Cleaning House

I recently cleaned out my entire tech up to a year old and replaced it with new. An old DVD recorder and internet radio, even older type wireless keyboards and webcams, sold for more than new. These are getting scarce, but I had already converted all my tapes and the new tablets serve also as internet radios.

I also rearranged my choices based on uses.

I wanted a device which would transmit recorded videos to TV such as the huge offerings by PBS, also Internet Archive.

I wanted a device to generate documents. Now, that means dictation, since I do most documents that way, now, but I also wanted a regular keyboard.

I wanted to do videophoning trouble-free

I wanted a device with good loud stereo sound to play music.

I wanted device sized for easy reading without being too heavy.

I wanted a portable device to accompany me everywhere.

I wanted the device really fast.

Now, here is what I concluded.

The Apple devices are best at sending to an AppleTV ($100), but Google devices are catching up. Google's new $35 Chromecast may be all it takes.

Google devices, especially the new Nexus were best for dictation. They are also the fastest.

The Apple Facetime video phoning works only with other Apple devices but is the best.

The Nook HD+ had wonderful sound and and also is a great size and weight for reading.

My old cell phone was already the right size, maybe a little small, to carry around---but I did need to learn how to speed it up.

In the future we may find one device which does most of this. For now, it took more than one. I made my choices.

How would you have chosen? I did manage to come out ahead in dollars.

Footnote:

Now, I need to add that I do use Windows, but not Windows 8. I wavered back and forth about a Windows laptop or tablet and finally decided neither offered anything new and traded in my original Chromebook laptop for a nifty Samsung---light weight, fast, reliable, indestructible, portable, slick.

But for a very few others, there might me another choice if Microsoft ever gets it right. One resident who does a lot of writing for publication bought a MS Surface RT, lovely hardware with very limited software which does MS Office, though little else, well.

I found it appealing despite very negative reviews. It can actually serve as your main computer by just plugging in a keyboard and display, and is very portable indeed.

A poor choice now for most, but I do believe developers are working hard to get it right.

Typed and published from MS Word (my old tablets are gone and I don't have the new one(s) quite yet).