<a href="http://davidhewson.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/dell-streak.jpg"><img class="alignright size-medium wp-image-5704" title="Dell Streak" src="http://davidhewson.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/dell-streak.jpg?w=300" alt="" width="300" height="200" /></a>I hate to think of the money I’ve spent trying to find the right mobile gadget to let me deal with words on the move. Many, many years ago I owned a battery-driven, memory tape taking <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinclair_QL" target="_blank">Sinclair QL</a> which wasn’t half bad for 1984 actually. I had a Newton, naturally, which was probably a step back. And a Windows CE mini laptop. And doubtless things I’ve forgotten.

None ever worked that well if I’m honest. And here we are in 2010, with the web everywhere, smart phones, dead cheap computers, tech coming out of our ears. And still no one’s perfected the trick of making a simple mobile device, smaller than a laptop, that will let you write, read and edit on the move.

Except this is the year of the tablet. The iPad might, I thought, be the answer, but it wasn’t though it seems that, thanks to the work of third party companies, not Apple, things are getting better. Don’t care. As long as you have to call up that dread monster iTunes just to transfer a file you can count me out.

But other solutions are promised, a flood of them. Here’s one of the first, the Dell Streak which, depending how you look at it, is either a small tablet or a big phone. This runs on Google’s Android platform, and so can usea stack of different downloadable apps, from games to satnav and all that social media stuff that mainly leaves me cold. What I want to know is simple: can it help me manage writing tasks on the move? Is this a good step closer to the working mobile gadget – not some toy – I’ve been craving as a writer and reader for years?

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<strong>The basics</strong>

For me the Dell is a large Android phone with a neat design and very slender body. It comes with a five-inch screen and an old version of Android, 1.6, which is supposed be updated soon and should be; users will get a lot more out of it when it’s brought up to the current 2.2. It’s a phone with a fast processor inside, 2gb of internal memory and another 16gb on a micro SD card. If you want to run video and massive libraries of music you probably need to upgrade that but it’s fine for me.

Dell have put their own face on Android and it’s pretty good. You can find your way around with a finger. The screen is clear and bright and can handle video, from Youtube and even Sky News though not BBC iPlayer (which should come with 2.2). I use Google for calendar and mail so all my messages, diary and contacts just sync automatically.

In the hand it feels like the biggest phone you’ve ever used or, if you turn it horizontally, a very small tablet. It’s clearly meant to spend most of the time horizontal so you can see lots of things. But turn it upright and the screen automatically goes to vertical and this is how I’ll be using it mostly when it comes to words. Battery life? Haven’t had much time to test in anger but I guess a day like most of these things.

It costs around £449 without a sim or from £25 a month for two years from O2 in the UK. If you want to buy one with a phone plan watch the details – that cheapest one includes no phone calls and actually, in spite of the size, the Streak makes a very good phone. For some people maybe the only one you’ll need (I barely use a phone for voice these days – it’s almost always data, so that could be me). I bought it sim-free direct from Dell and bunged in a T-Mobile PAYG sim which cost £10 to top up for calls and £20 for six months of data, which seems a bargain. The Dell spotted the sim instantly and set itself up without any input from me. It also hooks into wifi too, of course, so very quickly I was online.

One short comment about the cost: the Dell is grossly overpriced. I doubt it will be going out for anything like this come Christmas.

<strong>How about reading?</strong>

Kindle 3 is on the way. I’ve one of those ordered too, for general family use and because, well, these things matter to people in this business. When that turns up I’ll put it side-by-side with the Streak and see how each shapes up. K3 uses some fancy e-ink technology to emulate paper and will, I'm sure, be a lot more legible.

[caption id="attachment_5706" align="alignright" width="205" caption="Aldiko each shapes up. For pure reading I’d be surprised if the Kindle doesn’t win hands down. The screen’s a bit bigger and uses a completely different technology – e-ink."]<a href="http://davidhewson.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/aldiko.jpg"><img class="size-medium wp-image-5706" title="Exif_JPEG_PICTURE" src="http://davidhewson.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/aldiko.jpg?w=205" alt="" width="205" height="300" /></a>[/caption]

But… the Streak is really rather good too, though you won't be able to use it in full sun, as you can with e-ink. My everyday phone is another Android gadget, the HTC Desire. It runs pretty much the same stuff as the Dell but has a 3.7 inch screen. The difference that extra 1.3 inches makes is quite remarkable. I can’t read anything of length seriously on the HTC. On the Dell it’s no problem at all. Oh, and one nice surprise. All the apps I bought for my Desire download automatically to the Streak too – they’re tied to my Google account, not the machine. A neat touch.

One of my favourite Android ereading apps is <a href="http://www.aldiko.com/" target="_blank">Aldiko</a>. This is very much like the book apps on an iPad from what I can see, though Aldiko longs predates Apple’s efforts. It’s free in its most basic form and lets you browse out of print classics and self-published  books. Anything you can download as an epub file Aldiko can handle. You swipe to go from page to page. There are bookmarks, viewing choices and an easy link into the Google dictionary (provided you’re online – which you don’t need to be to read the book).

The Desire's screen is too small for serious book-reading for me. On the Streak it looks like this which is much more like it (sorry but taking pictures of this screen is not easy). Now a bunch of seven-inch Android tablets are on the way – Samsung will supposedly have one out next month, and by Christmas there will be five and seven and ten inch Android tablets everywhere. But actually it’s really quite usable on the five-inch.

[caption id="attachment_5708" align="alignright" width="236" caption="Concise Oxford Italian Dictionary"]<a href="http://davidhewson.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/dict.jpg"><img class="size-medium wp-image-5708" title="Exif_JPEG_PICTURE" src="http://davidhewson.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/dict.jpg?w=236" alt="" width="236" height="300" /></a>[/caption]

Plus you can have Kindle too. There’s a Kindle Android app that lets you browse the Amazon store (US and now UK). Anything you buy stays with Amazon so you can download it onto any Kindle-connected machine with your account, be it Android, desktop PC or Kindle hardware. I bought Arthur Machen’s translation of Casanova’s memoirs for $3 or so (it is available as epub for free which would work with Aldiko but not Kindle). Worked fine. In use Kindle is very much like Aldiko to be honest – bookmarks, but no dictionary. Will be interested to see how this compares with the Kindle 3.

There’s one other reading app I find invaluable when I’m in Italy and that’s the <a href="http://www.androidgear.com/en/eur/Concise-Oxford-Paravia-Italian-Dictionary-Android/product_4888981_details.html" target="_blank">Concise Oxford Italian dictionary</a>. It’s twenty euros but well worth it if you need a portable Italian dictionary. Not just words either but some genera language guidance too. Great on the Desire, even better on the Streak – fast and easy.

Now to the important part…

<strong>Writing and editing</strong>

<a href="http://davidhewson.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/word.jpg"><img class="alignright size-medium wp-image-5707" title="Exif_JPEG_PICTURE" src="http://davidhewson.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/word.jpg?w=201" alt="Word" width="201" height="300" /></a>I need to be able to see work – a Word doc in other words - edit it, and <em>view and make comments. </em>I don’t expect a pocket device to be something I will write thousands of words on. But I do want to write some, and comments are essential (the absence of them in iPad Pages was what made me realise that was principally a device for consuming things, not creating or editing them).

There are a couple of ways to view Word docs on Android devices. Many, including the Streak, come with something called QuickOffice for free. But it’s pretty basic. Even on my Desire I’d worked out it was worth paying $14.99 for the upgrade to the full version of <a href="http://www.dataviz.com/products/documentstogo/android/" target="_blank">Documents to Go</a>. This is a kind of mini version of Microsoft Office, seen right. I don’t use anything but the Word editor and pdf reader, and both work fine.

If I pull in a Word doc I can read it, see comments, add comments (and supposedly track changes too, not that I’ve tried or probably need that right now). I've zoomed for the picture (easily done on the Streak) so that you can see it better. In real life I'd run a smaller font than that and tighter line spacing to get more text on the screen.  My actual editing screen would look closer to the text in Aldiko or the dictionary above I suspect. Would just take a little tweaking.

The only slight glitch on the Streak is the delay in moving from landscape to portrait. But honestly… I can live with that. Typing is fine and a lot easier on a smaller phone – Dell have put on an extended keyboard, with number pad. Or you can use one of the alternative keyboards like Swiftkey. I imagine you could add a Bluetooth keyboard too though why is beyond me.

<strong>Note-taking and research</strong>

A doddle. There’s a 5 megapixel camera on the back so you can drop stuff straight to Evernote if you want, or simply email yourself notes and photos or audio clips too. There are apps for things like <a href="http://www.rememberthemilk.com" target="_blank">Remember the Milk</a> and other information services too, along with Facebook, Twitter, Flickr.... pretty much anything you could imagine.

<strong>Is it worth it?</strong>

That absolutely depends how much need you have for something like this. You can buy stuff from Dell and return it for up to a week. So I wasn’t sure whether I’d hang onto it frankly.

Right now I'm minded to hang on to the Streak. It’s an odd in-between device. It won’t fit in a jeans pocket, though it will in a shirt one or bag easily. It sits somewhere between the portability of a phone and an iPad or a netbook. But I can take serious amounts of work – full length books in progress – with me, edit and comment on them, make notes, take photos, get email, browse the web, and use some very nifty satnav features in the car too. It doesn’t need any extra connection widgets or software. Plug it in through any USB port and it recharges and looks like any memory stick for swapping round files.

Kindle 3 is an ereader. The iPad is much larger and mainly about consuming things, not editing or creating them. This is a small computer with a number of different and versatile talents.

The big question is... will a seven-inch Android tablet be better? I honestly don't know. In terms of text on screen for writing the Streak suits me. In standard font in Kindle or Aldiko or Word it fits around the same number of lines on the page and in line length that you get in mass market paperback book. I wouldn't want to see more, horizontally or vertically. That would be too long or too wide.

Also I suspect those extra two inches will make the thing a sight less portable. This could double as a phone... just. Anything larger wouldn't -- and I've already decided that the iPad is way too big for my uses (and I'm probably not alone since Apple are supposedly planning a seven-inch version).

Anyway -- that's where we are today. Tomorrow the Kindle should turn up and I may change my mind completely of course.