A question for you students. Would you use a tablet?

[etalns]

My current laptop is showing its age, and I'm considering buying a new laptop. At this point I am conflicted between going for a regular old laptop (a 12.1" Dell most likely) or a Toshiba Portege M200.

I regularly misplace my notes and mindmaps that I have made, and I was thinking a tablet would be useful to keep me organized and would allow me to embed graphs straigh tinto my notes.

I prefer to do my note-taking in class on a laptop as is, because I write very slowly, and I type extremely fast. The only thing I disliked about taking notes on a laptop was having to scan in the graphs later, which I usually never ended up doing.

 

[KLin]

Kind of old-fashioned don't you think?

 

[hypn0tik]

No. I wouldn't use a laptop for taking notes in class. Chances are I'd end up losing it or have it stolen. Pen and paper FTW!

 

[etalns]

Originally posted by: KLin
Kind of old-fashioned don't you think?

Haha, that was actually pretty good.

Die!

 

[etalns]

Originally posted by: hypn0tik
No. I wouldn't use a laptop for taking notes in class. Chances are I'd end up losing it or have it stolen. Pen and paper FTW!

That fact aside, I'm not too worried about losing it.

 

[hypn0tik]

Originally posted by: Qosis

Originally posted by: hypn0tik
No. I wouldn't use a laptop for taking notes in class. Chances are I'd end up losing it or have it stolen. Pen and paper FTW!

That fact aside, I'm not too worried about losing it.

It'd still be an inconvinience for me at least. I'm not sure of your major, but mine is EE and more than half of my notes are some type of equation, graphs, diagram etc. It'd take forever for me to type up my notes and then twice as long to scan in the graphs.

 

[User1001]

why not try something simpler like the Io pen

 

[etalns]

Originally posted by: hypn0tik

Originally posted by: Qosis

Originally posted by: hypn0tik
No. I wouldn't use a laptop for taking notes in class. Chances are I'd end up losing it or have it stolen. Pen and paper FTW!

That fact aside, I'm not too worried about losing it.

It'd still be an inconvinience for me at least. I'm not sure of your major, but mine is EE and more than half of my notes are some type of equation, graphs, diagram etc. It'd take forever for me to type up my notes and then twice as long to scan in the graphs.

Well, with a tablet you wouldn't have to type in the formulas, you could jsut draw them in.

 

[darkxshade]

Or you can be a little more hardcore and bring about 20 etch a sketch tablets to class to take notes with.

 

[hypn0tik]

Originally posted by: darkxshade
Or you can be a little more hardcore and bring about 20 etch a sketch tablets to class to take notes with.

ROFLMAO! This really had me laughing hard! Nice one!

 

[archcommus]

Originally posted by: hypn0tik

Originally posted by: Qosis

Originally posted by: hypn0tik
No. I wouldn't use a laptop for taking notes in class. Chances are I'd end up losing it or have it stolen. Pen and paper FTW!

That fact aside, I'm not too worried about losing it.

It'd still be an inconvinience for me at least. I'm not sure of your major, but mine is EE and more than half of my notes are some type of equation, graphs, diagram etc. It'd take forever for me to type up my notes and then twice as long to scan in the graphs.

Uh...that's exactly why he's asking if he should get a TABLET.

I'd say DEFINITELY do it. I am an EE major and I use an HP tc4200. It is the best thing I've ever used from HP. It works great as a normal laptop and great as a tablet. Writing is very accurate to pen and paper and does not feel unnatural at all. Coupled with OneNote it's the best thing a student could want. I take all my notes in OneNote (write for math classes, type for history class), and any documents I am given on paper I simply scan and drop it into OneNote.

If you have any questions about tablets in general feel free to drop me a PM.

 

[George P Burdell]

Sure, writing is slower, but sometimes you can use shorthand or little drawings which save a lot of time. In a classroom, my laptop stays in my backpack most of the time, and if I'm actually taking notes, it's with paper and pencil.

 

[HermDogg]

I found that I didn't use my tablet nearly as much as I thought I would. I would take most of my notes via typing on the keyboard, but then to have to use the tablet to sketch in charts and such, it was a pain, and it usually put me a step behind the professor. I would suggest just taking a laptop and then scanning them in later after you copy them down by hand. Much easier.

 

[archcommus]

Originally posted by: HermDogg
I found that I didn't use my tablet nearly as much as I thought I would. I would take most of my notes via typing on the keyboard, but then to have to use the tablet to sketch in charts and such, it was a pain, and it usually put me a step behind the professor. I would suggest just taking a laptop and then scanning them in later after you copy them down by hand. Much easier.

Just write on it with it in laptop mode, not too difficult. Or if you write too messy that way, just stay in tablet mode and write instead of type.

Qosis, just picture having no folders or papers whatsoever. All I have is my laptop and my textbooks which stay on the shelf in my room. Nothing else. It's a beautiful thing.

 

[etalns]

Originally posted by: HermDogg
I found that I didn't use my tablet nearly as much as I thought I would. I would take most of my notes via typing on the keyboard, but then to have to use the tablet to sketch in charts and such, it was a pain, and it usually put me a step behind the professor. I would suggest just taking a laptop and then scanning them in later after you copy them down by hand. Much easier.

How long did the transition between tablet/notebook usually take?

 

[archcommus]

Originally posted by: Qosis

Originally posted by: HermDogg
I found that I didn't use my tablet nearly as much as I thought I would. I would take most of my notes via typing on the keyboard, but then to have to use the tablet to sketch in charts and such, it was a pain, and it usually put me a step behind the professor. I would suggest just taking a laptop and then scanning them in later after you copy them down by hand. Much easier.

How long did the transition between tablet/notebook usually take?

All it involves is flipping the screen around and closing it again, maybe two seconds.

 

[etalns]

Originally posted by: archcommus

Originally posted by: Qosis

Originally posted by: HermDogg
I found that I didn't use my tablet nearly as much as I thought I would. I would take most of my notes via typing on the keyboard, but then to have to use the tablet to sketch in charts and such, it was a pain, and it usually put me a step behind the professor. I would suggest just taking a laptop and then scanning them in later after you copy them down by hand. Much easier.

How long did the transition between tablet/notebook usually take?

All it involves is flipping the screen around and closing it again, maybe two seconds.

That's what I thought also. And for me I would save much more time than that by typing on my keyboard and then quickly flipping into tablet mode and drawing my graph, then flipping back. I type extremely quickly, and write very slowly/sloppily.

 

[archcommus]

Originally posted by: Qosis

Originally posted by: archcommus

Originally posted by: Qosis

Originally posted by: HermDogg
I found that I didn't use my tablet nearly as much as I thought I would. I would take most of my notes via typing on the keyboard, but then to have to use the tablet to sketch in charts and such, it was a pain, and it usually put me a step behind the professor. I would suggest just taking a laptop and then scanning them in later after you copy them down by hand. Much easier.

How long did the transition between tablet/notebook usually take?

All it involves is flipping the screen around and closing it again, maybe two seconds.

That's what I thought also. And for me I would save much more time than that by typing on my keyboard and then quickly flipping into tablet mode and drawing my graph, then flipping back. I type extremely quickly, and write very slowly/sloppily.

Or you could even just lay the screen back flat and write on it without flipping it around.

 

[Ryan]

Nah - I like my regular pad of paper.

 

[etalns]

Originally posted by: archcommus

Originally posted by: Qosis

Originally posted by: archcommus

Originally posted by: Qosis

Originally posted by: HermDogg
I found that I didn't use my tablet nearly as much as I thought I would. I would take most of my notes via typing on the keyboard, but then to have to use the tablet to sketch in charts and such, it was a pain, and it usually put me a step behind the professor. I would suggest just taking a laptop and then scanning them in later after you copy them down by hand. Much easier.

How long did the transition between tablet/notebook usually take?

All it involves is flipping the screen around and closing it again, maybe two seconds.

That's what I thought also. And for me I would save much more time than that by typing on my keyboard and then quickly flipping into tablet mode and drawing my graph, then flipping back. I type extremely quickly, and write very slowly/sloppily.

Or you could even just lay the screen back flat and write on it without flipping it around.

I had considered that also, but a lot of the graphs I do are pretty comprehensive, so I don't think I would want to do those graphs like that.

 

[ts3433]

Paper and pencil aren't obsolete, and I prefer them.

 

[jammur21]

Write notes in class on paper

Type up later that day

That way you go over the material again while it is still new in your head and will notice any areas where your notes are or comprehension of the material is weak. Ask questions before class the next day for clarification.

 

[gotsmack]

I'd buy a tablet if battery life wasn't something like 3 hours. I need something that lasts 6 hours between chrges.

 

[archcommus]

Originally posted by: gotsmack
I'd buy a tablet if battery life wasn't something like 3 hours. I need something that lasts 6 hours between chrges.

Are you in class for that long? And don't your classes have outlets by the desks?

 

[etalns]

Originally posted by: gotsmack
I'd buy a tablet if battery life wasn't something like 3 hours. I need something that lasts 6 hours between chrges.

Some days I have that many hours of classes, and I'm not always able to get a seat with a plug, so I am going to just keep two batteries on me.