Traveling Without a Laptop (but with an iPad)
shoemoney
·
·
7 min read
Last weekend I took my wife for a little weekend getaway to Las Vegas. We really had no formal plans except we both wanted to see the Beatles show at the Mirage on Saturday night.
While this was not a business trip it was still the first time I traveled anywhere without a laptop going back about 8 years. I was not really worried though, I had applications installed that can do everything I needed. Plus I had the keyboard dock so if I was in a pinch I could always just dock it and type away. After all, I normally write 2-3 blog posts on planes and wasn't real excited about writing with the touch screen for full on blog posts so the keyboard dock put my mind at ease a bit.
As far as connectivity I have a 3G 64GB iPad that has unlimited data plan through AT&T. I was excited to test this out and see how convenient it would be over my Sprint 3G card that I been paying $60 a month for for the last 3+ years that I normally used for my backpack.
I also was excited to see how the battery life was going to do.
I had high hopes the iPad with built in 3G connectivity could actually replace my laptop on a permanent basis and this little trip was going to be the perfect test run.
Right away there were a few pluses. My backpack was considerably lighter than with a laptop.
Also, you don't have to take your iPad out of your backpack when you go through security. Not a huge deal but a plus for sure.
The first pitfall though came pretty quick as soon as I landed for our 1 hour layover in Denver. Our graphic designers were working on some new landing page mock ups and sent me a zip file asking for my feedback to proceed. Only problem is that I couldn't open a zip file on the iPad... The mail program actually grays out the link so you cant click on it or anything. So I had to forward it on to one of my team asking them to unzip it and just mail me the images. This was not a huge deal and honestly I could have replied to the designers also and asked them to send me the images unzipped but none the less it was something I did not think of and put a wrench in progressing on this project until I could get the images for review.
I actually didn't type anything on the plane.... instead I played games. Normally I do this on my iPhone and bring a couple battery extenders cause games run the phone dead after about 1 hour of play but playing games on the iPad from Denver to Vegas (1 hour 28 min flight) barely hit the battery. I had been using the iPad pretty hard since leaving Lincoln and once I landed in Vegas I was at about 75% battery life. Pretty impressive considering I was playing some very graphics intensive HD games on the iPad which made the flight seem like it was about 10 minutes long.
Once we got to our hotel at the Encore my iPad sat in my laptop bag until 8am this morning when I had a business meeting. I sent my wife off to the spa and I went to my meeting with my iPad.
ADD side note: I hear all you guys out there saying it seems crappy to have a business meeting when you are getting away with the wife but being able to deduct the entire trip for a 1 hour business meeting doesn't suck. So shaddup =P.
During the meeting I made a lot of notes just using the regular touch keyboard. Most were bullet points. It was a little bit awkward at times I will admit... but I still was able to take down all the points I wanted.
Shortly after the meeting I met up with my wife and we enjoyed the warm vegas sun outside (along with some frozen cocktails) until we agreed it would be good to go back to our room and get some rest before our late night.
Which brings us to the present tense.
About 15 minutes ago when I started to write this post. Here I am going to have my wife take a picture with me which I will insert later (I didn't buy the USB attachment otherwise I could have just put it on here now).
As you can see I am using the keyboard dock sitting down at the desk in our room banging out this post.
One thing that annoys me is I can't figure out how to adjust the keyboard repeat rate. Like if I want to delete a bunch of text I can't crank down the delay and hold down the delete key.. it's slow to delete them. It's not a huge thing but one that would make this typing faster for sure.
I am using the pages application on the iPad to type this post and I have to say its really nice. It's really easy to properly format this post. The autocorrection feature is nice too and makes it seem like I can spell OR makes me look like a complete ass cause my spelling is so bad it picks a completely different word... either way neat.
My wife's wake up call just happened so I have about 30 mins to get ready for our Beatles show and wont be using the iPad again until tomorrow on the plane. It's at about 55% battery life right now.
One thing I noticed is the AT&T signal is much better than on my iPhone. Like for instance right now looking at my phone from my Encore hotel room I have 2 bars and its running on the edge network. My iPad reports full signal running on 3G. The 2 devices are RIGHT next to each other so that's weird. But maybe since its a much bigger device its easier for it to get a better signal? I dunno... I don't know much about how cell signals work.
Also I ONLY brought my iPhone charger with me since it will charge both devices. At home I use the charger that came with the iPad to charge the iPad but here I am using the iPhone charger to do it. I noticed it takes significantly longer using the iPhone charger. So for future trips I will probably take the iPad charger for both devices (Hey why doesn't someone make a plugin one that has 2 outlets for iPad + iphone?). Hopefully using the iPad higher voltage one wont zap my iPhone.... but what the hell if it does cause the new iPhone comes out in less then 30 days.
So in closing it's been nice not having to lug around a laptop and use the crappy 3g usb connection. Honestly the AT&T connection from my iPad has been really good here at the Encore. I remember when I stayed here during leadscon a few months ago I couldn't get a signal for CRAP on my sprint 3g usb card and had to pay the $20 per day F-U internet charge at the Wynn.
I think its very possible that the iPad will replace my laptop for travel. But for use around my house.... not yet. But maybe that will change.
One final note- I really love the fact that there is no multitasking on the iPad. I know that sounds weird but its nice to be stuck in one application without getting notices for new emails, twitter updates, Facebook crap and anyone of the other 20 things that I can be distracted by.
As you can see I am using the keyboard dock sitting down at the desk in our room banging out this post.
One thing that annoys me is I can't figure out how to adjust the keyboard repeat rate. Like if I want to delete a bunch of text I can't crank down the delay and hold down the delete key.. it's slow to delete them. It's not a huge thing but one that would make this typing faster for sure.
I am using the pages application on the iPad to type this post and I have to say its really nice. It's really easy to properly format this post. The autocorrection feature is nice too and makes it seem like I can spell OR makes me look like a complete ass cause my spelling is so bad it picks a completely different word... either way neat.
My wife's wake up call just happened so I have about 30 mins to get ready for our Beatles show and wont be using the iPad again until tomorrow on the plane. It's at about 55% battery life right now.
One thing I noticed is the AT&T signal is much better than on my iPhone. Like for instance right now looking at my phone from my Encore hotel room I have 2 bars and its running on the edge network. My iPad reports full signal running on 3G. The 2 devices are RIGHT next to each other so that's weird. But maybe since its a much bigger device its easier for it to get a better signal? I dunno... I don't know much about how cell signals work.
Also I ONLY brought my iPhone charger with me since it will charge both devices. At home I use the charger that came with the iPad to charge the iPad but here I am using the iPhone charger to do it. I noticed it takes significantly longer using the iPhone charger. So for future trips I will probably take the iPad charger for both devices (Hey why doesn't someone make a plugin one that has 2 outlets for iPad + iphone?). Hopefully using the iPad higher voltage one wont zap my iPhone.... but what the hell if it does cause the new iPhone comes out in less then 30 days.
So in closing it's been nice not having to lug around a laptop and use the crappy 3g usb connection. Honestly the AT&T connection from my iPad has been really good here at the Encore. I remember when I stayed here during leadscon a few months ago I couldn't get a signal for CRAP on my sprint 3g usb card and had to pay the $20 per day F-U internet charge at the Wynn.
I think its very possible that the iPad will replace my laptop for travel. But for use around my house.... not yet. But maybe that will change.
One final note- I really love the fact that there is no multitasking on the iPad. I know that sounds weird but its nice to be stuck in one application without getting notices for new emails, twitter updates, Facebook crap and anyone of the other 20 things that I can be distracted by.