MINDSHIFT time:  it’s NOT a phone

An obvious one this one but took me a while to grasp a quite a subtle shift for the Android phone user. The Android tablet is not a phone and you don’t have to use it like a phone, let me explain…..

I've had an android phone for around a year, an HTC Desire and I love it. It has taken over from my itouch as my media player of choice , I synch podcasts each week and play them through my radio on the way to work, it  handles social networks , calendars and emails, it even takes photos of technology equipment reviews in WHSmiths so I can avoid buying magazines! (cheap)

Because screen size is so small, phone users rely on apps to deliver content and perform processes; Apps are dedicated to a single use and are configured to the small screen size. To use the browsers on the Desire is doable but a pain in the backside, text visibility is difficult without Panning and scanning across the website.  Apps are great, but apps are only as great as the developer and there are quite a few p*ss poor apps about.

When I got my Asus Transformer I initially treated it like a phone I downloaded a shed full of apps and my home screens look like I've thrown a handful of apps across the room and they have installed where they have stuck.

The Android Marketplace has only a limited number of apps which are optimised for the large screen size (although most work in some form or another) The number of Honeycomb apps are increasing all the time but why rely on apps anymore? We now have a lovely big screen that the browser can now be used alongside of apps.While apps are being scaled up to match the honeycomb screen resolution, the HTML world is scaled up and ready be used  ... For example  if you are looking for a news aggregator there are many sites that can do this www.news now.co.uk is one such site.

A big positive for the ASUS Transformer and Android tablets in general is the support for Flash, most websites just work.

All this may seem obvious to some but a little MINDSHIFT opens the potential of the tablet.

A thumbs up for the Transformer

Welcome to the blog. Ive recently taken delivery of the ASUS Transformer Android tablet along with the optional keyboard dock. I would like to share with you my experiences. Im not convinced that I have made the right decision so I keep this account hopefully to help others.

Instead of pimping articles and reviews of other people I will try to make sure that I quote references and give credit where it's due then include a link to article. If I miss giving due credit please let me know and I will sort it out.

I have had an Android phone, the HTC Desire , for the last year and I love it, I also have a netbook, the Samsung NC10 and the love doth flow in that direction as well. Im going to use these devices as the comparators , why did I buy a tablet, and what can and cant I do with my new toy ?