Workhorse tablets– myth or reality?
Although tablets have managed to carve out a sizeable niche for themselves in the global consumer electronics market, they are still viewed as devices that place content consumption and entertainment first, and productivity…well, not second, perhaps closer to last.
By Abhijit Asad
Tablets typically represent a strange paradigm of power and usability. While packing substantial amounts of power by the standards of mobile devices, they still cannot come even close to the power levels of a desktop computer, or even that of a laptop in terms of raw CPU cycles. This weakness is further augmented by the nature of their operating systems — in order to keep battery consumption and heat output levels low (since tablets don’t come with internal cooling fans and hardier batteries like proper computers do), tablets come with light operating systems like Android or iOS, which are hardly suitable for heavy lifting, or even running a full-scale office suite.
The restrictive nature of tablet input augments this problem further. Instead of requiring additional peripherals like keyboards or mice to interact, tablets require the user to get up close and personal with the screen with their hands, which sounds great in theory, but doesn’t work out so well in practice when it comes to using more complex software. Human fingers in general are hardly precise to begin with, and are hopelessly inadequate when it comes to manipulating the myriad of tools and settings that are present in most productivity suite interfaces directly onscreen. Some developers have attempted to counter this by making the interfaces of the tablet counterparts of their apps large and finger-friendly, at the cost of reducing the area of the workspace, as well as having to remove and tuck away many of the more advanced features. The result? A productivity suite that’s not very productive to begin with.
However, recently, the global interest in tablets has been waning, largely due to the fact that they don’t really have much to offer beyond their roles as media consumption platforms. As a result, to maintain public interest in tablets, the manufacturers are seeing no choice but to add more variety to their tablet lineups, attempting to break the monotony. For example, Samsung has recently unveiled the Samsung Galaxy View, a colossal tablet with an 18” display, which is more of a portable television than a tablet, but ideal for people who want something more than a run-of-the-mill slab. But what’s more interesting is that numerous tablet manufacturers, including the biggest ones like Apple, have started to push productivity as a core feature of their upcoming ranges of tablets.
Notably, the inanest part of their claim to productivity is that the user who wishes to get productive with a tablet would require to plug in a keyboard to their tablet, or at least use a stylus – essentially reinventing the laptop, albeit in a stranger top-heavy form factor. This is largely due to the aforementioned problems regarding finger-based input, but also due to the fact that a touchscreen is a pain in the posterior to type on, and a keyboard is just better at getting things done.
Interestingly, the first company to realize this crucial fact was Microsoft, who attempted to change the game a few years ago with the first iteration of the Surface Pro tablet, which not only came with a pressure-sensitive stylus and a radical new cover that doubled as a keyboard, but also ran a full-scale operating system – Windows 8 – that was compatible with all major windows-based productivity suites. It even came with a full-sized USB port, allowing users to plug in standard peripherals without requiring additional adapters.
Being ahead of its time, the first Surface Pro was not perfect, and although it was well-received from a critical angle, it didn’t quite catch on until the Surface Pro 3 came along. This year, the Surface Pro 4 has all but closed the gap by bringing in even beefier specs, a stupendously accurate display, an even better stylus and a backlit keyboard/cover. Yes, there are better laptops out there, but the Surface is a great option that can satisfy most power users without a problem. It has already inspired other OEMs to develop similar Windows-powered tablet offerings, turning it into a regular genre.
But what about the competition?
Strangely, things have not been going that well on their fronts in terms of competition. Although Microsoft threw Apple a bone by releasing touch-friendly (read ‘dumbed-down’) versions of Microsoft Office apps for iOS, Apple realized far too late that the definition of productivity runs deeper than that. However, their realization did not run deep enough, and the response they unveiled on September 2015 was not only far less than impressive, but also ended up looking like a blatant ripoff of Microsoft’s Surface.
The oversized 12.9” iPad Pro (Ha!) can be bundled with a keyboard unit that is suspiciously reminiscent of Surface’s keyboard covers, as well as a stylus which Apple is attempting to brand as the Apple Pencil. However, it still runs iOS, hence its productivity options are still remaining rather crippled, despite being priced on par with the Surface Pro range. Even diehard Apple fans have criticized this decision, as an iPad with laptop-grade specs and a full-scale OS like Mac OS X would indeed have been a formidable force against any competitor, and would have hit a definite sweet spot with a far greater number of users.
However, the weakest offering on the competitor front comes from Google in the form of the new Pixel C tablet. To be fair, it is a perfectly decent tablet with a svelte form factor, a lovely screen and a really nice-looking keyboard/cover combination that does not look like a Surface copycat. However, it still has mobile-grade specs, and the fact that it runs Android doesn’t help much either. Despite the fact that Android is vastly more flexible than iOS, it is still very much a mobile-grade OS. It doesn’t come with a stylus, but you can get a third-party one if you want. It’s also far less pricey, and therefore good for people on a budget who want to get some word processing or spreadsheet-crunching done on the go without the need to lug around a laptop.
In conclusion, it can be safely said that aside from the Surface Pro series and other Windows-based tablets inspired by it, tablet manufacturers haven’t quite managed to grasp the concept of productivity on the go. However, if Apple releases an OS X-running iPad in the future, that can tip the balance easily enough. Only time will tell.
SOUR PILLS
Recently, the global interest in tablets has been waning, largely due to the fact that they don’t really have much to offer beyond their roles as media consumption platforms.
LIKE A PRO
Yes, there are better laptops out there, but the Surface is a great option that can satisfy most power users without a problem.