Tablet?

[LLaurence 12]

Has anyone found a tablet that works with their vinyl cutter and software?... My laptop bit the dust and I'd rather just buy a tablet but I can't find one that will work with the software and has a USB port

[sleeveofwizzard 104]

I would be pretty surprised if there is such a thing. You can get an adapter to plug the micro usb port into the USB on the cutter but there is not any software available for tablets or phones that I am aware of. If you are using an economy cutter then I recommend a desktop computer with windows XP or 7 and a serial cable. Lots of software available and very stable. A laptop will work but again for economy cutters you don't want to run it with USB. Buy a Keyspan adapter to use the serial connection. 

[OWJones 1,981]

There are Windows based tablets available and almost all of them have USB ports that should work.  I have an HP Elitebook 2730p - it has a dual core processor, 2GB of RAM, a 128GB SSD hard drive and runs Windows 7 with no issues.  I have CorelDraw X5 installed on it and use it for working on designs when I'm away from my design or cutting computers.  With an extra, external battery and docking station it cost me $288 through the big auction site.

 

I have not hooked it to my cutter, but I have had no issues with any of the other USB devices I've used, so I don't foresee any problems with doing so.

 

I will point out that tablets tend to have very small screens when compared to a laptop or desktop (my laptop cutting PC has a 15.6" screen and my desktop design PC has a 27 inch screen), I think my EliteBook is something like a 12.1" screen and it seems positively tiny and can make certain operations very difficult when using the tablet interface.  I have to plug in a mouse in order to be able to use all of the features in CorelDraw, for example.

 

Tablet UI may seem intuitive for drawing, and for finger painting it is fine, but for doing anything detail oriented, where precision is key, it really doesn't work that great.  It's nearly impossible to drag a shape to exactly 3" in size using a stylus or your fingertip, for example.

[slice&dice 2,450]

I've heard of cutters that use Bluetooth connectivity (none being offered by USCutter presently).

 

However, that still leaves you with the issue of software which will communicate properly and drive the cutters.

 

Our machines utilize HPGL code, and until someone writes an Android or Symbian or iOS mobile application which incorporates HPGL along with all the various drivers for the myriad manufacturers, then tablets will not function with cutters.

And it's highly unlikely anyone is going to do that, because of the insignificant installed base of tablet users who own and operate cutters.

 

By the way, an older laptop (with a built-in serial port) would cost you under $90.

[hockeygirl 30]

Depends on what cutter you have. If you have a cutter that's accessible over the network, then you can theoretically use a tablet to send jobs to the cutter as long as the driver/sw is available for that. I think Adobe has design software for Android/iOS.

 

Although if it were me, I'd probably get an Ultrabook instead of a tablet. You can virtually do everything a tablet and a PC can do.

[signyouup 178]

There are Windows tablets that are running a full desk top version instead of "RT". They will run any software you can run on your laptop. Dell makes an 18 inch one.

 

http://www.dell.com/us/p/xps-18-1810/pd

[sleeveofwizzard 104]

Yeah as long as you are running a full windows OS on the tablet you will have access to most any software already available. I believed that the Windows tablets were a mobile based OS and not a full Windows. The mobile version has apps but can't run windows programs. 

[OWJones 1,981]

Yeah as long as you are running a full windows OS on the tablet you will have access to most any software already available. I believed that the Windows tablets were a mobile based OS and not a full Windows. The mobile version has apps but can't run windows programs. 

 

There are two versions of Microsoft's Surface tablet - the basic (RT?) model is NOT Windows and does not run Windows apps, other than the Microsoft Office that comes with it.  The fancier version (Surface Pro?) is a full version of Windows 8 and should run any Windows apps that any Windows machine can run.

 

I like my tablet, but it's really not well suited to vector design work.

[headgreen 0]

 

I've heard of cutters that use Bluetooth connectivity (none being offered by USCutter presently).

 

However, that still leaves you with the issue of software which will communicate properly and drive the cutters.

 

Our machines utilize HPGL code, and until someone writes an Android or Symbian or iOS mobile application which incorporates HPGL along with all the various drivers for the myriad manufacturers, then tablets will not function with cutters.

And it's highly unlikely anyone is going to do that, because of the insignificant installed base of tablet users who own and operate cutters.

 

By the way, an older laptop (with a built-in serial port) would cost you under $90.

Hello, I'm currently running SD in the cockpit on a Nexus 7 tablet which has served me well for a number of years. I recently upgraded the OS to Android 5.1 to enable the speech alert outputs to work. This works but the tablet now is very slow and a bit flaky and I think the CPU is not really up to it any more. Hence I'm thinking of buying some thing to replace it. I don't use the tablet for anything else other than SD so don't need the latest whizzbang spec but it needs to be a solid and reliable platform for SD in the cockpit which can do the speech synthesis and  has a good bright screen. I'm thinking of going down the iPad route this time, Looking around I can get a refurbed iPad air or air 2 for around £100-£150  which seems reasonable. Would that be a good  choice or do folks have any recommendations? Thanks. rugged tablet