Back to school at 30! Need help finding good notetaking computer!

[Tadzpalys]

Ok, So I'm back in school at 30 and I hate paper.... SO,

I want a computer that can take handwritten notes well.
I have an iPad and they SUCK for note taking purposes. I have seen profs at school that use Thinkpads, and they seem awesome, but they always say they bought it for $2000 and up...

Which brings me to my budget of $900.

If I sell my current laptop and iPad I should be able to wrangle together enough for that budget. I don't need video games, I don't need any fancy music making or video editing capabilities. Just the ability to write notes well. I'm in engineering so I need to draw graphs and FBD's all the time, and then write and attach little arrows and all that so typing is out of the question.

Has anyone seen anything that would fit the bill? really just something without all the glitz and glamour but just note taking and basic office suite functions!

Summary:
-Sensitive touchscreen for precision hand writing
-$900

Thank you,
-Tadz Palys

 

[iFargle]

If you absolutely need handwriting, I'd say... Surface Pro (2), since they have the pressure sensitive digitizers and removable keyboards and stuff.

And yeah, the iPad is pretty awful for taking notes. Very imprecise, I did it through a quarter of university and it went... meh

 

[Tadzpalys]

I like the look, but the lack of hard drive space scares me, the base model of the surface pro 2 comes with only 64 GB, -32GB for the OS and you haven't got much room left. I'm not sure yet how prices will scale for more space.

The regular surface 2 is still TBA so I'll keep it in mind. Thank you very much for your input.

 

[iFargle]

Sadly I don't think you'll find much that would be better for handwritten notes than the Surface Pro.

Maybe a Galaxy Note tablet?
Just to throw another suggestion out there

And if the current Surface is any indication, prices pretty much skyrocket as drive space increases. The 128GB version is $1,000 whereas the 64 normally retails for $930.

 

[carnageX]

I like the look, but the lack of hard drive space scares me, the base model of the surface pro 2 comes with only 64 GB, -32GB for the OS and you haven't got much room left. I'm not sure yet how prices will scale for more space.

The regular surface 2 is still TBA so I'll keep it in mind. Thank you very much for your input.

Can always store notes and such on a cloud service such as Dropbox as well, or on a flashdrive / external HDD after class.

 

[andrewrtn]

Ok, So I'm back in school at 30 and I hate paper.... SO,

I want a computer that can take handwritten notes well.
I have an iPad and they SUCK for note taking purposes. I have seen profs at school that use Thinkpads, and they seem awesome, but they always say they bought it for $2000 and up...

Which brings me to my budget of $900.

If I sell my current laptop and iPad I should be able to wrangle together enough for that budget. I don't need video games, I don't need any fancy music making or video editing capabilities. Just the ability to write notes well. I'm in engineering so I need to draw graphs and FBD's all the time, and then write and attach little arrows and all that so typing is out of the question.

Has anyone seen anything that would fit the bill? really just something without all the glitz and glamour but just note taking and basic office suite functions!

Summary:
-Sensitive touchscreen for precision hand writing
-$900

Thank you,
-Tadz Palys

I would recommend using the galaxy note, nook, or kindle. Also, remember that whatever you buy there is always some type of flaw or not 100% what you exactly want to do. I also recommend having a computer on hand also.

 

[SophyQ]

I had the same question.

There is a lenovo Idea pad or think pad. It has a built in digitizer pen.

I have the Galaxy Note 10.1 by Samsung; it's pretty good. But I haven't been able to figure out how to record and transfer notes to and from Microsoft word. The one thing to note is that this tablet only has 3 hours of battery life. S Notes is a pretty good program.

 

[SophyQ]

I would also like to add, if you are looking for handwritten notes function, I was told Microsoft is developing document applications for android users. The Samsung Galaxy note is really good, but it definitely runs on Android.

There are also two types of writing tools you might consider:
-Stylus
-Digitizer pen

They operate different. One acts more like a pointing tool. The other is pressure-sensitive.

Also, Microsoft word documents have an "ink" option. It lets people write in the Microsoft document. Unfortunately, this feature isn't well known to a lot of people. I'm also having trouble figuring out how to using it.

 

[carnageX]

On a PC, OneNote is the best IMO for handwritten notes. Not many people use it... but I love it. Great for taking notes in either handwriting or text because you can categorize everything in "notebooks" and have separate pages for notes in each notebook. You can categorize notebooks as well.

 

[SophyQ]

Would you be able to tell me how to use the handwriting tool?

I tried looking under pen but something isn't right. I am willing to use onenote.

Thanks in advance!