Student Productivity (windows vs Android)

[Horny Unicorn]

Hello All

i'm a student at a university level and im looking for a (tablet/hybrid) to buy

i own an MSI GE60 15 inch gaming laptop, it is hooked to my monitors, External Hard drives and many other things

at first i was considering getting an android tablet since my previous experience was very positive (i owned an Asus padfone 2 with the docking station), the main candidates were the Nvidia Shield tablet or waiting and see what the new nexus tablet is all about, the budget was set for 300-400$

then i start finding out about some windows 8.1 hybrids, a full windows 8 machines (none of that RT shenanigans) for the same price, and they include a a keyboard attachment, plus office 2013 fully licensed, the main candidate on the windows side are the lenovo Miix 2 and the Acer Switch 10.

after this long intro my question is, which system is better for general use and productivity ?? the only reason that gives me some doubt is that these windows machines have Intel Atom baytrail CPU, which i think is a very poor performer, so the user experience might be much smoother on the android tablets, however attaching a keyboard dock to an android tablet isn't also the best solution, it bulky and does not look as nice.

so which is better? high end android tablet, or intel atom windows 8 hybrid system

[_ASSASSIN_]

when I personally write papers, It's pretty important to me to be able to see both the source and my notes to write down. If you get either the Nexus or the Shield tablet, you won't get multi-window. That and word-formatting on mobile platforms isn't flawless.

I'd go personally with a laptop with windows/linux.

[xox]

If your budget can cope, go for a Surface Pro 3.

 

I don't care what Linus says, I have one and it is awesome for doing work on as well as anything you would generally want.

 

It is also worth mentioning that the Pro 2 is also a contender and can be purchased very cheaply nowadays.

[Deletive]

I'd go with windows... Windows scaling works better for productivity more then android scaling does.

[simtransporter]

All I know is that I'm personally far more productive with a windows desktop (and even some notebooks) than I am with any tablet.

[Toddwjp]

windows, its best to have the same os as the uni will use and windows is still the best for productivity

[Nico123473]

Windows has much more programs for productivity, but much more

[Darth_Klein]

Hello All

i'm a student at a university level and im looking for a (tablet/hybrid) to buy

i own an MSI GE60 15 inch gaming laptop, it is hooked to my monitors, External Hard drives and many other things

at first i was considering getting an android tablet since my previous experience was very positive (i owned an Asus padfone 2 with the docking station), the main candidates were the Nvidia Shield tablet or waiting and see what the new nexus tablet is all about, the budget was set for 300-400$

then i start finding out about some windows 8.1 hybrids, a full windows 8 machines (none of that RT shenanigans) for the same price, and they include a a keyboard attachment, plus office 2013 fully licensed, the main candidate on the windows side are the lenovo Miix 2 and the Acer Switch 10.

after this long intro my question is, which system is better for general use and productivity ?? the only reason that gives me some doubt is that these windows machines have Intel Atom baytrail CPU, which i think is a very poor performer, so the user experience might be much smoother on the android tablets, however attaching a keyboard dock to an android tablet isn't also the best solution, it bulky and does not look as nice.

so which is better? high end android tablet, or intel atom windows 8 hybrid system

Being in the same boat as you (college) I would go with windows, I have a lot of friends that love taking notes on there windows tablets like the surface pro 3. I feel like they are a little overpriced but a windows tablet will help with your productivity over and android one. Just a side note if you are looking at the surface pro 3, I did see a kid in my microprocessor class drop his off the desk it fell about 4 feet and was completely fine. 

[Kamil]

My personal recommendation is whichever one comes with an active digitizer. I'm not going to go do the research myself for what options have it (I know the Shield Tablet does, and the Surface Pro line), but I have a tablet without an active digitizer and it's basically impossible to take notes for any class that uses non-standard symbols or diagrams (i.e. any math, science, or engineering course). Maybe it's just that my tablet's touch screen is pretty terrible, but I just don't feel like a capacitive stylus on a capacitive touch screen can measure up to pencil+paper the same way an active digitizer can.

 

A keyboard is also good, but you can get an external one if you need it so that's not such an important consideration.

 

In all honesty, the Surface Pro 3 is pretty much the ideal option for a college student if you don't include the price. A Surface Pro 2 might be available closer to that range and still be almost as good, but I think even going all the way back to the Surface Pro 1 is still more than $400.

[snes]

As much as I love my tablet (I really do), when I need to get work done I will always use the PC. The tablet can be used as a second screen, though.

[GoodBytes]

As a student myself, I am telling you.. Windows.

You can run the full version of Office, some tablet comes with it, if you don't have it, you can use any software you want, and if you have the a hole professor that does special thing his the class note PDFs, which I encountered, you can run Adobe Reader no problem to view the PDF. And it's windows you can do and install what you want.

If you have the budget, I would get the Surface Pro 3, the pen is the reason, and Surface Pro line, has the best pen technology. It's not perfect, due to current N-Trig (and before on older models Wacom) technology, but it only goes down from there. You have crazy performance for what it is, and good battery life. Think and light. Great keyboard too.

Atom based is OK if you are patient. You have to expect to keep the OS extra lean, and expect slow program startups. Usually the SSD they put in is VERY slow, so don't be fooled by "SSD!", it will be like a 5400 or 7200RPM average laptop HDD performance, and a slow CPU. Then again, most of them comes with Office, Surface Pro 3 doesn't, and is much cheaper. No pen on most, though, and OK keyboard at best. So everything has it's ups and downs to evaluate. But once loaded, thing will be smooth. Just forget Chrome... like really forget it. It wont' run. Firefox might be OK. IE will be fine. One thing that IE11 is good at, is running perfectly smoothly under slow hardware. It's like if Microsoft put all it's energy in making that possible. If you check reviews, you'll see that yes IE is not the fastest, but it consumes the least amount of power, consumes the least amount of memory, and consumes little CPU power. Also it is high-DPI aware and have the best multi-touch support. Sooo.. yes it might be a battle to consider.

Now, I don't know which program you are at university, but the pen of the Surface Pro 3 will allow you to enter in your notes formulas, draw, diagram, make arrows for your notes and so on, something you can't do with a keyboard or touch (not easily at least).

[Horny Unicorn]

thank you All for all the responses i got, i really appreciate it, now that it is pretty much unanimous, the question is which laptop/hybrid to choose

i know the surface lineup is the best BUT and its a Big But, i simply can not go over budget, the razor 14 is a fantastic ultrabook but it is simply out of reach

here are some of my research results (with my pros-cons) that i'd love to get your thoughts about

 

Lenovo Miix 2 (Full HD IPS screen, microsoft office included and probably the best looking one - Average battery life and FHD might impact the already questionable performance)

1.33Ghz Intel Quad Core Baytrail-T Z3745 - 2 GB Ram - 64 GB Storage - 350$

 

Acer switch 10 (great keyboard, microsoft office included - questionable performance)

1.33Ghz Intel Quad Core Baytrail-T Z3745 - 2 GB Ram - 64 GB Storage - 370$

 

Asus T100ta (Long Battery life - dim screen and Bad keyboard, probably the worst looking one)

1.46Ghz Intel Quad Core Baytrail-T Z3775 - 2 GB Ram - 64 GB Storage - 375$

 

and finally Dell inspiron 11 3000 (better performance then the other with bigger screen - yoga style hybrid, bigger/heavier and more expensive, no office)

2.16GHz Intel Pentium Processor N3520 - 4 Gb Ram - 500 HDD Storage - 454$

 

please if you have any other suggestions let me know and i would appreciate if you attach the link for buying them as well (300-400 $ limit)