I'm trying to establish which of the best tablets out there are business friendly. I just need to be able to create, modify docs in word and excel as well as pdfs (adobe). I dont need much more than that or I would look towards the ultra book lines?
Can anyone advise which are options and/or the best when considering the usual tablet features including great entertainment features.
many thanks
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General discussion
Please help me understand today's tablet craze?!
Please help me understand today's tablet craze?!
I don't understand about the mobile tablets. I have used and
programmed computers for over 30 years. I have always told everyone
that laptops are so mobile. Now, everyone has gone nuts about
tablets. Why???? There is little storage. The keyboard screen is
pathetic. A tablet has no screen protection unless you buy a case.
Don't get me wrong, I use touch screen phones but typing on a
physical board is sooo much faster. Now, I was told that using a
tablet with a printer can be very difficult. What is going on? I
thought that maybe the cost is the key. Now there is an Apple iPad
that costs $1000. Great laptops cost less! Please help me understand
this craze, is this a fad? Your thoughts are appreciated.
--Submitted by: John C.
Discussion is locked
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For Windows 8 you want the Pro models. For Windows 7 tablets, most will do fine.
Bob
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The cheaper windows 8 rt tablets would be good if all he needs is office and pdfs, the Windows rt opens office in the desktop, and has a normal desktop mode, you just can't install the normal applications. You can also open the browser, chrome or ie, I'm not sure if Firefox has a rt version, in desktop or app mode
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I should also mention that Samsung androids come with a Polaris office app capable of opening word, ppt, and excel it can edit them, but it is no Microsoft Office. The ipad comes incompatible, I believe it can view most of them though. but there are apps available, none of them are free for ios though.
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I went out and bought a tablet (Samsung Galaxy Tab 2, similar to a friend's) since this thread began. I'm trading it to my brother for an old desktop with a non-working CD drive.
The voice command is nice when it's available. Voice searches and like that are absolutely necessary, though, because the "virtual keyboard" is useless. Even at my maximum patience and effort level, I can only log into my email about 10% of the time. I got an app for Yahoo mail, but cannot find any way to log out of it. That's a security issue and therefore renders the app useless. Other apps worth the time it takes to download them are few and far between. The much ballyhooed battery run time is cancelled out by the fact that the unit never shuts down. The tablet needs charging more often than either my cell phone or my Kindle, both of which I use more than the tablet. Being able to show someone YouTube videos or pictures of whatever could conceivably be useful if I had 4G, but I have not actually found an occasion for that so far, and YouTube especially is far easier for me on laptops.
I have learned enough touch-screen technique for the basics, and I'm sure I will eventually need to learn more. I come out neutral on that one.
All in all, I will eventually probably end up with an ultrabook or a tablet with a keyboard, but this is not the day. Today's tablet is an indicator of future progress but not worthwhile in its own right.
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My first entry into the digital phone market was a Nokia 9000 (like a micro laptop with a REAL keyboard). Using its auxilliary functions, alarms, appointments, etc. was extremely easy and required no reference to the user manual. Except that batteries are no longer available for it, I would still be using it.
When I had to replace it, I purchased a cheap Huawei, full touch screen, but found that the touch keys were way too small so I used the upgrade in 7 days option to buy something physically larger (U8230). The only reason I deliberate chose a full size touch screen was to keep the dirt out of buttons.
The auto-rotate into landscape so that I can TXT with larger keys ONLY works with TXTing, not data-entry and I very quickly turned off auto-correct and predictive text because I rarely want to enter words with sexual connotations (shows where the programmers are thinking, doesn't it?).
I have seen many people using their phone as facebook and eBay tablets, and I simply couldn't be bothered. If I want to enter serious text (like this post), it can wait until I get home to a decent keyboard and screen.
I am currently looking into a "Phablet", because if I'm going to lug something around for 'net use, I want phone capability as well. There are some nice Android units out there, but I'm in no rush.
I still await a manufacturer to blast this market open by crossing a Phablet with a Kindle -- ePaper is now capable of sixteen colors, as the greatest use I would have for a larger screen would be reading, and if I'm not wasting battery power on video the slower screen refresh is not a problem and, again, photos can wait until I get home to a real computer.
Also, because of XP-bleed, I am upgrading machines to both Win7 and Win8.1 and naturally the Win8.1 machine is multi-touch. The choice of a proper multi-touch screen, is because I have encountered significant mouse problems when it comes to accessing gesture-based functions. Of course, I will still have to connect mouse and keyboard for serious data usage!
The best use I see for a tablet is in-travel entertainment. At the moment, I'm quite happy with an MP3 player hardware to a D-Cell instead of having change AAAs every couple of hours. Visit instructables.com and lookup Treknology!
If there were a Phablet released tomorrow that allowed full video playback for 24-hours (without needing a an over-the-shoulder battery pack), I would give it serious consideration but, for a standard cell phone, I'll be sticking with my existing Huawei until the replacement batteries dictate that it requires replacement.
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