1. Introduction

As a tablet-toting computer fanatic, I always get a reaction from onlookers when I break out my notebook, with its swiveling screen and stylus-controlled interface. However, after the initial novelty wears off, I am often asked why a tablet is better than a regular notebook - and for good reason. A regular consumer can find it tough to justify spending hundreds extra for a touch-screen notebook without fully understanding everything it has to offer.

In truth, there is more to a Tablet PC than you might think - it’s not just a fancy digital notepad that elicits wandering eyes in the airport. A Tablet PC has added functionality that increases portability, adds extra entertainment value, and makes tedious interface controls so much easier than a standard laptop. In this article, these are the areas I explore fully, to help you understand all the features that only a tablet can offer.

The Power Of The Stylus

The first and most important thing to realize about Tablet PCs is that they are absolutely identical to regular notebooks in terms of basic features. Heck, a tablet could even be used just like a standard laptop from the same company without any compromise in performance. What a tablet offers is essentially two computers in one, or more precisely, it offers two wildly different ways to control the same computer. Simply put: for those who want to go beyond a normal notebook experience, a tablet can be transformed into a device with a full touch-screen interface.

An example of a magnetic Tablet PC stylus

The almost universal norm now for Tablet PC notebooks is to use a special, magnetized stylus interface that allows the touch-screen capabilities to only be controlled with the stylus. This means that you won’t accidentally change your font size just by bumping your thumb into the screen (for whatever reason that might happen). The magnetized stylus also gives you more control over movement of the PC cursor: by moving the stylus just an inch or so away from the computer display, you can control the pointer/cursor to highlight or activate mouse-over commands without tapping on the screen and without prompting a mouse click.

In other words, the stylus can do everything that a conventional mouse can do, in addition to a slew of other features. To prove this, I wrote this entire article, and did the screen captures and photo editing, without even touching the built-in mouse panel or my external USB mouse. I used the keyboard and stylus of my 2006 Gateway Tablet PC for all standard navigation through menus, all highlighting and editing in the writing of the text - including constant spell checks of any word that has three or more syllables! - and everything else I did in preparing this article.

The most effective use of your Tablet PC will probably include a mix of stylus control and standard notebook control. The point is that the extra dimension of computer interface adds a whole level of customization for how you want to use all the basic features of a laptop. This goes beyond the basic features to really underline why a tablet can take your mobile computing to a new level.

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