grahamfitter
Expedition Leader
Here's the background to the question...
I'm looking for a netbook or tablet for a trip this summer. Small and light is important because everything I take will fit comfortably in a ~30L daypack that I'm going to be carrying pretty much everywhere I go. Cheap is important, too: as close to $200 as possible and certainly less than $300.
Other than basic and occasional webby stuff, the primary function of the device is to backup raw photos from my new camera -- which I don't own yet but will probably be a 16MP Panasonic G3 or GX1 M4/3. My old ASUS EEE PC 700 with an SD card has fulfilled this need for years with my old Nikon D70s. The only problem with the EEE PC is its starting to get a bit unreliable with lockup issues with some web pages although that could easily be a result of installing the latest Ubuntu without any swap.
Anything with two out of USB host capability, SD card slot and enough HDD/flash storage will do this. I'm tempted with an Archos 80 G9 Turbo ICS 8GB 8-Inch Tablet and Toshiba NB505-N508BL 10.1-Inch Netbook (Blue). But to be honest if I could simply copy photos to an ipod touch this would be a done deal.
One of the limitations with the EEE PC has always been that it doesn't have enough of RAM (256MB I think) to display the 7MP raw images from the D70 which is a bit of a shame. If I'm going to lug a "real" computer around it would be great if I could view the images that I have copied onto it and convert some to JPEG so I can give them to folks or upload them to the web. There seem to be a variety of Windows 7 and Android raw viewers and converters so I'm hoping that both platforms will be adequate. I might also be able to simplify the workflow by setting the camera to store both raw and JPEG images. Copying raw and viewing and sharing JPEG is going to be a lot less memory intensive.
Anyway back to the memory question. Both the Archos tablet and Toshiba netbook have 1GB RAM (Toshiba is expandable to 2GB) but I really don't have a feel for how much RAM is needed for basic viewing, simple editing, converting RAW to JPEG, etc. Any practical advice here would be most appreciated.
Thanks in advance!
I'm looking for a netbook or tablet for a trip this summer. Small and light is important because everything I take will fit comfortably in a ~30L daypack that I'm going to be carrying pretty much everywhere I go. Cheap is important, too: as close to $200 as possible and certainly less than $300.
Other than basic and occasional webby stuff, the primary function of the device is to backup raw photos from my new camera -- which I don't own yet but will probably be a 16MP Panasonic G3 or GX1 M4/3. My old ASUS EEE PC 700 with an SD card has fulfilled this need for years with my old Nikon D70s. The only problem with the EEE PC is its starting to get a bit unreliable with lockup issues with some web pages although that could easily be a result of installing the latest Ubuntu without any swap.
Anything with two out of USB host capability, SD card slot and enough HDD/flash storage will do this. I'm tempted with an Archos 80 G9 Turbo ICS 8GB 8-Inch Tablet and Toshiba NB505-N508BL 10.1-Inch Netbook (Blue). But to be honest if I could simply copy photos to an ipod touch this would be a done deal.
One of the limitations with the EEE PC has always been that it doesn't have enough of RAM (256MB I think) to display the 7MP raw images from the D70 which is a bit of a shame. If I'm going to lug a "real" computer around it would be great if I could view the images that I have copied onto it and convert some to JPEG so I can give them to folks or upload them to the web. There seem to be a variety of Windows 7 and Android raw viewers and converters so I'm hoping that both platforms will be adequate. I might also be able to simplify the workflow by setting the camera to store both raw and JPEG images. Copying raw and viewing and sharing JPEG is going to be a lot less memory intensive.
Anyway back to the memory question. Both the Archos tablet and Toshiba netbook have 1GB RAM (Toshiba is expandable to 2GB) but I really don't have a feel for how much RAM is needed for basic viewing, simple editing, converting RAW to JPEG, etc. Any practical advice here would be most appreciated.
Thanks in advance!
