Why Tablet PCs Are Preferable To Laptops

Thanks mainly to their extreme portability, easy to use interfaces and varied ways they can be used, tablet computers have become incredibly popular over the last couple of years. Indeed, increasing numbers of people are now selling their laptops and netbooks via laptop trade in services so that they can generate some cash to put toward the purchase of an all-singing all-dancing tablet.

But is this the right way to go? Should laptops trade in providers be so busy?

Well, while laptops do still have the edge over tablets in a number of ways, it cannot be denied there are a number of areas where tablets enjoy pretty comprehensive bragging rights over laptops.

These areas are:

Size

Most people who trade in laptop devices for cash to put toward a new tablet cite size as being the chief reason for doing so. The smallest tablet currently available is about the same size as a small pad of paper and weighs less than two pounds. Needless to say, the need to have an integrated keyboard and trackpad ensures most laptops are a lot larger and heavier than this. Moreover, most laptops also have more powerful components than tablets, most of which require more comprehensive – and cumbersome – cooling and power elements to operate. Without doubt, tablets definitely have the edge when it comes to portability and compactness.

Battery Life

The relatively low power demands made on their hardware components means tablets are designed with efficiency very much in mind. In fact, the design of a tablet is such that most of a device’s insides are taken up by the battery. In stark contrast, laptops utilise more powerful hardware and are designed to accommodate a battery which takes up a much smaller percentage of a device’s internal space. This means that, even though laptop batteries have higher capacities, they do not run as long as those powering tablets. In general, users can expect the battery within a run-of-the-mill laptop to last for roughly three to four hours, while superior devices may stretch that out to around eight hours. Tablet batteries can power devices for up to ten hours at a time; this means that tablets can provide users with the holy grail of portable computing – all day usage.

Input Method

The lack of a keyboard is of course the most obvious difference between a tablet and a laptop – tablets are operated solely by a touch interface on the screen. Whilst inputting data in this way presents no problems when users need only to point, drag or click their way around a program, it can be less than convenient when text needs to be entered. Tablets use virtual keyboards of varying layouts and designs to make this possible; however, some people find them to less intuitive to use than regular keyboards. Fortunately, external Bluetooth keyboards can be used with tables nowadays so even users who have a strong aversion to touchscreen typing can get along nicely.

About the author – Bo Heamyan blogs regularly about personal computing and has written extensively about laptop trade in services for various websites, including Laptop Trade-In.co.uk.