Jerry Fahrni

Tag: Tablets

  • Look at the Transformer Prime with keyboard dock

    Nice little review of the Transformer Prime (TFP) hardware at GigaOM. Make sure to check the game play at around 7:55 in the video. The reviewer plugs an Xbox 360 controller into the USB slot on the keyboard dock and uses it to play Shadow Run. How cool is that. 

    I really think the hybrid design of the TFP is ideal for many situations, especially for those people that truly want to carry a single device. As much as I like tablets I find that I still need a keyboard for any significant data entry chores, whether it be with a spreadsheet, word processor, etc.

    I would really like to see tablet PC manufacturers like Lenovo and Samsung do something similar, i.e. a keyboard dock that increases battery life and folds into a laptop style portfolio with the tablet docked. My dream machine would be a Samsung Series 7 Slate with a laptop dock similar to the TFP. It doesn’t appear that Samsung is interested in such a docking solution, but I’m hopeful that a third party will take the hint and do it anyway.

  • New Windows 7 slates on the way

    Hmm, it looks like we’re going to start seeing more and more Windows 7 slates as the end of the year approaches. The most recent sighting is the the Dell Latitude ST.

    According to Tablets Planet the “Latitude ST tablet features a Intel Atom processor, Windows 7, Microsoft Bitlocker, Kensington lock, USB port, SD card slot, HDMI port, and a LCD that features finger multi-touch and a stylus for input, and there are also front and rear-facing cameras for video conferencing (front) and taking photos (rear).”

    In addition the Latitude ST claims an 8 hour battery life. This is in line with the battery life claims of the Samsung Series 7 tablet.

    Now if I could just get Samsung or Dell to develop a docking solution similar to the Asus Transformer we’d have something.

  • Interactive Handbook on Injectable Drugs for iPad and iPhone

    It feels like a day doesn’t go by that I don’t receive an email letting me know of something cool for mobile devices. With the ever increasing onslaught of tablet and smartphone use in pharmacy practice it’s only a matter of time before everything will be available in some electronic media format.

    In this case it’s ASHP’s Interactive Handbook on Injectable Drugs: IV Decision Support by Lawrence A. Trissel. Every pharmacist working in a hospital pharmacy knows about this reference. And if they don’t then they have a big problem because it’s only one of the most definitive reference sources for IV compatibility. Over the course of my career it’s simply been know as “the Trissel’s”. (kind of like “the Talyst”…just sayin’ – private joke people)

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  • Tarascon Pharmacopoeia available for Android and iPad

    I received the email below a few days ago announcing that The Tarascon Pharmacopoeia is now available for Android and the iPad. I’m not a big fan myself, but the reference appears to be popular with certain crowds. Historically it’s more popular with community/retail pharmacists than hospital pharmacists. This might have something to do with the availability of drug pricing in the Tarascon Pharmacopoeia. Who knows.

    Link to Android version is here.

    Link to iPad version in iTues store is here.

    tarascon

  • A tablet for the pool, the Fujitsu Arrows Tab LTE F-01D

    The Fujitsu Arrow Tab LTE F-01D is similar to many tablets currently on the market today. It has all the goodies like a 10.1-inch 1280 x 768 screen, a 1GHz dual-core processor, a pair of cameras, 16GB of storage, micro-USB, microSD card slot, and Android 3.2 Honeycomb. Now for the really cool stuff, it’s waterproof and obeys gesture commands via its front facing camera.

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  • Is the Motion J3500 still the best Win-Slate on the market?

    j3500To borrow a phrase from Tommy Lee Jones in The Fugitive, I’ve been doing a “hard-target search” recently for a new tablet PC. Don’t get me wrong, I love my Lenovo x201 Tablet PC, but I really want to try another slate.

    In my mind the ASUS Eee Slate EP121 (who comes up with these names?) is currently the best tablet PC slate on the market. I’ve spent quite a bit of time messing around with it at the Microsoft Retail Store at Bellevue Square in Washington. The employees in there must think I’m some kind of stalker.

    As far as the EP121 goes the inking is great, the touchscreen responsive, it’s fast, it’s the perfect size and it just “feels right” in my hands. So what’s the problem? The battery life is terrible? The information on the tablet states that the battery life is less than 3 hours. Online reviews have it at about 2 hours. That’s ridiculously bad in this day of hi-tech.

    I looked hard at the Motion Computing CL900, but just don’t think it has enough muscle for me. It’s a bit slow and clunky. That’s a bummer as on the surface the CL900 looks like the perfect device.

    While rummaging around the Motion Computing website for information on the CL900 I stumbled across an old friend, the Motion J3500. I’ve used it’s predecessor, the J3400 before and it was a great machine. I found the J3400 to be a good mix of functionality, toughness and battery life. With upgrades to the hard drive, processor and display the J3500 may just be the best option currently available, which says something about the tablet market; the J3500 is over a year old.

  • HP webOS dies a quick, albeit painful death

    hpTP_deathHP decided to discontinue the webOS, which means the TouchPad is no more. I can’t say that I’m totally surprised that it failed, but I am shocked at the speed at which the company pulled the plug. I thought this might happen. I even went as far as to say “the webOS died in 2010” in a post back on December 31, 2010.

    I have no idea why HP killed the webOS, but I’m sure we’ll find out more in the weeks to come. The operating system itself was awesome. I personally think it had the best user experience of all the current tablet platforms. I was looking forward to it’s maturation as a mobile computing ecosystem. With that said I think HP failed to offer the smartphone variety necessary to make the HP TouchPad meaningful.

    I considered buying a TouchPad, but ultimately decided against it. Like many others I have a host of tablets to chose from these days. Why did I baulk at the TouchPad? Basically it boils down to cost, lack of smartphone choice and the feeling that the TouchPad still had some growing pains to go through. These are the same reasons that lead me to hold off on purchasing many of the early Android tablets.

    Good-bye TouchPad. Your death was premature to say the least. Shame on you HP for destroying such a beautiful tablet operating system.

  • FrankenNook gets a facelift, suffers from identity crisis

    ScreenShotI’ve been using my rooted Nook Color, a.k.a. FrankenNook, for a couple of months now. Turns out that it makes a great Android tablet. There are a couple of things missing from my little lab experiment, the most glaring of which is a camera, but overall it’s given me a nice travel companion with great functionality and solid battery life.  

    The most common uses for the device to date have been:

    1. Games – hands down the activity that I use the tablet for most. Favorite games include Drag Racing, Pinball Ride and Peggle
    2. Reading – Pulse, Google Reader, etc.
    3. Interacting with social media – Google+, Twitter, Facebook
    4. Email, both work and personal
    5. Surfing the net – I don’t do this nearly as much as I thought I would. Most of my surfing is the result of following a link in Twitter or Google+

    One of the things I’ve been playing with is launchers. Throw in the fact that I’ve been recently considering converting to a Windows 7 smartphone and you can imagine my intrigue when I came across Launcher 7 for Android.

    Description from the Android Market:

      A Windows Phone 7 style launcher for Android.

      Unlike other current WP7 launchers (Windows Phone Android, Metro UI), this one allows you to properly modify your start screen. Just long press on a tile and drag tile where you want!

      I installed Launcher 7 and have been using it for about a week. I like it a lot. It does seem a little weird to be running a Windows 7 launcher on a Nook Color rooted to run Android.
      Overall I like the Windows 7 Phone experience. One thing that’s missing is widgets. Having widgets for Android is a real game changer for me. I use widgets for a lot of things; weather, Evernote, news, calendar, agenda, alarm  clock, etc. I’m not sure I want to live without them.
      Final verdict? I think I like having widgets enough to continue using Android for now. My new launcher of choice? Go Launcher EX. 

  • Taking a look at the Lenovo ThinkPad Tablet

    I know, I know, Android tablets are starting to stack up all over the place. A week doesn’t go by that another Android tablet hits the market. This week it’s the 8-inch Vizio tablet making the rounds.

    However, it wasn’t the Vizio tablet that captured my attention this week. It was the Lenovo ThinkPad Tablet. According to the Lenovo website it should be available at the end of this month.

    I already have a couple of Lenovo machines – a T410S laptop and a x201 tablet pc – so it’s not much of a leap for me to be excited about the introduction of a Lenovo Android slate.

    What separates this Android tablet from others is that it is targeted at business users. This basically means it comes preloaded with some productivity software as well as a couple of other nice touches like Gorilla Glass, ThinkPad Tablet Dock, ThinkPad Tablet Pen and foldable ThinkPad Tablet Keyboard Folio case.

    Specifications:

    • NVIDIA® Tegraâ„¢ 2 Dual-Core 1GHz processor
    • Androidâ„¢ 3.1
    • 10.1” WXGA (1280×800) 16:10 IPS panel with Corning® Gorilla® Glass
    • Multitouch display with digitizer input (pen optional)
    • Starting at 1.65 lbs
    • Up to 8 hours battery life (with WiFi enabled)
    • Up to 64GB storage
    • Bluetooth®, WiFi and 3G connectivity
    • Native USB 2.0 and micro-USB ports, full-size SD card slot and mini-HDMI output

    I really like what the Lenovo ThinkPad Tablet has to offer. I’ve been patiently waiting for the right Android slate to come along before I purchase another device. I was convinced that the Samsung Galaxy 10.1-inch tablet was it, but I think I’ll wait for the Lenovo to make my final decision. 

     

  • Tablet hunting – the Fujitsu STYLISTIC Q550 not so good

    I’ve been contemplating a new slate tablet PC. The market is full of them, which should make choosing one a piece of cake. Unfortunately it’s turning out to be much more difficult than originally thought.

    The most common problem, for me at least, has been short battery life. Less than four hours just isn’t an option, which eliminates what I think is the best slate tablet on market the Eee Slate EP121. So you can imagine my elation when I saw the specs for the Fujitsu STYLISTIC Q550. The screen size of the Q550 is a little small, but the pen and multi-touch input along with the claims from the manufacturer of extended battery life, up to 8 hours, caught my attention.

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