Laptop, tablet or phone next?

[boyo1991]

OP I know what you mean. When I was in the market, back in 2010 for an upgrade from my Motorola Backflip phone, I choose to go with the Atrix 4G. This phone, which I still have and use, had a Laptop Dock basically turning my phone into a netbook. (Had to have the right apps on the phone though.) Even though the technology really never took off, I really love the concept and still use them for work and play. I have a SGS4 now and I pretty much do everything on it from emails, text, reading digital book/magazines, scanning documents, playing games, productivity, etc. When I need to create or edit documents, I use my Atrix 4G and Laptop Dock. I use it for reading, web surfing, playing games, watching videos, etc. (I really like having an 11.6 inch screen, keyboard and mouse.) I considered the tablet, but when I looked at how I would use it, It just didn't work for me. I wanted something small, light weight and that I didn't, at the time have to remember what was on what device.)

So, I think in your case, sounds like you need a laptop. If you get one with the Windows and Android OS, then you can still work on both devices, cellphone and laptop, and have the same contents sync to both. (I do this now with my setup.) Most devices have where you can send/receive things wireless by bluetooth, etc. (Which is what I use right now between my devices sometimes.)

There are things that I can do much easier and faster on my Laptop Dock, then I can on my SGS4.

I very much agree. And I have the same logic, which is the laptop, even if I don't use it as much, when I do use it it will be so much more powerful. Good answer! Thanks!

 

[nickdalzell]

Mike, tapatalk isn't free. I don't like limited function apps when the browser supports the full site. Opera is so dated and doesn't do well to replace Chrome, which I prefer as it's the closest thing to Safari which I was used to. Opera is like trying to use Netscape.

Bottom line, my phone won't replace a tablet or laptop.

 

[mikedt]

Mike, tapatalk isn't free. I don't like limited function apps when the browser supports the full site.

Nick I know Tapatalk is not free(although it's not exactly expensive), but the official Phandroid app is though. That's what I use when out and about for AF, and it can do the important things, like read and write posts.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.blau.android.phandroidnews
...assuming that Play is working the moment.

Although when I'm using mobile data, I often prefer mobile sites, because they use much less data, especially given that I'm on a metered data plan. We don't have unlimited mobile data here.

Opera is so dated and doesn't do well to replace Chrome, which I prefer as it's the closest thing to Safari which I was used to. Opera is like trying to use Netscape.

Bottom line, my phone won't replace a tablet or laptop.

Tablets do have their uses, all depends on what you want to do of course. I'm buying an iPad next month, for use in my private classes. I could use a laptop, but I think a tablet is better for one-to-ones and showing around at English corners. It's replacing books and other printed materials. An Android tablet wouldn't be so suitable, because of the lack of good quality professionally written educational apps. I had an Android tablet, but I gave it away ...it actually went back to the city of it's birth... Shenzhen.

 

[nickdalzell]

I cannot stand mobile sites and change any setting to avoid them displaying by default. When I use my tablet as my main computer, I need all the website features to work. Data is only used at work and only to sync email and check weather conditions. Most of the time I'm near a public WiFi. Weekend streaming of music, weather and email sync through the last two weeks (away from WiFi mind you) equaled a mere 30MB according to Verizon.

 

[chanchan05]

Opera Next uses the Chromium 28 engine, just like Chrome 28. It can even use Chrome extensions.

 

[nickdalzell]

Chrome is the closest thing to Safari in Android, I'm sticking with what I like using. Of course, unless it can scale zoomed in text where the entire page shows so I don't have to side-to-side scroll to read posts here it doesn't matter. I never use my phone as a computer the way I do tablets. Typing is a pain, and extended use of an OLED display especially with teeny text displayed to fit the page into the dimensions of the screen causes migraines.

 

[mikedt]

I cannot stand mobile sites and change any setting to avoid them displaying by default. When I use my tablet as my main computer, I need all the website features to work. Data is only used at work and only to sync email and check weather conditions. Most of the time I'm near a public WiFi. Weekend streaming of music, weather and email sync through the last two weeks (away from WiFi mind you) equaled a mere 30MB according to Verizon.

When I was in the UK last month(Bristol, Oxford and London), seemed to be public WiFi everywhere, almost every place I went to had The Cloud WiFi service, like malls, pubs, hostels, restaurants, railway and bus stations, even the buses and trains themselves had WiFi. I didn't even bother with mobile data. Rural China on the other hand that's a different matter, a few of the local restaurants have WiFi, and I have WiFi at home of course. The school office has hard wired Ethernet, no WiFi, same with many hotel rooms. Have to use mobile data if want to get on-line. I used 1GB last month, and that was mostly browsing and QQ and WeChat, no streaming music or video though.

Many people do use tablets here, more so than laptops now, because of the low cost. AFAICT most of the time they're using them at home, or in the restaurants and bars that have WiFi. And seems almost everyone has an Android phone now, usually cheapo ones of course, they've more or less completely replaced the dumb candy-bar and flip phone.


BTW guess who's the largest internet user now?

...most of them are using tablets and phones, and not laptops.