Are you experienced? Have you ever been experienced?

[kinzel]

So gang, tell me --

1) anyone have experience with a Chromebook? Thumbs up, down, sidewways?

2) anyone have experience with wrist-carried heart rate monitors? Am particularly interested in those using a chest-strap.

3) anyone have experience with Android tablets?

TIA!

Comments

Android Tablet

[andyfunk.org (by livejournal.com)]

I have a Toshiba Thrive tablet running Android (Honeycomb), and I'm very happy with it. What do you want to know, Steve?

A few highlights:

full-size SD card
standard USB, mini-USB, and HDMI ports
removable battery
WiFi (no cellular data)
bluetooth (mouse, keyboard, etc.)
plastic, grip-surface back cover

While the app selection is smaller than that for the iPad, it is still extensive and continually growing.

Some posters to Thrive forums online have found they can leave their laptop behind, as they've found Android apps to do everything they need (email; MS Word, Excel & PowerPoint; browsers; ebooks; etc.),

Personally I use the Kindle app on my tablet when I'm out and about, and keep my Kindle itself by my bed for evening reading (I prefer reflected illumination at night). And I find a third-party keyboard app superior to the standard keyboard. That's one of the strengths of 'droid -- if you don't like something you can probably find a replacement you'll be happier with.

Drop me an email if I you have any questions for me.

/Andy
ARFunk@ARFunk.com

Google is our friend

[edgreenberg.livejournal.com]

2) anyone have experience with wrist-carried heart rate monitors? Am particularly interested in those using a chest-strap.

I had one of these. It was OK, but lost contact with the strap every so often. Usually when I had both hands on the treadmill's metal handles. I replaced it with a monitor that has a wired in ear clip. Works like a champ. Not wrist carried, but has a belt clip.

3) anyone have experience with Android tablets?

Been shopping for one. Most fail to get decent reviews. Battery life is usually poor. Inexpensive ones have slow processors and poor displays. A key question is whether it has the market app or not. Many of the 2.2 tablets do not. I'm waiting for an Android 3 tablet that has the market, has a decent processor and display, and has good battery life. Of course, I don't want to pay $600 for it either :)

No knowledge of Chromebook.

Best,

Ed G

[elektra.livejournal.com]

I've got a samsung galaxy and I'm pretty happy with it, for what it is--a giant phone. Wish I'd sprung for the 10" though, but I picked it up while Mike was out of work and I was feeling cheap. It can handle nook & kindle stuff (as well as other readers) and pdfs, which is a lot of what I wanted it for.
It does, however, charge abysmally slowly off a usb port--for speed you need to charge off the car an electrical plug.
It's great to do readings from, though . . . .
If you have specific questions, glad to answer.

[sraun]

azurelunatic got a sample Chromebook from Google and wrote about it. I'll see if she can come here and summarize.

[drammar.livejournal.com]

This (well, an older model, but this brand) is the one I use:
http://www.amazon.com/Omron-HR-100C-Heart-Rate-Monitor/dp/B000A5CEUO

It does a good job for me, is easy to program, and has adjusted to my "ectopic beats" part of my arrhythmia without having a meltdown. And it is a big help in avoiding rhythms and rates that might goose the pacemaker.

[dmellieon.livejournal.com]

1) - Nothing
2) - Nothing
3) - My husband and our 11 year old daughter are quite please with the ASUS Eee Pad Transfomer. It can be docked to a keyboard for serious typing. For more info about Android Tablets CNet might be a good starting place, http://reviews.cnet.com/best-tablets/best-5-android-tablets
Hope this helps.

[azurelunatic]

I do like my little Cr-48, which is the beta -- I understand that the hardware is somewhat different for the actual Chromebook, though the software continues to be updated.

They redid some of the keys, so there's a search key instead of a caps lock key. Since I actually use the caps lock key, I kept hitting it when I wanted caps and kept getting search tabs, so I eventually went in and changed it to caps lock.

They do allow a certain amount of window resizing now, which is important to some of my tasks.

The battery life is very nice; it was advertised to be 8 hours, and I got 8 hours out of her; I would hope that this would not change in the actual release model.

Some websites do not perform well with the limited hardware. My ~2008 desktop is more powerful than the Cr-48; in particular, all Gawker Media sites tend to make the page die, some other sites will whitescreen if the machine has too many tabs open, and videos will blackscreen while the audio carries on. I can't recommend it as one's only computer, but with the ability to send links to another machine, it's reasonably okay for most web-surfing.

It's not great for chat; I use IRC a lot and Freenode both blocks certain webchat applications from connecting, and has an execrable webchat interface of its own; the unofficial suggestion from one of the ChromeOS engineers in one of the above IRC channels involved connecting to a server with an IRC client installed on it, which is okay for people who have access to servers but not the best suggestion for the general public.

There's also no online equivalent of Scrivener that I have found. Google Docs is reasonably powerful but just doesn't compare.

I like it, and it's become my going-out-in-public machine, but it won't ever replace a desktop for me.

WearLink & Cr-48

[wjb3-reads.livejournal.com]

2) I like the Polar Heart Rate Monitors(proprietary radio), but it turns out they do not play with other monitor equipment(ANT+ radio).

If you decide on Polar, I love the WearLink since it has soft electrodes. The old hard electrodes kept losing my heart rate. The downside of any chest strap is getting it moist and properly positioned at the start of the exercise, and cleaning it after. I got the WearLink originally, because its coded signal lets my wife and me exercise together without scrambling the signal. If you wear it a lot, the user replaceable battery is nice. Chest straps definitely work better than the hand grip Heart Rate Monitors built into most exercise equipment. I have owned a Polar WearLink Transmitter(M32 receiver) and a Polar T31 Transmitter (115? receiver).

I am looking at the $180 iPod Nano 6th Gen (adding a $30 Nike + iPod Sport Kit and $70 Polar Wearlink+ Heart Rate Transmitter for Nike+) so I can track my data on the computer. A new Nano may be out next month and drop the price of the 6th Gen.


1) From a professional author with a CR-48:

“Which of course may be perfectly suitable for many if not most people — if your computer use is primarily wrapped up in e-mail, Facebook and finding things online, then a cloud-based OS might be awesome for you, not to mention the “instant on” joy that the Chrome experience provides. But I do actually use my computer for things besides being online. So for me, the Cr-48 and the Chrome OS aren’t there yet. I still need dedicated programs on my computer, accessible whether I have an online connection or not. Which is why I strongly suspect my next laptop computer will still have an “old fashioned” OS, and enough storage for the programs I need (and the files those programs create) resident on the machine.”

He later bought a Macbook Air because the hardware was thrifty

“I bought it because I needed a fully-functional laptop, and the two that I have aren’t cutting it for me anymore. The netbook, while really handy, is ultimately just too small to do anything other than answer e-mail on; the CR-48, with the Chrome OS, is underpowered (video of any sort is choppy) and doesn’t work when there’s no Internet connection.
. . .
I’ll presently be putting Windows 7 on this baby in a dual boot sort of situation. I didn’t buy this because I want to wallow in the Apple ecosystem; I bought it because it gives me the hardware specs I want at a price I can live with. Call it the practical side of me.”


URLs
ANT+ Receiver
( http://new.digifit.com/what-is-digifit/ )
Only works with Apple iPod Nano 5th and 6th Gen
( http://store.apple.com/us/product/H1922ZM/A )
Changing a WearLink Battery
( http://www.livestrong.com/article/278168-how-to-change-the-battery-in-a-polar-m32-monitor/ )
Cr-48
( http://whatever.scalzi.com/2011/03/01/what-ive-learned-with-the-cr-48/ )
Upside of MacBook Air
( http://whatever.scalzi.com/2011/07/29/what-i-was-waiting-for-all-day-long/ )

-=FIN

Heart Rate Monitors

[julian satchell (by livejournal.com)]

I used to use a wrist mounted Heart Rate Monitor, about 15 years ago when I did triathlons. It worked fairly well; the only problems that I can remember were that the chest band would not give sane readings for a few minutes, until there was a trace of sweat to make a better electrical contact, and that electrical interference would send it crazy. For example, if I ran underneath a big power line, or past a substation, the readings were nonsense.

The chest band could get vaguely annoying if worn for a very long time, but was OK up to say a few hours.