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Looking to purchase a tablet and would appreciate help.

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Tonakai
Posts: 594
Joined: Sun Aug 05, 2012 3:00 am
Location: United Kingdom.

Re: Looking to purchase a tablet and would appreciate help.

Post by Tonakai »

Hey everyone, I'd just like to thank you all for your suggestions. :mrgreen:

I've been thinking long and hard on this, and I have decided that I'd like to get a tablet instead of a laptop for some portable work when I go to University since many of them have keyboard docks and decent sized internal storage.

First and foremost, I want a tablet with a dock with both a touchpad and a keyboard with a size of around 10" (no smaller as I don't have the best eyesight). I want to be able to use Ubuntu or possibly another linux distro on it.

I'd like to know whether or not a tablet with linux on it can still use the terminal to write in programming language, as you can on a PC?

Also, I'm willing to spend up to around £300-400 (which is roughly 457-610 USD. I'm willing to spend a little more but no more than £499). Since I'm willing to spend that, I'm assuming that there should be decent emulation compatibility (this would be a bonus, but not necessary).

Would anyone kindly suggest a tablet for me? I've been thinking that the Dell XPS 10 would be good, but I'm a complete noob when it comes to tablets.

I thank you all for your time.

TLDR;
  • What's a good tablet I could get for around £300-400 (457-610 USD) that is 10"+ with a dock and touchpad
  • If I install Linux on this tablet, can I still use the terminal to write code as you would on a PC?
  • If I install Linux, would it A) still be able to emulate B) Emulate well?
  • I would prefer USB ports and an SD port would also be appreciated
  • Internal storage and ports are an issue, and I would prefer at least 8 hours battery life
  • I have been thinking that the Dell XPS 10 might be a good option - especially since the adds over 4 hours battery life
  • Thank you all for your time, and for the previous help.
Edit: I guess my main concern is this; if I use Linux on a tablet, would it be some watered down version of the OS that forces me to use tablet specific apps, or would it allow me to use it pretty much the same way it does on the PC?
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Theredbaron
Posts: 457
Joined: Wed Feb 15, 2012 8:47 pm
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Re: Looking to purchase a tablet and would appreciate help.

Post by Theredbaron »

There isn't really any good "docks" for for 90% of tablets. If it doesn't come with one, you are out of luck more or less.

Let me try to answer your bullet points

1. Again, the dock thing. I would just get one with a USB port, and a decient powered USB hub. Docks are nice, but most things can work on USB now, so I would just go with that.

2. Yeah, if you install linux, and not a mobile version, it will be a full linux install. You can get plain Debian Stable on alot of tablets, and it will be the same as for X86/64 except compiled for armel (with some packages missing that just don't work on armel) I actually ran linux on a 300mhz zipitZ2, which had a mips CPU. Everything was slower, but I had the whole linux desktop, and could apt-get anything I wanted

3. Emulation speed is going to be based on the device. Most linux distro's do not support arm graphics. Now that is change, AMD even has arm drivers out now, but it might be best to boot up into android for emulation.

4. This is not something I know about, sorry.

5. Yeah, the XPS looks pretty awesome. I personally wouldn't get it, as it is a bit much for me, but it looks very nice. I would go for a pengpod 10", though I have already mentioned that here. However, I don't know if I mentined that it is "made for linux", where as the XPS isn't. So it might be harder to get everything working on the XPS.

As for your last question, it will be a full linux. Not watered down. Unless you get a watered down one, like UbuntuPhone OS.
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