Best Tablet for Reading Academic Papers Text

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Update: zotero reader web allows you to read papers on your android tablet via your zotero library. I figured i would evaluate it, try and use it for reading papers, and keep it if i was satisfied. Now im no apple fanboy so theres no way i was going to buy an ipad instead, but for the sake of argument the equivalent ipad, with similar specs 16gb, almost identical size is 500$, so almost 50% more pricey. Furthermore, the ipad doesnt come with an expansion slot for additional storage, while the android tablet has a microsd slot.

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Android is more flexible and less annoying than ios it gives you access to a real filesystem, for instance. So how is the tablet? its pretty swell! its bright enough that you can read in the sunshine. The kindle app works like a charm in fact i think i prefer the feeling on a tablet than on an actual kindle because highlighting and flipping pages is faster and more natural.

Annoyances: resets zoom when you change pages only shows page previews when you push down on the scrollbar. Rendering is way slower than all the other pdf readers, which makes navigation painful. Fast rendering and good note taking, but forces you to use its own shitty cloud mechanism to save annotations.

That messes up any app that tries to read the annotations in your pdf and make plain text versions of it. It used to be the case that it wouldnt autosave the highlights so that if android wanted to free up memory and auto close the app you would lose your highlights, which was unbelievably annoying. When you touch the tablet, a menu bar appears with a preview of other pages and all the annotation tools see below. Given the size of the tablet, you can comfortably read half a page divided horizontally in horizontal mode or a full column in vertical mode. Changing pages to see different figures is painless since you see all the pages in thumbnail view. Its not quite as natural as when printed on dead trees but i feel i definitely get a more tactile feeling than reading on a standard computer screen.

If you havent heard of dropbox, its a cloud storage service that works across pretty much every platform known to man windows, mac, linux, ios and android it syncs a folder across multiple computers by keeping a copy in the cloud the internets, so to speak. Then its just a matter of navigating to the correct folder through the dropbox app above. Theres an app called zandy that supposedly shows your zotero library on your tablet.

That works, but its annoying it feels like working with a shittier version of your home computer. For every attachment in your library say, a pdf , it adds menu elements, including one which states send to tablet. After reading and exiting repligo, the saved file will be synced by dropbox automatically. Then on your pc, you choose get from tablet and zotfile will fetch the commented, highlighted pdf from dropbox. It will even extract the comments and highlights from the pdf and include them as a separate comment below. Its not as streamlined as i would like it to be a real zotero app for android would be best.

Nevertheless, its less trouble than printing on paper and rewriting your comments on the computer. If youre about working with other citation managers mendeley, citeulike, endnote, etc. My husband travels often for work and lugs around a 5 inch stack of print offs of scientific papers. I would like to give his spine a break and provide him with a tablet or something similar where he could store and access the pdfs on a whim. The kindle dx seems like the right size, but no color really makes it less than ideal.

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He has a windows laptop, but also has access to macs, if that makes a difference. the kindle dx seems like the right size, but no color really makes it less than ideal. can you explain why? the e ink of the kindle really, really provides an optimal, comfortable reading experience. If he decides to go with an ipad for this i love it for pdfs, but the ones i read tend to be more technical than scientific , he might like pdf pen for making annotations and other stuff. I've also never used a kindle dx, but i have always heard that it, too, was disappointing in this regard no notes, no highlighting, no zooming or panning. I read pdf ebooks on a smaller screened tablet and it leaves a bit to be desired. Posted by zjacreman at pm on september 16, 2012 e ink as found on the b amp w kindle and nook has a lot of things going for it: it's very readable high contrast, high resolution, good in brighter ambient light , lightweight, and low power so your battery lasts longer. Its disadvantages are that it's monochrome and that updating the screen is a flickery process that takes a good fraction of a second no big deal for reading documents it's as fast as a physical page flip but not very good for more interactive things.

If you go with an ipad, get an ipad 3 the first ipad display's graininess is kind of eyestrainy after a while. The 3's higher resolution display apple markets it as retina display is worth it if you're going to be reading large amounts of text or figures. I recently tried to find a system for managing e pubs/journal articles on mobile devices.

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Here are a few things to think about based on my very limited knowledge and budget more knowledgeable mefites: i bow to your expertise!: if your husband doesn't mind reading on an electronic screen, it's possible that using a program like goodreader will suit his needs just fine and then he'll get all the color he wants or needs. If he finds illuminated screen reading tiresome like i do then you'll want to look at e ink devices, but that means he'll have to give up color. If he needs to read academic journal articles, you'll want to be sure that whatever device you get will support open file formats. You'll want to be sure it supports at least the epub format, because then there is greater assurance the format and layout will be at least somewhat readable on an electronic device.