Dell Latitude XT table PC -- anyone?

Looking at the Dell Latitude XT -- a 12.1" tablet PC.

Looks pretty nifty (but very expensive) on the website -- anyone have one?

Useful or not? Would it be something useful for a student?

 

Depends on what sort of student. Unless you have particular need of the features of a tablet PC I would recommend against it. I say this as a Tablet PC owner. That's not to knock the XT, just a warning against tablet PCs in general.

For a student, the price of the Latitude XT is an extreme negative. Despite their marketing gimmicks behind it a Tablet PC will not revolutionize the way you work in everyday situations.

If you're getting it for digital note taking I'd probably go so far as to say standard pen and paper are your best bet. If you're doing on the fly schematics and illustrations, it will benefit you to some degree.

If you're getting it for art I would suggest investing in a good, solid standalone laptop and then buying a Cintiq 12UX, which will give you the advantages of a Tablet PC, better pen and application support and the ability to swap the Cintiq between PC and desktop.

Tablet PCs can be amazing tools if you have need of its benefits, but if you don't need it now, you're probably not going to miss much.

It all depends on what your intended use of the Tablet PC is.

 

Yeah I'm not looking to buy -- but the idea looks nifty, and I haven't seen much discussion on this model at all.

Of course . But the technology is slowly getting better; will there be a time in the future when these become more commonplace? The huge premium charged by the manufacturers for Tablet PC's will eventually dissipate -- they don't cost that much more to make..

I've long since graduated, but most of my courses made extensive use of formulas and diagrams that could not have possibly been reproduced drawing with a mouse.

Just wanting to add to my toolkit of laptop knowledge; that's all. The price points will come down too at some point in the future, and feature sets expanded.