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How Android Fits In A Microsoft Environment

N

nicenswift

Newbie
Hi,

Looking for a little advice on Android OS.

We are hoping to roll out some tablet PC's to our sales staff for when they are on the road instead of them using Windows Based Laptops.

I am ware that we can get Windows based tablets but was wondering how well Android would fit in a Windows based corporate network.

The sales staff at the moment can (on there windows laptops):

Access there exchange mailbox using outlook (I am pretty sure Android has the facility to sync with exchange so that question is sorted) :)

But can Android with additional apps if needed help with the following.

Access windows shares on the server using PPTP VPN. Is there a PPTP client for android and can it open files from and save back to windows shares on a 2003/2008 server/s ? :confused:

Open and edit Word and Excel 2003/2007/2010 files ? :confused:

Access there desktop pc's at the head office using Remote Web Workplace or RDP Terminal client ? :confused:

Many thanks for any advice on the above

Also any advice on a good android tablet that is about the same size screen as an Ipad would be helpfull also
 
You should be able to do all of those things via an Android device.

Remote Desktop - LogMeIn Ignition (PAID) - Really good for remote desktop.
1 VPN (PAID) - No idea on how good is it but a quick search will come up with several.
DocumentsToGo (PAID) - That ones great for editing documents.
 
You won't be able to use the Remote Web feature (It requires ActiveX). But, there are plenty of RDP clients out there.

Accessing Windows shares? Yes. There are also many SMB clients (Astro File manager has it built in).

PPTP? Not sure. However, it's a common VPN solution, so I'm sure many of the available VPN clients can do it.

Editing Office Docs: Yes and no. You have to buy an app to do the editing. Many free apps will allow viewing. ThinkFree Office is a solution here.
 
You can do all of those things on an Android tablet, but I would still recommend a Windows laptop/netbook for what you're wanting. To me Tablets are awesome content consumption devices and aren't there on content creation. Typing and editing documents on a virtual keyboard just isn't something most people want to do on a regular basis. A laptop is going to handle the VPN stuff much easier and natively to boot.
 
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