Working From the Car Shop With the Tablet PC

X200 TabletYesterday found me in a place where none of us like to be, the car repair shop. My old car was in need of some repairs, and I spent a few hours sitting in one of those comfortable car shop waiting room chairs. I knew I would have plenty of time on my hands so I brought two pieces of gear in my kit, the ThinkPad x200 Tablet PC and the Verizon MiFi.

I brought the x200 because of the flexibility it provides for working extended periods. It is thin and light, and the ability to rotate that screen around into a slate form insures it can be used comfortably, no matter the environment. That flexibility was the call of the day, so the x200 went into the bag.

When I settled into the waiting room I pulled the MiFi out of the bag and tapped the power button. That’s the beauty of using a MiFi — one tap for an instant hotspot. It connected to the 3G network in just a few seconds, and created a Wi-Fi hotspot just for me. The ThinkPad came out of the bag, and with another button push it resumed instantly from sleep and connected to my personal hotspot. I was online, up and running in seconds.

I used the x200 in slate mode, and I am still impressed with how much value the touchscreen adds to the slate experience. Tapping things on the screen and sliding the window around as needed is a natural way to work with a slate. When I needed to enter some text I popped the pen out of the silo and the x200 went into full tablet ink mode as soon as the pen got near the screen. This turns the touch off so there were no inadvertent events triggered while holding the pen to the screen.

Microsoft has done a stellar job with the inking improvements of Windows 7. I found it natural to ink into the Tablet Input Panel (TIP), and recognition accuracy was very good in spite of my horrible handwriting. When it incorrectly interpreted my scrawl it was easily fixed given the improved editing mode of the TIP. Tapping on a word in the TIP expanded it for correction, and I just wrote over the letters in error. Microsoft has put intelligent text prediction in this editing mode, and usually after correcting just one letter, the TIP would change the whole misinterpreted word into the new correct one. I found I could fly through the editing as never before.

I was doing a lot of research for an article, and the MiFi supplied fast 3G like a champ. I forgot I was on 3G and not regular broadband, the mark of good technology at work. I was jumping all over the web in Firefox, using touch to move around at will. The entire process was so natural that after a while I realized I was just doing my work, and not thinking about the tools in use at all. That is absolutely liberating, and the way things should work.

I’ll have another chance to work here on Friday, unfortunately. The repair shop had to order some parts for my old Volvo, so I’ll be back here working for the repairs to be finalized. I’ll be happily inking away in my personal hotspot, so aside from the less than comfortable chairs, it will be business as usual. Well done Microsoft, Lenovo and Verizon.

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