The more that I use it, the more that I truly appreciate just how incredibly useful a device my PlayBook is.
I'm currently travelling on business. I edited my presentation back at the hotel and copied the Powerpoint onto the PlayBook, along with various other backup PPT, PPTx, PDFs and PNGs, so I'm prepared for absolutely any question that might come up. I can present directly from my PlayBook using a little HDMI cable stuffed in my suitcoat, and look at the speaker notes on my tablet while the audience just sees the slides. I love knowing I can have all my backup material pre-loaded and ready to go, and with a swipe get to what I need. Now I take all my meeting notes with the PlayBook in Word To Go, so not only do I not have to try to transcribe my notebook scribbles, I can format them and highlight important parts so they're ready for emailing to my colleagues when the meeting is over. And maybe I'm just a bit sensitive to it, but I always hated a table full of laptop "shields". Now I don't have a big obtrusive laptop screen hiding me from my customers.
All I need to bring is this one conveniently small tablet, and instead of lugging around my laptop bag from train to taxi, it stays at my hotel. While I'm waiting for the next meeting to start or on public transport, I have an easy way to kill time by catching up on news, surfing the web, or playing games. I've downloaded close to a hundred different interesting apps, which gives me lots of variety when I get bored. (Since I've tried quite a few apps, I should really start blogging about the best PlayBook apps to download...)
With moving around so much, I am so very thankful for carrying one pound instead of twenty! (Disclaimer: I never actually weighed my massive laptop backpack, so that's just a guess. That eff-ing bag!)
Monday, August 22, 2011
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Posts
For someone that doesn't have a cellphone, how does the playbook stack against similar tablet running android. Is there a site to go check for all the existing playbook apps?
ReplyDeleteIf you don't have a cell phone, you'll need a WiFi hotspot to access the web until the 3G/LTE PlayBook is released. Most of the comparisons I've seen are on hardware, browser, performance, etc, not on the software stack. (If anyone knows of a good comparison site, please post it as a follow comment here!)
ReplyDeleteAs far as apps go, the PlayBook will have the ability to run Android apps, announced for an upcoming release later this year. In the meantime, you can look at the app catalog in the BB webstore: http://appworld.blackberry.com/webstore/
It doesn't look like you can filter the web version to screen out phone-only apps unless you have logged in with an account and have an associated device to do the filtering. However, many of the apps are listed as "for PlayBook" in the description or in the title, so those are easy to spot.
My problem is that (as an SE) I require a full development system with me at all times (I don't just present PPTs, I also demo development software). I am resigned to hauling around my laptop rollie (which must weigh around 15 pounds).
ReplyDeleteNo problem Rennie, just make sure that you are only demoing software that runs on QNX ;-)
ReplyDeleteSeriously, there are occasions when I have to break down and use my laptop too. It's just becoming further and farther between. What really helps me is that many of the things I'm talking about from a technology standpoint I can easily demonstrate on the PB.