Over the last year, Technology Services – Student Affairs staff have been testing a variety of tablet devices for ease of use and functionality. Among the devices we have actively tested are the iPad2, iPad mini, HP Envy, HP Elite 900, and Lenovo ThinkPad 2 Tablet.
iPad Types
The Apple group of products is very popular, very easy to use and highly functional. For email, web browsing and media, iPad2 and iPad mini are unparalleled. The “app” store for Apple products is the most complete today, but is a double-edged sword. While the Apple App Store provides a unified system for end-users to locate, purchase and download apps, the system is closely regulated by Apple which insures a certain level of quality assurance, but keeps some vendors out of the market. Where Apple fails is in the category of integration into the enterprise and desktop computing.
While there are some “apps” that allow iPad users to connect to shared drives, they are clunky and hard to manage. Saving and working on files is difficult. Security of files (i.e. encryption of on-board files) is also problematic. While there are functionally equivalent desktop applications to most of Microsoft’s Office suite, some do not provide full functionality.
Windows 8 Tablets
The Windows 8 operating system was specifically designed to fill the tablet “niche” for Windows interoperability that Apple iOS created. However, Windows 8 is still a young operating system. System administrators (like ours) are still trying to figure out how to support Windows 8 in the enterprise. The policy group structure of Windows 8 has some significant differences when compared to Windows 7. Windows 8 also is specifically designed for a touch environment, and therefore is optimized for tablets.
There are several different flavors of Windows 8 including RT, which is a stripped down version that doesn’t support all Windows applications. The full version of Windows 8 Pro supports most Windows applications, but is not available on all tablet devices.
HP Envy and 900 Elite
We briefly tested the HP Envy and HP 900 Elite, which promised pen support. In both cases, HP failed to deliver. Because a significant portion of our tablet market in the division relies on pen applications such as OneNote, we did not find these devices to be compelling winners in the tablet business category.
Lenovo ThinkPad Tablet 2
Finally, we found a tablet that may fit the bill. the Lenovo ThinkPad Tablet 2 is a Windows 8 Pro tablet with an N-Trig digitizer and full pen support. We have found that that runs the full suite of Windows applications adequately, comes with HDMI output standard as well as mini USB. Although the Atom Z2760 processor, at 1.80 GHz can be slow when CPU-intensive processes are active, the tablet creates a nice balance of ultra-portability and desktop power. Several Technology Services – Student Affairs staff are currently assessing the feasibility of using this device as their desktop replacement. So far, so good, but the jury is still out. Even so, this is the best Windows 8 tablet we have tested so far.
[h4]Tested Tablets[/h4]
