There’s been a lot of talk lately about netbooks being superseded by tablets. But I’m not convinced. For many tasks, tablets are indeed the superior device. They’re smaller, lighter, and turn on instantly. I bring my Galaxy Tab everywhere I go for this exact reason, and use it for social networking, browsing the web, reading email, reading eBooks, and watching movies and TV shows.

But the few times I’ve tried using it – and the iPad – as a work tool for blogging and writing articles, I absolutely hated the experience. Sure, both work well enough with a Bluetooth keyboard, but that wasn’t really the issue. The issue was the limitations in software and user input. On the software side, I found the WordPress clients for Android and iOS to be too limited (you can only place images at the end of the post, for instance) and I couldn’t find any word processing software that lets me do a word count on a highlighted paragraph of text (the ones I found only do a word count on the entire article). Plus, as a writer, I’m constantly chopping and changing text – cutting it out, moving it around, copying and pasting – and doing this with a finger on a capacitive screen while trying to hold onto my train of thought is just too much of a hassle. Way too imprecise. Give me a netbook with a built-in keyboard, touchpad, Microsoft Word and a desktop browser any day! Obviously, a tablet running Windows would solve this problem, but then I’d lose the instant-on capabilities that I love so much in my Galaxy Tab and iPad.

I’m sure that getting a tablet over a netbook – and even a desktop PC – makes sense to many people. People like my mum, for instance, who only ever use the computer to use Facebook, listen to music, send email, browse the web and play Scrabble. In her case, the iPad I gave to her is perfect, and she mentioned the other day that she loves how easy it is to make the text on a webpage larger so she doesn’t have to take her eye glasses out. She’s not at all tech-savvy, so she also loves how intuitive the iOS interface is to use – no complicated key strokes or commands, she just taps on the screen to launch the program she wants! But I view tablets strictly as a companion to my little Acer netbook and 27-inch iMac, and I’ve found that all three computing devices have a role in my life. The tablet goes with me everywhere and essentially works as a smartphone with a larger screen, the netbook comes out when I want to do some writing at a cafe, while the iMac is what I use for blogging, writing, web browsing while I’m at home, and editing photos.