Thinking about a tablet? All new to me

[heymrdj]

So work is considering upgrading me to lead design analyst and with that comes the choice of a tablet (i have to be alot more mobile). I wouldn't mind because my current arsenal of choice is my HP DV9550t (2.4Ghz T7400 Core 2 Duo, 4GB RAM, 60GB OCZ Vertex 2 SSD and 320GB Scorpio Black drives) or my netbook (Atom N450, 2GB RAM, 160GB Hitachi POS drive). The dv is simply too big for working with in one arm (12cell battery, dual HD's, 17" screen, lots of weight) and the mini is...well an atom. I have to run windows apps on it of course and it's just not that speedy. I ran it with the SSD (original reason I purchased it) but to be honest the mini just held it back, the access times were great but the atom just sat 100% pegged all the time so it wasn't really much faster.

What I'm thinking of is a tablet that will give me at least 4 hours of battery life, a good solid touchscreen, with decent power to manipulate excel files from a datastore on the wireless network. These excel files can be upwards of 8MB with several thousand rows (ctrl-F is useful here). My goal is to eventually convert this to a database so that will be a good question there as well.

So here the questions that will determine the best tablet:
Support for an app that can open MS word and excel files
Future support (by app or otherwise) to manipulate a database (maybe as simple as interfacing MySQL with PHPMyAdmin, but otherwise maybe MS Access support)
Support (by app or otherwise) browsing a simple windows network store with no password

Optional:
Some kind of docking system like the trasformer to make it Netbook like when I'm at my desk (as rare as that is)

So help me all mighty AT!

 

[Glitchny]

Asus slate

probably meets your needs the best as it straight up runs windows and battery life doesn't seem to be a large concern. Heard there is a new version coming out but didn't have a link on hand.

 

[heymrdj]

Asus slate

probably meets your needs the best as it straight up runs windows and battery life doesn't seem to be a large concern. Heard there is a new version coming out but didn't have a link on hand.

That's probably a little too much D:. While I would love it I'll probably be hard pressed to justify a grand to them for that monster. This is a business after all. :awe:

 

[hanoverphist]

That's probably a little too much D:. While I would love it I'll probably be hard pressed to justify a grand to them for that monster. This is a business after all. :awe:

"this is what i need to stay productive. a laptop is too large to use one-handed and a netbook/ipad/touchpad doesnt support the software we are required to use"

seems pretty simple. thats pretty much what i did to get the laptop i have for work, it costed a bit more than twice what the other managers laptops did, but im the only one that does as much with it, and i needed a true desktop replacement. the other guys do email, internet and a few different bid programs. the owner just looked at the spec sheet for about 20 sec and told me to get it.

 

[heymrdj]

"this is what i need to stay productive. a laptop is too large to use one-handed and a netbook/ipad/touchpad doesnt support the software we are required to use"

seems pretty simple. thats pretty much what i did to get the laptop i have for work, it costed a bit more than twice what the other managers laptops did, but im the only one that does as much with it, and i needed a true desktop replacement. the other guys do email, internet and a few different bid programs. the owner just looked at the spec sheet for about 20 sec and told me to get it.

My supervisor breaks our possessions down over the span of jobs. When a job comes in with 15,000 before any materials (servers ect) and labor (our wages) a 1,500$ laptop won't fly. Maybe if I offer to pay for some of it, but feeling him out I'm pretty sure the ceiling will be about 500-600 at most.

 

[Oyeve]

Seems like what you want to be "productive" and what you want to "spend" just doesnt exist yet. 500-600 will get you an adroid tab or an ipad but not gonna work well with excel. The only viable option I see is an Asus transformer, use polaris and get the KB all for 600ish (shop around for KB sales). You will have the closest to what you want but it may not me all that. I still think Glitchny had the best idea, you just dont want to spend that much.

 

[vi edit]

Sounds like you want a Macbook Air.

 

[heymrdj]

Sounds like you want a Macbook Air.

An Air is hinged, and requires balancing it in my hand while I work with it in the other. If that were the case I'd just use my netbook, but it's aggravating to Columbus type on something that weeble wobbles on every touch.

 

[Nintendesert]

http://www.panasonic.com/business/toughbook/fully-rugged-laptop-toughbook-19.asp


Good luck!

 

[vi edit]

An Air is hinged, and requires balancing it in my hand while I work with it in the other. If that were the case I'd just use my netbook, but it's aggravating to Columbus type on something that weeble wobbles on every touch.

As a tablet owner, I don't think it's going to the boost to productivity that you hope it will be.

A tablet is a portable, high battery life and convenient content viewer (of stuff like web, pictures, and movies). Not so much database kinda stuff or large spread sheets.

It sounded like you wanted a fast, portable, high battery life content manager. Basically a combination of your netbook and notebook. Best of both worlds. Hence my recommendation for the MBA.