[Xastir] Decent Linux Tablet for Xastir Use? (Question)

[Curt, WE7U]

On Mon, 20 Jun 2011, Kurt Savegnago wrote:

>  Any folks come across a decent tablet for reasonable Xastir use for
> APRS tracking? Processor speed woudl have to be fast enough so redraws don't take 5 minutes to do. :-)  I guess the bare minimum would be to be able to have either an internal GPS or facility to plug an external one in via USB and have another available USB to plug in either a stand alone TNC (like a TNC-X), Kenwood D7A(g) or the new D72A which has direct USB capability.
> Any of you techno-mavens had any suggestions?

I acquired a Viewsonic G-Tablet from woot.com a while back, as did several other hams around here that I hang out with.

I'm not sure whether I can recommend it at this point, although the specs are nice:  Has a dual-core Tegra-2 processor with integrated video.  Unfortunately it wasn't well supported by Viewsonic, so I'm waiting for the Honeycomb 3rd-party ROM's (Android 3.x) to stabilize a bit more.  One of them is looking pretty good at the moment but is still Alpha and I haven't loaded it yet.  The tablet came with Android 2.2 with a crappy front-end added on to it.  I very quickly (first few hours) loaded it up with Vegantab instead (another 3rd-party ROM).

I've heard there's a GPS module that will go inside it but haven't run down that lead to find out how much they are or whether I can acquire one.

It has one USB connector and one MicroSD? slot, as well as bluetooth and 802.11 B/G/N.

I'm having fun with mine, and the price was right.  I figure it's a good learning tablet if nothing else.  I've been using it a lot, and carry it around now instead of a laptop.

It was something like $269 on Woot.com, and has appeared a couple of times on there since I bought mine.

-- 
Curt, WE7U.        http://www.eskimo.com/~archer
APRS Device Capabilities:  http://www.eskimo.com/~archer/aprs_device_capabilities.html