Remember when people used personal computers - desktops and laptops - to check email, view video and keep tabs on Facebook? Back in that far-away era, I'd have several windows open for web browsers, a word processor, a photo editor and sometimes a reader for PDF documents.
I miss that capability on mobile devices, particularly on full-size tablets with a decent amount of display space. With iPads and Android tablets, I'm typically limited to one window displayed at a time; other apps run in background, out of sight. With Windows 8 tablets, I can run two windows side by side, but I'm constrained in what I can do with them. It gets better with the Windows 8.1 update due our next week, but it's still not free for all I had with PC's.
Samsung's new tablet formally called Galaxy Note 10.1 - 2014 Edition, supporting a 10.1 inch display, measured diagonally, the Note tablet goes on sale in US at a price of $550.
The first of the multitasking features, called Multi-Window, has been available in Samsung devices for about a year, but it works with many more apps now. You can run two apps side by side, such as Facebook on one side and YouTube video on the other.
Like Windows 8 tablets, you're limited to just two apps. You can change how much of the screen each one takes, a capability coming with Windows 8.1, but you can't choose to have a window take up just the top left corner, the way you can on PCs. In addition, Multi-Window isn't a universal feature. Apps for Netflix and Hulu won't work,for instance. You currently have about 18 apps to choose from, including Facebook and a variety of Google and Samsung apps.
With that limitation,it's nice that Samsung Electronics Co. is supplementing Multi-window with a feature called Pen Window.
With it, simply draw a box on the screen with the included stylus, and choose one of seven apps to open in a new window. Do it again and again until you open all seven apps, if you wish. That's nine in all, counting the two with Multi-window. Each Pen Window app appears in a window that floats over your main app. You can move that window around on your screen and resize it, just as you can on PC's.
For now, Pen window on the tablet works with YouTube, the calculator, the alarm clock, your contacts list, the wb browser and two chat apps - Samsung ChatOn and Google's Hangouts. I like the fact that you can open all of them and keep them out of the way in a minimized state. That way, it's just one click when you need the calculator and one click when you're done.
Beyond multitasking, the new Note tablet offers a My Magazine mode giving you personalized highlights, such as news topics of interest, content from social media feeds and suggestions on things to do and see, based on your current location. It's good concept, though Facebook isn't available through it yet.
The new tablet also gives you quick access to the tools you can accomplish with its stylus. PEN Window is one. Another feature lets you add notes to a screenshot of what you see. Another lets you clip a section of a Web page and store it with a Web link.
Pen Window is more difficult than necessary to set up. You need to take out the stylus for an Air Command tool to appear on the screen. You choose Pen window, then draw a box on your screen with your stylus. Then you choose the app you want to open. Do all of that again to get additional apps, after figuring out how to get Air Command again with your stylus already out. It would have been simpler to have a button on the home screen that you can tap with your finger or stylus.
In addition, Samsung have done more with apps in minimized state. Google's chat app is reduced to a circular icon. It could have flashed or changed colours to notify me of a new chat message, rather than make me open and close it regularly to check.
The tablet's back is still made of plastic, but it feels like leather - an improvement over previous Samsung devices. The tablet feel heavy, at 1.2 pounds, but that's still lighter than the 1.4 pounds for the full-size iPad.
Samsung's tablet price is around $550 but no iPad has stylus feature in it.
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