Consolidated Tablet Thread

[HHI944]

I ended up with the acer a500 tab. Look great o far, but. I'll really mess with it when I get home.

[Seahawk]

Originally Posted by Mr.Puff

You need iTunes installed for these links....

Just my .02.

Great info, John. Thanks!

Originally Posted by HHI944

I ended up with the acer a500 tab. Look great o far, but. I'll really mess with it when I get home.

What made you change your mind?

[Mr.Puff]

Originally Posted by RWebb

e.g. the iPad can display MS Word and Excle docs (according to a coffee shop Mgr. with one)... but I bet you cannot edit or create them (?)

You can edit Excel or MS Word documents. I am not sure how the documents are then saved. Pages files can be read with MS Word. I haven't tried Numbers documents with Excel yet.

When a document is downloaded you are provided with a list of apps to open the document. For example, when I download a zip file into the browser it now gives me the option to open the zip with ReaddleDocs. ReaddleDocs can then expand the zip.

Can't plug a camera in directly

With this attachment you can.

iPad camera connection kit.

You're welcome Paul .

[Hugh R]

Download the app wattpad she can download about 800,000 public domain books for free.

[island911]

Originally Posted by Mr.Puff

With this attachment you can.

iPad camera connection kit.

You're welcome Paul .

Those look like a way to take the SD card out of the camera, and into an iBarnacle to be read on the iPad.

On the other side ... My old Samsung (win xp) tablet can, not only plug directly to my camera, but I can use the tablet to see what the camera is 'seeing' -- a live preview. AND, If I touch/tap the live preview image, where ever I tap, the camera will take focus at that spot, snap the pic, and instantly download the pic to the tablet. --it's pretty slick.

[jyl]

I would avoid the RIM Playbook. Blackberry has never been able to get enough interesting apps for consumers. With iOS, Android, and WinMobile all competing for developers' attention, I don't see why I'd bet on that changing. I see that RIM says Android app developers will be able to very easily tweak their apps to run on RIM's QNX O/S (not sure how easily, or what performance hit) and distribute them via RIM's app store. But if you're going to rely on Android apps, why have a QNX O/S?

[RWebb]

ThinkPad X-series Tablet??

[HHI944]

Originally Posted by Seahawk

Great info, John. Thanks!



What made you change your mind?

Price and overall reviews. The only consistent negative mark is that it's a little bigger and thus heftier than the competition. At $450 though, it's a clear winner in price. Hardware specs are pretty similar to the wifi only xoom. Still messing around with it, but honeycomb is pretty intuitive for those familiar with android and the changes are mostly vast improvements IMO. TV show streams works on it as well, I use that app a TON!

[red-beard]

Wow! That is a lot more than $100! Did you look at the Galaxy Tab, or did you have to have Honeycomb?

[HHI944]

Just had to have honeycomb and wanted a little larger than the Galaxy.

I was hoping to find a $500ish, but willing to fudge the extra 100 for the xoom until I started researching the a500. Went into a staples, played with it for a while and bought it.
The only thing is that, without an SD, you have to download an app to Macs to transfer files. Not a big deal, but did have me stumped for a minute.

[HHI944]

Really enjoying it so far (posting from it now). The browsing experience is nice and most of my frequently used apps are flawless. Actually, so far the browser is great.

[Mr.Puff]

Originally Posted by island911

Those look like a way to take the SD card out of the camera, and into an iBarnacle to be read on the iPad.

On the other side ... My old Samsung (win xp) tablet can, not only plug directly to my camera, but I can use the tablet to see what the camera is 'seeing' -- a live preview. AND, If I touch/tap the live preview image, where ever I tap, the camera will take focus at that spot, snap the pic, and instantly download the pic to the tablet. --it's pretty slick.

There are two connectors. One is for the SD card and the other accepts the USB plug from the camera.

The auto-focus things sounds pretty cool. iPad 2 has two internal cameras .

[island911]

yeah, my old Samsung tablet also has two internal cameras.(one front, one rear) ...and stereo speakers... and stereo mic's. ... and a couple of USB ports... and an SD card slots, ethernet, VGA out ...and weighs in at 1.5*lbs. But hey, who wants to talk about old, circa 2006 tech, when Apple is on to their second tablet design?

[Mr.Puff]

Originally Posted by island911

yeah, my old Samsung tablet also has two internal cameras.(one front, one rear) ...and stereo speakers... and stereo mic's. ... and a couple of USB ports... and an SD card slots, ethernet, VGA out ...and weighs in at 1.5*lbs. But hey, who wants to talk about old, circa 2006 tech, when Apple is on to their second tablet design?

Haha, I remember all of the tablets from back in the early 2000's. Either the world was not ready yet, or we needed better screens, operating systems, battery life, etc. As I recall the old soft screens would scratch like nobody's biznis. These new glass screens will only scratch if something harder than quartz gets to them. Even steel won't scratch glass .

Tablets through time! Very abridged .

[porsche4life]

Originally Posted by jyl

I would avoid the RIM Playbook. Blackberry has never been able to get enough interesting apps for consumers. With iOS, Android, and WinMobile all competing for developers' attention, I don't see why I'd bet on that changing. I see that RIM says Android app developers will be able to very easily tweak their apps to run on RIM's QNX O/S (not sure how easily, or what performance hit) and distribute them via RIM's app store. But if you're going to rely on Android apps, why have a QNX O/S?

Big +1


iPad 2, Galaxy, or Motorola would be my choice... In that order...

[island911]

Originally Posted by Mr.Puff

Haha, I remember all of the tablets from back in the early 2000's. Either the world was not ready yet, or we needed better screens, operating systems, battery life, etc. As I recall the old soft screens would scratch like nobody's biznis. These new glass screens will only scratch if something harder than quartz gets to them. Even steel won't scratch glass .

Tablets through time! Very abridged .

Yeah, the "Gorilla Glass" is a nice step fwd, for tablets. I'm fairly certain that my wife's old, HP tablet has something similar. --it's pretty tough, what ever it is.

Display brightness is still a problem for most all back-lit tablets. --The e-ink eReaders wouldn't be so popular if the color screens could be easily read out doors.

Kudos to Apple for marketing the crap out of the tablet cmptr. Although, from what I've seen, people are finding the novelty of the iPad to be wearing thin. (Yes, I know there are fan-boys who still sleep w/ theirs). I see iPad being handed down to entertain kids on long flights, or on road trips. I expect that this has a bit to do with the phone OS, but more to do with the PIA input. That is, typing on one is awful, and a fat finger is hardly a precise pointing device.

...just look at navigating this forum. Say you want to select the second page, of a multi-paged thread. ...that '2' is tiny, compared to the field/area that a finger will touch. ...SO, lobster-claw open the area, and then select. ...That's called a work-around, because the input-precision just isn't there.

I'm sure that if Apple owned the internet, that every field would be fat-finger friendly. And that very little information/selection would be on any given page.

But. . .it's not. (thankfully)

That's why Windows tablets are still being used to get work done. They have been designed to have precision input. One can easily select small fields. One can actually hand-write on the screen as if you were using a fine point pen on paper. (The iPad is like a Sharpie, at best) And, the Win Tab's make great work of converting that hand-writing to text - just like this post. (Would hate to type this on a cramped iPad virtual keyboard)

[red-beard]

Acutally, typing on the smaller tablets is pretty good. You hold it with 6 fingers, support it with your pinkies and then type with your thumbs. The larger tablets (10") the keyboard distance is too great for the thumb typer, unless you turn it sideways.

[red-beard]

I'm typing this with my thumbs pretty fast

[island911]

Originally Posted by red-beard

I'm typing this with my thumbs pretty fast

. .for being 'all thumbs'

A buddy of mine thought his texting addicted 16y/o niece was fast w/ the thumb input. ..and she is is fast (for thumbs). But cursive on the Win touch input, or transcriber feature is way faster. It is amazingly accurate, even w/ complete slop for input.

..tho' I do agree, turning it sideways (and thumbs) is still better.

[Mr.Puff]

In landscape I generally type with my right thumb while supporting the iPad, and use my left hand (for typing, not tricking me here!). My hands are large and skinny like an alien though. The small input fields never get me .