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Questions to owners?

Hey all, I am in the market for either a new laptop or tablet and after reviewing have picked up that I really do like the TF300T, I am in debate of which machine to get.
I want something decent that I can do the usual web browsing on and play games. I have a main PC at the moment but am going to be travelling to Australia in a few months and won't have access to it, I like the tablet as the battery life is excellent (so I've heard) and is nice to have as a casual device at night time when you are relaxing.
I may do some learning of coding but nothing too much and I am sure there are notepad ++ style apps out there.
Your input wouldbe greatly appreciated of this machine, I have played with it at Curry's for about 25 minutes and was quite impressed, the keyboard wasn't as bad as I thought either.
Many thanks!

Avengedsins said:
Hey all, I am in the market for either a new laptop or tablet and after reviewing have picked up that I really do like the TF300T, I am in debate of which machine to get.
I want something decent that I can do the usual web browsing on and play games. I have a main PC at the moment but am going to be travelling to Australia in a few months and won't have access to it, I like the tablet as the battery life is excellent (so I've heard) and is nice to have as a casual device at night time when you are relaxing.
I may do some learning of coding but nothing too much and I am sure there are notepad ++ style apps out there.
Your input wouldbe greatly appreciated of this machine, I have played with it at Curry's for about 25 minutes and was quite impressed, the keyboard wasn't as bad as I thought either.
Many thanks!
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Its a great device. Not quite a laptop replacement from a productivity standpoint, but it can handle basic tasks with the addition of the dock. I use mine mainly for entertainment purposes. Hard to put down when i am relaxing at home or on the road.

dxwilliams40 said:
Its a great device. Not quite a laptop replacement from a productivity standpoint, but it can handle basic tasks with the addition of the dock. I use mine mainly for entertainment purposes. Hard to put down when i am relaxing at home or on the road.
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I don't have a doc and I'm sure it would increase the functionality,
but it definetely is not a laptop replacement for productivity or development work
particularly if you're going to learn to code, I'd recommend a laptop, where you can have all standard modules and libs available
while android is based on linux, there's quite a few things that are either crippled or not available
you'd have to learn to compile quite a few things from source yourself
KAD

I use DroidEdit as a text editor and it works pretty well. It can use files from dropbox, local storage, ftp, etc and color formats code. While not the most optimal solution as doing internet research and coding at the same on a desktop/laptop, it still gets the job done.

Avengedsins said:
Hey all, I am in the market for either a new laptop or tablet and after reviewing have picked up that I really do like the TF300T, I am in debate of which machine to get.
I want something decent that I can do the usual web browsing on and play games. I have a main PC at the moment but am going to be travelling to Australia in a few months and won't have access to it, I like the tablet as the battery life is excellent (so I've heard) and is nice to have as a casual device at night time when you are relaxing.
I may do some learning of coding but nothing too much and I am sure there are notepad ++ style apps out there.
Your input wouldbe greatly appreciated of this machine, I have played with it at Curry's for about 25 minutes and was quite impressed, the keyboard wasn't as bad as I thought either.
Many thanks!
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
if you don't code too much then get the tablet,
for other purposes like entertainment, surfing the web,... the tablet can also handle them

Thank you all for your input. After a lot of consideration I went with the laptop (which really sucked as I truely wanted the tablet) more so as I found one for less than I could get the tab and can play games.
Hopefully it won't be a mistake!
Sent from my Desire HD using xda app-developers app

Tablets worth the price?

So, feel free to flame, but I was writing something in another thread about tablets and the following came to mind:
Are tablets worth what we pay for them? Or are they just a marketing 're-deploy'? Allow me to expound:
Literally just before tablets careened onto the current computer scene(I know windows failed to promote tablets years back), there existed Netbooks. What it seems to me is that Netbooks are what the Industry thought we would want, A very portable yet still completely functional computer. As if even the small laptops weren't small enough...anyway. What I think happened is these things weren't cool enough. Maybe not powerful enough either, but that point should be moot because modern hardware can support this, as proven by current tablets.
I bought a Netbook and loved it, BUT I don't do a lot of gaming, just some simple web browsing, skyping, some skript kiddie type hacking. Plus for me the ultra small design was essential due to the nature of my work/constant traveling blah blah. This thing played movies, had the latest support of my favorite *nixes and performed pretty well except for battery life(typically a measly 3-4 hours) and of course gaming. Then came tablets; they look cooler, offer touch screen capabilities which sometimes feel as cumbersome as alt-tabbing, and have much much better battery and gaming performance, with the added benefit of blending nicely with the current "app store eco-structure".
Ahh, finally my point!!!:
A trend I see rising with tablets is the ability to add a keyboard and mouse....really? So what, then you have a laptop again? Or just the ability to go from cool-tech-but-not-too-nerdy tablet guy, to an fully functional device, and back again? I don't get it, other than the obvious shift to more clever marketing and selling us yet another device. On top of that I can use a USB 2.0 anything on my netbook, or be stuck with a proprietary connecter as with the Transform or iPad. Why would we choose this other than to look cool or because it's being shoved down our throats? What I see is a device (tablet) that is less fuctional, less productive, and more money compared to the more practical, just as portable netbook. I just miss the support of my Netbook, which I only paid $200 for....
Any thoughts...like maybe I'm a crazy hippy that needs to go live in a commune?

my points why my a500 is better use then a netbook,.
portability - no one can say its not easier to carry a slim tablet with a integrated keyboard
functionality - being able to do such things as stand in the street looking through the tab with the camera and seeing augmented reality deal, offer, new location without having to open startup, login and hold a massive block of hardware to do the same, and also a whole plethora of other uses such as barcode scanning, video making ,etc etc imaging scanning barcodes to find cheaper prices with a netbook,,,.,..one handed possible? probably not
battery life, my tablet can go 2days on a single charge with medium usage, a netbook would last a few hours,
i can do pretty much anything on my a500 i can do on my laptop.
i can access and use my laptop with screen and sound from anywhere else in the world.....from my a500 tablet (phonemypc)
also most usb devices connect to my a500 i think the only thing my lappy has that my tablet doesnt is a dvd drive, but the one in my lappy is dusty as hell as i download all my movies and move them between devices to play in diff' areas anyway. and then again my laptop has no gps. and only a front camera
if my laptop im writting this message with was a tablet it would probably be a crap one lol
no gps,no touchscreen, no back camera, front camera is weak no accelerometer no hdmi port lol etc etc

Major edit:
I see your point and don't want to convolute my thoughts too much. I just think a lot of the things you mentioned could be implemented, if the money was there.
You have pointed out that I have kind of answered my own questions...
Why tablets, because the phone market was so successfull and it allows for a lot of control on the developers end of the OS, so it's easier to implement the apps, market place as apposed to a traditional PC software sales setup.

r0zj0k3r said:
I think that depends on what you want to do. with my netbook, I literally could do everything I could on my computer because they were the same OS!!! That means, compiling software, video/audio editing, skype with group video , a similar app store could be integrated into a netbook style os (see ubuntu store). The industry just doesn't want to push it, and because it was easier to shift from phones to what amount to "really big phones"
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Do you think that the new windows OS will allow you to switch between a Tablet and your Netbook without loose of functionality?

warus1 said:
Do you think that the new windows OS will allow you to switch between a Tablet and your Netbook without loose of functionality?
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I think it would be a great way for windows to break away from the pack, but I don't think they want to do that now. They seem to be in the same mode as everyone else, lets follow the market instead of trying really new things.

Mini PC Tablet Dock

Based partially on this idea here about a tablet dock for a phone, I was wondering about the logictics of having two devices, a self contained SOC like a Mini PC or Raspberry Pi, and a form factor extender with a display, touch controls and other bells and whistles, and having the two dock with one another so that one could use different size devices with the same internals, and you would only have to upgrade one or the other part depending on what you needed at the moment. Could something like this be fabricated without the massive resources of a Samsung or HTC behind it, since it would seem like I pretty cool Kickstarter project if it could be produced without cobbling everything together.

3 in 1 super dock
I like that idea, but thinking 4 inch phone, slide into a 7" tablet and a 10"tablet. The Motolora Lapdocks seemed to be heading in that direction, but they are shelfing the product. If you buy the Lapdock around $50 you can convert your tv stick into a laptop. Even load ubuntu onto it, then it would be a chrome book, but more options.

cesar33 said:
I like that idea, but thinking 4 inch phone, slide into a 7" tablet and a 10"tablet. The Motolora Lapdocks seemed to be heading in that direction, but they are shelfing the product. If you buy the Lapdock around $50 you can convert your tv stick into a laptop. Even load ubuntu onto it, then it would be a chrome book, but more options.
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See, why have a phone when you can just make a shell that you could slip the brains into? Seems like a waste of glass and formfactor.

maybe a dream

Maybe I am dreaming here a little bit but I want to use an android mini PC for home automation. Basically I want to have a total of 4 mini PCs in my home 3 on TVs for using xbmc Netflix etc and browsing on TVs, 1 as a brain sort of. I want to be able to control all through my LG Nexus 5 remotely and my hip street titan 2 tablet. The components in which I would like to control are a coffee maker some outlets and a few sets of lights for now. I realize the mini PC it self is probably incapable of this (unless your able to get a kind of on off switch controller for it) but I'm open to maybe using something like an arduino (with much more education of course lol) anyways looking for any input ideas and or education. I plan on using tasker app to handle command processing. I also have a desktop with event ghost that could play a key roll as well.
I know this is very open ended but I'm just trying to gather information ATM.

This sounds like a very cool little project.
Take a look at X10. It is a protocol for communicating between automation units. Also, I personally would consider using something like a Raspberry Pi as the main controller. In terms of power consumption, I would expect it to be less than an Android phone (especially the new Model A+). It would also be easier to program for and find home automation software for a linux distro than for Android. Raspberry Pi would also integrate with Arduino better or possibly even remove the need for that altogether.
Good luck. Post your progress on here, it would be good to see it.

I have little to no experience with arduino and rasbeery pie both. I really want to use ifttt software triggered by tasker for android as I have tons of experience with both, but at $50 for a duplex recepticle its going to get very expensive very fast... Also for say my coffee maker has simple on off switch. I would like to be able to put coffee and water in it and when about 10 mins from home trigger it on so my coffee is ready when I get home. When I get home I want to NFC my phone on door and have it unlock (or when I'm coming up hall but I don't think I will be able to get a precise enough GPS location fix to do so.) I want to have my lights follow me as I walk through house at night. Ie when I enter living room the light turns on when I leave it then turns off. And I want to be able to shut off outlets when I leave home in case I leave something on I shouldn't. My idea was going to be using an arduino on power wires to switches or outlets. Now I think that could get expensive as well. So even something homebrew could work just as long as it meets the "cheap" criteria I'm happy lol.

I love your idea to transpire. I wish you goodluck with that.

So far the cheapest way I have found is the smart things. They will trigger with IFTTT, but the hub alone is $200 and each accessory (is, light switch, recepticle etc) is $50. I've got 6 light switches I want to control ($300) and 4 outlets ($200) the hub ($200) and want a door lock ($300). We are talking nearly $1,000 not really in my budget.

V20 used as a gourmet replacement for a programmable microcontroller.

Why I'm proposing it: Arduino and Raspberry Pi have been popular learning tools and hobbyist project foundations for years. People use them to automate filling their fish tank, watering their plants, build gyrocopters out of them, create home automation solutions, and more often than not, make some LEDs blink as their first start in the long road toward Computer Science. They're cheap, they have their uses, and if you want them to do more, you can buy addons called "shields", making your board bulkier, more complicated, and more expensive. Let's face facts: we're in a world that is throwing V20's away, and an old V20 has an infinitely better collection of sensors, display features, touch digitizer, audio input AND output (I mean, Quad DAC vs ... what, a crappy piezo and PWM on an Arduino?), and the love many of us still hold for this great piece of old hardware.
What I'm proposing: We use thread to look into adapting it to have GPIO pins, and then throw together a way to use it as the foundation for such projects. There is no Arduino in the world, and few Raspberry Pis that have the video and audio capabilities, as well as sensors the V20 comes with, for free, since you already own it and it's sitting in a box, or perhaps you already recycled it, since so many of they are dying with the 5G switchover. I got this idea and couldn't find any resources on how to do it, so I went the Arduino route to build my washing machine electronics, and while learning that I stumbled on how Android can have GPIO via FTDI USB Adapters / Breakout Boards and a kernel patch, so I'm making this thread to get started on that.
Anyone interested in running with the ball, go right ahead and post what you've already done in this area, or scoff at me. If I succeed, the scoffing will fall away, and if I don't, at least I'll learn from failing.

Here's the start for how to get simple data out of V20, via USB2Serial hardware. https://github.com/mik3y/usb-serial-for-android

And here's straight GPIO from Android, but it still requires root to add a driver to the kernel: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/55130034/android-ftdi-ft232h-compatibility
It's not exactly reusing the volume buttons as GPIO, but it's neat.

Hmm i'm interested in this, i could definitely look into this

Keyosuke said:
And here's straight GPIO from Android, but it still requires root to add a driver to the kernel: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/55130034/android-ftdi-ft232h-compatibility
It's not exactly reusing the volume buttons as GPIO, but it's neat.
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