iPad™ For Dummies®

Chapter 9. iPad Video: Seeing Is Believing

In This Chapter

• Finding videos

• Playing videos on your iPad

• Restricting movies

Picture this scene: The smell of popcorn permeates the room as you and your family congregate to watch the latest Hollywood blockbuster. A motion picture soundtrack swells up. The images on the screen are stunning. And all eyes are fixed on the iPad.

Okay, here comes the reality check. The iPad is not going to replace a wall-sized high-definition television as the centerpiece of your home theater. But we do want to emphasize that with its gorgeous, nearly 10-inch, high-definition display — arguably the best we've seen on a handheld device — watching movies and other videos on the iPad can be a cinematic delight. The screen looks terrific even when you're not viewing it straight on.

So without any further ado, let's get on with the show!

Finding Stuff to Watch

You have a couple of main ways to find and watch videos on your iPad. You can fetch all sorts of fare from the iTunes Store, whose virtual doors you can open directly from the iPad.

Or, you can sync content that already resides on your PC or Mac. (If you haven't done so yet, now is as good a time as any to read Chapter 3 for all the details.)

The videos you can watch on the iPad generally fall into one of the following categories:

• Movies, TV shows, and music videos that you purchase or fetch free in the iTunes Store: ...