Acer Switch 10 review: Right idea, wrong execution

Acer Aspire Switch 10 $430.00 The Acer Aspire Switch 10 is a novel take on the 2-in-1 notebook/tablet hybrid, but both the tablet and the keyboard halves of the equation are mediocre, and the tablet's battery life is too short.

Acer tries to do Lenovo’s Yoga-series laptops one better with its Switch 10: This 2-in-1 can fold into tent, presentation and tablet modes just like those famous convertibles. But Acer’s 10-inch display can be completely detached from its keyboard dock to transform it into a true tablet.

There’s no need to fumble with a release mechanism, either. Friction catches and strong magnets hold the two components together, but the magnets are almost too powerful. They’re supposed to help guide a pair of sockets on the tablet to posts on the keyboard, but I found myself constantly needing to reseat the tablet, because the magnets seized the dock before I had an opportunity to line them up properly.

Michael Homnick

The Acer Switch 10's display can be detached from its keyboard dock to become a true Windows tablet. 

To separate the two, hold the keyboard down and give the display a strong tug. The friction catches inside the tablet sometimes take a few seconds to retract, with a disconcerting sound that had me wondering if something had come loose inside the first few times I heard it. With devices that have 360-degree hinges, presentation mode leaves the keyboard facing down against your work surface, while putting it in tablet mode leaves the keyboard facing out and against your hand.

Reversing the Switch 10’s display leaves the keyboard facing up behind it in presentation mode, and flat against the back of the display in tablet mode. Tent mode is also available for those times when your work surface is limited—such as an airline tray table.

Michael Homnick

Tent mode makes it easy to watch movies in cramped spaces, such as an airline seat. 

This clever design is somewhat undermined by a less-than-awesome display. I suppose a 10.1-inch, 1366x768 display is to be expected at the lower end of the tablet price range, but Acer’s panel doesn't get particularly bright. It's the only tablet I've used where I felt the need to keep the brightness cranked at all times. The tablet looks bulkier than its 0.35-inch thickness and 1.29-pound weight due to its wide, black bezel, with an outer silver frame. Front-firing speakers at the bottom (in notebook or presentation mode) or top (in tent mode) get impressively loud.

Michael Homnick

Presentation mode is just the ticket for PowerPoint slideshows.

The keyboard’s keys are small, flat, and surprisingly stiff. My first keystroke failed to register until I became accustomed to its tactile response and learned how hard I needed to strike the keys. The dock is also on the light side for how heavy the tablet is. It tends to slide around the desk when you tap its display in notebook mode.

Michael Homnick

Unlike laptops with 360-degree hinges, you won't feel the keys when you put the Aspire Switch 10 in tablet mode. 

The only ports on the tablet are micro and mini versions of USB and HDMI, respectively. The tablet also supports Miracast wireless video streaming if you don't want to mess with an HDMI adapter to connect the tablet to a stand-alone display. Bluetooth and 802.11 a/b/g/n Wi-Fi round out its wireless connectivity. The included keyboard dock has a full-size USB 2.0 port, but no USB 3.0.

The rest of the Switch 10’s specs are standard for the lower end of the tablet range. Acer picked an Intel Atom Z3745 (Bay Trail-class) CPU and paired it with 2GB of DDR3/1066 memory. A 64GB eMMC drive is provided for storage, which can be supplemented by a MicroSD card. Acer also offers a less-expensive model with only 32GB of storage, but that's really pushing it for a machine running Windows 8.1.

The Acer Aspire Switch 10 isn't as powerful as the Lenovo Yoga 2 11 or the HP Pavilion x360. 

With standard specs comes average performance. The tablet is perfectly acceptable in day-to-day usage, but my usage is not particularly demanding: Email, web browsing, YouTube and Netflix, and Office tasks all worked smoothly. The Switch 10 outperformed the Lenovo Yoga 2 11 and the HP Pavilion x360 on the PCMark 8: Office benchmark by virtue of its flash storage, not because it’s inherently more powerful.

Both of those machines have mechanical hard drives, but faster CPUs, so both of them earned a higher Laptop WorldBench scores. And that makes it doubly disappointing that the Acer’s battery died seven minutes sooner than the Lenovo’s did (the Pavilion x360’s less-than-3.5 hours of battery life, for what it’s worth, is just atrocious).

The Aspire Switch 10 should have better battery life since it doesn't need to spin the platters on a mechanical hard drive like the HP and Lenovo machines. 

If a 2-in-1 with a detachable display is what you crave, I’d suggest taking a look at the Asus Transformer  Book T100. It’s a little thicker, but it weighs about the same. More importantly, it has a better keyboard, and the 64GB model is street-priced the same as the 32GB model of the Acer Switch 10. The 64GB version of the Switch 10 reviewed here costs $80 more.

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Review: Xmind Pro mind mapping utility has good intentions, but poor execution

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Endlessly tweaking his workflow for comfort and efficiency, Erez is a freelance writer on a mission to discover the simplest, coolest, and most effective software and websites to make tomorrow happen today.
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Being able to put down your thoughts in writing can lend them powerful clarity. Doing it in graphical form, as a mind map, can add to the process by exposing relationships and allowing a bird's eye view of a large subject. XMind Pro is a $99 tool that wants to help you do this, and it also has a free version available. Both the free and Pro versions support many chart types other than mind maps, such as organizational diagrams and "fishbone" diagrams showing cause and effect relationships. The Pro version adds export capabilities, a Gantt chart view, brainstorming and presentation modes, and more drawing tools.

At 29MB, XMind Pro is a larger download than both the svelte, tiny Blumind mind-mapping utility (750KB) and TheBrain, a powerful personal mind mapper (16MB). Then again, these days you don't have to download anything to get started with mind mapping: Online tools such as MindMeister and SpiderScribe offer powerful mapping capabilities right in the browser, using Flash (SpiderScribe) or HTML5 (MindMeister).

XMind Pro comes with many templates featuring different diagram types.

Starting your first diagram with XMind Pro is easy, thanks to its many helpful templates. At first glance, the XMind Pro interface is bursting with tools and options, but these are often encumbered by interface idiosyncrasies making them difficult to use. For example, you can choose between different color themes for your mind map, but you must double-click the button for each theme for it to work.

XMind Pro's interface is detailed, and can be overwhelming if you're not familiar with it.

Another case in point is the Map Shot tool: This tool lets you quickly take a screenshot of your mind map. I clicked it in the menu, but it seemed to do nothing, so I clicked again, hoping for a dialog or a message. That failed, so I clicked a third time, and then gave up and kept working with the application. A few moments later, when I tried dragging a node in the mind map, I realize my mouse can only draw selection frames now. Once I drew a selection frame, XMind Pro popped up a file save dialog–and only then did I realize what happened: The tool took effect but was waiting for me to pick an area for the screenshot, without telling me about it first. Since I clicked the tool three times, XMind Pro did the same thing three times, and I had to abort the action three times.

XMind Pro handles revisions seamlessly, letting you roll back the clock to an earlier version of the mind map.

One last example: Each mind map can contain several sheets, represented by tabs along the bottom of the window. There is a powerful Outline view that lets you see a nested list of all nodes, including those on other sheets. But clicking a node in another sheet does nothing: XMind doesn't take you there.

This version of XMind Pro introduces map revisions: Saving your mind map is non-destructive. Every time you save it, a new revision is added on top of your previous saves, and you can then flick between revisions, visually inspecting differences. This is similar to MindMeister's excellent timeline strip, but again, it's held back by the interface: The map preview is shown at 100% zoom, and there is no way to zoom back out. This means you'll have to do a lot of panning to see the differences when comparing two versions of a large map.

All in all, XMind Pro offers a powerful, rich environment for visually plotting ideas, but only if you can get over its often-clunky interface.

Note: The "Try it for free" button on the Product Information page will download the software to your system.

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Inexpensive EasyTables Database Program: Good Concept, Poor Execution

Many people need to keep track of structured information in a simple, straightforward, way. Database programs often skew towards the higher end of cost and complexity, or towards unstructured, free-text tools which have benefits, but also drawbacks. EasyTables ($35, 14-day free trial) is a program that attempts to fill a niche for users with no database or coding experience that still need to track, sort, and search their data. Unfortunately, showstopper bugs and an unresponsive development team make this database program an unreliable choice.

EasyTables allows the user to create simple flat-file databases with minimal hassle.EasyTables 2.4.5 resides, after installation, in the taskbar, and this makes it convenient to create or review tables of various sorts. The user can create as many tables as he/she wishes, and access them from a right-click on the icon in the taskbar. Thus, it's easy to quickly bring up a contacts table, a to-do list, or a simple inventory.

Creating tables is equally simple; a straightforward interface allows you to add columns and set their type (text, integer, date, currency, and so on). Once this is done, you can then begin adding in data, either manually, or by importing it from a CSV. Columns can be deleted or edited later, though users should be careful about doing so; once a column is deleted, that data is gone, even if the column is later recreated.

When being used, EasyTables presents a basic grid of data. Columns can be dragged around to reorder them, and clicking a column will sort by it. Filters can be created by clicking a value in a cell, or by bringing up a filter dialog to set multiple conditions at once. Data can be entered in the grid, or by a simple form which is auto-generated. Text font, color, and size can be set on a field-by-field basis.

Unfortunately, EasyTables has serious bugs, including some that locked me out of my database, though I was able to make a copy of it and re-access the data. Setting a filter on an integer field by using the "add to filter" button caused a crash error that re-occurred whenever I tried to reopen that database. Automatic fields, such as Creation Date, sometimes came up blank and sometimes not. While not a bug per se, there is no way to delete an entry from the drop-down type fields, so if you made a mistake in typing, the erroneous entry will remain to clutter the field.

Further, EasyTables is poorly documented. There is a .CHM file which contains very basic information, but doesn't document all features, such as the "Expression" field type (which would seem to be very useful). There is a FAQ, which is written in somewhat broken English and which mostly just repeats the documentation. As of this writing, NiceKit has not replied to email queries.

With a list price of $35, EasyTables is pushing the limit of price for functionality if everything worked perfectly. Given the issues and the seeming lack of recent updates (the program is copyright 2010), I have to put this firmly in the "not recommended" column, which is a shame, as its features and functionality would make it an excellent choice if it had fewer bugs and a slightly lower price point. Filemaker Pro, once the leading personal database, is currently targeted at businesses more than single users. Microsoft Access offers a lot of functionality, but can be more than is needed for a single, flat-file, type database. GS-Base, which has some flaws but also has a rapid turnaround on bug fixes and updates, is a good candidate to consider for low-end tasks on a small budget.

Note: The Download button takes you to the vendor's site, where you can download the latest version of this software.

--Ian Harac

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