Do you have such a system / hardware? I am deeply interested in buying such a GPS enabled device in Europe. But I would be also willing to stress test such a system and return report on this for the short time I need it in the US. I am a geek, but I am also a reluctant female customer. Contact me, so I can interview you or we may talk about such a test gadget. You will get honest feedback, so don’t contact me if you expect cozy treatment just because of that. It is my time and expertise as well, and I don’t plan to compromise my reputation just for a little gadget. :)

Why do I need a gadget like this for my trip? I do now want to deny the possibility of having to travel by car and knowing my *awful* sense of direction, I am considering investing in a gadget pda with gps. I still have my Palm Tungsten E, but that one has a not working sync and no gps. I could buy a gps card for my tablet, but I don’t want to drive around with my tablet open. As I have been out of the loop of that part of gadget land for some time now, I would like to get up to date fast.

I can probably drag Ewan into giving me a fifteen minute rundown on what symbian systems are. If you don’t know him – that is the guy wearing a kilt and having at least a dozen different gadgets with him. Don’t believe me? Go look for yourself.

As others might be interested in this as well, I would like to make that as a podcast. Anybody else who would be suitable to convince me to buy another machine? ;)

These are the features I am interested in at the moment:

• GPS should be on board
• it would be nice if some electronic navigation system already was in there when buying (I know in Germany those are sold together, a windows machine with German routing planer and navigational system)
• it should have software available with which I can track the GPS and then transfer it to my PC
• I will be travelling with it. Having a USB cable which charges and syncs is preferred, but it should have alternatives like bluetooth.
• the OS should have a bejeweled available*grin*
• needs to hold at least a day with battery
• having a little camera on board for quick shots is great
• perhaps even wlan?

I know that most devices can only do part of it. As usual: Show me what they have and I can decide on that if this combination is interessting.

Besides that, are there good and cheap routing planers available I can use for my tablet? I would like to be ready for the case I don’t have a pda and I have no access to the net.

And could somebody at Gmail please get their grip together and add words like podcast, blogging, bluetooth, wlan and such to their dictionary?! It is the normal language of their early users! :)

Well, I have such a little nuts as my own brother (everything Apple makes is by default beautiful) but that is okay as long as he does some jobs for me on his G5 for me. ;))

Also in the comments of that post and in Robert’s post was a sentence which grabbed my attention – it seems to be as if a new Lenovo Thinkpad is on the way. This reminded me of giving you an update on my tablet, which is one of the first Thinkpad Tablet PC.

I thought about it for a while back when somebody ask me about “which tablet should I buy” and I only could show him mine – and made sure he understood the disadvantages of my Lenovo X41. And there are a lot. Yes, it does have wifi and bluetooth, many slots and such, but there are some downsides which make me not recommend the Lenovo anymore.

A tablet pc itself? Yes. A thinkpad if you do not want a tablet? Perhaps. For example the keyboard: It is great. When I type english posts. But not when I do write german ones – because the umlauts are only half keys together with +#. And I am desperately missing the windows key. Yes, I do use it.

There are no mics on the screen, so phoning just with the tablet is not possible and the built in mic does not pick up anything good besides hard disk noise. Speakers are at the bottom of the laptop, so you have to crank it up really loud and can not have it on your lap while typing.
It adds up. The digitizer is not as responsive as I want it to be and needs recalibration very often. It does only have a few buttons on the tablet side, so it is not very easy to use it just in that mode. And many more things.

There are many more things, small things which annoy me. Yes, it still is a good notebook, but it is missing some features I am seeing in other tablets. So from my point of view this has switched from “ooooh, new toy” to “okay tablet”, but nothing more.

But should you buy a tablet? Definitely. And at least most of the machines are not as expensive as Macs. Wonder how Scoble’s son wants to finance his possible new notebook as he only has a third saved? Well, advertisement of course:

unless Dad’s going to pony up $1,300 :-) then I’ll be glad to cover my Macbook with Microsoft stickers.

*g* Patrick, make a contract on time and make sure you have something to remove them. Then, after the sensation of that wears of (aka when your licencing term with your Dad about how long you run those is over), make a ‘relaunch’ with that nice etched logo. ;o)

If you have not metal laptop where you can etch stuff into, maybe you should try out the laptop stickers from aspoke!

(oh and go read the comments on Partick’s original post about the new mac, they are hilarious)
Technorati Tags: thinkpad, lenovo

I have my “main” desktop computer, but there is something about snuggeling on your couch and typing on your notebook. Yesterday I was thinking about really buying a replacement power adapter, but 60 Euros is a lot to spend for something which should be in the mail any day. Additionally I do want to buy one, but as a travel power adapter set, so I would need less travel plugs. Which is why I left it in the store, because I can do everything with the big one. Not on the couch, but I can.

And guess what? Half an hour after the stores have closed here on Silvester (yes, the ‘late’ ones close on 14:00) I do read that there is a party tonight. A real geek party in Second Life with buddy Eric Rice. Yes it was posted two days ago on Eric’s blog, I am still catching up *grrrr*.

Which is cool, because I had not had other plans for today, as I am not the big party with ball gowns dancing type. (I am a geek, remember?) . The “great” feeling lasted for about 10 seconds, because I can’t come. My computer “has no clothes for it”.

Now, didn’t I just write I can do everything on my big computer? Yes. Everything except SL. Because that damn thing uses so much graphic, that my main computer can’t cope and crashes in there about every 5 minutes. My thinkpad on the other side has a better graphic card which can cope with that.

Great. One ‘party’ I am interested in the whole year and I can’t go because of a stupid power cord issue. :(

*snief* At least I know what I can listen to.
Tag(s): second life, geek party

Some of you have asked how working wit my lil tablet is. A short update on my Lenovo X41 experiences about screen, keyboard, microphone/speakers, etc.

In general, it feels good. I am still trying to acustom myself to having two computers and have not really set up this one. The whole “now it is a windows machine directly connected to the internet” somehow freaks me, because I know how vulnarable windows machines are.

The wifi thing is still new to me and I am sponsoring a collegue to give me a quick rundown on current networt and wifi. Remember, I have had a single linux router for years now and had not to deal with this stuff. I manage at home all the time and on the road sometimes to get access to the wifis available – but have not many clues why not. (This is a high level complainig – I kind of know what it has to be but don’t know at the moment to fix it.)

Typing is really nice on the machine, I can do, but I absolutly feel the problem of me having another keyboard layout in navigational sense. There is a reason why I have identical keyboards on my workmachine and the one at home: I do hit keys blind, including special combination like for [] etc. I am absolutly missing the windows key on the tablet, because explorer but even more minimize is key in my daily work.

Isn’t there a way to make the FN key a win key and set original function of FN to shift FN?! I use the FN key perhaps once a day but miss the win key several times. (And I don’t know if this is a driver issue but Shift-CTRL-Pageup / Down does not work for me.)

Noise / speak control
It is quite but the fan hits from time to time, but still is okay. Recording skype with headseat works like a charme (before you get your hopes up: external recording), but according to the whole noise issue. But I still have no clue why the whole speek command thing is not even accessible (there is no tab speak control ….) and the microphone on this machine is a joke. Quality is poorest. You remember, we talk about a machine of 2000 Euros which is supposed to be a tablet in everything, right? Additionally, ohe one mic whole is besides the keyboard so if you have it in slate mode, it is not even accessibale. Stupid beyond compare.

The same thing applies to speakers. They are on the bottom of the keyboard. Yes right, bottom. If you have the normal laptop mode, you don’t hear anything because it is blocked by the tablet pc itself and when you hold it in your hand, you have to crank up the volume so much to hear anything. Jacks for the headphone and mic are right of the laptop, which I find not so good, because if I hold it in my lap, it does bend the jacks.

If you are in any need of those things (mic, speakers), then the machine is nothing for you. That is absolutly 1 out of 10 points. Recording skype with headseat works like a charme (before you get your hopes up: external recording), but according to the whole noise issue. But I still have no clue why the whole speek command thing is not even accessible (there is no tab speak control ….) and the microphone on this machine is a joke. Yes, only one.

Quality is poorest. You remember, we talk about a machine of 2000 Euros which is supposed to be a tablet in everything, right? Additionally, ohe one mic whole is besides the keyboard so if you have it in slate mode, it is not even accessibale. Stupid beyond compare.

Screen / Digitizer / pen / slate mode
Bright enough for me, still have no screen protection, because I don’t know where to look. Pen is not heavy enough for me, I can’ use the mouse buttons on the thing. Needs improvement. I still don’t know how much I can use pressure and tap on that thing without hurting it aka leave marks. I’ve seen some of the channel 9 videos – oh uh.

Needs recalibrating quite often or what even the errors are, they vanish after some time aka calibrating. But then again, this is only how it feels to me.

I usually turn the screen and leave it in half slate mode, because it is easier to write then on when sitting at a table. Keys on slate mode are not enough and not well enough thougt out. There are other keys I am missing and it would not have been a problem to add some programmable keys, right?

Trackpoint
Yes, I like it more than a touchpad, and the keys have a nice shape also, much better than the usual just buttons. I still have not managed to figure out how to control them, because I would like to make sth like both left/right keys together like pressing the mouse’s wheel. Trackpoint is in the last day starting to move a little of itself, which is annoying.

General size
Okay with me, still a bit heavy, but the external battery brings the problem of not being able to use standard 12″ protection cases. I am hoping to find a good shop next week in London to test it out or on sellers who adapt on this successful modell.

Energy usage
I have no comparison, but it feels okay. Defenetly around 4 hours with full wifi. I have not stress tested it.

Finger print scanner
Built in “do not show off”-protection – never works the first time in public. ;))) Takes several times to use, but is much easier than typing in your password. Privacy issues is another thing of course …

So far for the things which come directly to my mind. Next stop probably me and the software. ;)

If you want to really impress people turn the slate upside down, shake vigorously, and then turn it back over.

Tell them it clears the screen (like an Etch a sketch)

Yes, I know my Lenovo has some hard disk protection, but NO WAY! :)))))

Talking to another friend brought me the idea to have a little GPS-USB-Tracker – with that big of a hard disk I can probably get the whole continent onto it and have a great navigation system at hand. Which is a really good idea, because I get lost on even simple routes ….

And I can surf and discover some Wifi’s and plazes in my surrounding on the way. :)

*sigh* that is going to be a very expensive month. The bright side? I will learn everything I never wanted to know about Wlan, Windows system security, network sniffers and how to enter free wifi’s. :)

Tag(s): tablet fun, plazes

But it struck me, that I would have liked to give a shout out to some of my contacts on skype but was to weak to sit at my desk and type … but I would be able to scrabble some notes by hand.

I remember Rachel sitting next to me in one presentation at reboot and ink chatting with someone, can we have that in skype, please? Which, as a matter of fact, will probably not work very well, given the awful slow file transfer. Perhaps Gizmo?

Tag(s): Skype, Gizmo, ink

Tag(s): Onenote, Evernote, tablet pc, beta software, vista, drm, privacy, Office, Open Office, Excel, Word, Powerpoint

As new tablet owner, I of course am looking into software to make my life easier. Onenote and Evernote are both mentioned as ‘the’ applications for using your tablet instead of dozens of postits.

While Evernote does have a free version, I have to admit, that I am not into the way it presents notes. So I thought I would give Onenote a quick look, even thought it costs some money. Well, if it really helps me getting organized, it is worth the money. Besides, the inked enabled version of Evernote does cost money too.

So I did get my key from Microsoft for my test download, downloaded it and installed it on the tablet. It took me about 40 seconds to get highly disappointed with this software (if you would like to compare it: I am still angry about that education pack thing, but this is just plain annoying). Why 40 seconds?

Because that is about the time it took me from starting the software, to going through the first steps of the flash based tutorial (getting bored with that after 30 seconds, yeah, will look into that later, want to do notes now!) to see a message, that I have to activate my trial version – which I already had to get a key for and pay with my email address.

Which means nothing else then ‘we want to check who installed and used my software’. As my fritzbox is not up and running, I don’t have any net connectivity of my tablet at the moment and I though “it says it won’t work with all features, but that is okay, I can active it later, it will not be that critical’.

Me naive thing. The 38th second ended, when I was eager just to jot something down to find – nothing happening. I was expecting to be able just to start as in journal just to paint my notes. From what I figure from my quick looking around and testing, it seems to me, that I can’t use ink in Onenote testing without activation? Please tell me, that I overlooked something?

Taking a look at the available possibilities which are not greyed out, I am highly set back. We are talking about a 60 day version of Onenote, which wants a registration and sends out who knows what as data, just to be able to use a time limited software? Are you kidding me?

As it seems now, I will only have 55 days for testing, because from what it looks now, I don’t see it happen for me to have my internet access of my tablet running in the next days.

Which sets me off for different reasons. If they make such an effort to not allow me to experience this test software, I have to wonder what they will send out back to Redmond from my PC. And second, what if I don’t have an internet access on my machine at all? I can’t test this test version. Even if I am to ‘activate’ it, it leaves me wondering, what kind of control they think they will get of me and my data.

And to be honest: The more they try to get to my data (of course, everything only for my own good!) like

• protect me from pirated software (thanks, I know where I bought mine)
• making sure it is still my copy (ooh! I forgot that I might have installed a new version!)
• demand of me to activate my hardware combination (what do they need that for again?)
• having basic featured locked out of a TESTVERSION unless I give them what data

(and everything under very ‘interesting’ U.S. laws) I only can imagine, they think of me of something they have control over.

Let’s see: They want my email address and name. They want this version activated. It is likely that I will install my bought version over it if I buy it. Which probably also wants to be ‘activated’ – and is easily trackable then too. As this version is connected with my name and my email address, other things on my computer are tied into that as well.

But of course, nobody has plans for exploiting that and all your data belongs to^w^w is safe with us. Would you like direct access to my bank account too, so you don’t have to bother with me still hanging onto the Office 2000 and just collect the money from me? How about I visit you (on my own cost of course) and give you a full body scan, finger prints and whatever else?

Hello McFly? This is me, these are my data, this is my computer. I am in control and even though you do not seem to like it, I am way to smart for you and aware of what you are doing. Yes, you can try and sell me the DRM in Vista as improvement, and it may be improvement to someone – but not to me.

Seeing the development of the OS and the Office software especially over the last decade (I am in contact with MS products since nearly 20 years now), especially regarding my interests versus Hollywood and other interests, MS is loosing me. Big time. And I am a ‘fan girl’.

Just to give you one example: I absolutely hate the keyboard settings of Open Office and it drives me nuts to use it. Go on with those ‘enhancements’ instead of real functionality and I will personally create the correct keyboard shortcut map like in Excel. And switch to it.

I am giving seminars from time to time, due to my tight schedule not as often as I would like to do. It is Powerpoint and Excel for small biz owners at the moment. They use the functions which have been available oh since Office 97. Go on with your “Activiation is good for you!” and I will translate the sheets of my seminar to “How to be successfull in your business with Open Office” without any regret.

Activating Windows, restricting display only to ‘certified allowed’ monitors, introduced in Vista and through the backdoor of updates also in Windows XP? Hello Lindows, hello KDE.

As you can guess from my Excel statement above, KDE and the other applications tick me off also – not efficient keyboard support, lack of consistent UI, inconsistent throughout applications, etc, etc. Guess what I have been doing for a decade also now: Testing the UI of a software and giving feedback. Bugging the authors to implement those changes. Marking inconsistencies. Given, I come from a very special angle on those testings of mine, but most of the time, people come back to me and ask me to do more testing once they go over the shock of what I told them I did not like.

Combine my (already built up) frustration about those little things like that one above with Onenote on a bigger scale, which a deep knowledge and understanding of how the main Office applications (Word, Excel, Powerpoint) work from a users perspective, which function they need and how they expect it to be delivered if they come from Microsoft Office.

Not today, maybe not next year but after that, I am farely sure, that I will be out there and help Open Source developers make their applications so people can use them.
Without activation on basic features, without having to pay much money, without having to take being treated as a dumb customer and a pirate.

Will I activate Onenote? Probably. Will I buy it? Also, as it seems from a quick look this could be a helpful application at the moment. Will I show that off to other people? Yes. Will I encourage them to buy it too? Maybe to yes.

Will I make sure, that they also get to hear my opinion about Microsoft treating me (and them) as thiefs, as dumb customers who will like sheep just deliver their data and not think about it for one second? And what I think of that? Of course I will.

This is a game, and not a one sided one. Will it matter what I think of this? Judge yourself. Over the last years I would estimate that I had some hundred clients asking me for advice of which software to use. I say, they buy (if they can afford it.) I am what I call a multiplier. Not on a big scale of course, but still.

At the moment I am strongly considering going more into the consulting business, which unfortunatly I have not enough time for at the moment. Which would mean more clients, of whom some will ask me about “what software to buy, which os to use, which office software”.

And why all that? Because of a small thing like “you need to activate this 60 day limited test version of Onenote, before you can lay your hand onto the whole functionality of this software. Which you are likely to buy anyway. And the main feature why you probably installed this software for testing, aka the ink feature, well, you will only get this when you activate too.”.

Even is I missed the point where I can do ink with this software without activating it, I don’t care.

I had a pile of notes I wanted to put into this software this afternoon, which still lie on my desk.

Because I was eager to test out this software, happy with joy, but had no internet connection.

Little things count. And they do sum up to very big sums …

I still have to set up my Fritzbox Wlan Fon for the internet connection of my tablet, which means the tablet still needs ‘software installation by usb stick’. :)

After chatting with them I tried to check out the Speek recognition – despite the unusable mic one could use a headset, but I just had to find, that the speach tab in the system properties and the speech entry like described on the first screenshot in Jeff’s article is – greyed out? What the? *sigh*

So, if you have any suggestions on webpages and software for me after that show, please do :)

Tag(s): tabletpc, lenovo, x41

As people in my on- and offline surrounding probably can tell, I have been in the mood for shopping a tablet since some months. Since reboot, I just tried harder to find excuses why I need one. ;o) Of course I have given into it, and ordered it last week. You can stop making faces at me now, I will only bother you about my new toy for some more months like a new parent. ;) (interestingly, before ordering it, I only imagined myself in all those places, where I would use it – now I only imagine it to be stolen in these places …)

Already I got first suggestions on what to put on the tablet – I need that Education pack, it has one of my loved games in pen optimized *arg*. I am listening carefully to all episodes of the Tablet PC show so I can be an expert soon.

I took the chance of Tris being at Gnomedex to organize me some stickers and failed to motivate Cameron from The Podcast Network to give me one of his stickers – if you have some cool ones, mail me :))

Which one did I order? Of course the finest one available: The Lenovo x41 Tablet UP06SGE. The best one, with Bluetooth, 60 GB etc – if you buy such an expensive toy and the smallest configuration is only about 100 Euros cheaper than the best configuration, you take of course the best.

Still, it is a lot of money and for a shop a good sell. So why did I contacted and finally bought at that specific shop named notebooksandmore.net? Because of one single sentence. It said in Shipping:

Delivery with German Post only possible if especially expressed as wish.

Why is this a reason to order there? Because everybody else only said “delivery with UPS”.

Which, in most cases, is okay, but not for me. As I work in a big company, delivery by UPS to _me_ during the day has been proven 3 times to be impossible. They just deliver to my company, where it is checked into the internal logistic process. I once had to get my own paid Palm out of the company’s assets accounting because of that!

With Deutsche Post, it is highly likeable, that I can pick up that parcel in a station near to me without any problem. The nearest UPS center is about 50km away and in former attempts to work with them I found them highly annoying to work with – which is why I want to avoid them if possible and alternate possibilities are available.

The website in questions showed me “alternate delivery possible, if you wish.” Of course, if the call afterwards would have been a desaster, I would not have purchased. But that is not the question: the sale was initiated by this single sentence.

Btw: It will not be delivered by Deutsche Post but another delivering service they work with. We have already set up the delivery time frame which will work perfectly with me and they will call in advance so I can be there to get my new toy. And of course IBM has delayed the start about 1-2 weeks *grrrrrr*

So, what does your webpage tell me about how much you care about my needs?

One good start could be “sleeves for X41 tablets with extended 8 cell battery” or “alternate pens for X41 with eraser. ;)