Up next in 10
After reviewing a competitor's tablet, Penstar wanted me to check out their new offering! This eNote N10 electronic e-ink notebook. After quite a while of using it daily, here are my thoughts: Exactly what I liked about it, didn't like about it, and who it is for!
You can buy your own eNote N10 here (Paid Link): https://amzn.to/4ibyrjI
Rather read the article version? You can read that here: https://gear43.com/penstar-enote-10-review
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0:00
all right everyone let's talk about the
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pentar penar eote in 10 I think that's
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how you say it now a while back as you
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guys know I reviewed the supernote Nomad
0:12
and I was pretty impressed with it now
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it didn't start off all amazing however
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however I grew to really really enjoy
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that tablet and well Penstar saw that
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video and they reached out to me as they
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were coming out with a 10in version of
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their tablet and they wanted to give it
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to me to see if I liked it and so I did
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that I wanted to try it out and I wanted
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to continue learning more about
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minimalist notebook taking electronic
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devices and that kind of stuff and so in
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this video after using I think about a
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month month and a half I'm going to let
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you guys know what I like about it what
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I don't like about it and exactly who
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this Writing Tablet is for and so stay
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tuned for that but before we do if you
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guys do want to purchase this tablet I
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do have a link down in the description
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and the top comment it is a paid link
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and I appreciate if you guys do use it
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as I do get a commission if you use that
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link but let's go ahead and move right
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into it before we get into things that I
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do like about the tablet I want to talk
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first about what it is it is a 10.3 in e
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in display notet taking tablet now it's
1:12
based I think on Android 11 however it
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has its complete own overlay over top of
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it meaning basically it has all of its
1:18
own software you can technically Sid
1:20
load applications onto it like the Play
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Store however I tend to review and use
1:25
products as they come box so I didn't do
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any of that and I used basically only
1:29
the appc apption built into the device
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now unlike a lot of other devices that
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it's competing with it does not have
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multi-touch and it only works with the
1:36
stylus that's included with it and the
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stylus does have a button which is
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basically an undo button and then you
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can flip the stylus around to basically
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work as an eraser and then it does also
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come with the folio already installed
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now at the time of making this video
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it's around
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$369 meaning its base price is more
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expensive than the Nomad that I also
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reviewed but when you look at getting
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the accessories that you should have
2:00
with the Nomad this is actually a
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considerably cheaper alternative because
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everything comes with it in the box now
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outside of using the stylus there are a
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bunch of buttons on the left hand side
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of the screen that basically work as the
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multi-touch instead of being multi-touch
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and they are mostly all mappable except
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for the top one which is basically a
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button you use to basically set the
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mappable buttons now it may not come
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with a Kindle application but if you
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have PDFs you can read books on it it
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has a built-in application for writing
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things you can technically access your
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email on however the experience is it's
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not amazing and then you can even browse
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the internet using a built-in browser
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you can listen to music and there are
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some cloud services associated with it
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as well and that's the basic gist of it
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and for those people that really care
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let's get into some of the detailed
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specs it comes with 32 GB of onboard
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storage has a 1.8 GHz 4 core processor 2
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GB of RAM and has a 227 PPI screen
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resolution and of course thankfully it
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has been updated and does us USBC
3:00
charging which charges up a 6,000
3:02
milliamp battery and just in case you're
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wondering it weighs in at 86 lb is 198
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mm wide and 226 mm high and for those
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that have glazed over because they don't
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care about specifications let's move on
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to my opinion on the things that I do
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like about the tablet all right so
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number one thing that I like it comes
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down to the writing experience and I
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don't know what they did but this thing
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feels just like writing on paper like
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it's no joke it's just as slick it's not
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gummy it really really does feel like
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paper it feels like you're drawing on a
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normal piece of paper I'm sure it has to
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do with the coating that they have on
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the screen matched with the stylist that
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it comes with it genuinely does feel
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like it's writing on the screen and that
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also kind of comes down to the stylus
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the stylus itself is actually pretty
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light now I'm used to heavier styluses
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to go along with these tablets in this
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lighter plasticky stylus actually feels
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a lot like a pencil it's the right
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diameter it's light weight and it feels
3:57
really nice in the hands now I think the
3:59
button placement on it is a little bit
4:01
off because when I write like it's a
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normal pencil I do accidentally hit that
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back button every once in a while but
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overall I have to say the writing
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experience like the physical writing
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experience of this tablet is the best
4:12
I've used so far the number two thing I
4:14
like is its price point now its base
4:15
price point like I mentioned earlier is
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$369 and The Nomad that it's competing
4:21
with is
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$299 however when you go with a nomad
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and when you get things like the pen and
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the folio it gets almost to around $500
4:29
and those are accessories that you have
4:30
to have really for that Nomad otherwise
4:32
it doesn't really make sense and wi $369
4:35
gets you basically all of that and makes
4:37
it a fully usable drawing tablet that's
4:39
actually a pretty compelling price point
4:41
the number three thing is the home
4:43
screen I really like the home screen
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I've not been a big fan of a lot of
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these drawing tablets home screens they
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feel more like file systems rather than
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a home screen like you're used to on a
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smartphone and I have to say they did a
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very very good job on their home screen
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it's extremely usable it's all laid out
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really well it's not exactly like what
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you would expect from a standard Android
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phone or anything like that but it is
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all easy to use you know how to get into
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things and you don't have to go hunting
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into different menus that are placed in
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different places you have to swipe
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different places to get to it it just it
5:12
works really really well and then the
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last thing that I really like about the
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tablet comes down to its 10.3 in screen
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diagonal I like the bigger screen it is
5:21
really nice now it isn't quite as
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portable not something that's quite as
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easy to throw into your backpack as a
5:26
smaller screen version however having
5:28
that larger screen real state is really
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nice when you're drawing uh and writing
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things you can fit more on a single
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piece of paper instead of having swap
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between Windows to make it work and so I
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really did like the screen real estate
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that this thing gave you but that leads
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me into the things that I don't like
5:45
about the tablet and that number one
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thing is while I enjoy the physical
5:50
writing experience of the tablet I
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actually wasn't a huge fan of the
5:54
software behind it it always felt like
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there was a little bit of a lag when
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you're drawing so basically you kind of
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move the pencil along the screen and
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then you know the line kind of is like a
6:03
millimeter behind it while it's trying
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to catch up I think that actually comes
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down to the refresh rate I think it's
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actually a lower screen refresh rate
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than the competitors meaning it takes a
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little bit more time for that you know
6:14
the drawing to basically show up on the
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screen and I was a bit bummed out by
6:18
that I also have to say I didn't super
6:20
like the software behind switching out
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you know kind of styles of pens and how
6:25
the actual like writing Works uh I
6:27
wasn't a huge fan of the software it
6:28
wasn't as easy to get to and be able to
6:31
change your pen preferences and stuff uh
6:34
than what I'm used to with some other
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products and then number two thing that
6:37
I didn't like is the lack of multi-touch
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so so while it comes with everything you
6:43
need like the folio and the pen and
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stuff it's really difficult to use when
6:48
you don't use those things now again
6:50
going back to the Nomad that I had used
6:51
before it does have multi-touch on it so
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you can use it on its own you can take
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the folio off you can leave the pen
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behind and you can still easily read
6:58
books using multi touch you can swipe
7:01
all of those things and the pen star
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just kind of was a bit disappointing you
7:04
never felt like you could fully use the
7:06
tablet without using the pen and the
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folio which means you have to carry
7:10
those things around with you you have
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that added bulk and I wish it had that
7:13
now I'm sure they did that to keep it at
7:15
a price point and a little bit more
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budget price point but I just never felt
7:19
like I could move away from using the
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folio or that stylus and using the
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tablet on its own now you technically
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can by using the side buttons uh but I I
7:29
think the normal person never will map
7:31
those out to make it so that's it's
7:32
anywhere as easy as using multi-touch
7:34
hey guys so I actually got an email from
7:36
penar specifically about this part and
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they said that it was actually
7:40
deliberate it sounds like a lot of their
7:43
customers uh would prefer to have a
7:45
really goodlooking screen and it sounds
7:47
like multi-touch in some of the
7:49
additional layers on the tablet uh made
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it so it didn't feel as paper like to
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read on so they decided to do away with
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multi-touch I'm sure it helped out with
7:58
budget but but I wanted to say that as
8:00
maybe there are people out there that
8:02
are more concerned with having it feel
8:04
more like paper rather than necessarily
8:07
needing multi touch so that's pretty
8:08
interesting and then number three thing
8:10
that I didn't like about it is it didn't
8:12
include a ton of good applications now
8:15
it had the basics it has a drawing app
8:17
which is also paired with a note taking
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app which was a bit of a bummer because
8:21
you don't have a lot of the flexibility
8:23
would expect from like a dedicated
8:25
artwork application and so I was a bit
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bummed by that and then the other that
8:29
kind of bothered me is it didn't come
8:30
with Kindle it didn't come with a Kindle
8:32
application which is a big boner because
8:34
that's where all of my books are and
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it's probably where a lot of your books
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are and these e notebooks work really
8:39
really well for reading and that's just
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not something you'd want to do all that
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much on this tablet unless you start
8:45
side loading applications onto it which
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takes a skill set on its own now of
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course it did come with some
8:50
applications that like The Nomad didn't
8:52
such as a web browser you can't even get
8:54
on the web on The Nomad but you can on
8:55
the pen star so like I was just you know
8:58
kind of surfing around on gear 43.com
9:01
and on just an eink tablet which was you
9:03
know kind of cool and that wraps up the
9:05
things that I don't like about the
9:06
tablet so who is this for if this is
9:09
somebody that needs a bigger screen and
9:12
they really are exclusively using it for
9:14
note taking this actually is a pretty
9:16
good tablet because it comes with
9:18
everything you need you don't have to
9:19
make any choices you just order it shows
9:20
up it works and that is about it however
9:23
if you're looking for a more flexible
9:25
tablet it allows for easier reading this
9:28
may not be that tablet for you unless
9:30
you really really want to get into side
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loading applications which at that point
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a lot of apps are built around
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multitouch and it may not work quite as
9:36
well on this tablet so I don't know if
9:38
you are somebody that takes notes and
9:40
that's all you need you just need to
9:41
digitize your notes this is a fantastic
9:44
option it's probably one of the best
9:45
price it has the best screen it has
9:47
really really nice writing capabilities
9:50
but if you're running anything more than
9:52
that I probably would recommend going a
9:54
different direction now if you are
9:56
somebody that that does sound like again
9:58
I do have a paid link down in the
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description and the top comment and but
10:02
if you're somebody that that is not
10:03
great for make sure to watch this video
10:05
right here as that might be a better
10:07
option for you
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