Tablet for Engineering School.......

[2kwik4u]

A little back story so everyone knows where I'm coming from....I've been a member here for awhile, but not much of a contributor or active user. I worked for a small family run business that had gone "paperless" before I started, and I was issued a rather nice Motion Computing LE1700 to do my work on while there. I had access to a FlexDock, USB DVD Drive, and external montor for my desk. While on the go I had a decent power invertor for the service van, as well as the extended slice battery for the back. It was a really nice machine, and I enjoyed using it while there. I always got interesting comments on it when taking notes in meetings, or while on a job site doing preliminary evaluations. I also had to use the machine for light AutoCAD duty for asbuilt drawings once our jobs were completed. Overall the machine worked well, although it would lag from time to time when trying to do work with larger AutoCAD files. Normal MS Office apps ran fine, as did most anything on the web. My biggest complaint was the lack of a physical keyboard when trying to type an email outside of the office. I had a bluetooth keyboard with me, but got tired of charging it (or more appropriately got tired of forgetting to charge it and then needing it). I often found I could bang out an email quicker on my blackberry than I could my tablet. Tethering via bluetooth and the Blackberry was an awesome solution, and I was very sad to see the company switch to Android devices and the stupid hot spot setup that never worked reliably (I think the switch from AT&T to Sprint might have had something to do with this as well). Also the slice battery failed on me after about 3yrs usage, and we couldn't find a replacement NEW battery for it. Battery life fell to around 15min, and it quit being the handy tool it used to be. Moral of the story, I have SOME experience with a tablet in a "real" work environment.

NOW.....Fast forward a bit to my current situation. I've quit my day job, and have returned to college full time to finish my career, and get back to the engineering field I left when I took a gamble on the family business. I'm taking a full load this semester at 17hrs, and expect to maintain this pace for the next 8 semesters until I get my degree. I'm going through with a Mechanical Engineering Technology degree from Purdue. I have a couple classes already that will require me to bring a laptop to class, and my current Acer Aspire 5000 isn't quite strong enough to run the programs I need. It's an AMD Turion ML-32 1.8Ghz processor, 1GB RAM, 80GB HD running WinXP Pro SP3. It doesn't meet the minimum specs for either AutoCAD, or SolidWorks. It runs most everything else fairly well, and I would like to retire this one to my wife, and get a new machine. I'm struggling with the selection of a new machine though. I'm on a bit of a budget being as how I have a newborn at home, and have quit my well paying day job in favor of college, and a return to the pizza delivery industry. I've tossed some ideas around, and have looked at a few machines, and can't really decide what I need or want. So here are some thoughts, and I was hoping to run these by the resident guru's here to see what the general thoughts were.

1. HP TM2T. This seems like a pretty solid machine. At the family business there were a couple of older HP convertibles running around, and even at 3 and 4yrs old they were still performing well. It is available with a nice Core i5 processor, up to 4GB of RAM, and a decent sized HD. I like that it has the dual graphics cards with teh ATI Radeon with better OpenGL support for my drawing/modeling programs, and the integrated Intel chipset, and it seems like an overall good machine. I've found some used ones in the $800-$900 range on eBay, and places like that. New ones are still floating around for around $1,100 or so. A little high, but not terrible on the budget.

2. HP EliteBook 2760p. This is a powerhouse of a machine. I can get tons of RAM, a nice HD, and a Core i7 processor. I'm sure this would run all of the applications I need, and probably last me for quite some time. I like that a slice battery is available, but I hear that it makes the device a little heavier. I am already dragging 4 large books around so lighter/thinner/smaller is better. Obviously within reason. The price is very high though at around $1,500-$1,700

3. Motion Computing LE1700. Again my biggest problem here is that it doesn't have a physical keyboard. While I think a good portion of my time will be taking notes in classes with the pen. I have some concern about it's ability to run SolidWorks and AutoCAD well also. They aren't available that I can find with anything stronger than a Core2Duo processor, and 2GB of RAM.

4. Some combination of powerful desktop and super simple tablet. I was thinking some sort of Win7 powered tablet (like the Acer Iconia) and then either use the schools desktops, or get a new desktop for home that is strong enough to run the heavy modelling that I might want to get into a few years from now. I could spread out the cost here, and maybe end up with a better overall solution. I like the idea of the ultra-portable tablet to take notes with, as well as not have to carry around a power adapter, and "heavy" laptop to class with me. Any thoughts on this idea? It might be a little less cash up front, but might lead to the best overall solution?

Is there another machine that I should be looking at? I'm still a little concerned that I even "need" a tablet at all. Pen and Paper still work just fine (what I'm currently using for notes). $1,000 can get quite a nice standard laptop, and a helluva desktop computer nowadays. I won't be working on any ridiculously large modeling files, or AutoCAD files, but I need something somewhat powerful to insure that I can at least run those programs. Ultimately I'm just wanting to make sure that I spend my budget on the appropriate hardware that will last me as long as possible, and be as useful as possible. I'm open to any thoughts and ideas that you guys might have for me. Thanks in advance.

[Steve S]

2: Based on your short description, I'd suggest Option 4 assuming that you do not envision doing heavy computing when you are away from your "home base" (say for example, you won't be doing heavy computing at the library or at a part-time job but will defer this until you are at home). Although it's been years since I finished college, I've always thought that the home base / mobile tablet paradigm made better sense than trying to exclusively use one or the other (having a reliable back-up for the near-inevitable machine failure being a big reason).

Another option (4a) might be to buy yourself a decent i5 or i7 desktop machine and combine it with an older but reasonably capable C2D convertible tablet (so you'll have your keyboard) like the Dell XT2 or one of the HP's. Dell offers excellent prices on refurbished machines and I presume that HP does, too. (BTW, since you obviously find issues with BT keyboards, why don't you simply use a USB keyboard?)

Good luck with your new path in life. Shame about Purdue's football team, though...

[2kwik4u]

I tried a USB keyboard as well, but found that it was cumbersome to try and "prop up" the tablet while typing. Or I ended up leaning over the tablet laying flat while I typed. Had the LE1700 had a touchscreen instead of a just the digitizer I think I would have been OK with the on screen keyboard. Hard to say really, I just know that the external keyboard+propping up of the tablet itself was cumbersome and aggravating to me.

I'm kind of leaning towards the same thought process of having a mobile device and a home base setup. My wife thinks I should just get a regular laptop as I won't actually use the inking portion of the device as much as I expect, and isn't sure we have space for a desktop at home (Small 2-bed condo with a newborn). She has a good point, and we are a bit cramped. She's also asked me to determine what it would take to bring our current laptop "up to spec". Some quick searching and I'm already into $500 for a new battery, RAM and HD upgrade. So, while she had a good point, I do think I'm on the right track with a replacement setup in mind. Battery life is also something I'm a bit concerned about. I have a couple classes that meet for 2.5hrs at a time, and I need to be able to be doing full on note taking and excell work for the duration of that time. I'm afraid that even with a new battery, the current laptop won't make that cut.

I'm a little concerned about doing some heavy work outside home base, but I think it would be more convenience than necessity. With a part-time job, a newborn, and rigorous class schedule, I am trying to get as much work in as I can when I can. I could probably put off my modelling and drawing until I was at school and able to access the campus computers, but I would really enjoy the flexibility to do them "on the go" as needed. I'm really torn on how "strong" of a machine I really need, again coming back to getting the most useful machine for the money spent.

I did just find a couple Lenovo Thinkpad 220's on Amazon for right at $1,100. They seem to get some great reviews, and are available with an i7 processor, 4GB RAM, and 320GB HD. I'm not really jazzed up with that goofy little red button pointing device thingy that Lenovo uses, but I suppose I can work around that. They also aren't the sexiest machines in terms of appearance, but that isn't really a big deal overall, just something I noticed. Any thoughts on those machines?

Also, one other thing I would like to do that I didn't mention above is some light video editing. My buddies and I take a bicycle trip each year, as well as several boating trips. We have all invested in the HD GoPro mini cameras, and record most of our outings. Sadly I can't edit or view any of our videos in HD on my current machine. I don't want to be doing any crazy long movies, but editing together a few minutes of raw footage into a 30-45 second clip would be nice to show off wakeboarding tricks that were landed (or miffed). So, there is some need there for a stronger processor, but again, if I had a nice home machine I could take care of that there...........Two of those guys have gone and got a MacBook Pro, and all swear I should just get one of those and be done with it. My modelling software requires a Windows based system though, and I think I want the touch capability.

Oh the decisions to be made!!!

Thanks for the help thus far. I'm a few weeks out from a purchase, but am trying to make sure I do my "homework" on this one before shelling out the cash!

[2kwik4u]

Thought I would update this thread with the research I've been doing. It appears that some of the software (SolidWorks 2010, AutoCAD 2010) I want to use is a little picky about what graphics card it will work well with. The Intel HD 3000 graphics that is in just about everything is said to be a hit and miss solution. Most have decent luck with it until they start getting into some heavier models and assemblies. The ATI card in the TM2T has slightly better results from what I can find, but still not great. SolidWorks needs to use OpenGL, and of course for any hardware acceleration, you need a specific card (FireGL, or Quaddro) to take advantage.

This has me torn in two directions.

The first thought is to get a less expensive tablet for portability and note taking. Maybe another LE1700, as I've found them on eBay for not a lot of money. Then getting a nice desktop for home to do my modelling on.

My second thought is to get a Binford 6100 laptop that has a high powered i7 processor, and lots of RAM in it, and just go around the hardware acceleration and let the processor and memory of the machine take the brunt force of the modelling tasks.

I'm finding both to be about the same price overall since Lenovo X220T and HP EliteBook 2760p are the only two that offer i7 processors, and 4+GB of RAM.

Any thoughts on either of those?

[2kwik4u]

Well, I made it through the first semester without purchasing anything. I even managed to install SolidWorks on my aging Acer Aspire 5000 laptop. Amazingly it worked far better than expected. This semester I have two classes that "require" an internet enabled device to take quizes, tests, and do some of the homework on. Since the wife and I have been battling over the laptop a bit at home anyway, it was time for a new machine.

So off I went to eBay to try and find something as inexpensive as possible. I bid on (and lost) several auctions for LE1700 machines. One of which I was high bidder on until about 30seconds left. That was a nice machine that went for just over $450. 64GB SSD, 4GB RAM, Core Duo processor, and View Anywhere screen. After loosing those, and then losing a bit of patience, I found a seller on Amazon with an open box Asus EP121, and pulled the trigger on that purchase Friday morning. $850+shipping for it. Not quite as budget oriented as I wanted, but I needed to get moving on something, and this was the closest fit that had a "buy it now" button. I really would have liked to get the slightly nicer Samsung Series 7 Slate, but I just didn't have the $1,200+ to drop on that, for only marginally better performance.

The Asus should be here by the end of the week. I'll keep you guys posted on how it does!

I just plopped down the cash for a new