Android/Windows hybrid tablet.

saras · September 23, 2016

My current mobile solution consists of a hybrid tablet ultrabook(a lenovo yoga pro), a kindle and an android tablet (an older samsung note).

Generally speaking I used to use the windows device for everything and the tablet for casual reading. However, the balance was destroyed; getting the note saw the effective retirement of the kindle, leaving it as nothing more than a decoration.

My current use case is basically the windows machine, for whenever I give a fuck about what I'm doing(work... etc), and the tablet for when I'm not(reading, youtube, podcasts... etc).

Now kindle and the ultrabook was fine, because they're different enough to where they don't overlap with each other... This is no longer the case as they both seem close enough to where it just seems that I'm carrying around two devices for ultimately the same god damn thing. This isn't further helped by me having issues with both devices.

I hate how the ultrabook is UHD and with a 16:9 screen. I don't watch movies, I need to work, 16:9 screen is a nightmare for that at ultrabook screen sizes. And I hate UHD because I have to deal with shitily coded legacy software and honestly, it just doesn't have the sheer grunt horsepower to deal with it comfortably.
I despise the tablet, for it being "old" (old software, old design, "slowness" due to what software that actually got up to date, WXGA resolution) and it being a bit too small.

At first I wanted to just get a new tablet and go back to a proper laptop for work, but I really fucking love the note's pen and it appears that no one makes new android tablets with digitizers.

And since I view my current ultrabook as a "bundle of compromises" without actually being satisfied with it, I'm thinking of replacing all three things I have with something like a surface/surface pro and either VMing android on top of it or dual booting while I'm "out and about" and not actually working.

While the surface would satisfy me as a windows machine for when I need it, the question is basically how good of an android device/tablet is it? Is it light enough to say be used as an ereader in bed, does it go dark enough to not blind me while there? Does the pen... etc work while in android mode? Is running android apps on it a chore?

Also if the above is feasible, are there other alternatives to the surface? I want 10ish inch, as square as possible windows tablet with a digitizer.

Factory Factory · September 24, 2016

Your best bet for Android on x86 is going to be RemixOS, which sits a bit uncomfortably between tablet OS and desktop OS (though more tablet-y than Windows is). You can try it as a liveUSB to get a feel for it, even on a desktop. Running Android of any sort in a VM will likely be a poor experience for anything besides mild tinkering because of unoptimized battery life and difficult-to-impossible hardware acceleration in Android on a VM.

Long story short: Even great Windows tablets generally make poor-to-awful Android tablets, because driver support and OEM optimization just isn't there. Don't buy any Windows hardware with the expectation to seriously use it part time as an Android device, IMO. A fantastic supported-OS experience (like Windows on a Surface) can go down the crapper fast on an alternative OS not optimized for the particular hardware.

Before you make the switch, though, you can mess around with RemixOS for yourself on your existing Ultrabook to get a feel for it and see how the battery life/etc. holds up, whether it can adjust the screen brightness, that sort of thing. If so, that bodes well for a Surface. It also comes in a self-contained VM format, if you want to go that route. And if you only need to run a few Android apps, you can see if you can get Bluestacks working.

I've used my Surface Pro 3 as an ereader before, but while I'd gladly take it over an LCD Kindle, I think e-ink makes for the better ereader experience.