2-in-1 tablet investigations

[srw]

I'm typing on my phone because the very early 2-in-1 I usually use in this flat is rapidly falling apart. Literally and now electronically too. It's an early Android Asus transformer. So I'm looking to replace it.

I like Android in a phone but it has too many constraints in a bigger format, so I'm almost certainly looking at Windows. I don't do Apple.

A lot of the use it will get is sofa surfing, listening to music and watching telly online, but I've got a few other things I'd like to be able to do. Whether I'll do enough of them to make it worthwhile is, if course, another question.

First, I love taking photos but rarely get around to optimising them properly, because I spend a lot of the week 40 miles from where our main computers live. So being able to process and edit photos would be useful.

Second, I'm a church organist. I'd love to be able to keep a large catalogue of music with me rather than always carting aroung lots of paper. I'd also like to be able to run Sibelius so that I can edit, arrange and compose easily.

Third, eventually my employers will bring in software to enable BYOD securely (I was supposed to be piloting it last summer...), and I want to be able to make best use of that.

All of that is leading me firmly towards a large screened 2-in-1. And specifically to a Microsoft Surface Book. I haven't yet found anything else which would be as neat a solution. The nearest I've found is a Lenovo Yoga, but that seems to be lacking pen/stylus support. Before I splash out a good chunk of cash, does anyone have any other suggestions? And how do I choose from among the specs?

 

[shouldbeinbed]

I have an older lower end MS surface tablet, which I like and even it would meet your criteria quite comfortably, it is more computer like than tablet like in use, style and intent.

My one quibble is that it falls between being treated as proper computer or proper tablet by MS & other programmmers and developers and at both ends it is incompatible with some useful programs that work on laptops/PCs and with some useful apps in the Windows Mobile app store.

Depending on access to peripherals and, I imagine for your music, device screen size, the new Windows Mobile 10 phones can serve as the processing core of an almost Raspberry Pi system where you can plug in screen, keyboard and have a quite capable mini computer on your hands. I know WM gets a bad rap vs Android and Apple but I've liked both WM phones I've had & would happily go for another, the only reason I have an android handset now is that the deal was the best available at renewal time vs the brand new launched WM 10 higher end handsets.

 

[screenman]

Whoosh! That was the noise when that lot went over my head. Thanks for letting me know how little I know about this whatever it is.

 

[Old jon]

I have recently bought a Surface 3, which is about the same size as the Asus transformer it replaced. Windows 10, not Sibelius but Muse Score, Corel for the photography, Office for all the boring stuff.

I also bought the keyboard ( extra ) and stuck a spare microSD card in the slot at the back of the monitor. The problem that no one including Microsoft seem to be able to cure is the 'black screen' problem. Every now and then, unpredictably, the monitor goes black. Hold the power button down for ten seconds or so, leave for fifteen and then reboot. Had I read up on the subject , hmmm, I am not sure I would have bought this. Maybe twice the price for the Surface 4. Being an optimist ( spelt f o o l ), I am sure the cure will appear . . .

Aside from that, all my scores are kept in landscape Acrobat files on a laptop at present. I have a USB footswitch that allows me to page through these files without removing my hands from the instrument. I have yet to try the footswitch on the new toy.

 

[srw]

Large screen size is important, and a foot pedal page turner not all that useful on an organ! A mobile plus monitor might be a neat solution if a touch screen portable monitor is available..

I tried handwriting recognition software for a while. It didn't even recognise it as handwriting.

 

[srw]

The PC World near the office has an MS Surface Book, which when I went in today was actually powered up and had its pen attached. It's gorgeous. The pen is very intuitive and very responsive, and makes taking notes on other people's documents a breeze.

As for sheet music playing, I reckon I could get two portrait A4 pages side-by-side and play quite comfortably from them. And, of course, having a pen makes it easy to annotate and add the usual sort of musician's or page-turner's marks you need in real life. Sibelius also claims to be able to do handwriting recognition for music - making writing music a piece of cake.

@Old jon - do you use any specific Acrobat viewer? The one on the machine in the shop was almost perfect, except for one thing. The holy grail for any keyboard player would be to be able to choose when to page turn - which means being able to flick one page on at a time. I could work out how to set up to display two pages and go from 1&2 to 3&4 and so on, but not to be able to go from 1&2 to 2&3 to 3&4 and so on.

 

[Cuchilo]

It always makes me smile when people say " i don't do apple " Yet want all the services that they provide
Personally i will buy what ever product i want if it provides what i need .

 

[srw]

It always makes me smile when people say " i don't do apple " Yet want all the services that they provide
Personally i will buy what ever product i want if it provides what i need .

I also don't want some of the services that Apple insists I have. Like an entirely closed infrastructure and an exorbitant price tag.

But that's for another thread.

 

[Cuchilo]

I also don't want some of the services that Apple insists I have. Like an entirely closed infrastructure and an exorbitant price tag.

But that's for another thread.

That may have been true 15 years ago but not today . Everything just works . Still its up to you if you want to limit yourself .

 

[srw]

That may have been true 15 years ago but not today . Everything just works . Still its up to you if you want to limit yourself .

Suggest a bit of Apple hardware that will do what I want and I'll take a look!

 

[Cuchilo]

Suggest a bit of Apple hardware that will do what I want and I'll take a look!

I don't work for apple or you so do your own homework

 

[fossyant]

I bought a Linx 1010B for a bit of sofa surfing and other stuff (mainly using an i7 laptop with a 1GB SSD) - and it's a nippy little thing. Cost was about £150 from Amazon.

It's perfectly good and nippy compared to a top end laptop for everyday stuff. It streams movies fine as well.

 

[AndyRM]

Suggest a bit of Apple hardware that will do what I want and I'll take a look!

There isn't one, and I say that as an Apple user. I used to be a big fan of their kit but over the years I feel like they've lost the plot a bit, claiming they've "changed everything" when they really haven't.

A Surface Pro is closest to what you're after I reckon.

 

[Sea of vapours]

The nearest I've found is a Lenovo Yoga, but that seems to be lacking pen/stylus support.

They do have a stylus:
http://shop.lenovo.com/us/en/laptops/thinkpad/x-series/x1-yoga/

Very nice machines, given that a 2 in 1 is what you need/want. And it's a Thinkpad, not merely a Lenovo device. i.e. it's professional quality.

 

[jefmcg]

I'm an apple fan (bought my first Mac in 1991, I'd guess), but have never gone near iOS because of the reasons @srw states. I bought my second smart phone just as the iPhone first came out, but bought a Window Mobile phone because I didn't like that you couldn't swap sims or install unapproved software without voiding the warranty - oh, and it didn't have GPS.