so youre saying writing on an ipad with a stylus is better for you than writing on a piece of paper with a pen??
If so, good for you. But as someone who writes and takes notes a lot - I can tell you from experience its not even close.
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iPad mini iPad Mini for college note taking?
- Thread starter firemonk09
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so youre saying writing on an ipad with a stylus is better for you than writing on a piece of paper with a pen??
If so, good for you. But as someone who writes and takes notes a lot - I can tell you from experience its not even close.
It's been a few years since I was in college and tablets weren't available at the time, but it probably does depend on which subject(s) you'll be taking. Equations can't be typed very easily but everything else is way easier to type than write if you are a decent typist (and way more searchable later). Writing with pend/pencil and scanning in the notes after class every day is not a bad option either.
I would just note that the more classes I took, the more I realized that I got more out of the class if I took minimal or no notes at all and just tried to actually absorb what the professor was saying. It depends on the format of the class, but I found that in general my notes were not as useful as the relevant reading material in the textbooks and that if I focused on notes I didn't engage with the flow of the lectures as much. Just a thought since I know how easy it is to get wrapped up in the technology of it all and forget to think about the real world practicality of my gadgets vs the lust-factor and just wanting to buy the new shiny.
I would just note that the more classes I took, the more I realized that I got more out of the class if I took minimal or no notes at all and just tried to actually absorb what the professor was saying. It depends on the format of the class, but I found that in general my notes were not as useful as the relevant reading material in the textbooks and that if I focused on notes I didn't engage with the flow of the lectures as much. Just a thought since I know how easy it is to get wrapped up in the technology of it all and forget to think about the real world practicality of my gadgets vs the lust-factor and just wanting to buy the new shiny.
A lot of people will knock Windows but in my experience, nothing comes close to using onenote on a tablet with an active digitizer. If you get one that is wacom or ntrig based, you can write normally just as you would on a sheet of paper. There is no need to change your handwriting style or wear a glove in class. This isn't my video but this guy goes over a lot of features of onenote.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7OROShRVzQ
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7OROShRVzQ
I use my iPad mini as a complete paperless solution. It works well for me because it is a nice large screen that still fits in to my pocket.
My main apps are:
Notability
Good Reader
Quick Office
Aviation Apps (cuz I'm done with skewl and fly airplanes now)
Secondary apps include the typical apps one has (email, cloud storage, etc)
I'm currently playing with Notes Plus as a potential replacement for Notability as I really like the better additional tools it has (better screen capture from web pages, handwriting recognition, and portability of viewing the notes outside of the app). However, they need to fix the Bluetooth bug before I make the leap.
My main apps are:
Notability
Good Reader
Quick Office
Aviation Apps (cuz I'm done with skewl and fly airplanes now)
Secondary apps include the typical apps one has (email, cloud storage, etc)
I'm currently playing with Notes Plus as a potential replacement for Notability as I really like the better additional tools it has (better screen capture from web pages, handwriting recognition, and portability of viewing the notes outside of the app). However, they need to fix the Bluetooth bug before I make the leap.
But you don't need to keep up with a professor's lecture when you write your notes...you get all the time you need. Even up in the air, you probably don't have paragraphs worth of things to write on the mini, correct?
I have to keep up with a lecture and everybody in the class is surprised that I can follow the class perfectly. You just need to get use to writing on the iPad. Once you are ready, it is a great tool.
In college now, I've tried taking notes with MBP, ipad, ipad mini, surface pro, and pen & paper. While I'd love to find a good note-taking solution that's digital and autosyncs over the cloud and all that, I still can't find anything that competes with pen and paper for me. A good leuchtturm notebook and mechanical pencil or pen has done much better for notes than others. Laptops are great until you need to draw a diagram. Tablets are great until you need to draw anything detailed, or try to read your crappy handwriting later...
maybe we'll see a decent e-ink note taker in the near future, but right now it's pen & paper all the way
maybe we'll see a decent e-ink note taker in the near future, but right now it's pen & paper all the way
I do agree. A thousand years working with pen and paper (or equivalent) and 20 years of digital replacements...
However, if one feels one MUST go digital - and this is going to sound like a sacrilege here at MacRumors.com - the Samsung Note products (I have a Note 8.0) are actually quite nice. They do pretty good handwriting recognition, the S-Pen plus digitizer doesn't pick up any wrist input so it's much better than an iPad with rubber stylus, and the writing point is much finer. The converted text can then be send to Evernote or another app of your choosing. Drawings/sketches will remain as-is.
I used to use a stylus with my iPad all the time plus Penultimate (an Evernote product). The Note 8 is a better combination for that purpose.
So if you don't mind using Android, the Note 8.0 (and the just-announced Note 10.1 2014 edition) are definitely worth considering.
On an equally sacrilegious note, the surface pro with OneNote is great for digital handwriting recognition, and will let you choose whether you convert it to text or store it as handwriting/pen strokes. It also does this well for equations that can often get messy. It also uses a wacom digitizer and pen, so it's a decent tool for drawing, etc too.
It's mostly the feel of pen and paper, and the resolution (I write small and neat, on grid paper) that are holding me back from moving to a digital note taking setup.
I tried and tried the Note 8 -- used the built-in app and LectureNotes (which is pretty good). It's nowhere as easy to use (for me) as the iPad Mini with an Adonit stylus and Notes Plus. On the iPad, you can very easily write a page that looks exactly like the page of a real notebook, with small lines and a lot of handwriting. This looks very nice -- people are really pleased when I send them letters this way, as they're much more personal than one typed on a computer or other device. On the Note 8, while the stylus works well, it's not possible to make the writing look as nice as on the Mini -- and I also found it was harder to use. For me, writing on the Mini is no harder than on a piece of paper. For some reason, my handwriting looks a lot nicer on the Mini.
I'm an engineering student at UMass Dartmouth. I find Notability on my mini is great for taking notes. I use it exclusively over pen and paper in my CIS class and my math class. I can draw charts and graphs easily, then zoom in and out for fine printed labels/text, then I back them up to google drive. It's perfect for the size.
I don't really see it happening. Especially with the speed of certain lecturers I feel the interface of zooming and scrolling around will end up causing issues.
Now you may want to consider the Jot Script pen - I have no idea if it works well, but if it does it could be exactly what you are looking for. It is a bit pricey at $75, but it is bluetooth 4.0 and has an accelerometer used to improve accuracy.
Might want to wait for reviews though.
Now you may want to consider the Jot Script pen - I have no idea if it works well, but if it does it could be exactly what you are looking for. It is a bit pricey at $75, but it is bluetooth 4.0 and has an accelerometer used to improve accuracy.
Might want to wait for reviews though.
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My iPad mini actually replaced my Moleskine for most notetaking tasks.
Especially with a (adonit) pen it's really easy.
Hey, were these notes taken in landscape or portrait mode? Just curious haha, they look real neat!
I never use my iPad Mini or my iPad with Retina in any other orientation than landscape. Even for reading, I prefer to have the iPad in landscape. It may just be me, but it seems more comfortable that way.
