I have a Cisco 871 router that is awesome
When I got the ipad1 I had an even worse wifi connection issue. I tried everything and it would get a little better and then go back to awful. Apple would suggest all kinds of time consuming nonsense that didn't work - and then the real kick in the nuts - "we know it's compatible with other apple products." the message I took away was that apple didn't care about their screw-up as long it works with other apple products. Is this their way of trying to push their router sales? It wasn't until apple came out with a new os (6 months later) that it was fixed. IMHO it was crap programming.
I am now having the same problem, though not quite as bad, with my new ipad2. I can't believe apple screwed this up again!
With the ipad1 I could see how they could have an unanticipated problem, 2 years later it is just sloppiness. It is a beautifully designed product, apparently they need to pay some more attention to what's on the inside.
As I write this on an ipad2 the connection has died 3 times and I am 15 feet away from the router.
I realize it may not look the best on the beautiful case, but apple needs to add ethernet ports until they figure out how to build wifi products