Importing gmail contacts

I don't have an iPad but on the iPhone if you set up your gmail as an exchange account you can sync contacts, calendar and get push email.

http://www.google.com/support/mobile/bin/answer.py?answer=138740&topic=14252

Let me know if that works on the iPad.

Works great, thanks for posting that. Hadn't used an apple product before and the guy at the store preset my gmail up for me by selecting gmail for the account type. I deleted that and reset it up using the exchange option. I now have all my calendar data, contacts and mail sync'd. Is there a downside to doing it this way? One odd thing I did notice, While in the mail app, it seems to check for new mail every couple of seconds. I didn't see any way to slow that down. Hoping it isn't doing that all the time and killing the battery.

As far as I know the only downside would be if you actually did want to set up another exchange account, for example, a work email. I understand that only one exchange account can be running at any one time. I have MobileMe, Gmail (Exchange) and a couple of POP accounts all going at once and there is no issue.

The Push email you just created works just like the Push email on MobileMe so there should be minimal impact on battery as it is part of the intended design. If you do start getting low on battery you can switch Push off system wide for a little boost but I don't think it is a huge drain.

actually, i have three email accounts working, just toggle between them.

three exchange accounts? They just announced that feature for 4.0.