According to Forbes, Apple was selling pre-orders for the iPad at a rate of about 25,000 an hour yesterday morning. The numbers aren’t exact at this point and very unscientific. It’s based on differences between the order numbers assigned to early buyers. Not official Apple numbers.

But if it is accurate, here’s how it compares to some initial figures during the debut of the iPhone and iPhone 3G S. There were no pre-orders for the first iPhone, but roughly 200,000 phones were sold in stores on the first day that the phone was available. With the iPhone 3GS there were reportedly “hundreds of thousands” of pre-orders.

The Duracell Instant Charger just got a big refresh. It’s handy as ever and looks nice too. The Duracell Instant Charger Designer version has just gone on sale in the UK in fact. The company claims that Apple and BMW inspired the look, if you can believe it.

The Duracell Instant Charger is pretty damn convenient if you have an iPhone or other battery hungry gadget which can connect by USB. Just plug it in and the lithium ion reserve inside will charge it up on the spot. Pretty sweet. Only £34.99, which isn’t too bad.

iPhone fans will want to recreate the iPhone’s interface on their fridge or other metal surfaces using these cool geeky iPhone App Magnets from Jailbreak Toys. There are 18 different magnets to choose from, measuring 7/8 square. You get an iPod icon along with email, weather, calendar and more.

So you can turn anything into an Apple device. They won’t launch any programs when touched, but it should be $13 well spent to geek up your home or office. All of your other Apple fan-boy friends will be jealous.

While the tech world is anxiously awaiting the launch of Apple’s iPad, a number questions still looming around the exact details of the device and its functionality. One of those questions which was queried directly to Steve Jobs himself was answered today, apparently by Steve Jobs himself.

The Swedish site Slashat.se reports they had sent a question directly to Apple’s CEO asking if the WiFi version of the iPad will support tethering to the iPhone, allowing 3G data access to the iPad. To this the answer came back simply as: “No. Sent from my iPhone.”

Apple’s feud with Adobe has been making headlines and this latest news should make Apple happy. Virgin America has ditched Flash on its website because of lack of iPhone support. The new website was launched on Monday and will be replacing Flash with HTML so that customers can easily check in using their iPhones.

Of course the site will also be moved to HTML5, once the standards have been ratified. We aren’t sure if the loss of Flash will help Virgin America with increased web traffic or not, but we are assuming that they know their customers and if they do, this may be a great move for them.

On Tuesday Apple filed complaints with both the U.S. International Trade Commission and a federal court in Delaware seeking to stop the import, sales and use of some phones made by Taiwanese manufacturer HTC. The complaint suggests that HTC has infringed on patents owned by Apple with a number of their mobile handsets, all which rely on Google’s Android operating system.

The mobile devices in question include the Pro Touch, TouchPro 2, Touch Diamond, myTouch 3G, Tilt II, Pure, Imago, T-Mobile G1, Hero, Droid Eris, HD2 and of course Google’s own Nexus One which was also made by HTC. As many as 10 of the 20 accused violations involve the Nexus One, which brings up some speculation. Since Apple is targeting Android-based mobile devices with HTC, they could be gearing up to go after Google directly with the Android operating system. Not all of the patent infringement complaints by Apple involve the Android OS, however.

Apple has announced that it is filing a lawsuit against HTC over the alleged infringement of about 20 patents that cover critical aspects of touch phones, like hardware, software and touch-display control. Some question whether the lawsuit is actually meant to send Google a message. But maybe it’s against the entire smartphone industry and it’s just Apple showing their teeth.

Apple should probably be more worried about Microsoft and its Windows Phone 7 Series since it has such a nice user interface and all. Basically it’s just business as usual as everybody tries to gain some breathing room in this turf war.

Love or hate Apple, no one can deny that Jobs and his team can make and market a product. The company has the most popular music store around and sells more apps than anyone else sells as well.

Apple has announced that the 10 billionth song has been sold via the iTunes store. The song that made the historic 10 billionth purchase was “Guess Things Happen That Way” by Johnny Cash. The track was purchased by Louie Sulcer of Woodstock, Georgia.

These good looking black and white colored Image S4 and Image S4i earbuds are now making their way out to the masses. The Image S4 in white is already available for pre-order and Apple stores are ready to receive their Image S4i (includes an in-line microphone for iPhone) any time now.

The Image S4 will sell for $79 while the latter is $99. They look pretty awesome despite their lack of colors. Way better than Apple’s own white earbuds.

Obviously the iPad has generated plenty of interest, but we are all waiting anxiously to find out just what the demand is. Well, according to a new survey, the iPad should do slightly better than the iPhone did initially. The survey found that of the 3,200 surveyed, 13% were somewhat likely or very likely to buy an iPad, compared to the 9% who said the same thing about the iPhone when it was first launched.

They also say that the iPad’s relatively low price is a significant factor. Only 8% of those surveyed were unwilling to pay Apple’s prices for the iPad, compared to 28% that said the initial iPhone prices were out of the question for them.

We’ve seen the 3GS Supreme Rose, so it was inevitable that at some point that they cover an iPod in gold too. Stuart Hughes is at it again and this time it’s an iPod.

It will cost you $95,000. Non douches need not apply. The iPod features 263 grams of 18k rose gold, a platinum rear Apple logo with 53 diamonds and a platinum navigation button on the front with 4.5ct of diamonds surrounding it.

Now it’s official and the name of Apple’s mystery tablet is indeed the iPad. Steve Jobs calls the device “very thin”. You can change the homescreen to whatever you want and of course you can browse the web with it. The device has new drop down menus in the mail interface and a large onscreen QWERTY.

Yes, the interface looks just like a huge iPhone. Some other features include the iTunes store built right in as well as YouTube, and YouTube in HD. The scrolling looks super smooth. Jobs casually browsed several sites to demo the device and then demoed email. If you want to send a message, you just hit compose and the keyboard pops up. The typing looks very responsive.

If anyone is likely to know about the Apple tablet, it would be Harold McGraw, CEO of McGraw-Hill, since they publish all kinds of books and you want stuff to read on that tablet, right? Makes sense. In an interview with CNBC, the McGrawster mentioned that the tablet will make an appearance at the upcoming event, which isn’t news, but he did also mention that the OS used will be similar to the iPhone. But will it use the iPhone OS, or is it just loosely based on it?

Also, 95% of all the publishers eBooks are going to be available on the tablet, which makes for a great library of diverse content. There you have it. Confirmation from a dude who should know.

No one seemed to know exactly what Apple intended to do with Lala after it bought the company, but now it looks like Apple may be looking to use it for an online locker for users’ music. Where users will be able to access collections anywhere, through a web browser, or through the iPhone, Apple tablet etc.

Everything would be stored in the cloud, so users could free up memory on their devices. Since customers already own the music, Apple won’t need to renegotiate with labels to get sharing rights. Microsoft has a similar service, but it’s not the same thing. Microsoft charges a $15 monthly fee for a Zune Pass, which offers you unlimited access to the entire Zune Marketplace music catalog.

I neither hate nor love Apple, but the company tends to have those that are at each extreme of the love hate relationship. I have an iPhone I really like, but I am not a fan of Mac computers. If you are a Mac fan and have wished for more screen sizes in the iMac line, your wish may be coming true.

A rumor floating around has Quanta building a new 22-inch iMac computer for Apple that is set to hit this year. There are no hard details on the rumor, but the screen size would fit in between the two existing models.