Slate PC

[FireFox]

Hi

I was wondering does anyone have any experience with slate PC's?

I've been browsing around for something that will fit my new needs and these things seems like they can work.

Basically my needs are:
1) a electronic document reader, should support as wide as possible document formats
2) smallish (bigger than a cellphone but not as big as a laptop)
3) portable
4) easy to use on the move
5) preferably be able to be used for other tasks as well

It should also be noted that this will be used for personal use as well as office use.

My work has lately required of me to work through lengthy text files and acts. Due to the length they also don't want me to print out these document if they aren't absolutely necessary to save on wasting paper and what not, which I understand and agree with totally. Now reading these documents of the desktop can get tedious to the point the other day I actually dismounted my LCD from its stand so that I can lay it flat to read it more like and actual book/paper document Besides this requirement I sometimes need to present matters and the documents themselves can be up to 50 pages thick and usually it is more than just one matter at a time and you can imagine the workout you can get by just logging your paperwork around

Besides that, there are other smaller things that will make having an e-reader or something similar handy.

At home I also tend to do some late night browsing/reading/checking mail etc. which I like to do in bed before going to sleep. For this I currently use my phone (nokia E63) and you all can imagine that in itself can be annoying to because of the screen size.

This is what brought me to looking into other options and I came across these. What I also like about them and I'm not sure if this is supported across all of them is the ability to use it as an actual notepad with the "pen" and I can use it for checking my mails and other tasks too besides just reading documents. An other thing I like about them is the fact that they are basically a pc minus the physical keyboard like a laptop/notebook which makes them unsuited for my needs and the slate a much easy more portable and easy to use "pc". They also seem to require less "add-on gadgets" to function e.g. the keyboard and mouse as they seem to be touch screen and most of the mouse functions you can do with you finger on the screen itself which I find appealing especially after working on my boss's Galaxy S for a day

At the moment I'm looking at the Mecer LUCID.

Mainly because I could currently only track down 2 different slate pc's available locally. One being the Mecer as stated and the HP Slate 500 but the HP way more pricey

I will dig around some more and see whether there aren't more to become available in the near future but in this backwater country I'm not holding high hopes for it to be any time soon

So any thoughts, inputs, things to look out for, pros, cons would be appreciated.

Thanks

[fliptw]

four letters. starts with an i, ends a d, made by a smug guy in a turtleneck.

What you describe is what an ipad was made for.

[FireFox]

Well yea iPad came to mind but being a Windows user I thought getting a Windows Tablet would be better somehow

Well to be honest after some more reading today I found that yea they have the familiar uses and features they do lack something. Being that windows apps seems not to have caught on that they need to be made touchscreen friendly. So yes my above options would seem to have all the benefits of windows but the majority of the apps on it will come with a drawback of not being touchscreen friendly (meaning just using your fingers as I've came across couple of people mentioning that you will need to use the slate's pen to use some apps). Basically if possible I'd like the device to be finger usage only friendly if you catch my drift. (Thou the pen writing on the Slate is a cool feature, but I'm guessing there is something similar on the other options?)

Digging a bit more I found this comparison sheet and one of the major things that caught my eye was the lack of flash support on the iPad, the lack of multitasking (but I think that has been addressed in iOS4 or something) and the lack of expandable memory. Those are a couple of concerns that will keep me from getting an iPad. But as the obvious Windows Slate tables drawback goes it might make me look more into the Galaxy Tab as most of the concerns of the iPad isn't a problem with the Galaxy and due to the fact I've been working a lot on my boss's Galaxy S which is powered by Android 2.2 I've become a little more familiarized with Android now.

The only thing it would seem to lack is usb ports for easy and quick uploading/downloading of files but that can most likely be circumvented by WiFi but then there is one more thing I would need to have a look at and that is networking. The Windows Slate will be easy to integrate into our "windows network" the Galaxy tab thou I would guess will need to be integrated by something like AllShare? I know my boss mentioned something about her wanting me to sort that out on her Galaxy S on our network so more research for me, joy

[Sirius]

Agreed, the problem with Windows slate PCs is that the user interfaces of pretty much everything out there at present are not designed for touchscreens. You can work with it with some precise finger poking, but in the end, you're probably only going to want to if you have to. I expect this situation to change over time but as of right now the best option if you really want Windows on that form factor is probably a touchscreen netbook so you can at least use a mouse if it becomes too much of a pain.

[fliptw]

the other thing to consider is this:

Planting a tree is pretty cheap.

[FireFox]

the other thing to consider is this:

Planting a tree is pretty cheap.

True but it just takes so damn long to grow But seriously one of the attractions and reasons I'm looking into this option is to reduce the paperwork clutter that is inherent to my work. Having everything on a tablet will be so much easier to manage and organize so that you don't get lost midway in your presentation looking for that odd document you just need for a reference or what not

I should also note that this is particularly orientated to my work as in the near future I will have to start presenting mass volumes of matters that will consist of rather thick documents. Normally you will just need some of the pages but other times you will need to have everything and this can't be determent before hand so you will need to go with everything just in case

[EDIT]
Well I'm still totally in two minds about this as of yet. So far I'm ruling out the iPad for the above stated reasons no matter what who says. I don't want to spend that amount of money and then on top of it more time jail-breaking it to try and force it to accommodate my needs

At the end of the day this device will mostly be used in my corporate work environment and sticking to a windows based form just seems to make a little more sense for me especially considering the prices as the Mecer and Tab is almost the same price over here. That and there just seems to be something missing for me on the Tab I can't figure I guess force of habit being a Windows user and to be honest I've been watching some youtube reviews of the slate's and the Windows 7 issue of not being totally touchscreen friendly does sometime seem like a negligible annoyance as all the issues can be bypassed using the pen. What really caught my eye in these reviews was the note taking and note-to-text decryption capabilities of some of the slates which I can see as a total time-saver in my work place not to mention paper saver. Yes the other devises probably have this too but why go through all the pain of cross platform issues when you can stick to what you know?

One thing though is I've been looking at two particular slate reviews, one being the HP 500 slate and the other the ASUS EP121. For some reason I can't find anything other than store listings on the Mecer and absolutely now video reviews If I were to class these 3 the HP and Mecer would roughly fall in the same hardware specs (the Mecer being a bit slower) and off course the ASUS is in a whole other class but so is the price tag.

The ASUS looks absolutely like what I would like to have [like and need being two whole different things] but it trades off battery life for performance which I understand but 3h is a bit weak. The HP 500's reviews I looked at it would seem like the device will work and manage normal usage pretty good but you will have some issue with smoothness and brute processing power and this is where the ASUS is one up but then I'm not planing on doing photo-shop editing on it either. But looking at my options I was wondering, it would seem that the HP's memory (RAM) can't be increased but the Mecer is a bit of a dark horse here as on this site it states it's maximum capacity is 4GB thou it doesn't give you the ability to select 4GB. So I was kind of wondering wont replacing the stock 2GB with 4GB, if it can be upgraded, compensate a bit on the sluggish performance one would expect from it comparing it now to what I saw on the HP reviews (seeing that it is my only base reference at this time). Because if it will than the Mecer is a pretty appealing option as it will be smooth enough, have a decent battery time (they claim 6.5h which is double that of the ASUS) and costs nearly half what the ASUS costs.

Yes the ASUS is shipped with a keyboard and everything but you really don't get a slate if you're planning on using it with the keyboard now are you? I have enough usb k/b's if I need to have a k/b hooked up or just get the docking station of the Mecer for about $40 extra.

I just need to get some confirmation on the memory upgrade and opinions whether it will increase the performance as I hope it will.

[dwlpunk]

you should give android a try. i have a 7" ARM11 android 2.2 tablet. and the new gingerbread update adds more functionality. great for couch surfing, viewing and editing documents, and streaming youtube.

[Sirius]

Slow performance can be caused by a lot of things, not enough memory being one of them - and 2 GB is a bit on the lean side at the moment, yes. A slow CPU, or sometimes even a slow hard drive can also be responsible though.