Bay 12 Games Forum
Finally... => Life Advice => Topic started by: GodlyTeapot on December 26, 2012, 10:06:37 pm
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A Google Nexus to be specific, the only problem is I have no idea what to do with it, short of playing angry birds on a slightly bigger screen...
So Bay12, ideas for apps/games I should download to improve my tablet experience? I really like being able to download old books for free, and I feel like it could help me out a lot, by using Google+ and all that guff, but so far it just seems like a laptop without a keyboard and a screen that doesn't do what you want it to ::)
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I just got a Kindle Fire and I'm only scratching the surface of what (besides reading books/watching video) to do with it too. It's nowhere near as capable as my laptop BUT it also fits into a jacket pocket so I've been carrying it everywhere instead of making the decision "lug around laptop bag/leave the damn thing at home". So far I picked up a ton of free apps to see what's useful. What I've been using the most:
Wi-Fi Analyzer - Find open wi-fi (it lists the open ones with an *, handy)
Bloomberg - quick look at financial news while I'm in a bar/restaurant
Engadget - gadget news ditto
newshog - ditto other news
WSJ live - Wall Street Journal news videos
Opentable/Urbanspoon - find bars/restaurants
Fandango - movie theater times
Pandora - listen to my Pandora channels
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Mapquest - maps. I'm working on getting Google maps working (it's a bit of a hassle on the Fire)
Weather Channel/Weatherbug
USTV free - sometimes gets HBO/Showtime/Starz movie channels, news stations
ES Task Manager/GSam Battery Monitor/AppSwipe - find out what's running and slowing down my stuff, lots of stuff doesn't stop the app when I leave the screen, kind of annoying esp if it has audio.
The built in browser mainly to look up addresses and phone numbers.
I also have Amazon Prime so I have been watching a lot of the free streaming videos - Dr Who, Red Dwarf, a bunch of noir films. Mostly I have a bunch of books and jazz/classical music downloaded so I have something to read/listen to while stuck waiting somewhere with no wi-fi.
I'm working on getting it working as an additional display screen for the desktop/laptop - it's handy to keep a man page displayed without needing to switch back and forth, for one thing. Or to keep displaying stuff I'm monitoring without taking up main-screen real estate.
I couldn't stand the tiny display on the earlier smartphones (I have been getting tempted by the later models, but I still balk at the cost of phone + service here), this is a pretty good compromise in being portable but usefully big. Although now I kinda want to try a 10" model, maybe TF700 yum...
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Sky player, BBC iPlayer if in Uk.
Maybe some remote desktop app to control pc from Tablet?
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Root that device and drop CyanogenMod 10.1 on it!
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Pro-tip: A lot of smart phones let you use them as a router to let other devices access the internet through your mobile phone. This way you don't need an extra data contract or even a data-contract-supporting-Nexus.
To be honestly, I mostly use mine to read e-books or browse the internet whilst on my morning commute to work and keep up with my work e-mails whilst at work. Also a bit of YouTubing, mostly when at my PC though (so I don't need to take up one of my monitors with YouTube videos).
Basically there's nothing I've found it vital for in my life, but it's quite convenient to have one around. Especially since there's like no boot-up time so you can just quickly look things up if needs be.
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I noticed the convenience when I was attempting a pixel art dwarf on minecraft :P thanks for all the tips guys, I really appreciate them. I can tell this will make things a lot faster, especially for watching YouTube videos, and browsing bay12 while I play games, etc.
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There's some nifty astronomy apps out there such that you can point the tablet at the sky, and have it tell you exactly what constellations those are, where the Space Station is, etc.
Can't recommend any off the top of my head, just because the gyro/GPS stuff tends to not work well with my HP TouchPad.
If you're into cooking, get a splash-resistent screen cover and use it as a digital cookbook. There's all kinds of apps to tie into sites like allrecipes.com and epicurious.com.
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If you like reading 'old' books, I assume you have already downloaded the Kindle App?
And just search for 'roguelike' in GooglePlay, there are already some ports from major roguelikes (eg. Nethack) available - if you like such games.