What's a tablet?

Well, I get the general idea. It's a laptop with the screen on the
outside. Is there a NG that deal with tablet hardware?

Anyway, I'll ask my question: I have a mass of pdf and text files on
my PC but I'd like to read them over dinner, or while watching TV, or
while sitting up in bed... many places where a great hulking desktop
isn't practical. But, I'm also a cheap bastard. Kindle is out ...
anyway you can't get one at the moment...and Sony reader is out
because it's poor at handling pdf's. Ideally I'd like a Sony Reader
with an 8.5 * 11 screen but some allege that even if you could live
with the tiny size its speed in displaying even the 1st page of a pdf
is glacial. Hmm, doesn't look good. Most of the pdf's are textbooks in
probably 8pt type.

Then it occurred to me that a tablet is almost 8.5 * 11... oh but the
price is astronomical... then again I don't need a fast modern machine
and there are used tablets available for about the price of a new Sony
reader. So will this work for my intended application? Bear in mind
that I've never touched a laptop (strange eh?) let alone a tablet. I
presume the tablet OS is something like Win2K (which I use on my
desktop) or its deformed son, XP? I presume I can transfer a pdf from
the desktop via either a USB port or a CD? I presume I can run it on
110V and ignore the batteries? I presume the same Adobe reader runs on
the tablet? I presume the tablet OS has Notepad (for reading the text
files)? IOW a cheapo old one would be like a (say) 486? Oh, and can I
turn the image around so it looks like a page of a book?

What say you?

In message <>,
writes
>Well, I get the general idea. It's a laptop with the screen on the
>outside. Is there a NG that deal with tablet hardware?
>
>Anyway, I'll ask my question: I have a mass of pdf and text files on
>my PC but I'd like to read them over dinner, or while watching TV, or
>while sitting up in bed... many places where a great hulking desktop
>isn't practical. But, I'm also a cheap bastard. Kindle is out ...
>anyway you can't get one at the moment...and Sony reader is out
>because it's poor at handling pdf's. Ideally I'd like a Sony Reader
>with an 8.5 * 11 screen but some allege that even if you could live
>with the tiny size its speed in displaying even the 1st page of a pdf
>is glacial. Hmm, doesn't look good. Most of the pdf's are textbooks in
>probably 8pt type.
>
>Then it occurred to me that a tablet is almost 8.5 * 11... oh but the
>price is astronomical... then again I don't need a fast modern machine
>and there are used tablets available for about the price of a new Sony
>reader. So will this work for my intended application? Bear in mind
>that I've never touched a laptop (strange eh?) let alone a tablet. I
>presume the tablet OS is something like Win2K (which I use on my
>desktop) or its deformed son, XP? I presume I can transfer a pdf from
>the desktop via either a USB port or a CD? I presume I can run it on
>110V and ignore the batteries? I presume the same Adobe reader runs on
>the tablet? I presume the tablet OS has Notepad (for reading the text
>files)? IOW a cheapo old one would be like a (say) 486? Oh, and can I
>turn the image around so it looks like a page of a book?
>
>What say you?
>
A second hand XP tablet will do everything you want.

I would shoot for a Slate type with no keyboard (and no optical drive)
for the purpose you describe. It would be lighter and easier to handle.
A 1Ghz processor will give you all the power you need to use it as a
reader.

And yes you can turn the screen into portrait mode - that 's the way I
use a tablet almost all the time.

All the tablets I have ever seen come with wireless networking. Get
yourself a cheap wireless router to connect the desktop to, and you can
simply pull the PDF's from the desktop as you want them. You can also
install software from the optical drive on the desktop if needs be.

Good luck
--
Peter R Cook

<> wrote in message
news:...

>
> Then it occurred to me that a tablet is almost 8.5 * 11... oh but the
> price is astronomical... then again I don't need a fast modern machine
> and there are used tablets available for about the price of a new Sony
> reader. So will this work for my intended application? Bear in mind
> that I've never touched a laptop (strange eh?) let alone a tablet. I
> presume the tablet OS is something like Win2K (which I use on my
> desktop) or its deformed son, XP? I presume I can transfer a pdf from
> the desktop via either a USB port or a CD? I presume I can run it on
> 110V and ignore the batteries? I presume the same Adobe reader runs on
> the tablet? I presume the tablet OS has Notepad (for reading the text
> files)? IOW a cheapo old one would be like a (say) 486? Oh, and can I
> turn the image around so it looks like a page of a book?
>
> What say you?
>


I say hit ebay and look for this tablet - "TC1100". It is about the size of
a sheet of paper. Disconnect the keyboard( making it a true slate), install
Adobe 8 on it, and view your PDFs full screen mode (it works very well). As
a portable library with a lot of additional functionality it will be hard to
beat. Not to mention it is color, something that e-paper has not quite
gotten yet. By the time the used tablet gives out ( a few years) you can
re-visit that market.

On top of that the tablet itself, with journal allowing for writing, may fit
your needs better than you realize. Of course you can use wireless with the
tablet as you would a standard computer, bypassing the need to sync with
another desktop (or pulling it off from the desktop hard drive via network
share).


For more info check out wikipedia on ths tablet:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TC1100


(By looking at the wikipedia article it might be cool to note how many
movies and tv shows it has shown up - it just looks cool and fits in your
hands well as a slate. The price on this model should be down in the area
that you are looking now.)

..02, FWIW.