Final Post on the Coby Kyros 7022 - Dead Touchscreen

Long story short - the touchscreen stopped working on my tablet tonight. Just quit, while I was in the middle of surfing. Resetting, restoring, even a factory wipe didn't help. This is a hardware issue, and from what I can gather, I'm not the only one whose had it.

I'm returning the tablet to Toys-R-Us tomorrow. I don't feel enough confidence in the product to risk an exchange for a new one, that might fritz out on me as well. It's a shame, because I did like it. But not enough to risk a $195 paperweight again.

So, my final weigh in on the Coby Kyros 7022 - if you want a 7 inch Android tablet, I suggest spending more on a better brand. It was easy to root, and functional while it lasted, but I just can't recommend the brand based on my experience.

The tablet was a birthday gift (bought with gift money, anyway), so now my challenge is figuring out what to get instead. I'm not sure I want to try another tablet. My luck with gadgets has been rather poor overall, lately.

Maybe it's time to get a desktop, for a dedicated writing station. We'll see. Funny that this happens so soon after the 3DS price drop.

I don't think I'll have any hassles at Toys-R-Us with a return, since it's defective. Although their return policy is known to suck. If I do have any problems, I'll make sure to post about it here.

A Few Further Thoughts on Tablets

Specifically 7" Android tablets. Even More specifically the Coby Kyros 7022. In a nutshell, I like it. For the price, I am perfectly happy with its utility. I would not have wanted to pay more than the slightly under $200 it costs, for what it does. But I also don't see more expensive tablets doing much of anything worth paying more for.

Basically, the niche tablets fall into now is that they are essentially low powered netbooks. The problem with this is that netbooks are already as low powered as is practical for most actual productive applications. But...

Tablets are really cool for surfing the web in bed. There portability makes them pretty nifty videogame machines, media devices, and that kind of stuff. I may get some use out of mine for reading PDFs as well, although I definitely prefer my ereader for actual book reading. Oh, and I just read a comic book on the tablet as well, and actually enjoyed it more than on my larger netbook screen. A 10' tablet, or even 12' (should one hit the market), might be better for that, however.

As kind of a back-up option for the netbook, the tablet is nice, too. I am typing this entry on mine. It's definitely clumsier than it would be on the netbook, even using a full sized USB keyboard, but it does get the job done.

The Kyros 7022 runs Android 2.3, BTW. I can see room for improvement, which presumably 3.0 and 3.1 have been. But again, a little clunky, but gets the job done.

The netbook I have is an Asus 1005p, BTW, and it is my main computer. It does enough, and is portable enough, and gets about 6-9 hours out of a charge. Since I don't do processor intensive stuff, it has been great for me so far. When I write I just hook it up to A USB mouse and keyboard and a bigger monitor (an LCD TV/DVD combo that serves triple duty in my household.)

This post has gotten long enough that my tablet is freaking out, so I'll stop here. Short post shorter - I like my new tablet, and think most people could get some use out of one, this brand or another. Especially writers who spend a lot of time online trying to learn new stuff.

Doldrums

We all hit them sooner or later. Those days (or weeks, or months even) where creativity just doesn't flow the same. Where our needs to get it out doesn't burn. Ho-hum.

I've barely written anything this week. I had an important birthday party midweek, and all my energy went towards making that a success. Between that and other stuff, I've basically lost the last four days, as far as writing new fiction.

Besides the party, I had another distraction. I got a new 7 inch android 2.3 tablet, the Coby Kyros 7022. I will blog more later about this particular device, which fits me fairly well. Suffice it to say, new toys and writing discipline don't go hand in hand.

The worst part about all this is the loss of momentum. I feel like it is difficult to get started again, now that I've been stopped for so long (comparatively.) Not too worry, today is my day off, and should be an upswing. But that feeling is a real one that's important to acknowledge.

I seem to run in cycles anyway, a few days of heavy writing, followed by a few days of editing. And taking a break sometimes is good, right? But it's time to get back to work.

The most important lesson - distractions will kill your word-count. Kill it dead dead dead. Eliminate the distractions (when possible).