as a Wi-Fi hotspot to share the cellular data connection with other devices, then you don't need the iPad to have .

For me, my iPhone is with me virtually 24/7, so it makes more sense to just get a Wi-Fi iPad without the 3G and use my iPhone as a Wi-Fi hotspot if necessary. This arrangement makes sense from a financial and logical perspective.

I am with AT&T, so I pay $25 a month for 2GB of data on my iPhone 4. If I had an iPad with 3G, it would cost me another $25 for a separate 2GB of data on the tablet. For $45 I get 4GB of data shared between the two.

Not only do I end up saving $5 a month, but it gives me more flexibility in case I use more than 2GB of data on one of the devices--like 3GB of data on my iPad, and 1GB on the iPhone. Using separate plans, I would end up paying $35 for the iPad ($25 for the 2GB and $10 for the additional 1GB), and $25 for the 2GB of data on the iPhone 4 even though I only used half of the available data. In this scenario, I would end up paying $15 more for the same 4GB of data just because it is divided between two plans.