Just to be clear, I am only having trouble downloading and installing from the app store from my home wifi connection, it takes forever! I have no trouble downloading to any other devices, my netbook, laptop and media center linux box all stream hulu movies and videos with no issues and I can download files just fine. Just a point of clarification, I even have this trouble with the iPad2 when I disconnected all other devices from my wireless and wired network and reset the wireless access point to the factory default settings.
I am a newbie when it comes to Apple products so please bear with me, I know Unix & Linux and windows very well and am now learning iOs and Os X (which I thought would be easy with a Unix background). At home I use Linux almost exclusively, the only time I run windows is for iTunes. I can install apps from iTunes just fine, it is a little slow, but that is because it is a very old computer.
I can browse the internet, read The Daily, USA Today, CNN and The New York Times just fine on the iPad2, the only thing that is slow is downloading and installing apps from the app store.
I reset the iPad2 to factory settings, added it to iTunes as a new iPad and then tried to download, still having the same issue. Then, I reset it again and restored my last backup and am still having the issue. I called Apple Support and got to level 2 tech support and they said it is an issue with my network settings, but don't know how to change them. I didn't get a chance to stop at the Apple Store yet, will have to plan the trip for my next day off.