Displays Need a New Monitor for Uni (Also Laptop / Tablet)

Ha! So true.

For me, I usually type my notes as my hand writing is abysmal. What annoyed me is classes I could not use a laptop like math, logic classes, and so on, because using charmap and searching for symbols for 30min each time, isn't ideal thing to do. I also like to record lectures. Not to really listen them all at 100%, but sometimes I miss something important. I make a note of it on my notes, and then I get back to it, relisten and complete my notes.

But now that such device (tablet with keyboard) cost ~1000$ and not 3000$, its a bit easier to afford one.

 

Mute the argument here

- Paper notebook get get dropped and thrown across a room
- A notebook is as thick as a tablet, with many hundreds and pages
- File dividers are your friend, we've developed over many decades a system that works.
- Photocopiers, well I just used a scanner to make backups but tbh I would type up the useful stuff.
- Really? A notebook is super light with a brio, plus it's not as if you need to charge it.


Seriously a tablet device isn't a requirement, plus having less stuff that can be stolen the better.

 

I was referring to the digital format of the notes mainly, which:
- Take up no physical space
- Weigh nothing
- Can be organised with the click of a button
- Can all be taken with you everywhere without any hassle

Scanning notes does provide a backup, but:
- I would have to get a scanner
- I would have to remember to scan my notes
- The quality of the scans might not be very good
- I can't edit the scans (change the text etc)

I understand that a pen + paper would suffice, but I'd rather make life a little easier for myself (which I think a laptop / tablet would do).

 

Obviously it's up to you, but very few people had tablets/laptops in most of my lectures. (I'd say less than 10% of classes of 150 at times)

So are you planning on typing or writing the notes?

 

I was gonna wait a bit before buying a laptop anyway and make a judgement after going to lectures.

Ideally I'd like to type them, but I'm not sure it would convenient if there is lots of maths.

 

Yes, few people had tablets.. because all they know is iPad and Android, both of which don't know about OneNote, (or OneNOte alternative), let alone a digitize pen, with an optional keyboard.

This is what I saw:
-> Some people tried to use the iPad for notes... they were fighting with their touch screen keyboard as you cant' write properly fast on it.
-> People with laptops using Word instead of OneNote, and when you see their screen in mid lecture you are like "WTF is this mess?"
-> The Andoird devices with digitize pen support, people don't know about it.

Another strength using a tablet, is that with programs like OneNote, you can search through your notes. Notice the search box on the picture you have. This is great when you want to search for a term when you study for amid term or final, and not have to start going page per page on your notes, because you don't know where you last saw it, then skip it, because you went too fast, and rescan your notes again and possibly one more time again, until you find it.

Yes, it is a luxury device. Yes it is not required. Much like:
-> colored pens for organizing your notes
-> separators
-> quality note books
-> Mechanical pencil over a normal one
etc.

You get it to improve your note taking.
Anyway, at least for me, despite using a laptop for most of my semesters, it helped me a lot.

Oh another thing that is cool, is that when the teacher provide a PDF, when I open it, I can do: File > Print > Send to OneNote (as printer). and voila, it will show in One note, ready to add notes to it. While it ends up being a picture so you can't search through the content (Unless the PDF is well done... but you'll probably see most teacher don't know how to do it), it is convenient as it allows you to have all your noted in a continuous mater and 1 location.

It must be noted however, if you do this, it's best to do it BEFORE class, much like you would do to print it out and bring to class, if you can. (I had some teacher just add it to the online system, and those who had a computer could access it, but the rest had to wait after the lecture, and look at the projector screen, and that sucks in taking notes.

Why do it before hand? When it's 1 page it's not too bad, but when it's multiple, and the teacher scans his notes in super duper high quality for some reason, the process in sending to OneNote can take a bit of time... not very time consuming, but you know, takes more then enough time, to be annoyed as you want to write notes because the teacher is talking.

Also, if it's your first time, then you don't know how to use OneNote, as you learning it as you go, so if the print out doesn't appear correctly you must redo it, and adjust the option (landscape/portrait, don't scale, scale, etc.)

 

- I am doing electrical and electronic engineering too where are you studying?

- I plan on taking my desktop for some of the simulation work but not 100% sure yet but looking at the new gigabyte u24t as it is touchscreen, light and has a gt750m so can do some light gaming.

- the 2nd generation surfaces are meant to be announced in october but that means they won't retail until november or december in the uk.

 

Resolution of the laptop you are looking is very low (in fact Windows 8 minimum screen resolution). Like 3-4 row tile will only fit on the Start Screen. I would at lest get 1440x900 or 1600x900 as a bare minimum. I have 1440x900 on my laptop, and I feel squished. I need 1920x1200 or 1920x1080.

The rest, is a sweet system. Damn that display! I just wish there was a way to buy after market laptop display, where, you can just go buy any panel of the same size, insert it, and all works perfectly, with no worries. Much like replacing an HDD/SSD or something.

It's also a bit disappointing that the laptop has HDMI over DisplayPort.

 

Without question I am taking my monitor to uni (1920x1200) so for the sake of note taking I think I can deal with a lower res and then use my monitor for movies and gaming, I can carry my monitor under my arm for the gaming soceity but lugging my desktop around is out of the question.

Anyway, my thinking ws the lower res means it will be slghtly better on the frame rate and battery life side of things, the non touch version is higher but for onenote and win8 a touchscreen helps!

 

Huddersfield

 

I am going to Loughborough.

 

If you're going to Loughborough then moving your desktop to LANs shouldn't be a problem, they should still be running the LAN Van. Very few take laptops, and they're just scrubs (like me this year )

 

Loughborough was my insurance.

 

Same, York was my firm but I missed it by a grade :/

Lan Van? So moving the desktop around isn't an issue, in which case I am turning the laptop fund into a cheap surface and a custom loop

 

Loughborough >> than both of those, no idea what you guys were doing.

Yeah at the moment they hire a van and bring computers to/from lans to your house/hall.

 

That is awesome, thanks for telling me before I put £800 into a laptop I might not need


P.s sorry for the major sidetracking off the thread!

 

My 2p on the matter having been through uni is to ditch the laptop and stick with pen and paper.
Those notes are meant to be rough.

You make revised and improved study notes later on, using what you've learnt as a guide.
That said if they're just reading off of the slide.. there's not much point to it.

Laptop may be useful if you need to work on a group project somewhere other than your halls.