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Ask Slashdot: What's a Good Tablet/App Combination For Note-Taking?
EmagGeek writes "My wife recently started back to school to finish her 4-year degree, and one of the things that we've been considering is procuring for her some kind of tablet that would enable her to take notes in class and save them electronically. This would obviate the need to carry around a bunch of paper, and could even be used to store e-textbooks so she doesn't have to lug 30lbs of books around campus. At minimum, she would have to be able to write freehand on the tablet with a fine-point stylus, just like she would write on paper with a pen. We've seen what we call those 'fat finger' styli and found that they are not good for fine writing. Having become frustrated with the offerings we've tried so far, I thought I would ping the Slashdot Community. Any suggestions?"
IPad with a fold-up keyboard? Taking notes with a small stylus (quickly) seems really hard -- end up spending more time to correct the notes taken than keeping pace with the lecture and notes that need to be taken.
Why not record the lecture? A stylus doesn't provide a very good handwriting experience, and not using one would allow her to use an iPad.
Don't even think of clicking.. goatse alert. Way to get me fired, bro
I'm just finishing a graduate program and my iPad and bluetooth keyboard/case combo have definitely made the long treks across campus easier. Evernote is fantastic for note taking and it has a feature that allows you to record audio... great for snagging lectures and random professor rants. Evernote syncs what you write/record to the cloud which has allowed me to have access to my materials anywhere. And I haven't lost a note yet!
Word of warning: If she is going to use a tablet for taking notes, the external keyboard is a must. Before I picked mine up, my wrists were aching after even short typing sessions in class.
A pen and some paper. This method is proven to increase later recall of the subject matter. [too lazy to provide citation]
"I'm just here to regulate funkiness."
nt
Almost certainly an NSFW link since dev455 is currently submitting crap on the Firehose...
UNIX? They're not even circumcised! Savages!
Why not a laptop? Note taking by hand can be very tedious and much slower than using a keyboard.
goatse
Yeah, stop looking for an excuse to buy a tablet and just buy one.
I'm a huge fan of Super Note on the Asus transformer. It works great to capture handwriting notes or typed notes if you have the keyboard dock.
Honestly that's the first time I've been Goatse'd in a long time. Thanks for refreshing my memory.
I own an Evo View 4G (basically a sprint version of the HTC Flyer) and it is amazing for notes and drawing. it feels solid in your hand and has very little creak (if any) it connects to Evernote natively in its note taking app and works well. the 7" tablet is big enough to be useful without being so large as to get in the way on small lecture hall desks and an otterbox defender case is coming out that will allow you to use it as an easel.
Rather than a tablet have you looked at the livescribe pens - audio + hyperlinked notes.
http://www.livescribe.com/
If handwriting is desired, I generally would recommend against an iPad. I've been using one with a stylus, and the non-intelligent screen just doesn't work well enough.
A friend of mine has a convertible X-series thinkpad, and it's great for them, with intelligent built in stylus + OneNote.
At my university, my classes are all basically in the same room. (upper level grad classes). I use a combo of:
Ubuntu Live USB
Wacom Bamboo Pen, (usb tablet)
Xournal
It's far better than writing with pencil/pen. I can edit notes easily, copy and paste, ect...
I realize this has several limitations in comparison to what you are trying to accomplish (different rooms, no computer, compatibility..) But its a good place to start. I don't think there is a "tablet" to date that includes an active digitizer, but if you're willing to shell out, buy a full blown tablet PC and load up the program on that. Write on the screen, save, export to PDF, keep forever.
I also have all of my books as a PDF saved on the same jump drive. If you look hard enough, you can find the PDF of most books online. (I also have a hard copy, but the pdf is nice to have on the spot.)
I've been a "professional student" for so long it's embarrassing. I've been a technophile just as long. Paper and pen are the best; there's nothing to get in the way of your recording others' thoughts or your own. You can focus on the learning more than on wrangling the technology to make yourself believe that it's seamless.
Give meade a bailout and stick with the paper.
http://us.store.creative.com/Creative-ZiiO-7-Entertainment-Tablet-16GB/M/B004DJQXDW.htm
Resistive Screen, comes with a stylus.
Runs Android but has not access to Android Market - not a problem, you can still download APKs and install it onto the device.
Evernote would be the app you you are looking for for Note-taking, you can download the APK for that no problem - it's freeware.
Granted, Slashdot will ignore anything you type anyhow. That said, it would be helpful to know the solutions which were insufficient. Otherwise, we'll just all post stuff you've tried (assuming the OP is reading this).
That said, I've found few things work as well at digitizing notes than the various digital paper options out there. I have a therapist client that uses it for her case notes and then an iPad for content she takes with her. I'd probably prefer the 7" form factor but by offloading the more finicky aspect, handwriting, to a dedicated medium you then have many more options for the content portability.
My client uses a DigiMemo product but there are quite a number out there with various options you might look into.
You know the thing about UDP jokes? I don't care if you get it or not.
I'm liking Ghostwriter, which has solved the fat finger problem. It's not perfect, but it does the job, and is getting me through Discrete Math!
If she needs an actual laptop as well, I strongly recommend a Lenovo X220 Tablet. I have an older model and love it - it's a tablet you can actually use for work (and has been around for several years).
Yah, either one of these or something similar to the transformer. A keyboard is mandatory for note taking, but if she's taking chem or calculus, then it's important to be able to scribble in formulas with a stylus. OneNote is great.
No tablet as exists today are incapable of taking good usable notes, or if they are (Microsoft OneNote running on a Samsung Series 7 with Windows 7) then they certainly won't exceed a regular laptop with a keyboard. People love to claim the technology is up to that stage but as someone who has foolishly wasted more money that I would like to admit on the tablet dream, I can tell you that, no, you're just wasting money.
The "main issue" I've found is two things, first off handwriting recognition is crap. Secondly that even when it works there isn't any real integration with the rest of the system, so the resulting text and diagrams is an uncategorised orphan unusable by anything of use.
Android and iOS are great consumers of content but they're terrible producers. The software is lacking, the interface designs are arse-backwards, and all it ultimately results in is an inefficient irritating system that you might have well not use. Things like the Android Transformer almost prove my point for me by opting for a keyboard and Microsoft Word-clone like software to increase your productivity. If the fact that the best Android can do is to copy a "normal" laptop then that is as damning of a statement of the state of tablets as I can tell.
You don't have to give up on paper. If you are also thinking of getting a printer as part of going back to school, try getting a combination printer/scanner with an auto document feeder. I'm happy with our Canon Pixma 420 (around $100). It's pretty quick to scan 50 pages to PDF.
If her handwriting is decent, it'll even OCR it for her.
If she likes 4x8 notepads, those will scan and display decently on even a Kindle.
If this cheap alternative doesn't work, you still have a decent printer and can still get something digital.
The world is made by those who show up for the job.
The Lenovo tablet was designed to enable note taking, with an intelligent stylus that communicates with the tablet, and handwriting recognition software as well. My girlfriend has one and likes it quite a bit:
http://www.lenovo.com/products/us/tablet/thinkpad/
Just because you're paranoid, it doesn't mean that they're not out to get you.
dont click. goatse
get an android tab that uses honeycomb, or get something soon that will have ice crem sandwhich, and use swypes tablet app for text entry. once you get used to it its very fast and can be used with one finger or a stylus. i can type with that faster than with two hands on a tablet or smartphone.
you can use one note 2010 (an MS office product) and mobilenoter on android, but mobilenoter isnt as polished as it could be, or use one note live maybe in the tablets web browser.
evernote is probably a better idea, as it has apps for pretty much everything now, and web sync to keep up with things.
one of the eee transformer tablets might be nice, since you can use a keyboard if you like. there is also the eee slider that has a keyboard built in. those have honeycomb, should get ice cream sandwhich, and get decent reviews, but youre going to shell out some money for them (but it might be good enough to be a laptop replacement)
im waiting to see if the new nook color will get ice cream sandwhich put on it, since its small, cheapish, well specced, and the current nook color has been running custom android builds well for months now.
n/t
I use an IPad, and have a bluetooth Logitech Keyboard that doubles as a case. It's about the thickness of a clipboard, maybe a little more. I prefer NoteTaker HD to take notes, so that I can use a Stylus to highlight certain things if I want to, but if you are just going to use the keyboard Pages works just fine.
Silly.
Need to buy an iPad and hand-write notes. That way, any lack of typing skills won't cause you any problems.
Don't take life too seriously; it isn't permanent.
Maybe the ideal solution is a device that does text to speech and stores the contents of the lecture in (time-tracked) text format. The student might want to click a key to occasionally record video if something important is being demonstrated visually.
After trying many options over the years I still find the tried and true paper version works the best. I recommend a small netbook + real notepad. There is just no real substitute for paper yet. I love das blinkinlights as much as anyone but when it comes to a classroom environment, a paper and pencil just works. Especially for math formulas. The only college classes where I used a computer to take notes were programming ones. A laptop or netbook works better because you can use VI or other editor of your choice to copy code examples much more quickly. Also doesn't hurt to be able to actually compile and test something right then and there.
I would suggest Livescribe (http://www.livescribe.com/en-us/).
I realize the pen is a little on the fat side but the system starts at around $100. Lets you write down physically, electronically records the pen strokes and records audio. It then links the audio with the text you wrote previously so that if you wan to recall what was said when you wrote a particularly interesting comment you are able to listen to what the prof was saying when you wrote it.
I don't know anyone who's ever used OneNote on a Windows tablet to ever stop using it for note taking/organizing ideas.
You Asshat. You know, some of us read ./ at the office. Please don't post obscene links.
unless of course the teacher or school claims copyright or such. Can you take photos provided you don't use flash (which the iPad doesn't have - its camera is weak but it can take passable photos of a presentation)
I would recommend something to prop the iPad or similar device up and be sure to that the microphone is unobstructed.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
College ruled ( legal pad ).
Paper, pen or pencil and try real hard to understand what you are being told.
If you are trying to write everything down you are not trying to understand what you are being told.
It's the only 10" tablet with an active digitizer currently on the market. 7" is too small, let alone 5.3", Asus's 12" or the Atom ones won't last a day... HTC are supposed to release another active 10" shortly, but the Thinkpad Tablet is out now, has no glaring defects, and is a regular, if a bit bulky (comes with plenty of ports), Android tablet.
The Cloud - because you don't care if your apps and data are up in the air.
/thread
Sounds like you're looking for the iRex iLiad -- a letter paper sized ePaper display over the top of a wacom tablet. It's a pity then that iRex went bust in 2010.
Unless she is getting her degree in the humanities, there will be parts of the lecture that include equations, graphs, and diagrams that are hard to input with a keyboard. Nothing beats handwriting for that sort of content.
Maybe consider Inkling by Wacom?
http://www.wacom.com/en/Products/Inkling.aspx
http://youtu.be/fXbBA1DRE84
I haven't used that so I have no idea if it works for lectures but on the concept it sounds interesting. I have heard people using for note-taking though.
I bought an iPad when I went to college and Penaultimate (with a Pogo Sketch http://tenonedesign.com/products.php or you can use http://www.dagi.com.tw/front/bin/home.phtml (I have not personally used these but I have seen reviews)) also if your college uses blackboard there is an app for that as well.
I did exactly what your wife wants to do - I handwrote all my notes throughout school on a tablet. I have an Android tablet, and I've previously had an iPad, and I can definitively say that there is only one solution that works- but the good side is that it works insanely well.
Get a Windows tablet. Not a consumer one. Get a business-grade version. I recommend the x tablet series from Lenovo. I started with an x41 in 2006 and I still have a lenovo tablet that I carry to any meeting where I have to take notes. The writing on a wacom-based tablet is the closest you can come to paper- paired with Onenote, you can rapidly change pens/colors/ink size, etc and it's honestly a better experience now for me than paper is. In response to the statement above that a stylus doesn't provide a good handwriting experience- the author clearly hasn't used a Windows tablet (not that surprising, it's not like they got much marketshare...)
The iPad versions with their big styli just don't work well for a number of reasons. The tips are huge- hard to see what's under it where you are attempting to write; they are inaccurate- location points just go off for some reason; they don't have hover- you have to touch the screen to locate your pointer and by that point you're at the wrong place; and the apps just suck in comparison to Onenote for inking.
Digital ink can work, and work really, really well. But to do what you want, you need a real machine that was designed to do it, and the only solution out there is the one I've just outlined.
Disclaimer- I worked in consulting for paperless process redesigns. So I used to put together solutions for offices wanting to do what you want to do... I've used most of the solutions out there, and could never suggest any of the Apple or Android tablets for any kind of inking at all.
A tablet with a stylus is a very awkward way to take notes in a class. Outside of recording the whole lecture, I don't think anything beats a small laptop or netbook for this task. As long as can touch type fairly quickly, it's the best bet. And then you can use something standard like Word or OneNote or whatever OpenOffice and LibreOffice have. Or maybe use AbiWord and a AbiCollab account. I've used this for group projects and it is extremely helpful.
1 (short ton / firkin) = 89.1432354 slugs / keg
And the keyboard and screen easier on the anatomy than an iPad. I used to use a notebook computer, but their wireless is slow. There are sever new airbook competitors now.
Pen/paper for notes. Consider the cornell style notebook paper and that methodology.
Whatever e-reader you can afford to lose and can hold the textbooks required.
I've tried different computerized note-taking schemes over the years. The only time it's worked is for programming or sysadmin work where I have a browser up on one display, a terminal window for notes, a terminal window for my editor, and a terminal window for running my code.
The rest of the time... I bring paper and start doodling with my notes.
http://www.lenovo.com/products/us/tablet/thinkpad/
I used a version of this tablet going through electrical engineering studies and it was great for taking notes. Whatever you do, stay away from resistive touch screens as it makes taking notes much harder as other input (i.e. hand resting on screen) besides the stylus affects your writing. Lenovo thinkpad tablets are very well designed and supported. While mine is over 6 years old, it still looks and runs great.
As others have pointed out, there is no viable substitute for pencil and paper, unless she happens to be taking a class where drawings and diagrams will not be used and everything can be typewritten and she had excellent keyboarding skills. Get a good ADF scanner and a good PDF program (such as Bluebeam for the desktop - about $150, but $100 for students) and for her portable (any reader for laptop or something like Goodreader with a dropbox sync account for iPad). Know that finding information in a tablet PDF quickly is an exercise in frustration. Doubly so if that data is in the cloud.
It was my preference in school to use plain copier paper with a sheet of cardstock behind it printed with heavy lines or grid. I've scanned a bunch of notes, but I'll be honest - I keep a paper copy of my "test" sheets in a three ring binder next to my desk for reference. They condense a semester of graduate course work into about 8 very well organized notes per class.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
This doesn't meet the ground rules you laid out, but you could consider taking notes on paper and then getting electronic copies of them.
I'm thinking of the Livescribe products. It's a smart pen/dot paper combination. The big additional win from the Echo or Pulse smartpen is that it will record audio while notetaking. There is an add-on app for the pen that lets you use it as a stylus for your mouse cursor on the laptop (the pen must be tethered to the laptop with a usb cable). I've never used that aspect of the pen.
The recorded audio can be cued up after class by just pointed to the note you wrote at the same time, as well as by more normal play/pause/scrub controls.
Also, the handwritten text can be searched in the base desktop application. There is an additional software that will convert the handwritten image to fully editable text - but again, I haven't bought it or used it.
You can also send complete audio/image combinations to an online account and sync them with your iPad/iPhone, so you don't need to carry around all your notebooks just to read them, though you will need them if you'd like to take new notes (assuming you keep one notebook per class, as intended)
To be honest, I bought this long after school, because I thought it was so damn cool. I haven't had much call to use it, so I can't really be for or against it. Anyone else use it in an actual class?
http://www.livescribe.com/
Get Microsoft OneNote - it has some crazy fuzzy search ability that lets it search through handwriting, text, and audio without converting the analog sources to text first. Since it doesn't first convert to text, it doesn't commit to a single representation of audio, and just searches by sound, so you don't have the issues of badly converted audio. It just lets you jump to the point(s) in the recording that match sound-wise. It also keeps track of when you take written / typed notes vs. the audio recording, so you can follow the lecture with your notes.
Then go get a MotionComputing tablet off of e-bay. They are WAYY to expensive to buy new ($2500+), but they are awesome, and can be bought off ebay for $300. Something like the LE1700 - get the detachable keyboard too if you're likely to want that. Or else, find one of the fujitsu or acer tablets. All these tablets have wacom digitizers, with a pressure sensitive pen, a right-click button on the pen, and the ability to hover, so interfaces work as well as they do with a mouse.
Staples had a pen that would record your strokes as you wrote, that you could then download into your PC.
Forget the name, (don't feel like googling), you still need paper though.
I like to write my pseudo-code out ahead of time on certain projects, it would be nice to then import that in when I'm done.
tablets are nice and all, but there's something about hand-writing it out. helps me with memorizing. Typing, "seems" less so.
"Hmm. I am to metaphor cheese as metaphor cheese is to transitive verb crackers!"
When in college I had Palm Pilots with keyboards, laptops, and portables (lunch box pc's). But honestly the best results I got was using a simple digital recorder to record the audio. A digital camera (no flash) to catch the board. and I sat a really listened. Later I would listen to the audio and type my notes from that. I'd also drop the photos I'd taken in as well. You pay good money for the teacher to be there, but you may not ask a lot of questions if you are too busy taking notes. I sold my notes multiple times and more than paid for my text books. (I got straight A's in a double major involving business and computers.)
I would go for a cheap kindle for $88 which can hold a lot of textbooks. Don't waste your money on a good tablet since it may be a distraction during the class where u may receive emails / notifications when you are taking notes. For taking notes, nothing still beats a good old paper and pen. Most of the presentations from courses in most schools are now posted as scanned PDF notes in the respective course websites or the sessions are posted as videos.. So there would not be too much note taking anyway.
We considered this for our son in college (he wasn't interested), and if I were attending lectures, I'd sure get one of these! The pen records audio as you take notes. Later, tap on the page somwhere and the pen plays back what the instructor was saying at the precise time you were writing at that spot on the page. Can also download the audio to your computer, and does many other things too. Check it out at www.livescribe.com.
Well, it won't display eBooks for you, but for note-taking, have you seen the (almost available) Wacom Inkling? I haven't had the opportunity to try one of these out myself yet, but I can't wait until I get the chance. I've never liked the tactile feel of stylus on tablet, and while I tried to use a netbook for typing up notes in grad school.... It worked great for plain text, but terribly for diagrams and equations. I ended up going back to good old paper and pencil. Something like the Inkling seems to be the perfect cross between familiar tactile feedback and instant digitization.
http://www.wacom.com/en/Products/Inkling.aspx
If I don't care about handwriting recognition, then I use EverNote + a hp tx2000 from 4 years ago. (That's a tablet before iPad commandeered the name to mean something entirely different) Evernote has a nice interface for using a stylus to write a note but Evernote retains the original handwriting and never translates it to text. For what I write up via the stylus that works just fine. You should be able to find a modern tablet with a real digitizer, but I haven't a clue what one would call it in order to locate it via google.
A Livescribe pen would let her take notes like normal and record the lecture. Plus Livescribe will also let you take notes for all your classes in one notebook, and then you can sort the notes into individual classes ion the computer. So only one notebook to carry around at a time. AND the notes can then be put into PDF or loaded into Evernote so you can read them on whatever device you want. Easy and familiar to use to record information and easy to sort it and use the notes later. I love mine for notes in meetings and my own projects!
I second this. The Thinkpad Tablet is excellent. I use it all the time to write in meetings and for jotting notes throughout the offices. While the included software is great, it cannot completely turn off finger recognition, it only does palm rejection.
A piece of software called "Quill" for Android, built specifically for the Thinkpad Tablet, has an option to disable all touch, and the writing response is extremely fast! It's only $1 too.
The pen I have is the 2GB model, which can hold the notes for several classes for a whole semester. I received it as a gift, but they are fairly inexpensive these days, especially given what you'd pay for tuition, books, etc.
The benefit of this approach is that in addition to text notes, you can also draw any diagrams by hand. The audio has also saved my *ss several times, since I could go back and listen to the lecture on important points that were covered too quickly to get them all down on paper.
Try a tablet PC, or something with a high resolution stylus. My wife really loved note taking in OneNote - she does NOT want to type on the computer while taking notes. Taking notes in OneNote (or similar, but OneNote is very nice) lets you mix writing and diagramming, and then lets you go back and transcribe them to typeset text. I'm sure there's something similar for an IPad, though I don't know anything about how good their stylus is. The Wacom stylus and screens have been pretty awesome, though.
I've been scouting for this a long time, and the conclusion I repeatedly come to is that at least at this time you need a Windows machine to get this kind of functionality. I am a proponent of Open Source, but in the end there is nothing that compares with OneNote so Windows is a necessity. If you want a slate form factor (no connected keyboard) you are on the verge of a tidal wave of what you need, but about a year/half a year too early.
The best compromise for a slate form factor tablet is the Samsung Series 7 Slate. They are having build quality issues at the moment but it appears as though they are working on it.
The reason this slate is particularly good is that it compromises battery life, power, and speed. Users are citing that it gets 6 hours battery life when appropriately configured. It comes with a Wacom tablet which is necessary for inking, Ntrig in my experience is just not up for the task.
If you just need an inking computer, then any Thinkpad X-series tablet will do. I know people using the X61 with good success, and you can get those for around $200 vs $1200 for the Series 7 Slate. It's more cumbersome, so probably not the answer to your needs, but it is an option.
Recording is nice because you get all the content, however, it is much slower to retrieve that content than flipping through notes. I've known several people who tried recording lectures, and only one who actually used them after-words. I for one hate it when information online is only provided in video form. Having my notes in that form would drive me crazy. Video is best as a supplement for notes in situations where you have a professor that covers material not in the book, doesn't post good lecture notes, and insists on lecturing faster than you can write. In other situations it is just a hassle.
And like others mentioned, not all schools/professors allow recording of lectures.
and not using one would allow her to use an iPad.
So? Why choose a device that doesn't meet your needs and work around it, when there are devices that do?
I have an x60 tablet and used it for notetaking for a couple years before I stopped taking classes. OneNote is absolutely fabulous; I tend to whine incessantly about almost all of the software that I use, but I was almost always very pleased with OneNote.
In my mind there is a very clear hierarchy of notetaking mechanisms. At the low end is typing. This is obnoxious to classmates unless you have an unusually quiet keyboard, and is awful for anything except straight text, which is easily less than half of my notes. I tried that for a short while and hated it. In the middle is pencil/pen and paper. At the best is software like OneNote. Has almost all the benefits of pencil/pen, but comes with decent text searching, easy backup, easy distribution, and the other benefits of digital. (The handwriting recognition really is pretty good if you leave it in hand-written format. It seems to do sort of a fuzzy search -- a scribble can match more than one word. This means it works even better than the standard Windows input panel (which is already surprisingly decent), which has to commit to one particular recognition because it's actually doing handwriting-to-text conversion. You're lost if you want to search for something that isn't English text -- but that's still a way better situation to be in than pencil/paper.)
I'm not sure what there is in the iPad world, but I'd be surprised if there's anything nearly as well-developed. By its very nature, it would likely only be useful to a very small segment of the iPad population -- those who have and use a stylus. Taking notes with just your fingers doesn't seem fun.
The Lenovo tablet was designed to enable note taking, with an intelligent stylus that communicates with the tablet, and handwriting recognition software as well. My girlfriend has one and likes it quite a bit:
http://www.lenovo.com/products/us/tablet/thinkpad/
http://forums.lenovo.com/t5/ThinkPad-slate-tablets/App-Quill-handwritten-notes-v6/td-p/561697
People swear by this app for handwritten notes with the think
The Lenovo tablet was designed to enable note taking, with an intelligent stylus that communicates with the tablet, and handwriting recognition software as well. My girlfriend has one and likes it quite a bit:
http://www.lenovo.com/products/us/tablet/thinkpad/
There were three things that annoyed me when I tried to use tablets to take notes. The first is that I couldn't rest my wrist on the screen. The second is that there was a delay between writing and seeing the results on the screen, and I just couldn't get use to that. Finally, I couldn't get enough written to compare to a paper page of the same size (probably because of the fat-finger styluses mentioned above). How does the Lenovo tablet fare in these situations? I'd love to have a tablet I could really use to write on, and I'd buy one in a second, but I just can't deal with any issues in those areas.
The HTC Flyer is especially designed for this type of usage. It comes with a stylus and full Evernote integration. Plenty of demo videos on Youtube, if you want to know more.
Microsoft OneNote is the best when used with a stylus. I design out my software using it and with the free form nature I have as much page as I need to the right and bottom of what I am working on. I use it to paste source code into it to graph and highlight areas I am focused upon. The tablet world is missing out on a stylus + OneNote.
OneNote has a ton more features that I am not using. Like being able to record audio and during the replay of the audio it can show what you were writing at the time. That allows you to follow your notes as the audio is played back.
In terms of general note taking, the one app I do use is evernote. I like the way it integrates between the tablet and laptop or desktop. This might be useful in terms of organization.
I have several note taking apps on my iPad. They all seem about the same. Some have more emphasis on organzation or on integrated all your devices. The basis of the app is simple enough that there is likely a variation that will work, once a good stylus is found.
Let me make one suggestion that may be a bit out there. There is an app called chalkboard wich I use to scribble down notes. It has a simple and elegant interface. You can use different colors, just like some people do when they take notes.
"She's a scientist and a lesbian. She's not going to let it slide." Orphan Black
I went "paperless" taking two graduate mechanical engineering classes this semester, using Note Taker HD on the iPad. It takes some getting used to, but once you figure out the workflow issues (Good Reader and Drop Box are a must), it is incredibly convenient. I evaluated 8 or 9 different iPad note taker apps, and at the time (August 2011), the only one that could do everything I wanted (easy PDF import for annotations, zoom feature, ability to draw shapes, easy export) was Note Taker HD. You will also NEED a stylus. Controlling a tablet UI is fine with your fingers - writing text and drawing diagrams for an hour during a class with your fingers just doesn't cut it. I love my Wacom stylus for iPad, though I have actually worn through it in just 3 months. You will probably need to try several (I tried 3 different ones) before you find the one that is right for you.
you should take only a few notes: names and dates (or other very specific information) on a Reporter's-pad type thing. Everything else you should just pay attention to, very visually. Don't copy down the blackboard except with words you don't know, and pay attention.
I know you said you want to hand-write your notes, but unless you NEED to for some specific reasons, or are a terrible typist, I would re-think it. Most people can type considerably faster than they can hand-write, even under the best circumstances with pen and paper. Plus- typing can take advantage of modern spell-checking and auto-correcting functions. If you MUST hand-write- I recommend a good smart pen instead, like those offered by Livescribe. It provides a good level of handwriting analysis and can make your notes searchable via an online app. None of the handwriting apps I've used on Windows-based tablets have come anything close. If you are looking for a good, light, portable means of taking notes- I would recommend a good Bluetooth keyboard with an iPad. Many are very lightweight and small, yet have a good typing feel and are quiet (less intrusive in meetings or classes). Some are integrated with ipad cases, while others come with their own that fold out into stands. I personally love the Logitech Tablet Keyboard for iPad.
For software- I've gone between Evernote and Google Docs for my notes (I'm an IT executive and spend much of my time in meetings), and prefer Evernote because it doesn't require an Internet connection (if you pay for it), and I had too many problems with Google Docs suddenly becoming unresponsive in the middle of a meeting. I mostly went with these options because I wanted my notes available anywhere/everywhere. If I'm stopped in the hall and need to reference something, and I don't have my iPad with me- I can pull up my notes on my phone. Both Evernote and Google Docs are multi-platform and synced (almost) live.
If you don't want to pay for Evernote offline- a lot of people in my office use the notepad shipped as part of iOS. It does work very well for what it is.
Pen and paper baby!
No batteries. Use whatever type of input device you want.
Why is it that most of the people that I encounter seem to have been shat from the Sphincter of Mediocrity?
I have an HP Touchsmart tm2 and it is a joy to take notes on. It is small, light but has an excellent keyboard. The screen can used either fingers or the stylus, if you choose to use that as well. In combination with onenote (an amazingly underutilized program) and Microsoft's "live mesh" to sync it across many machines makes the entire process painless. Onenote can even import the ppt slides and allows for writting to text conversion.
I've got an older Lenovo tablet, and it *only* contains the Wacom array; it's not touch-sensitive. This lets it have a much better resolution, and it's insensitive to resting your hand on it. As for the delay... I've only noticed it when flinging the pen back and forth. At normal writing speeds, it's registered the stroke before the tip of the pen leaves the pixel.
I've taken years worth of calculus and physics notes on it without once feeling like I'd rather switch to paper. And when I'm not writing stuff, I use it like a regular laptop. I've never tried writing on a capacitive or resistive touchscreen, but I can imagine that it's a pain in comparison to something that just uses wacom.
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I've beed using this since it came out. (9 months? longer ?) Dan Bricklin (visi calc) still has it. As fast as a pen and paper and you can back it up - email notes etc.
notetakerhd.com
I like the pogo stylus pro - or what ever its called.
Your only tablet choices, unfortunately, are bad or none.
Engineering lectures have lots of schematics, equations, and diagrams, so keyboard entry alone just doesn't cut it. You have to use a pen.
For myself (as an instructor), I use a Fujitsu tablet combined with OneNote to manage and organize my notes. It is your typical Windows tablet abomination, painful and clumsy to operate, with your hand constantly brushing against the terribly placed scroll control, but it is better than nothing. The "feel" of the pen on the screen doesn't match the feel of pen on paper, and no matter how you calibrate the screen, the pen registration is never quite right at the edges. The hassle was still worth it to me because I needed some way to edit my course notes and generate PDF copies on demand, but I wouldn't recommend it to a student trying to take notes during lecture.
A tablet for handwritten notes is one of those markets that I fervently wish Apple would enter. At least we'd have one vendor that might get it right, as opposed to all the Windows kludges out there. But for now, I'd recommend taking notes on paper, then scanning them into some soft copy format.
As for recording the lecture: DON'T. Take notes. It forces you to engage your mind during the lecture, and dramatically improves your recall of the material. Recording a lecture just means you're forcing yourself to sit through it twice. Take good notes during lecture and you'll save yourself a lot of time and effort afterwards.
OK, so I realize I am completely going against what the poster asked ... but I've actually found I prefer paper for this.
I've got engineering lab books going back 15+ years, and they're what I use to record stuff at work and keep notes. For something a little more transient I occasionally use a notepad or a whiteboard.
Having a chronological set of books going back that far is actually handy.
YMMV, but I've been taking paper notes for so long going digital doesn't even seem like an option to me.
Lost at C:>. Found at C.
I can't attest to this personally, having only used the non-saving version, but I'm seriously considering buying one of these. http://www.improvelectronics.com/boogie-board-LCD-writing-tablet/boogie-board-rip-LCD-writing-tablet.html granted, you can't load textbooks onto it or anything, but that makes it a fair bit cheaper compared to buying a full-blown tablet. the non-saving one was quite good just for scribbling rough working and had a really nice feel.
I respectfully submit my own choice, which is working for me in my work environment:
iPad,
WritePad app,
Griffen stylus.
I fully realize that this combination is working (very) well for me, but others will also have plenty of other opinions and options to offer.
smp
The tablet alone is a good tablet, but with the keyboard it becomes what a netbook always wanted to be but could never quite manage to pull off.
15 hours of battery life -- good for an entire school day and then some. Physcially connected keyboard (useful if the campus has bluetooth restrictions). keyboard also has full-sized USB connector (2) so you can back it up to thumb drive for use elsewhere... As for specific android apps, that's sort of a mixed bag. None of the "office compatible" apps have spellcheck, which is annoying, but if you're looking for something just to put notes in the Polaris Office that comes preloaded with the ASUS is more than sufficient.
Eviscerati.Org: All Hail the Eviscerati
While this does not really solve the OP's issue as expected, it might be a worthwhile consideration. LiveScribe is a digital pen which can be used to take down notes on digital paper in tandem with audio recording capabilities. As a result, you can listen to a lecture as you go through your notes along with a bunch of other features. While this is nifty in itself, you can also hook up the paper/tablet to a laptop and digitise it effectively in real time. While you can buy everything including the paper from the store, I believe that you can also print the paper yourself at 600dpi.
My information on this is purely based on hearsay and I have not tested it out myself. I'm very curious as to how well this tablet approach works and if we can do away with the paper concept altogether and replace it with something like an Etch A Sketch.
I believe that EverNote also supports integration with tablets etc., and might also be worth looking into.
Since I was in an engineering field, my computer needed to do more than just be a note-taker. I used it for Matlab, PSPICE, cygwin, Office, Eclipse, Sketchup as well as some custom programming applications that the school had for their robotics program. Point is...I think most students will still need a laptop even if they have a tablet for taking notes. For me the TC1100 did everything well. Truly, in my opinion it was one of the best machines HP has ever produced. I in 6 years I never had a problem with it.
When I finished school the computer was still going strong but was getting dated. My brother still uses it today.
I don't know if the tablet PC market has kept up since the new "pad" craze but when I was using it Microsoft was really supporting the platform well.
A netbook isn't much bigger than a tablet, and you get a real keyboard, a real operating system, and you can take notes in any program you want. Store all your school stuff on an SD card and then just transfer the card to the desktop if you want. Or if you don't mind the small screen and keyboard, just leave it on the netbook.
The biggest drawbacks to a netbook aren't that important in a class setting. Lower battery life than a tablet, but plenty of battery for a day in class. Slightly bulkier, but not so much that you can't just throw the thing in a backpack like you were probably planning on doing with the tablet. (Especially if you were going to get an external keyboard for the tablet) Slower to boot up, but plenty of time while you're sitting at a desk waiting for the lecture to start. Plus you can just put it to sleep while walking between classes.
I'll grudgingly admit that there are some things that tablets do better than netbooks. Taking notes in class is not one of them.
I found it to be more useful to do all the day's reading ahead of class and then don't bother taking any notes. Just listen and pay attention. And ask questions.
Before that, I'd go in clueless and spend the whole class furiously taking notes. I'd miss major points and then go home with incomplete notes that I'd never have time to review anyways.
Probably that and learning how to prioritize are how I went from nearly flunking out to a 4.0 on an overload schedule.
Godaddy is a scam and a ripoff.
Has anyone else noticed the strange pattern of moderation happening on Slashdot? It seems like almost every post is now modded overrated or underrated. Why is this happening so much all of the sudden? I can't count the number of "Score:1, Insightful" or just "Score:3" posts I see in every story now when I used to rarely see them.
I acknowledge that this post is off-topic, but there's no other place to bring it up, and the parent post was yet another example.
Totally, completely false. Writing stuff down is statistically one of the best methods for remembering things. The act of writing -- the act itself, even if you throw the paper away afterwards -- has an imprinting effect in long term memory that is totally absent when you type on a keyboard. Lots of research backs this up. Google it or check out http://www.lifehack.org/articles/productivity/writing-and-remembering-why-we-remember-what-we-write.html for a start.
You can find those babies on eBay for $150. Full Tablet PC running Windows XP with a battery-free stylus (pressure sensitive). Battery life is terrible (about 2 hours) but they are warm-swappable, so carry a few in your bag. Otherwise, the note taking is fantastic, with pretty decent handwriting recognition. They were built in 2003 but you can still find them around. I bought one to play adventure games in the subway while commuting (thx to GOG.com for simplifying the process).
JigJag
"The hallmark of humanity is the ability to move beyond sensory inputs" - Mary Helen Immordino-Yang
I haven't used the lenovo, but I've used Fujitsus for years. Their old resistive touchscreens had no problem with resting your wrist on the screen. Then I moved to a capacitive touchscreen that also had a Wacom-type digitizer/pen, so you could disable the touchscreen and just write on the screen with the stylus no problem.
However, the resolution still isn't as good as I can get with a hyper-fine tip Pilot G-Tec-C on paper.
Serious question. Why wouldn't a netbook or laptop work just as well, other than it's not as shiny and new as a tablet?
Are YOU using the TOOL, or is the TOOL using YOU? Think about it!
http://www.amazon.com/Logitech-io-Personal-Digital-Pen/dp/B00006JP23Logitech IO pen will allow to have notes, digital notes and some sort of text recognition at the same time. I used it long ago with some satisfaction. Note that technology has evolved since, and I cannot refine my statement with today's standards... Anyone?
I've got an older Lenovo tablet, and it *only* contains the Wacom array; it's not touch-sensitive. This lets it have a much better resolution, and it's insensitive to resting your hand on it. As for the delay... I've only noticed it when flinging the pen back and forth. At normal writing speeds, it's registered the stroke before the tip of the pen leaves the pixel.
I've taken years worth of calculus and physics notes on it without once feeling like I'd rather switch to paper. And when I'm not writing stuff, I use it like a regular laptop. I've never tried writing on a capacitive or resistive touchscreen, but I can imagine that it's a pain in comparison to something that just uses wacom.
Thanks. I might look up the older model on ebay, it does sound nice.
I use and like the Asus eee slate it is a full computer with i5 core. I use either the keyboard or pen to take notes and plan lessons using MS Onenote. It is what the ipad should have been.
All the comments I've seen are naysayers. I use my iPad with unote. Unote has a neat zoom feature. you write with a stylus in the zoomed section and it acts like a typewriter, moving the real position of the drawable section left as you move left, letting you write a lot on one line, while letting you write clearly. It is good for formula and Greek lettering.
Space Shuttle was a program that strapped humans to an explosion and tried to stab through the sky with fire and math
I have been using the iPad for notetaking at work for about a month now. NoteTaker HD is an AWSOME program for handwritten notes but you need to use a stylus for it to be the most effective. Once you get used to it it, you are almost as fast with it as you are with a pen and paper.
Palm T|X with pedit32 (for text files) and DiddleBug (for freehand notes pages). Writing and drawing with the stylus is still much more precise than any of the capacitive fat-finger interfaces I've seen on modern smartphones.
I wrote part of my master's thesis on my Palm T|X, using a free portable IR keyboard I got with the device.
Still waiting for some set of Android apps that would give me a similar experience.
"Draw & Share" is the only free app I've found that comes close to DiddleBug, but still isn't as convenient (with DiddleBug you could scroll around, and hit the "new page" icon and get a new sheet without having to go through save dialogs).
I have a nifty cover + USB keyboard for my Viewsonic G-Tablet, but keyboard input in Android still sort of sucks (all kinds of focus problems). I haven't looked for any decent text editors for Android yet.
I know there's an app that has a wrist-ignore option (though, due to hardware issues, it does not work on the galaxy tab 10.1), but I forget the name.
Like other posters I have trouble both comprehending a lecture and taking notes simultaneously. To work around this I make MP3 recordings on my cell phone. I can store hundreds of hours of quite high quality audio using only a small percentage of my micro SD card space. Then if necessary, I can scan through it at 1.5x speed and pick up whatever I may have missed the first time around. As far as tablets go, capacitive screens aren't that great to write on if you want fine control. There are plenty of low end Android tablets with resistive screens which work just fine with a stylus. Again, the experience may leave you disappointed. I prefer to just write whatever I need in a coil notebook and then take snapshots of the pages to store on my phone or laptop for later reference.
Technology inst going to save your a$$ Pay attention and write with pen and paper. If you think recording the audio will help, watch "Real Genius". If your not paying attention (and asking questions) while the lecture is going on , you wont do so later.
This. I've been using an X series tablet for my note taking needs for about two years now, and my productivity has skyrocketed since then... and the weight of my bag has plummeted, even with a 90W power supply, two 8-cell batteries and a regular X-Series Thinkpad in addition to the tablet.
Add OneNote and PDF Annotator to the mix and I'm taken care of perfectly.
Now all we need is Windows 8 ARM slates with Wacom digitizers - that would further cut the weight while keeping battery life the same and hopefully giving us a full MS Office Suite (for OneNote) and hopefully also PDF Annotator for ARM :)
I made it through Vector calculus mostly without studying (I then tutored calc 1-3 for paying students). The act of paying attention and taking notes was sufficient to get it all into my head with understanding. I did occasionally read my notes or the book, but the writing is what worked for me. That's just me, everyone has their way of learning. I learn by doing, and taking notes is close enough to doing I guess. Another professor I had gave out printed course notes with each lecture. They had key pieces missing, so you had to pay attention to fill in the blanks, but the writing workload was significantly reduced so you could think about what it meant more. That also seemed to work well - it's like taking notes without the distraction.
From the perspective of a psychology graduate student at a large university: 1) Get used to taking notes on a laptop via typing. 2) Use Preview to annotate lecture outlines; this works wonderfully (you can draw arrows, circle things, type notes, underline, highlight, etc) 3) For course involving mathematics, print available lecture slides or outlines, and then take notes with a pen and paper (i.e. right on the slides themselves). Trying to find some way to use a tablet seems to just make things more complicated. A laptop is not too much more bulky, and has much more functionality and utility. True, you cannot hold it like a book and read from it on the bus. But, does one really want to read a 3-column academic journal article on a tablet or e-reader? I sure don't; I have tried and hate it. Do your serious studying and reading on the laptop, and add annotations and notes right to the pdf files of the journal articles.
I personally use mindmapping software for notes during meetings. It allows for the information to flow naturally and be reorganized and regrouped quickly (i.e. during the lecture). You might need other stuff for diagrams but mind mapping is terrific. I use mindjet because I learned it a decade ago, but the market is much more competitive now and I would likely pick another brand today.
Notebook by circus pony (link) is specifically designed for what you want to do and I've heard good things about it.
Lots of excellent note-taking software, including things like MathJournal for specialty-usages (mathematics), or Corel Grafigo for diagramming (v1 is still freely available from Archive.org --- http://www.tabletpcbuzz.com/showthread.php?35645-Corel-Grafigo-1.0-(corelgrafigo.exe) ).
I use a mixture of Evernote (collect web clippings), AutoDesk Sketchbook (draw bitmaps), FutureWave SmartSketch (the program which grew up to be Flash --- Flash still has the nifty note-book organization option last I checked --- I use it for quick vector sketches) and InftyReader (for math, freely available from http://www.inftyreader.org/ ) as well as WinTeXShell (for actual writing using LaTeX which is where I collect everything else).
William
Sphinx of black quartz, judge my vow.
I have been a pen and paper person, from college to my current career. I recently shifted to an iPad, the GoodReader app, and a Zaggmate bluetooth keyboard/case. I find that I type more legibly than I hand write, and my iPad gives me a better platform to both review and share my ideas. GoodReader gives me the ability to take notes as .txt files, "draw" on those notes, and sync my notes to any number of server platforms (in my case, Google Docs). The app is also a good repository for other document formats including rtf's, Word docs, PDF's, videos, etc. I chose the Zaggmate keyboard because of the key responsiveness and the presence of both a left and right shift key.
Don't take notes. Taking notes is a queue to your brain not to remember what you are hearing. In one ear and out the other on to the page. Instead of taking notes listen and ask questions. [too lazy to provide citation]
Find yourself a pen that you really like writing with--mine is usually a G2 from Pilot, then write it on some college ruled paper. Use a good old fashioned keyboard to copy your written notes electronically later. This should help you with memory retention as you have to review the material (especially if your handwriting is as bad and rushed as mine and you have to piece the material back together in your mind).
or there's the Samsung Galaxy Note that is basically an oversized Galaxy S2, but comes with a stylus.
Having tried the X220i myself, I found that surprisingly you can rest your hand on the screen. The stylus is more or less the same size of a pen and you can use the reverse end as an eraser. Using OneNote and writing notes directly into it there is a slight delay like the ink drags behind your pen a little bit but I suppose someone could get used to it. However, if you write really small then you're still probably better off using just pen and paper.
The laptops and tablets that use digitizers solve all of those problems. Lenovo makes both a tablet and convertible laptop, and I believe HP still makes the consumer focused tm2 and some other business focused convertible.
If you can get one the e-ink side is great for note taking and you can plug in a USB keyboard if the notes would be better typed. You would have to deal with the company having go under so all the support is other users.
Anything can be found funny, from a certain point of view.
Learning is completely a personal matter, our tricks are shared as a personal contribution. Calling someone else method BS shows how empathetic you are (not). Unless there is a single way to learn? (see also: matrix helicopter training fantasy)
A look on Apple's discussion forums revealed a lot of people really liked Wacom's bamboo stylus for the iPad or iPad 2:
http://www.amazon.com/Bamboo-Stylus-for-iPad-CS100K/dp/B004VM0SE6/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1321380108&sr=8-1
As long as it feels enough like writing with a real pen and doesn't fall apart, I think this could work great combined with software like Note Taker HD:
http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/note-taker-hd/id366572045?mt=8
I use the Adonit Jot Pro on iPad 2 with Noteshelf, and it's vastly better than a finger. Not quite as responsive as a pen and paper :)
Noteshelf has a wrist rest, allowing you to lean on the screen and write naturally. It links to Dropbox too, so I just store all my notes digitally now.
I'm very happy with the set-up. Eight weeks paper free!
Mead makes good tablets and notebooks. But I prefer an engineering pad or a grid composition notebook.
Why don't you just buy a notebook (not electronic) and a bunch of pencils. Nothing beats the flexibility, increases uptake of the new material and still allow for active listening, is not distracting (no internet and facebook or chat) than pen and paper. If you really want to have your lecture notes in electronic format, type them up in LaTeX later at night and compile to PDF. But for actual note taking nothing beats pen and paper.
As the island of our knowledge grows, so does the shore of our ignorance.
I've got the original Boogie Board and it's great as a scratch pad. The new version, the Boogie Board Rip, allows you to save up to 200 pages as pdf files and download them into your computer where you can OCR them or whatever you might need to do.
It's not a laptop or tablet PC but it's great for taking notes, drawing diagrams, etc. And it's only $130.
http://www.improvelectronics.com/us/en/boogie-board-LCD-writing-tablet/boogie-board-rip-LCD-writing-tablet.html
My son has autism, so we attend a LOT of IEP meetings with our local school district. This is one device that I always see used by our school district. You can write on a regular notepad, and with the included pen, the device will store the notes electronically as well. You would then have both a hard copy back up for any notes stored electronically.
http://www.adesso-shop.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1&products_id=168
The best combo for handwritten note's I've found is ipad + the note taker HD app.
If there is something as robust available for android I'd love to hear about it. I'd sell my ipad and switch.
As an added bonus, note taker HD is written by the guy who created the first spreadsheet, visicalc.
http://acecad.tw/
The Acecad DIgiMemo allows you to write your notes on pen & paper and you can save them electronically.
They are Open Source friendly see http://www.acecad.com.tw/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=17&Itemid=111&lang=en and google "digimemo open source"
This is an awesome combination. Pick up PDF Annotator and you can add your own notes on top of the professor's PDFs.
I used this combination through Comp. Engr school. OneNote is perfect for school and class notes, grid lines, regular lines, you can email and print out copies for classmates who aren't there, you can collaborate with others using OneNote via shared notebooks.
Plus, you have a full Windows PC.
I knew several other engineering students with tablets and we all had great experiences with Windows Tablet PC and OneNote.
I didn't find it clumsy, or have problems with the touchpad (how do you when you open the tablet into slate mode?)
I carried around a couple sheets of paper just in case I needed to write something down and hand it in, but for the last 2.5 years of school, I carried the books I needed and my tablet PC. I did all my homework in my tablet pc and printed it in the computer labs.
I had a Toshiba M400 (started with XP and upgraded to Vista, still have it, upgraded to Win7) and I've used it twice now for signing PDF forms for purchasing a house and a condo.
There's no comparison to a Windows tablet PC and an iPad or Android tablet for taking notes.
If u dont mind poor battery life and a hefty price tag, any tablet PC should do the job. If u plan on doing graphics design, a wacom-penabled device should be used.
U can use the windows 7 touch components to ink via pen, or type via onscreen kb, which performs character conversion if necessary, and then sends characters into any application.
Using apps specifically for notetaking, such as MS onenote, u can make paper completely obsolete.
Ideally tho, u wouldnt want to use any Microsoft garbage or any other proprietary solution. But getting this to work in a open platform will require some maneuvering.
Ive got my EP121 to boot OpenBSD with X and KDE3, and got wacom drivers working, so the pen worked, and i got touch drivers, but couldnt get multitouch working, only single touch. But I didnt spend too much time on that since UNIX is a cripple without a physical keyboard, so I ended up selling the device and waiting for my new UX31e-DH72 to arrive.
Also any mobile device with a 2 hrs battery life, cant really be considered a mobile device, so if u plan on buying a tablet PC, dont stray to far from a power source. Unless of course u like to carry around a flat brick after 2hrs of use.
Hopefully in the future, tablets-PCs will be more power efficient, cheaper, and not as heavy.
-HasHie
If you're up to the task, you could try installing a linux OS such as Ubuntu and use the Xournal hand writing software. It is excellent. Quick and responsive, looks very similar to my handwriting on paper, can be converted to PDF, can easily erase, different colors to highlight, etc. However, I have only used this on my Lenovo X40 (I think that's what it is?) Tablet PC. I have a Viewsonic G-Tablet, but I haven't had time to try to install Ubuntu. Another thing with tablets is that the majority of the styluses suck major ass for handwriting. I bought the Jot pen which seems to be good for handwriting, but I haven't used it yet! :P So you could look them up and watch videos about their product. Again, it might be more effort to you than it's worth to try and install Ubuntu. I think this is called rooting. I kind of have been avoiding it because I am afraid it might take awhile and I don't have the time to do it right now. However, it could be fairly simple. I suggest googling it and reading up on it.
Galaxy Note
No one have mentioned this yet? Weird, it looks perfect for what he asks for. Top of the line Android smartphone/tablet hybrid with support for both hands and stylus.
It's The Golden Rule: "He who has the gold makes the rules."
By your standards we would all be modern slaves, taking information only from trusted sources like those objective newspapers. Also, the idea of internet and linking is obviously only ment for real morons who would be so stupid to think that random unknown people might ever give you interesting information. In fact, you consider everyone a moron except yourself or the one posting a goatse in the first place. You must a superman, or should i say uebermensch. Nicely following orders from your sup, never to disobey, and never waste a second of your precious boss's time. If everyone would be like you the world would be utopia.
The only real moron here is you. Trying to justify trolls makes you the troll shaman. Maybe you should consider the fact that not everyone is a bastard like you, but such idea is likely out of your reference frame.
I'm in graduate school and I picked up a Lenovo X220 Tablet PC (to replace my previous Gateway tablet PC, which performed admirably for many years). It gets about 6 hours of battery time with the larger battery, the pen input is great and includes pressure sensitivity, and I love Microsoft OneNote for taking notes. The professor gives us PDFs with the slides, and I can either drag the PDF into the app and insert it as a printout so I can take notes directly on it, or I can use the snipping tool that comes with Windows 7 to cut out sections of the slide and paste into the notepad (which makes for better flow than inserting as a printout, but can be time-consuming in class when I'm quickly cutting something out and pasting it in while the instructor is talking).
Several years ago there was a special pen with a special paper you could buy: take notes with the pen, connect to pc and it had recorded all your key strokes. Seems like the best of both worlds. No idea if that product/idea is still around.
"UNIX is very simple, it just needs a genius to understand its simplicity." -Dennis Ritchie
The current Lenovo tablet PC (X220) senses the proximity of the pen to the screen and disables the touchpad automatically, so resting your wrist on the screen will no longer mess things up (my previous tablet had that problem and I just disabled the touchscreen altogether). With an i7 in it, mine has no appreciable input lag when I'm writing. The screen's a nice size, so you can get a lot onto it. I use MS OneNote, which can also convert your handwriting to text (and does a pretty good job of it that I've found). I mostly type my notes into OneNote, then past in graphics or use the pen to draw on the screen when I need to put in a formula or chemical structure (I'm working on a Master's in Biomedical Informatics and Computational Biology, so math and biology need a bit of freeform input).
Seriously, who studies from those? I found I NEVER go back to my notes when exam time comes. I just read from the book, slides, homeworks, wiki... never found the notes particularly useful after all.
I don't have a sig.
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I have an HP Touchsmart TM2T and use it for taking notes in class. The stylus/screen is great. I do find that I cannot write as small as I can on real paper, but I just start zoomed in and so when I zoom out it ends up at the same size. It's a great little system.
http://www.improvelectronics.com/us/en/
You shoulkd try a Boogie Board. Their new version has the feature to save your handwritten notes to a pdf and send it to a computer over usb.
You can save around 200 pages in the internal memory before you dump them to your pc.
Saves paper, you save your handwritten notes/drawings/etc..
Cheaper than a tablet $130.00
The current Lenovo tablet PC (X220) senses the proximity of the pen to the screen and disables the touchpad automatically, so resting your wrist on the screen will no longer mess things up (my previous tablet had that problem and I just disabled the touchscreen altogether). With an i7 in it, mine has no appreciable input lag when I'm writing. The screen's a nice size, so you can get a lot onto it. I use MS OneNote, which can also convert your handwriting to text (and does a pretty good job of it that I've found). I mostly type my notes into OneNote, then past in graphics or use the pen to draw on the screen when I need to put in a formula or chemical structure (I'm working on a Master's in Biomedical Informatics and Computational Biology, so math and biology need a bit of freeform input).
Sounds like exactly what I want. Thanks.
I used the lenovo x41 with MS Onenote throughout college for note taking and it worked great.
Pen and paper is the best when I have to take notes quickly, but if I have more time, I like an iPad 2, long stylus, and Pentultimate. I say an iPad 2 because I have tried it on an iPad 1 and their is noticeable lag when I write. It does come in handy when you need to share those notes with others though.
I would rather write on a real piece of paper than scribble notes on a computer emulating pieces of paper.
I would rather use a laptop with a real keyboard than scribble notes on real or virtual pieces of paper. Hint hint you can easily touch type without having to look at a computer screen.
Also think of the lecturer... Most are annoyed by armies of glowing displays in their field of view. Laptop displays are oriented in such a way this is not a problem.
Tablets are ususally the wrong tool for the job if you intend to be productive.
It would seem to me that the best idea would be an app that would record audio and allow note-taking, and kept the two in sync, so that when reviewing the notes you could listen to the original if it was confusing. That way you really might just take notes that would highlight the important things, and be able to use most of your concentration paying attention to the lecture.
Finally, as voice recognition inevitably improves you would be able to intersperse the voice-recognized words with your typed notes -- again, using time stamps to organize everything.
Best solution: safe your effing money. You could probably find both a pen and a notepad at the dollar store for 99 cents each. So you want to spend hundreds of dollars to write notes on a tablet... what happens if it gets lost or stolen? Tablets are a lot more desirable than a notepad and pen. Maybe I'm getting old...
This doesn't fit most of your critieria ("handwriting" being the most obvious, but also textbook storage), but it's what I've used and it works great for me.
iPhone (or any smartphone)
Bluetooth keyboard (I use Apple's)
Evernote
Evernote automatically uploads content to its cloud so you can edit and use from your computer without having to sync.
All you have to buy/carry in your purse is the keyboard - I'd chose a usable one that's a bit larger, like the Apple, rather than a small one that's harder to type on, since the main point will be to type notes quickly. Apple's keyboard is $70 or so, but compared to buying a barely usable netbook, I think it's worth it. Batteries in the kb last forever.
You could use a tablet instead but I find the iPhone screen big enough to read what I'm typing, which is enough.
Another benefit of the phone, is less temptation to multi-task.
Personally, I put the keyboard about a foot in front of me, with the phone in between me and the keyboard - easier to see, works better for touch-typing, less distracting to others I'm listening to.
I dislike handwritten notes, because they're barely legible and non-searchable.
I bought a tablet for the same purpose. What a let down. Typing on a touchscreen is awful, writing with a stylus is worse. I no longer use it for much of anything. Hundreds of dollars wasted. If you have a Mac, nothing beats OmniOutliner for notes, OmniGraffle for diagrams, and LaTeXit for equations.
They are quite pricey, however. The Asus Eee Slate is one of the few new one I know of that are a full blown computer in tablet form. It's able to use a pen as well as multi-touch, so note writing should be a snap. I haven't used a slate in years, but I still have my HP TC1100 with XP tablet and FranklinCovey PlanPlus for Windows. It's not designed specifically for note taking, but does that ability. Back when I was using it, it's handwriting recognition was amazing. It could take even my crapy handwriting and convert it to text with little to no errors/misspellings.
Until they develop actual handwriting capabilities and accurate handwriting recognition on tablets on par with a Slate PC, you might as well get a real laptop. You'll be using a keyboard anyway with the tablet, and with the laptop, you'll get better computing power to process those notes. Or, even better, have her sit up front (away from all the keyboards) and take hand written notes. Transferring them to the computer later will help in remembering what was said.
I haven't been in a lecture hall in years, but I can imagine all the clickity-clack of the multitude of keyboards is very distracting to both the professor and students.
--- Keep the choice with the user..
Try Note Taker HD on the iPad 2 with a stylus. It takes a little practice, but once you get the hang of it, it's great.
I second the tablet PC form factor. Others that qualify are the ASUS Eee Slate, Samsung Series 7 Slate, as well as models from HP and Fujitsu.
I use a Thinkpad X61 tablet on linux with the note-taking software Xournal, which also can annotate pdf's.
Unfortunately, Steve Jobs in his infinite wisdom, very publicly denounced the stylus as a failure when the iPad was released, and you know, Steve Jobs is always right. Never mind 10,000 years of history placing sticks to parchment. So the entire iPad clone industry (Android) has completely eschewed the stylus, much to my dismay. Worse, the manufacturers have decided that the only thing people really need to do with a tablet is watch movies, so the screens are low resolution, and 16:9 aspect ratio. This, when placed in portrait mode, is much taller and narrower than a piece of paper. And because the resolution is low, if you put up a full-page PDF on the thing, small letters like subscripts in equations are often readable. And even worse, all the new tablets are 10.1". A 8.5x11 piece of paper has a 14" diagonal, for comparison.
So, if any of you have the ear of any Android/tablet manufacturers, please bring back 4:3 screens at high resolution, with a form factor essentially the same as that of paper. Minimum DPI for this usage is about 150 (or about 1024 vertical resolution).
1^2=1; (-1)^2=1; 1^2=(-1)^2; 1=-1; 1=0.
The best teacher I ever had refused to allow the taking of any notes during a lesson in any shape or form. "I want you to concentrate totally on listening to me and thinking about what I am saying," was his reasoning. "I want you to understand this subject, then you will not have to waste energy trying to remember it." Any notes that he considered we should keep for reference he handed us on a sheet of paper at the end of the lesson. Which was physics, should you wonder.
Learn how to do a mind map. Not only is it quick, it's easier to remember when your notes are organized graphically.
I have an iPad and I use Takenote. I like that it allows me to write freehand, draw shapes, type into text boxes, and does minor page layout work (e.g. moving and resizing components). It's also good at organizing different notebooks with multiple pages and named sections and bookmarks.
My wife recently finished law school. When she started we got her a then pretty pricey Fujitsu 10" notebook that fit in her purse. I don't remember the model number, but it also could take another battery pack in place of the dvd drive.
She needed office applications, I first gave her openoffice, but eventually we purchased ms office with an educational discount because she could not open all ms office documents.
She took some notes on the laptop, but mostly used pen and paper. Then retyped them if she needed them digitally, which is a great exercise for memorizing.
If she had to do it today, even with all the tablets available I think she would still pick a laptop. Office and exam software (like secureexam) are probably the main reason, but being able to hook up to printers and projectors on campus is also important.
My suggestion is a small laptop (or if tight on budget, then a netbook), paper and pen.
I recommend getting a livescribe pen instead of a note taking tablet. It records audio synced with the written ink on the physical paper. It allows easy reviewing of spoken info at precisely the time desired, and searching the backed up ink and audio notes on a pc at home is easy. Battery life is incredible and nothing is more intuitive or reliable than a paper and pen notebook.
Besides, etextbooks just aren't worth it on a cost or usability basis. Most are merely overpriced rentals with no resale value. And that's for the few textbooks with electronic versions.
For quickly recording information which might include diagrams, I find handwriting the quickest. Inevitably when typing you will find yourself futzing with the formatting. Whereas when writing you will likely already have a mental format in mind as you put down notes. I've found "where" on the paper I write the information critical to finding the information and remembering it. The physical act of writing cements the information.
However, for storage, you can't beat a tablet. For notes, Evernote is amazing. I will scan my handwritten notes into a PDF and store it in Evernote along with pertinent information. I can use Evernote's OCR to later retrieve information if I can't recall where it is in my notes. I can also store other relevant information.
I'm using a refurbished Nook Color that I rooted to run Cyanogenmod and it works very well _except_ for one thing:
If you scan each lecture/class/session of notes into one PDF and thus one note (althoug you can add multiple PDFs to a note) there isn't an easy way to flip through them. That is, you have to open the note, then open the PDF. To get to the next note you have to close the PDF, open the next note, then open the PDF. That kind-of kills the whole "flip through all the notes" thing. I have requested this ability as an option (along with several other users.) In theory I could continually add the new set of pages to the old PDF and update it. Though, that would mean the that PDF would grow to a rather large and unmanageable size. Also, Evernote doesn't immediately apply the OCR (it takes several days before the OCR is applied, less time if you're a paid member.) So if you kept updating a PDF stored in a note it might never get the OCR data applied as it would think it was a new document to be scanned. That's too much mental effort in my mind.
Note that I haven't seen how an iPad's implementation works. I am using the free version of Evernote. If I would purchase it I could cache all my notes locally for quicker access, however once each note is loaded on my machine it is cached.
As far as the 7" tablet goes it is a very, very convenient size. However, in the end I think the iPad is a better size in that you can more easily view an 8.5x11 sheet of paper.
I have a Fujitsu Scansnap which I use to scan in my documents as PDFs. It is hands-down the best peripheral I have _ever_ had. I highly recommend it.
Lastly, if you are totally against using paper, the Lenovo Thinkpad Tablet has a nice digitizer stylus. I haven't seen it used in practice and I don't know their application support. I'd suggest using one in person. It is priced competitively and has a nice set of peripherals.
Try to find a Motion Computing LE1700 on eBay.
It has an active digitiser, a large high-resolution screen (1400x1050), and it's brilliant. I use mine all the time -- for taking notes in lectures, for giving lectures, for Skype sessions where we're talking technical stuff that needs sketches and graphs, for Photoshop, for signing PDFs. I've also tried a convertible Lenovo of some sort, an HP, and a Fujitsu lifebook, and none of them comes close. I think the killer feature of the LE1700 is its high resolution, which helps enormously with fine-motor-control handwriting.
Honestly: Your wife should use the classic combo of Pen and Paper. If it *must* be electronical, nothing beats the Livescribe System. It's basically the best of both worlds.
The HTC Flyer Android Tablet has a pen system integrated aswell, but that only lasts 5 hrs on one load. And it probalby breaks if you drop it or it gets wet. Not really an alternative, if you ask me.
My 2 cents.
We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
The Asus EEE Note is perfect, I've found. It has a Wacom stylus, monochrome screen without backlight and no touch. It has a web browser and a note taking program with really good handwriting recognition. It's basically what you need but no more and as a result it's also really cheap. If you're into that kind of thing it's also really hackable (runs Linux). It hasn't been launched outside Taiwan which I think is why nobody has heard of it but you can get it (in English) from Ebay.
It's the only piece of software I've found for Android that runs on low-end hardware, provides for separate notebooks and allows for multi-fullpage notes.
I recently tested several note-taking apps for the purpose of taking notes during meetings.
I tested several apps looking for an app that supports handwriting and keyboard text entry, offline synchronization (dropbox), and pdf import and markup for adding notes to handouts or diagrams. Based on this criteria, I would recommend Noteability and NoteTaker HD. NoteTaker HD is the more full featured app, but Noteability is a little more user friendly and still has all the key features I was looking for. Noteability is only $.99 and NoteTaker HD is $4.99. NotesPlus also has some potential, but could use some polishing. I imagine after the next major upgrade it will probably move to the top of my list since it was missing features like dropbox and pdf markup.
As for a stylus, I got a Kensington stylus from Amazon that also has a pen on the other side. Compared to some of the other ones my coworkers have, this one has been the best. http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004BSF1I8/ref=asc_df_B004BSF1I81783797
Take picture of handouts/whiteboard.
Join the Slashcott! Feb 10 thru Feb 17!
A rooted nook with cyanogen is the best http://www.montuori.net/
While I was going to school, I used a Toshiba M205-S810 convertible tablet and MS OneNote. I was able to handwrite all my notes during classes using OneNote and organize them neatly into different notebooks within the application. The application allows for both lined paper (college, wide, etc) and graph paper (large gridsize, small gridsize), various pens, colors and tip sizes. For handwritten assignments that needed to be turned in, I could just print the pages out of OneNote. Many of the classes I attended where powerpoint driven, and I could import the powerpoint the teacher was using into OneNote and then simply handwrite notes on top of each slide and we went over them.
IMHO, your best bet with the technology around today would be a Windows slate or convertible tablet with an active digitizer.
Most powerful Windows tablet out there. OneNote works great on it. Wacom digitizer, palm detection(when you rest your hand on the glass), and an included bluetooth keyboard for more serious typing.
http://www.asus.com/Eee/Eee_Pad/Eee_Slate_EP121/
I am currently doing a grad degree in CS and use my modbook and inkbook for taking notes. As others have pointed out, handwriting recognition is hit and miss, and Apple's inkwell is no different, so I usually just take notes with handwriting recognition turned off. Either way though, you can doodle on it like it's paper and add in diagrams, etc. It makes me very happy as my day-to-day all purpose machine.
Anyway, you can get them from a bunch of distributors, and if you're in the US you can order them from OWC. That said, Axiotron has been going through some financial problems for awhile now and the modbook hasn't been updated in some time to use current macbook base systems, but if you're comfortable getting a 2009 era macbook and the possibility that the company may disappear at any time (so, warranty repercussions) then I can recommend it as a great system. Personally, when my modbook eventually retires I'm not sure what I'll replace it with if Axiotron isn't still around - it will be a sad day for me when I have to give up the stylus. YMMV.
"Belief means not wanting to know what is true." [Nietzche, The Anti-Christ, 1889]
Too bad they went out of business... great idea tho. a full LCD tablet + a touchscreen e-ink.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
If the redesign and re-release this in a Tegra 3 platform like the ASUS Transformer Prime, I'm in. Otherwise I'm following the Prime until it's released. I'm a developer and also need heavy processing for compiling code at times, for that I simply have SSH capability to my home desktop and can remote in on the command line or use X over SSH.
I really like stylus input for these kinds of devices, so I've been doing a lot of reading about that specific tablet. It's one of very few devices (excluding costly hybrid tabletPCs) that uses an active digitiser with pressure sensitivity and a more pen-like nib size (compared to the stubby ones used with devices like the iPad).
You can find videos on Youtube of people using it for sketching as well as note taking and it seems pretty responsive, and the pen nib size is more comparable to a Wacom stylus than the stubby ones. It's supposed to have some kind of palm input rejection, but from what I've seen said by owners, it's not perfect. One of the owners posting videos started usng a fingerless glove with it as a workaround.
The glove thing is annoying, but not a deal breaker for me, so I'm still considering it. What I really would have liked was an Asus Eee Note, which was supposed to sell for around $200 as a specialised device intended only for sketching and note-taking. Too bad Asus never released it outside of Taiwan.
So the entire iPad clone industry (Android) has completely eschewed the stylus, much to my dismay.
Not everyone. As others have mentioned in comments here, Lenovo has an Android tablet with a proper, pressure-sensitive stylus. http://www.lenovo.com/products/us/tablet/thinkpad/
I love my Asus EP121 tablet with a real digitizer pen (not a fat finger stylus), using technology licensed from Wacom (same technology as Bamboo and Cintiq devices). I use it to take notes with diagrams, and math symbols. I also use it to do all my math and physics exercises. On other tablets I tried before this one, the pen sucked - it worked but was not accurate enough to efficiently draw diagrams. For taking plain text notes, a keyboard (which the Asus EP121 supports) is more efficient, but in fact I found that I learn more efficiently by taking notes with the stylus. I assimilate the information better this way, probably because I type too fast and have spare time to think about other things while the teacher is talking. So having the pen slow me down ensures that I stay focused.
Wacom recently released a pen that records everything you write (or draw). Their products are usually fantastic.
http://www.wacom.com/en/Products/Inkling.aspx
I have an asus eeenote 800. The software is total cr**, there is not even cut & paste, no apps, etc. But it's what one wants in the campus: you can read on it in the sunlight and you can perfectly take notes on it. Except that you can't move or cut & paste pages except in an external editor e.g. by exporting them to images or pdf.
The point of taking notes in class is to help you learn the subject matter. You might want to look at what kind of note-taking would be most effective for learning and then decide your medium. Mind-mapping and Head First style combinations of drawing and words have a lot a going for them in that department, and pen(s) and paper are the way to create them. A notepad and paper is very light and easy to carry around. Consider a voice recorder too. A lot of the actual learning will happen in review and sorting of notes after the lecture.
Use a Asus Transformer to get the mouse and keyboard and use the camera on it to take photos of any formulas or diagrams.
The ThinkPad Tablets are tough as nails and include a digitizer screen and stylus. They sense when you are using the stylus and can filter out your palm touching the screen so they are very comfortable to write on.
My experience, after about a month of using the following setup, is that it replaces any need for pen and paper, at least for what I use it for. I do a lot of note taking in meetings, etc, and that often includes diagrams. My setup: Ipad2 Evernote Dropbox NoteShelf an Adonit Jot Pro Stylus. (This is as good as a balpoint pen on paper, with the right note taking app). I've also tried out UPad as a note taking app, it works quite well - I just preferred the look and feel of the writing in NoteShelf overall.
Years ago, I managed to convince my friend to get an X41 Tablet (http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Category:X41_Tablet) when it first came out, thinking that she could use it to jot down notes using OneNote in classes. In the end she kept on using paper and pen instead.
She did find the tablet functionality useful - To draw with ArtRage.
There are some reasons why she didn't use it to jot notes - The machine was too heavy (4lbs) and large (10" x 10") for her to carry around together with the printed textbooks and other stuff; The performance was not very good (4,200RPM 1.8" HDD); She's not that into technology and felt more comfortable to shift through notebooks......
Few years later, I got an X61 Tablet myself. These days, I mainly use the tablet functionality to jot down notes with OneNote when I read the Bible, and occasionally to write the diary.
The ability of OneNote to recognize my hasty handwriting is surprisingly good. But the machine is still too heavy to hold in hand for long periods.
There are slate-only models which are lighter, but I need a keyboard and have no interest (and money) in buying and switching between 2 machines.
I think one of the blocking issues for my friend to utilize the tablet functionality more was that, e-textbooks were in most cases just not available back then. She would have to carry the book AND the machine all the time.
The above comments are about Tablet PC running full-fledged Windows.
With regard to the newer tablet market out there (e.g. iPad, Xoom, Galaxy Tabs...), most of them use capacitive screens which are not accurate enough for handwritten notes (there's a stylus called Jot from Adonit who seemed to give excellent accruacy, but I have no actual experience myself so cannot vouch for it).
A few of them have an active stylus (which I mentioned here http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?p=1819164#post1819164), but then software support is an issue - They all have their proprietary and incompatible ways to utilize the stylus and store the drawings/notes, which could prove to be problematic down the road.
I can go on for many paragraphs, but not knowing more about what your wife expects, it's difficult to give more useful comments. But feel free to let me know if you have any specific question in mind.
Cheers.
Boogie board rip
http://www.improvelectronics.com/
I developed Audiotorium Notes a couple of years ago for my niece who was just starting college. Since then it has been featured by Apple a number of times in their back-to-school apps lineup. Note taking + audio recording + dropbox syncing goodness. http://itunes.com/apps/audiotorium
Livescribe's offerings look quite interesting: oversized pens that record whatever you write or doodle, and optionally, what you are listening while you write, so later you can replay both your writing and the audio recording in your computer, or this last directly from the pen. You can skip to any point in the recording by just clicking whatever you where writing at the time, both in the computer and in paper.
I could not find any tests of the quality of the OCR, for which seems you have to pay a hefty extra to get; and you also have to buy the special dot paper (or print it yourself), but still, seriously impressive, and aimed specifically at school. Here's a demo.
As for books... they have joined the app fade, so I'm sure if you are willing to pay, someone is willing to create a PDF reader for it. ;) I can't imagine why anyone would want to study languages or guitar chords in such a limited device. Play poker *against* your pen, seriously? Still, Hangman and Sudoku seem perfectly appropriate.
I've been using HP's tablets with OneNotes for years. I'm on my third HP tablet (HP Elite Book 2760p). I have handwritten and type written notes all in one place going back to 2004 from both classes and meetings.For really critical classes I've used the audio record feature to sync the audio to the notes.
Not exactly what you asked, but might be a solution...
A friend of mine has a smart pen. It needs a special notebook (of the paper variety), but has some cool features. You can upload your notes to a computer. From memory, it does handwriting recognition, so you get searchable text. Also, it has a microphone and records what's being said. Point the pen at a word it wrote, and it will replay the conversation, starting a minute (configurable) before the word was written.
I think there are other smart pens out there, too.
I've used my palmtop/phone/pad systems for note taking for quite a while now... starting with a Palm Pilot and the IR folding keyboard that they sold. The worst (but still functional) setup I've used was a Samsung Palm OS flip phone, with a wired keyboard... worked great, but, between no stand for the phone, and the cable in the way, was just a little inconvenient
My current setup is a MS Mobil Bluetooth Keyboard 6000 and a Droid X...
The keyboard is about 3/8 inch thick and about the size of a standard laptop keyboard with a nicely ergonomic layout... When I picked it up it was about $80 with a separate 10-Key pad...
It's not quite as nice as the Palm folding keyboard and T5 since there's nothing like the built in stand that Palm provided... but it's a LOT nicer keyboard for the touch typist!
I'm pretty sure that a similar keyboard with any of the Apple or Android pads would do every bit as well...
Try the Asus Eee Note. You can do eBooks, handwriting and sketching: http://www.asus.com/Eee/Eee_Note/Eee_Note_EA800/ . I've been planning to buy one myself, but it is still not available in this part of the world.
But *10 years ago* I had a Palm IIIc which had everything I needed:
a foldable keyboard for typing, a resistive touch screen with a stylus for drawing (or for keyboardless writingonce you got used to its graffiti). All coming with great and responsive default applications (including Notes. Great for note taking). I only had to get a plug-in to directly embed drawings into notes. Went through all my studies in medecine and then bioinformatics with the same setup (and a hardware upgrade to a T3 along the way). And that was 10 years ago.
Happy to see that the technology has improved so much to the point that modern devices don't feature writing recognition out of the box (which doesn't really need haptics) but instead rely on crappy on-screen keyboard (which without haptics are completely useless for typing anything long) have lower precision touchscreens because capacitive enable funny things like multi-finger gestures, and apparently doesn't een feature a decent note taking app.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
+1 to this
I have owned an EEE Note for a couple months now, and it's pretty decent. Being a wacom based system, it is accurate with a stylus and you get pressure sensitivity (not that anything seems to use it - yet). I originally wanted something to take notes and sketch on, and its not great for sketching (the default programs anyway), but it works pretty well for taking notes.
I should mention that it takes a little while to get used to - I have been using tablet PCs for around ten years now, and its a little bit different to those. Its much better for taking notes than any tablet PC i have owned (and I have extensively used the Motion Computing LE1700, which is the best tech until very recently IMHO). There isn't any lag, but there is a bit of parallax error that you need to get used to. Once you grab the idea of just writing on it and not looking where the text appears, you will quickly get used to it, and will get the text exactly where you want without thinking about it.
It's pretty cheap too ~USD250, reckon you could get it cheaper if you got a 2nd hand one or drive a hard bargain.
(oh yeah, and it *does* run linux)
Yeah, the LE1700 is still pretty awesome. Still a higher resolution than most tablets around.
I find the weight and battery aren't the best for taking into lectures - for that I prefer the Asus EEE Note. But at home, correcting proofs, drawing, and general laptop work, its fantastic.
Don't know what I will replace it with...
Paper and pencil. Sorry, tablets still can't do anything like what my pencil can do, in terms of fine detail, shading, not mattering if I drop them on a concrete floor, they're generally flexible, (the paper, not the pencil) and you can easily tear pieces off and give them to others... let's see you do that with your fyePad. Any other solution is either too small to use, but small enough conveniently to carry, or big enough to be usable but too large to carry.
Paper has many other advantages. Sure, I can type faster than I can write, but shorthand can make up for much of that difference. I was working out a simplified script for my own class notes based on the letter shapes early touch-screens used, where like for example an "a" was drawn as an inverted v, (needing only two strokes instead of three and able to be made without lifting the pen,) a "t" was made by a horizontal left-right line followed by a vertical descender... an "r" was made by going from bottom up and then to the right, basically a horizontal reflection of the same... it economized pen/brush/finger strokes, but like learning to type on a Dvorak keyboard, the entrenched paradigm in my head made it too hard to switch. Too much of a learning curve and too high opportunity cost for the marginal gains in writing speed. Looked cool though... Made for some funky looking notes.
Then I tried a completely revamped character set based on the smallest number of strokes and simplest letter shapes for the most frequently occurring letters in our language, starting of course, with "e" (a diagonal slash) etc., and I actually reached a point of proficiency with that where I could almost read it like it was plain English, which also gave me the advantage of a steganographic writing system that while not any species of crypto, would at least protect my notes from casual prying eyes over my shoulder. But again, I still lost more time than the speed of writing the characters made up for in having to remember each alternate character.
Then I tried spelling simplification, but that caused speed loss in having to remember how properly to misspell each word... it led 2 notes THT OFTN LKD LK THS. SUR ITS GR8 BT U BCOM DEPNDNT ON CONTXT 2 MCH.
So long story short, I returned to paper and pencil, while my various tech solutions are used more for entertainment than productivity, which is kindofa waste, but phuck it. It's a sunk cost.
Cheers, and happy fyeFadding.
Have you not considered a fujitsu or lenovo with the flip screen and stylus?
I have all my notes from my undergrad handwritten/typed depending on what was easier (Math was handwritten) as well as textbooks and marked homework on my fujitsu and it's quite a bit better than a typical laptop or tablet.
December will see the release of the Asus transformer prime. Go with it its going to be very good.
The Asus EEE Transformer Pad with or without keyboard-dock works great with a touch screen pen for note-taking in SuperNote (Bundled software).
Other than that, you can't go wrong with tee transformer and a keyboard-dock since it has a total of 14-16 hours of use with it.
I'm a university student, this is what I use:
iPad2
App- UPAD
Stylus- Adonit's Jotter Pro http://adonit.net/product/jot-pro/ - accept no alternatives to this stylus
I assure you this is the best combination, ignore the rest they dont seem to know what a university student's needs are.
The Android based Lenovo tablet is great.
There is very little parallax between the stylus and the 'ink' appearing on the screen. This is very important for not only taking the notes initially but also updating/annotating them later.
EverNote is a good note taking application - notes can be left handwritten or converted to typed characters - either way they are searchable. (Much like Microsoft’s OneNote.)
The battery life is not too bad either and with a, rumoured, new Lenovo Tablet coming at the end of 2011 you may be able to pick up the current generation at a reasonable price.
Hey everyone, I just wanted to say thanks for all of the helpful information offered in this thread. You've offered a lot of interesting ideas and solutions, and given us a lot to go on.
As usual, the Slashdot community comes through.
I'll try to follow up before this thread gets archived with what we looked at, and eventually decided to use.
Thanks again!
http://noteslate.com/ The noteslate is definitely what you're looking for. But I'm not sure it is released at the moment.
A pen and a spiral note book. Studies have shown that the act of physically writing notes helps you remember them.
Find your own citations.
Utilizing the synergization of benchmark e-solutions to pre-workaround action items!
I took notes by pen and paper, then on the same day of the lecture, sat down and typed them up in an organized form. It took about 15-18 minutes per hour lecture.
Some advantages:
-if you didn't "get" something, so couldn't make the notes make sense, you knew *that day* and could ask the prof before the prof moved on, ahead of any test on the material, or could compare notes with another student right away.
-having typed up notes really cut down the time spent studying throughout the semester. It was not wasted time, just studying a different way.
- I found that when I knew I was going to go over it that day, I found myself taking notes a little differently--subconsciously thinking of how they would be organized, and they got easier to type in.
- I developed a sort of shorthand for each subject as I only had to remember it till I typed them up and expanded the notes later that day.
-they became more permanent notes: I would bind all the printed out notes at the end of a semester
into a binder and they still sit on my shelf years later.
-another advantage is not having to depend on hardware that gets dropped or has battery issues or disk full problems during class like you do when you type them in directly.
Consider also a reason that hand note taking works well: Information is not always presented in correct order in class, the prof goes back and fills in a detail, or gives a second reason for something, you just write it in the margin (so to speak) which is harder digitally than with a pen and paper.
One option that you can go with is the Asus Eee Slate. This is a Windows based tablet that has a Wacom stylus. It is designed for handwriting and even is smart enough to know the difference between the stylus and your hand so you can rest your hand on the screen and still write. It also features full laptop specs. The down sides to this tablet is size and price. It has a 12" screen and is quite a bit heavier than an iPad which makes it harder to use while holding it in your hands. It will also cost you around $1000.
Another option is the Asus Transformer. This is the option that I currently have and I use it for taking notes in my classes. The app that I use most of the time for taking notes is Repligo Reader. My teachers post their lecture notes online as PDFs. Repligo Reader does a wonderful job of allowing me to take notes right on the PDF. The handwriting feature is a little rough on it, but I find I don't have to write as much when I already have the teachers notes as part of my notes.
Another wonderful app is SuperNote. Supernote does a wonderful job of allowing handwriting and typing and allows you mix it up in the same note page. It also allows you embed pictures, videos, or audio recordings. This is the app of choice for me if lecture notes are not posted. The Asus Transformer also has a keyboard dock that extends battery life, allows connection of USB devices, and makes typing easy while still enabling tablet functionality.
I know this sounds crazy, but the best HW recognition on the planet is still circa 1998 tech, the Apple Newton 2100 handheld. About the size of a paperback novel, it has a black on green screen and has separate HW recognition engines for both cursive and printed, which approaches 99% accurate. Prices run around $200 USD today, and the unit will last a several weeks on a single charge. The screen even has a backlight for darkened lecture halls. The screen has a very paper feel to it, the stylus stores in the unit, and there is still an active user community with several thousand participants...NewtonTalk. Amazing tech...that has never been replicated since.
I got a Lenovo ThinkPad Tablet (android 3.1 for now). It is one of the few android tablets with multiple ports and connectors and an N-trig digitizer/stylus. The software is still lacking. It doesn't have anything like OneNote yet. But I am able to listen to a lecture and take notes about as easy as using paper. The android app I us is Quill. The thing it lacks is handwriting recognition. There is a handwriting recognition app included (Notes Mobile), and its recognition is pretty good, but it is still useless most everyone agrees. Maybe a second generation will fix the manifold problems. Using my tablet, I can take notes, export png's, send to Evernote for partial OCR and indexing, and even print the notes out . . . It does work, though the clikcing of the stylus on the surface is a bit louder than I'd like. The ThinkPad Tablet is coming under a lit of criticism, though. Just check the forums for the breaking USB port issue (forums.lenovo.com). The ASUS Transformer Prime coming out next month I think will be the ThinkPad's equal, and it will have android 4.0 with its built-in stylus benefits, and the Tegra 3 processor, and all the accessories the Transformer is known for. Look into it -- and watch in general any tablets that use the N-trig digitizer.
Seriously.
I take complex math notes every class on a Motion M1400. It does exactly what OP is requesting. With Microsoft OneNote I can take large, multicolor notes with detailed precision.
The problem is, everyone is dead set on having typed notes. The moment you mention a stylus, you have to start talking about the difference in speed between a keyboard and handwriting. The problem is *THIS ISN'T AN ISSUE*. Handwriting is fine to read and store on its own and complex equations can only really be written by hand. Only a few people in the tech sector have realized this, but students are really better off being able to write detailed notes by hand. Give them access to a keyboard if they only want to type text.
So yeah, Jobs may have asked who wants to write with a stylus: the answer is *ME*.
Uses paper and uploads to any system both the notes and the audio.
I'm on my second LiveScribe pen (Pulse this time, lost the Echo) and my wife just one for herself. I use it ten hours a week at work in various meetings. So much more pleasant than a laptop (and I am not bashful about taking a laptop to a meeting when it's useful), more expressive, audio recording indexed to each word you write. Couple that with Evernote, and you're in business.
The only downside is that ink and audio is all you've got until you dock. It would be KILLER if you could dock to an iPad or Android on the go.
I have the previous gen Lenovo convertible tablet (X201T) and it is great for all 3 of those issues. The touch screen turns off when the stylus is near so you can leave your wrist on the screen and I don't notice any delay with handwriting. The screen is still a bit smaller than letter (12.1") but the stylus seems similar to a pen so it is pretty close. Plus, when I get stuck at the side of a page in One Note I just lift the stylus and use my finger to scroll over for more space. You can also move and resize text along with many other neat features. I don't know about the stand-alone tablet because it is a bit smaller (10.1"), but it will definitely be better than tablets that don't have a digitizer pen for those issues.
Didn't read the responses yet, but as a long-time tablet PC I will advocate the following:
I've looked at other solutions. HTC put out the Flyer, but the inking only works in certain programs and not with the general interface. It sucks, not worth it. I've even tried the PRS-T1 sony reader to buy ebooks since it allows inked notes, but it has a flaw where it starts flipping pages forward after a couple of hours use (on many models, including both mine and my wife's Reader). Really, if you are in school, there is no decent substitute for a good tablet PC.
There's an ipad app (don't have the link right now) which enables the ipad as a touch screen as a laptop. I may go back to school in the future and have considered this approach. The laptop goes in my backpack and the ipad connects wirelessly to it. I could take notes in one-note (or any other windows program) right onto the ipad. Any opinions from the rest of the slashdot crowd?
I do security
I've also looked at the boogie board rip. Seems like a simple way to take digital notes though the pdf format probably makes for an extra step to get the file into a note indexing tool (i.e. onenote). I've mainly looked at the boogie board rip (http://myboogieboard.com). The noteslate (http://www.noteslate.com/) looks interesting but I think it's a dead project. Anyone used a boogie board that cares to comment?
I do security
(27yr old average user student)
I'd like to lend my findings to you, I've read on the plethora of Tablets available for 2011. My needs share your wife's scope as well.
HTC flyer comes short with limited to none for stylus sensitivity. 7" is too small.
Samsung slate 7 near 1200$ plus software. This is most excellent. Windows based.
It has all you would expect for a buisness functional tablet and stylus input.
Android 3 upgradeable to 4 ICS on the Lenovo Thinkpad Tablet, ~600$. 10.5". Tegra 2. The highlight comes with the stylus. Stylus entry has strengths through software and hardware. The stylus has 256 pnts of sensitivity. Software has hand script to text translation, reportedly with 95% accuracy. Interestingly you can save hand written documents, then search these documents with handwriting. There is a full compliment of document support and security software suited for institutions or the common user.
Hardware includes, a dock, a keyboard-folio, and on tablet ports.
USB/usb-mini, Expandable-memory, HDMI. Including additional ports on either the dock or the folio.
LINKS
www.slashgear.com/lenovo-thinkpad-tablet-review-27183350
www.engadget.com/2011/09/29/thinkpad-tablet-review
http://www.solidsmack.com/cad-design-news/lenovo-thinkpad-tablet-designers/
As a Designer, attending university, from a generation raised on ink and paper - I find the Lenovo Thinkpad Tablet the most attractive currently. It doubles as a very functional note book, sketch book and laptop. Luckily, as a student, I'll be looking forward to 2012 iterations of such a tablet.
I hope this finds you well!
Fun, not functional. I would say this is too small. /paragraphs of hand writing, 5" input surfaces are to constrictive, your thoughts feel choked.
We are all accustom to writing on 8.5" by 11" note paper. and you'll notince smaller surfaces for full sentence
I suggested The Lenovo Thinkpad Tablet Below (anonymous coward)
I am using an HP Slate with OneNote and sharing my notebooks through a SharePoint site. It works well and by combining it with SharePoint provides a great way to share notes with others.
Another option is called the boogie board. I played with the $40 version that can't save data in brookstone. The writing could be a little finer (think fine point sharpie), but it isn't bad and as long as you can save-n-flip pages quickly it should work well for class. The version that can record data is $130.
Might not be the lightest or the cheapest solution, but for the best writing experience the X series tablets with Wacom digitizer and pen are unsurpassed for not taking in my opinion, especially if you use Microsoft One Note. I have an Ipad 2 with Wacom Bamboo stylus and Wacom Notepad which is ok, but nowhere near as good as the X61 I use.
Unless you get a windows based tablet, I wouldn't count on your eBook's DRM being supported. All the textbook rental places I've used require a hideous piece of DRM to be installed on your computer before you can read any textbooks. Also, don't discount the benefit of having a physical book in your hand to refer to. In many situations, having the book in one hand and notes in the other sure beats having to constantly switch between your textbook and note taking apps.
He might not be too pleased by the sound of dozens of students going clickety-clickety-tap while he's trying to speak either.
Call me a luddite, but I'd stick with paper.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
The benefit of a Wacom stylus is that you can rest your hand on the screen.
I've got most functions to work under linux on an X series, but do your homework: thinkwiki.org
I realize that the iPad is pretty much out but I have to throw my experience with Note Taker HD in the ring. Coupled with a Wacom Bamboo stylus it has met all of my needs as a consultant and could see it performing well in an academic setting with the addition of a keyboard.
In theory, theory always works in practice. In practice, theory rarely works. <><
I've tried various electronic forms of notetaking, and they're all deficient in some way or another. The approach I currently use is a high-resolution tablet PC (I use a refurbished Thinkpad X61 tablet with the 1400x1050 screen). It's better than a lower-resolution tablet PC (typically 1024x768 or 1280x800), which I've tried, where the low resolution is really quite obvious. For software, I use Windows 7 with OneNote 2010 -- it's quite decent. Complaints about poorish handwriting recognition, while true, are beside the point: compared to transcribing pen and paper, it's dramatically better. But a tablet PC is a heavy object to carry around, and the battery life is only 2-4 hours, so I am making some compromises here. Android/iOS tablets address the weight and battery life, but lack resolution. Despite its portability and battery life, iPad is a nonstarter with its whiteboard-marker-like pen and low 1024x768 resolution. The Thinkpad tablet with stylus is better in both respects, and is a reasonable option for people willing to give up some resolution for portability and battery life. I haven't tried the stylus-equipped Samsung Galaxy Note yet, which offers the same resolution as the Thinkpad (1280x800) in a 5" package rather than a 10": I suspect 5" will be too physically small. The Creative Ziio 7" (with stylus, suggested above) is between the Thinkpad and the Galaxy Note in size, but at 800x480 it's quite low resolution.
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I agree with Tragek.
I have been using a Tablet PC (Note: capital 'T') for taking notes in class since I started back to school in 2005. I actually owned it for a few years before that. Yes, they cost more than an iPad or an Android tablet but you are going to need a real laptop anyway so you are actually saving about $500 by not buying a useless (in this context) toy. I started with an Acer model but now have a Fujitsu Lifebook T4310. I can write on the screen using a stylus, in handwriting as tiny as any I would write on paper. If I make a mistake I just flip the stylus end for end, "erase" my mistake and keep going, just like a pencil but much faster. I can easily switch between different colors of pen in just one tap, something that you can't do with a regular pen (except those cool four color pens, I love those). However, in contrast to using a pen and paper, I can quickly and easily drag to make more room for more notes between previously written notes. I can quickly select text and move it around to make more room or make more sense. My Fujitsu also has a capacitive touch screen so I can easily just tap with my finger and scroll the screen around to any section of the infinitely large page I want. If I run out of room on the right edge of the paper, I just slide the screen over to the left and keep on writing because the page is as big as I need it to be.
In addition, when you are finished taking notes, you can easily search for text within your notes. Something that can't be done with paper. You can also easily convert those handwritten notes into text. Sure it isn't perfect but it is better than my typing accuracy and that is good enough for me. Later, you can flesh out your notes by pasting pictures or embedding whole files right there on the page. If you want, you can record the audio or video while you are taking notes. Then, later, you can replay that audio and OneNote will automatically highlight the notes you took as that part was being recorded. Or you can select your note and it will play the audio or video from around when you took that note so you can add more info to that note if necessary.
Finally, when it comes time to write research papers, I use OneNote to keep track of all my research notes and then use it to build an outline for my paper. Now getting that into Word is an absolute mess (MS totally dropped the ball on this one) so I just copy and paste the plain text of what I need to move over to the actual paper, but everything else is like a student's dream.
I have seen students, and even professors, trying to use an iPad to take notes in class or in lectures and it is ridiculous. They spend all their time messing with the screens and windows, switching between one tiny window and another, calling up the stupid screen keyboard and closing it down. Over the course of the lecture it seems they get maybe a hundred words of notes typed in. In an HOUR. Meanwhile, I am handwriting notes faster than most of the other students who are using pencil and paper. Plus, my notes are more useful to me after class.
All in all, I personally believe that every student should be issued a Tablet PC with OneNote. It is the most powerful note taking and paper writing tool ever.
If you think I am just a plant for Microsoft (and I know most Slashdotters will assume anyone saying anything positive about MS is being paid to do so) then you haven't read my rants on what used to be the Microsoft newsgroups. I've damned near been banned a few times. I just know a good tool when I see it and OneNote has proven so helpful to me that I put up with the rest of the MS crap just to keep using it. Now THAT is saying something.
It helps that a new LE1700 cost $2,500. The others barely crack $1000. Motion can afford to spend the extra money on the view anywhere screen, insane ruggedness, etc... The battery life on a new battery isn't bad, but yeah, they get pretty terrible when you buy off ebay.