I have my first Windows 8 tablet from work. It is an HP EliteBook Revolve 810 that replaces my old EliteBook 2740p. The old 2740p was starting to show its age – the battery only had two of three cells remaining and it had some sort of issue going on whereby at time I started to believe that:
- It as 1984 again with multitasking – yes that is how slow the old girl was becoming;
- Speaking of 1984, at times it was like I was back on a 300 baud modem – I _ _w_o_u_l_d_ _t_y_p_e_ _a_n_d_ _s_l_o_w_l_y_ _t_h_e_ _w_o_r_d_s_ _a_p_p_e_a_r_.
The Revolve 810 is, well fffaaasssttt!!! I should not be surprised, it is an Intel® Core™ i7-3687U (2.1 GHz, 4 MB cache, 2 cores) with 8 GB RAM and a 256 GB mSATA SSD. The 11.6″ diagonal LED-backlit HD UWVA (1366 x 768) is beautiful. It is not an Apple Retina display but then again, I don’t like OSX, so…
It is not all sweetness and light: The 2740p had a built in stylus. I got the HP Executive Tablet Pen with the tablet. It does not have a nice little slot for the pen (grrrr…). Plus, it is – with the current drivers and other support software a piece of 5h1t. Really. The stylus with 2740p was really, really good for taking notes in OneNote. The Executive Tablet Pen looks like something from an, well, 1984 digitizer… a bad one at that. Hopefully this will improve because for me this is a big downer. I will put one qualifier on this: It could be Windows 8 – but likely not. I will be playing with the Revolve 810 for the next few days when I get a chance – I still have work to do! 🙂
PS – I booted Linux Mint 15 off a USB3 memory stick – the tablet has two USB3 ports; the dock four more USB4 ports – and it worked quite nice. I didn’t get around to seeing about getting the touch screen to work, but I’ll like find time to!
About Mike Pelley
Let’s see… A little about me…
I’ve been around information technology since 1983 with computers such as DEC Rainbows (weird machine – the standard DOS couldn’t format its own floppy disks – remember them? – and I had to format them on a friend’s IBM PC) to Radio Shack TRS-80 to Apple ][e and Apple //c in the beginning.
I have programmed in 8-bit assembly language on 6502, FORTRAN and COBOL on IBM System/370 (and I still hate JCL), VAX BASIC and COBOL (and a weird and massive WordPerfect 4.0 macro) on DEC VMS (Alpha), C/C++ on Digital Unix (ALPHA), and C/C++, Perl (it may be powerful but I still hate it), PHP on Linux (Red Hat, Centos, Ubuntu, etc.).
I have work with databases such as Digital RDB (later to become Oracle RDB), Oracle DBMS, Microsoft SQL Server, MySQL and PostgreSQL on VAX, Alpha, Sun and Intel.
Check out my professional profile and connect with me on LinkedIn. See http://lnkd.in/nhTRZe
I still think that Digital created some of the best ideas in the world: VAX clustering, DSSI disks (forerunner to SCSI) and the Alpha processor (first commercial 64-bit processor – Red Hat screamed on an Alpha!). DEC just could not seem to be able to give air conditioners away to someone lost in the Sahara Desert!
VMware is one of the best ways to get the most out of an x64 server. And I have tried Oracle VM, Virtual Box and Microsoft Virtual Server.
Outside of that I am a huge military history buff starting in the early 20th century. I love Ford Mustangs (my ’87 Mustang GT was awesome) and if I had the money I would have a Porsche 928S4. If I had a lot of money I would have a Porsche 911 Turbo.
I also play too much AmrA 3 Exile mod. Over 5,000+ hours...
I have a wonderful son, Cameron. I have a long suffering (Do you really need all that computer junk?) wife, Paula. I live in Paradise, Newfoundland and Labrador.
