Saturday, May 21, 2011

A Full Day With the HTC Flyer

To give the Flyer a real test, I’ve tried to use it all day as my primary go-to machine.  I only turned to a computer to test Evernote syncing and browse forums.  I suppose I could have done that from the Flyer also, but I didn’t feel like typing in urls, usernames, and passwords.  I’m still baffled as to why my (synced with chrome) google chrome bookmarks don’t sync to my google android tablet.  Android is so good about pulling everything else from your google account.  Oh well. 

The day started with reading news feeds, emails, and social network feeds.  I’m using the HTC included apps for all of these tasks.  I particularly like how the news app automatically pulled my feed list from google reader. 

Our small group had a meeting later in the morning, and I used the Flyer for note-taking and switched back and forth between that and the Bible app for reference.  After lunch, I read more of my book with the nook app before giving the Flyer a break while I took a nap (it is Saturday after all).  I’ve spent the rest of the time testing various apps (yes, Angry Birds works quite nicely) and seeing how notes on the Flyer sync with Evernote. 

This is the only piece that’s leaving me a bit disappointed.  Ink notes sync to Evernote as a screen shot.  You can add typing to the bottom, but that’s it, no editing the ink.  It’s still a step up from OneNote not even being able to display ink outside of the desktop application.

On the other hand, there is a third party program for the eDGe that will import the ink notes into OneNote as ink that can be edited and converted to text.  Hopefully, with the availability of the pen SDK for the Flyer, some developers can provide similar apps for syncing ink off this device.

The Flyer also paired with my Bluetooth keyboard easily, which works well with the notes app.  Notes typed in (either with external keyboard or the onscreen keyboard) are editable in Evernote in all the other places Evernote works. 

The battery life is incredible.  I’ve been using it all day (14 hours with only an hour nap), and the battery just went yellow in the last hour and is now around 29%. 

3 comments:

  1. Have you tried MobileNoter on the Flyer? It seems like a possible option for OneNote syncing.

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  2. I have looked into it and downloaded it several times on various devices. But right now, only the notes app works with the pen, which was one of my primary motivations for getting the flyer, so I've never felt like taking the plunge to pay for syncing. Additionally, the app doesn't support syncing through Skydrive, which is where I keep all my notebooks. I've been content to work more in evernote.

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  3. That's unfortunate that no one is supporting the pen yet. Hopefully, pen support will become more common as more manufacturers add active digitizers to their tablets.

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