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What Is: Santa Rosa

17 May 2007 Posted By: William
Posted in: Blog Related

While I didn’t quite keep my promise of ‘one what are a week’ I have a great one for you now.

Lots of notebooks have been released recently, the majority of them having refreshed specifications due to the new “Santa Rosa” specifications. If you want to know what it is, how it works and why you want it then read on for more information.

It doesn’t have anything to do with any South American city or Christmas and it’s not a Prisonbreak clue but it does mean many new features for mobile computing.

Award for “Screencast of the Week”

15 May 2007 Posted By: Frank
Posted in: Screencasts

Wow, this is too cool for me. Betsy Weber, Chief Evangelist, over at TechSmith informed me that my first true post here at the StudentTabletPC was chosen for this week’s “Screencast of the Week.”  Thanks Senorita Betsy.  Thanks Tracy for letting me on the team, so I could receive this award in the first place.  I already have a few more screencasts lined up to be shared with everyone once I get the editing (fun stuff) out of the way.

Math 3.0: It Compliments Your Handheld Graphing Calculator

15 May 2007 Posted By: Frank
Posted in: News, Software Info

A recent topic in the forums had me looking around for math specific software, and up popped Math 3.0 from Microsoft. If you’ve used Microsoft Student 2006, then you’ll be familiar with this program. The additions make Math 3.0 a very useful learning tool for high school math all the way up to early sophomore level math. The usefulness becomes more of a convenience for upper level math courses. Graphing differential equations is not possible. That’s a subject covered as early as in some high schools, so it won’t replace high end handheld graphing calculators.  The user interface and output graphics in Math 3.0 still make this program a valuable addition for the dull graphing features in most handhelds.   

Looking for a Tablet? Lenovo’s 25% Off ’till Memorial Day

15 May 2007 Posted By: Andrew
Posted in: Choosing a Tablet PC, Low Budget Tablets

Thanks to a heads up from Kevin at jkOnTheRun, Lenovo’s offering an astounding 25% off the X60 Tablet plus free shipping and handling to the US (save Alaska and Hawaii…sorry guys).

At the low end, you can grab an Intel Core Duo 1.67GHz, 1GB RAM, 60GB SATA Hard Drive, 12.1″ XGA screen, Windows Vista Business, with A/B/G WiFi and LAN for $1495.

Upgrade to a 120GB SATA hard drive for a mere $33.75 and another gig of RAM (for 2 GB total) for $135 and you’re looking at a pretty rockin’ system.

A Tablet PC Substitute?

15 May 2007 Posted By: Frank
Posted in: Blog Related, Choosing a Tablet PC, Low Budget Tablets, Note-Taking

Check out this really cool tablet PC substitute pictured on the left (Adesso’s CyberPad).  It doubles as a notepad to write down your lecture notes, any notes for that matter, and can be plugged into a USB port on your laptop/desktop PC to serve as an inking surface.  I use Aipek’s HyperPen 1200U with an enormous writing area of 12×9 inches on my desktop running Vista.  Hooking up one of these digital tablets to a non-tablet PC computer makes using Microsoft’s OneNote and other inking applications come to life if you currently own a non-tablet PC.  Aipek recently put out a new tablet that is optimized to run with Vista (Slim Tablet), and they also have a similar CyberPad device (My Note Premium). 

Happy Mother’s Day

13 May 2007 Posted By: Frank
Posted in: Blog Related

Happy Mother’s Day to all the mothers of the world—at least one reads this blog (Alice). It would be difficult for a lot of us to be here without a mother. For some students, it may have been as difficult to own a tablet PC had it not been for a mother that coughed up the funds. Thank you all.

Is GoBinder getting swept under the rug?

10 May 2007 Posted By: Robert
Posted in: GoBinder, Note-Taking

I was doing a bit of research surfing earlier (honestly :o)) and I ended up in a place I haven’t been for a while - the GoBinder forums and two threads “Future Status of GoBinder and PlanPlus” and “Announcing the abandonment of GoBinder2006” horrified me instantly. Now I need to make it clear that these are not official announcements but in both threads lies convincing evidence that Agilix are winding down their efforts on GoBinder. It all goes back to Rob Bushway’s November 2006 interview with Agilix’s VP of Marketing Mark Calkins when, according to the topic author, Mark shows little enthusiasm for a future GoBinder release. I know it’s all theoretical talk about abandonment but what worries me is that no-one on the Agilix team has rushed on to the forum to refute the claims. Additionally I’m worried about how little GoBinder marketing buzz is coming out of ‘Camp Agilix’ these days i.e. none. What about patches and updates for GoBinder? Well we were given a major update with SP3 at the end of January, adding among other things Vista support, but nothing since (is that because SP3 really is the definitive bug buster?) and what about GoBinder buzz on the blogosphere? Maybe I’m just visiting the wrong places but I hear little to no chatter on GoBinder these days and there’s certainly nothing coming through on my RSS feeds.

Laptops Considered "Educationally Empty"

7 May 2007 Posted By: William
Posted in: Blog Related

According to a recent New York Times article some schools around the US are abandoning a notebook per student requirement. They claim that they do more harm than good. Liverpool High, NY, is one of the schools beginning to phase out laptop requirements. School board president Mark Lawson believes that “After seven years, there was literally no evidence it had any impact on student achievement — none.”

School officials felt that laptops had been abused by students, did not fit into lesson plans, and showed little, if any, measurable effect on grades and test scores at a time of increased pressure to meet state standards.

Gateway E155c Gets Reviewed

6 May 2007 Posted By: William
Posted in: Blog Related

The champions over at notebookreview.com have a moderately in depth review of the Gateway e155c or C120x whatever you want to call it. It seems like Gateway’s first second fifth? attempt at a tablet has resulted in some solid results but notebookreview still found some room for improvement. They liked its appearance and feel but felt that its weight and thickness let it down. It seems that there isn’t anything particularly new for students to be particularly excited over. It is good to see however that many of the more recent tablets (this one included) have featured touchscreen as well as active input panels.

HP Feels Generous

4 May 2007 Posted By: William
Posted in: Blog Related

As part of a program to encourage student interest in science, technology, engineering and math, HP has decided to award 172 schools and universities around the US with a bounty of tech goodness consisting of:

Five HP Tablet PCs, five multimedia projectors, five HP digital cameras, five HP Officejet All-in-Ones, software and accessories, and a cash stipend for each teacher for K-12 schools.

While universities get HP products, including HP Tablet PCs, and a faculty stipend valued at more than $68,000 per award.

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