Like Apple posted it in serveral Videos, that your next computer might not be a computer at all, but an iPad. Since I support out demand management in exlporing new technical solutions, I testetd four tablets this year to find out if our next computer is an iPad or something else.

The four competitors were:

• Microsoft Surface Pro 7
• Apple iPad Pro 2018 12,9”
• Lenovo X1 Tablet Gen 3
• Samsung Tab S7

I work as an IT Architect and when I develop code or try out a new technical solution (container, faas, etc.), I do that remotly anyway, because my Sina Workstation S is not suited for intensive work, it struggles with daily tasks as video conferences or softphone functionality and can not even cope my office tasks. So I try to do as much work as possible in the browser using jira, confluence etc.

Since I do not require many local apps, I should easy make the switch to a tablet. This Surface Pro and the X1 Tablet are Windows 10 Machines like my Windows 10 VM on my Sina Workstation. It did not take long to adapt to this machines, but the tablet mode in Windows is not realy good, many apps are not optimizied for touch input and the pen support in onenote is not what I have expected. On the plus side the Sureface Pro ist an elegant machnine, the Core i5 I tested has no fan at all any works perfectly silent. The X1 Tablet fells more robust, but the keyboard is defenetliy not on par with a thinkpad. I found no reason to prefer it over the surface pro and we had trouble with the ethernet driver.

The iPad is defenetly the device with the most app optimisation for tabelt use. If I would be in the market for a device, that I use only for office and pim and browsing the web, that would be my choice. But lag of suppoert for external displays with an other resolution than 2:3 and missing multitaskting possibilities (when I wnated to look at my mails while attending a video meeting, the camera was disabled) and the mediocre pen support (no text recognistion in german) did not make it the goto device for me.

The Samsung Tab has the best pen support, the best nodes app and a killer feature, that made it easy for me to use it as a replacement devices: Samsung DeX. Whith dex I could join a videoconference from the device and use mail and browser on the external monitor at the same time. I also can multitask during a call, when all apps are on the DeX Screen. The android apps are not optimized for tablet use, so I can not recommend this device to everyone, but for me this would be a good replacement for a notebook. Also I could use it as a telephone, when I added my sim card, so I do not need an other work device. I would only use the phone with bluetooth headset, because holding it to your head might look akward.