App of the week: Supernote from Asus
In a little known update pushed to the Asus tablet lineup a couple weeks ago (3.2.1), Transformer and Slider users received probably one of the coolest updates to hit their tablet yet. A new app called Supernote was quietly placed on the Honeycomb tablet, and while I usually hate bloatware, I’m ecstatic over this new app.
Supernote combines the best note taking applications across the Android app markets, and puts them all into this freebie. Users can swap easily from the keyboard, to a stylus or a finger and back. Add photos, drawings, voice recordings, and videos anytime you want, and you can place them into the notes at the appropriate time.
So, to put that into perspective, imagine your professor (or boss) is giving a presentation and you’re humming along jotting things down with the hardware keyboard. Then he throws up a simple little graph, which you decide to draw quickly onto your Transformer. Then the next part gets a little hairy, and you decide you want to capture the next couple of minutes on a recording for further review when you get home. Simply tap the Insert button, and you can select the Sound Recorder from a plethora of options. This recording gets an icon next to your notes, right where you want it to be, and is ready for playback when you need it.
When you’re done taking notes, you just need to figure out how everything needs to be organized. Unfortunately, this is were things aren’t as polished. There isn’t any drag and drop functionality when you finish a note, which would make adding and swapping notes much easier than it’s implemented now. Instead, you pretty much need to set up notebooks before you take notes to make the experience a little smoother.
Conclusion
This is some seriously cool stuff that Asus has thrown in here for free, and something that will stick with me the next time I go to purchase another tablet or computer. There isn’t a note taking application like this on Android yet. Asus is really making the choice for students easy with all of the bundled extras they pack in the Transformer, and this can only help. It’s no wonder as to why the Transformer is my favorite Android tablet.
[Smartnote]
