Tablet PC

[Shaun Stuart]

Does anyone here use a Tablet PC.

I am an Ipaq owner but I need something more substantial at times and the concept of the tablet pc appeals to me.

Would you recommend one ? How small is the smallest available - can you get one A5 Size yet ???

[Don Tolson]

My wife has a Compaq that her office gave her to test drive. The thing weighs more than my laptop!

I work for Fujitsu and have seen the latest tablets from our neck of the woods and they are much lighter and have pretty neat accessories, keyboards, etc. On both, the handwriting recognition is pretty good -- much better than what we get on the Pocket PC. It's a bit of a pain, though, that you have to use the stylus provided -- it's not a true touch screen, so you can't use just any blunt object.

Most of the tablets are just over 8.5x11 format -- to make it look and feel like a notepad you carry around. I believe most of them will handle A5 format -- just not possibly at 100%.

You don't really get the full benefit of using a tablet unless you're in a facility with a WiFi setup -- it's neat to be able to walk around the building with your PC right there with you, to access email, meeting schedules, LAN-based documents and databases, etc. If there's no wifi, then you're better off sticking to a laptop for now.

[JackTheTripper]

A friend got one cause they wanted to show off. They don't have WiFi at home, only at the office. Also didn't istall a wifi card. 8O And also didn't realize the thing didn't come with a CD-ROM drive. 8O 8O

Make sure it's really what you want and will work for you.

[Jeff Rutledge]

I was able to trial a Compaq TC1000 for about three weeks. I found it very cool in concept, but it was definitely an emerging technology. I don't think the O/S or the apps take enough advantage of the pen input. I also found it very slow compared to my laptop.

There were good things though. I found the power consumption to be pretty good. And the ability to turn on WiFi and surf pages on such a small form factor without sacrificing anything was very cool. The handwriting recognition was very good as well. Speech recognition wasn't bad, and I think it would have been better if I'd taken the time to train it.

The only application unique to the tablet is Windows Journal. I found this to be a really good concept and could see myself using it often. The integration with other applications wasn't that great. I hear this is going to change with Office 2003 though.

For me it wasn't ready to replace my laptop, but I'm looking forward to the day when it is. 8)

[jimski]

I just ordered an Acer C110 today. My laptop's hard drive started giving me disk errors yesterday (18 month old hard drives do that) and I know the inevitable is coming so IT ordered me a new laptop machine that will probably take 2-3 weeks to get delivered and configured.

While I am waiting for the new laptop (a 7.5 pound desktop replacement) I thought I would play with the Acer for a bit and see where it could fit in. Comparing the Acer to the Compaq, I thought Acer provided more bang. It measures 10" x 8.5" x 1.2" and includes an integrated keyboard and external CD-RW/DVD drive.

All of our facilities now have wireless and I am thinking of using it around the office (meetings, etc.) or when I travel for short trips that are not necessarilly technology intensive. At 3.2 lbs. I know my back will thank me.

[Don Sorcinelli]

I have been using an Acer C104 for a couple of months now. Personally, I am in love with the technology, but I fit the business profile for someone who probably should (lots of meetings, lots of note taking, still want a full OS). I did a review of the C104 at BostonPocketPC.com (http://www.bostonpocketpc.com/modules.php?op=modload&name=Reviews&file=index&req=showcontent&id=130). I wrote up not on the hardware, but also how it worked from a needs perspective.

I don't think the Tablet PC (in its current incarnation) is for everyone, and is not intended to be. Its just a matter of doing a simple needs assessment and determining if a Tablet PC is of any value to you.