The incredible new touchscreen device was unveiled at an event in San Francisco.

The new device will cost between $499 and $829 in the US, and fills the gap between smartphones and laptops.

The iPad weighs in at 1.5 pounds for the Wi-Fi model, and 1.6 pounds for the Wi-Fi + 3G model.  The size is 242.8mm x 189.7mm and is only 13.4mm thick.

The display is an impressive 1024 x 768 pixels, full touchscreen, and under the hood is a 1GHz Apple A4 custom-designed, high-performance, low-power system-on-a-chip. Memory comes in 16GB, 32GB and 64GB flash drives. The battery life is estimated at 10 hours while surfing the web on Wi-Fi, watching video, or listening to music.

To get an idea of what the iPad's all about, take a look at this video on the Apple Web site, introduced by product designer Jony Ive.

Rock