choosing a tablet for pdf annotation, pdf reading, sorting etc and general academic use

ulugeyik · Apr 4, 2012

I am trying to choose a tablet specifically for storing hundreds of pdf files ranging from journal articles to PhD dissertations to presentations to books, reading them and most important annotating them by free hand writing as well as basic text type and highlighting. I should be able to store the output in a standard format and read it on any other pdf reader.

Other specific things I would like to have include a nice software to take handwritten notes/drawings and save as pdf. Like a paper notebook replacement -- I note down a lot of equations, figures so typing is not a good solution --.

Something like Xournal or journal for Android and a good tablet that works with it.

I think wifi, skype enabled webcam, 3G etc are pretty standard so not worth mentioning.

I have played with some random applications on a dell streak 7 and an acer iconia 500 and I have concluded that the choice is not easy and that I need a stylus (*). I simply could not do any of the annotation well using fingers. From what I read, stylus does not work so well there either.

I think either 7" or 10" would be fine but a 7" one with a nice, smooth scrolling would be more convenient for me.

I have been reading various reviews and comments online and ended up concentrating on HTC Flyer, HTC Jetstream and Lenovo Thinkpad tablet.

HTC flyer has the right size. Good price but most reviews are from when it was released with Android 2.1 and I can't tell if the software is now much better or not --- pen thickness, the lack of continuous addition of new pages when taking notes -- so if anyone can update on this it would be great.

HTC Jetstream appears to have solved some of the software issues but it is very expensive and bulky. I am not sure I need that. Although, I can consider it despite the price. I could not find good reviews or comments from users using it for this type of applications.

Lenovo thinkpad tablet appears to be pretty nice except as far as I understand there is no evident software for this purpose. ezPDF does not seem to fare so well.

New color e-ink devices from ectaco appear also promising and I have been a grayscale e-book reader but I am afraid for papers with images, figures, equations it won't fare good.

Any suggestions, examples of usage would be very nice!

Thanks.

(*)I had installed linux and customized it on a Samsung Q1U slate computer in the past and used for this purpose. Except from battery life, lack of "instant-on" etc, it was fine)

smileman · Sep 23, 2012

what did you end up deciding?

i'm a PhD student and i think the sooner i get on the annotating journal articles/books in a tablet/e-reader the better as this is clearly where the future is going.

based on my preliminary research it would appear that the galaxy note 10.1 might be the best current solution. however, it would seem like the ideal solution does not yet exist. i'm envisioning a large (11"), fast, e-Ink device with a stylus. am i correct that there is nothing out there like this yet?

ulugeyik · Sep 24, 2012

I have purchased the htc flyer and with the Android 3* upgrade it works fine. It is possible to get good bargains since it is no longer produced. I believe there are rumors of a second version.

Pros: pdf annotation works just fine, notetaking works fine albeit slow with longer notes -- better split into different files --, size is manageable for day to day use and carrying around in conferences etc.

Cons: Older model, no new OS upgrades are expected. There are faster processors etc out there. It lacks 3G option. The pen tip is movable and it make sound when lifting/re-applying and distracts the user. I could not find a decent paper manager/BibTeX manager.

I have not been following up with other new devices. I like 7" better than 11" for portability.

smileman · Sep 24, 2012

thanks for responding.

ulugeyik said:
I have purchased the htc flyer and with the Android 3* upgrade it works fine...notetaking works fine albeit slow with longer notes

i like that it can be had for cheap but i read some complaints in reviews about the weight of the flyer's stylus due to it requiring a battery. your comment about it being slow is a concern as it's crucial for me that i not have to interrupt my train of thought or slow down when reading/annotating an academic piece.

ulugeyik said:
I could not find a decent paper manager/BibTeX manager.

Is this true for Android as a whole? this is making me think that Windows 8 might be a better solution.

ulugeyik said:
I like 7" better than 11" for portability.

my concern with anything less than 10", or really 11", is that journal article PDFs will probably require frequent zooming. has that been your experience?

ulugeyik said:
I have not been following up with other new devices.

the one i've got my eye on now is the Asus Vivo Tab, which has an 11"+ screen and the same Wacom digitiser/stylus as the smaller Galaxy Note 10.1. it's going to cost a couple hundred more than the 10.1 but i think the screen size and Windows 8 probably make it worth it.

Asus Vivo Tab preview - Tablet - Trusted Reviews

ulugeyik · Sep 25, 2012

smileman said:
i like that it can be had for cheap but i read some complaints in reviews about the weight of the flyer's stylus due to it requiring a battery.

I got used to it. It does not bother me. The tip that wiggles is the most annoying part. When I am annotating journal articles, it is ok since I just write a short note , cross-out parts, draw things but when I take notes during meetings, it is a problem.

smileman said:
your comment about it being slow is a concern as it's crucial for me that i not have to interrupt my train of thought or slow down when reading/annotating an academic piece.

The speed bothers me most when I am taking handwritten notes that go many many pages. The default note-taking application is storing a bunch of independent, editable images which quickly take up a lot of memory.

smileman said:
Is this true for Android as a whole? this is making me think that Windows 8 might be a better solution.

I believe so. I guess it is a matter of demand. I have not seen a good bibliography manager that integrates well with vanilla BibTeX for syncronization with my PCs, e.g. via dropbox or ubuntuone. There are many paper/ebook managers and bibliography managers that use their own formats. I expect that this will change soon but it may still not be a "jabref" or "mendeley desktop" type direct integration with BibTeX. I would be happy if there were a plain text integration.

smileman said:
my concern with anything less than 10", or really 11", is that journal article PDFs will probably require frequent zooming. has that been your experience?

When I read a journal article, I hold it in the landscape mode. It fits the width without any problems but limits the height. I do not have to keep zooming in/out. A larger screen would make reading papers more like reading them on paper -- specially for a person like me who reads a snapshot of the whole page in one go -- but I would not have been carrying it arround as much. At the end of the day, you will have to choose based on your habbits and daily routine.

Asus Vivo sounds good. I am refraining from looking into the newer tablets to avoid getting the itch to go ahead and buy yet another one

I hope this helps. Let us know what you end up choosing and your comments about it.

Mini Logo · Sep 27, 2012

I bought the Galaxy note 10.1 yesterday. I have used it today, so there is my experience, but still....

I currently do research, and I needed a tablet for article reading, searching databases and taking notes. I wanted a tablet with a stylus, but I find the others to thick and clumsy. The stylus on the note 10.1 is nice. A bit slow if you are a fast writer, but it lived up to my standards. Setting up a VPN connection was also very easy, so I was ready to start working in 10 minutes. Unfortunately it was not that simple, because I could not type directly on the pdf-document. There is a polaris office package that comes with the tablet, but it can not open pdf-files. Pubmed provides pdf, so now I am stuck at this. I guess I need a program to convert pdf to that other type I can not remember right now...

I would also like to store my articles in a folder and have it easily accessible. I have stored articles on it, but I would like to have a shortcut to this folder. I have not found out if this is possible, and if it is, it is not very intuitive.

My impression right now is that is has a lot of possibilities, but that it is not very intuitive. This is my first impression, but I hope it changes with more practice and with more apps!

smileman · Sep 27, 2012

Mini Logo said:
Unfortunately it was not that simple, because I could not type directly on the pdf-document. There is a polaris office package that comes with the tablet, but it can not open pdf-files. Pubmed provides pdf, so now I am stuck at this. I guess I need a program to convert pdf to that other type I can not remember right now...

you need to get iannotate. would love to hear how the 10.1 works with it. alternatively i've read that you can import a PDF into S Note, but that sounds like a pain.

Mini Logo said:
I would also like to store my articles in a folder and have it easily accessible. I have stored articles on it, but I would like to have a shortcut to this folder. I have not found out if this is possible, and if it is, it is not very intuitive.

What about Dropbox or Google Drive? on the iPad version iAnnotate syncs with Dropbox, so if that functionality isn't already available on the Android version it should be coming soon.

ulugeyik · Sep 28, 2012

Good to hear a mini-review of the Galaxy note.

About your questions regarding annotating pdf files. HTC flyer came with a stock installation of "foxit mobile pdf reader" which is what I use to annotate pdfs. There are several other options out there.

Everything in android is store in simple folders but many programs hide their locations but it is reasonably straight forward to locate them. I use "Astro file manager" for that purpose. You can move, rename, copy, paste etc like you do on a regular PC.

For various reasons, as far as I understood Dropbox, BOX, Google Drive, Ubuntu One etc do not sync automatically on android. One reason is to avoid huge data usage while on 3G and such (remember android is mainly a cell phone OS).

My workaround for that was to use "Foldersync" and define few folders that should be automatically synced with the cloud at regular intervals. I did this with UbuntuOne but it could be done with others too. On my linux-box(es), I place the papers on a shared UbuntuOne folder (for example, Dropbox is equally simple) , I told foldersync to syncronize a folder on my HTC flyer with the equivalent folder on UbuntuOne cloud, which then automatically ends up on my PC.

Some software such as the stock notetaking application syncs automatically with evernote cloud but I did not find a similar option for pdf annotators.

BTW, I am using "lite" (i.e. free) versions of all this software except the stock software.

Also, I did not like polaris much so I am using kingsoft for office.

smileman · Sep 29, 2012

a galaxy note 10.1 owner who uses it for academic purposes posted his thoughts here:

http://androidforums.com/samsung-ga...-annotating-journal-articles.html#post5018905

Mini Logo · Oct 12, 2012

smileman said:
you need to get iannotate. would love to hear how the 10.1 works with it. alternatively i've read that you can import a PDF into S Note, but that sounds like a pain.

I downloaded ezPDF and I have used it for two weeks. It is absolutely amazing! I can search for articles, open them in ezPDF and add annotations in any way I like. The only thing missing is a "flatten all annotations" option. I have to flatten every single one, and that is a pain..

Sorry for not being able to tell you anything about iannotate. I have not tried it, but that is because I am so satisfied with ezPDF. For that reason I have not tried importing into S note either..

What about Dropbox or Google Drive? on the iPad version iAnnotate syncs with Dropbox, so if that functionality isn't already available on the Android version it should be coming soon.

I do not know if it syncs with dropbox (does that mean a constant upload/download of information?), but it has a "send to" option that allows me to put it right into my dropbox folder. Works great.

I "discovered" the ear phones yesterday. Amazing sound...

I have a few problem though. First: The tablet does not come with USB(!!). That is absolutely ridicilous, because I have to buy an external usb, and having that in my lap is not very pleasant, nor can I put it on the table...
Second: I am doing research in a Psychiatric Department and wi-fi is not allowed. I have to connect my tablet through a ethernet connection. So I need a USB to ethernet or a 30-pin to ethernet adapter. This is very hard to find, and those I find are not compatible with Samsung (why?).

Sum up. I love the tablet. It is really great, but it seems like there are problems as soon as things are not "stream lined"...

Well, well. Appreciate all feedback on how to solve the ethernet problem...

Mini Logo · Oct 12, 2012

Sorry. I commented on your quotes within the quote... Not clear now, so please read for feed back on iannotate and such in blue, quote area.

choosing a tablet for pdf annotation, pdf reading, sorting etc and general academic use

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