Due to a burglary at our office over the three day weekend, my Tablet PC ownership has come to an abrupt end. To be exchanged for drug money, what a bitter exit.

Do I miss the tablet already? Yes. Will I be buying another one? Not one from Motion Computing and probably not a slate. Won’t buy from Motion again because they operate with too short a cycle retiring their older models. Have I switched to the convertible tablet crowd? If going with a full-size tablet as opposed to UMPC and as the Magic 8-ball might say: outlook is good.

Something smaller appeals to me as well, perhaps as a replacement to my aging Pocket PC. I’m leaning toward the UMPC but those never really came down in price as promised. Would also like something that works with my Sprint EVDO USB. What UMPC work with Sprint EVDO? I’ll have to do some digging.

My tablet ownership experience took a dark turn on March 4, 2006 when I started having some hardware problems. At first, I tried to work around the USB ports not working reliably any more, but eventually this frustrated me because there were times I needed to use my USB keyboard in my business. It was still a great sales illustration tool, but companies we deal with had put our applications in a format that almost demanded a keyboard. This would require me to carry two laptops on outside sales appointment which became awkward and cumbersome. A few months later I shelved the tablet and returned to using a traditional laptop.

Over the holidays I started thinking about how I missed using the tablet. Also it seemed silly to have spent a couple thousand dollars on a tool that’s gathering dust. So at the start of this year I began using the tablet regularly again, this time not for outside sales appointments but as a second PC at my desk. It was used almost exclusively for handwritten notes with OneNote and quickly discovered a rhythm that worked in our business. The good tablet experience times had returned.

And then we came in yesterday morning and saw that our office had been violated. Thieves broke in and stole the tablet from it’s spot pictured above.

I had been working on an after New Year’s resolution post of sorts that showed my new work area flow including the tablet. The keyboard tray was a handy place to store and use the slate tablet to take handwritten notes and the pictures above are the last photos taken of the tablet. I’ve always found it more comfortable handwriting notes from phone conversations versus typing. Quieter too as I’m a noisy typist.

According to the police officer who responded to the burglary call, the likelihood of getting the tablet back is small, so those pictures might be the last ones ever taken. The police have the tablet’s serial number but the officer told me the pawn shops aren’t required to and usually don’t check serial numbers.

My best hope of getting the tablet PC back is if it’s recovered as part of an arrest. Imagine, my tablet thrust into a world of trades for a quick drug fix. Or maybe sitting on a pawnbroker’s shelf with a sticker well below the value to me.

Sad.

Backups and after the burglary
When filing the insurance claim, we learned that another office like ours had been hit recently. I posted about the burglary to Twitter yesterday and was asked if there were backups? Yes, there were backups of everything except for OneNote. I know, stupid not to include a OneNote update to the regular backup schedule.

The files were all protected by fingerprint, but in case the tablet ends in the hands of a skilled cracker I changed passwords for anything associated with the tablet, including any passwords that would have been saved in the browser. Also changed FTP and SSH passwords.

Emotionally I went from mad at myself for leaving the tablet at our office over the three day weekend to angry at the thieves. Based on the investigation of the crime scene the policeman believed there was more than one criminal in play.

Lestat asked me if I LoJacked the tablet?

In fact your laptop has a 1 in 10 chance of being lost or stolen this year and according to the FBI, 97% are never recovered.

Bummer.

And unfortunately no LoJack, but that sounds like a worthwhile service. Lestat said his company uses LoJack for all their laptops. At 50 bones a year with a software refund if the laptop isn’t returned within 30 days of being stolen, I’ll strongly consider doing that with all future laptop purchases.

This morning I asked on Twitter if others had used LoJack service and their experience, if any. Took two messages to generate this non-serious response from mjkeliher:

Not very scientific, but perhaps most Twitterers I follow (and follow me back), aren’t into LoJack’s service? I remain curious how others are securing their laptops? I’ve never secured any of our laptops but now that I’m part of the 10% victim, I’ll be thinking about it more. I welcome your feedback in the comments below.

As for office security? We’re investigating options for adding monitored security. ADT is in the pole position although they seem a bit spendy at $40/month with $100 activation fee. I could buy a new tablet every three years with their service if the burglars didn’t return. In the almost 10+ years we’ve had an office in town, we’ve never been broken into before. One side of me says we should just add security cameras that monitor and record remotely.

End of line?
This could be my last post as a Tablet PC owner for a little while. I’m going to hold some hope I’ll get my tablet back, yeah, even if there is only a 3% chance. You never know. I stopped the counter on the blog home page. Frozen in time on January 22, 2008 Day 1135.

As far as our computer owner history goes, the desktop machines don’t last very long. Either they are obsoleted (we buy mostly cheap desktop hardware) or break, but I’ve only purchased a few laptops through time. The Sony VAIO I bought back in 2000 (for over $2,000) still gets a little use from time to time.

The Motion M1400 specs, despite being dated, are still relevant and I believe would have run Vista. After reading through my history above and below as well as current needs (primarily interested in digital notetaking with OneNote), which tablet PC or UMPC would you buy?

History of Tablet PC Ownership
July 26, 2003 - December 15, 2004: Chronology of tablet indecision (pre-tablet ownership)
December 19, 2004: First full week of ownership complete
February 13, 2005: 60 days after buying a Tablet PC, was it worth it?
March 3, 2005: Day 78 bought external CD-RW drive
May 3, 2005: Day 140
June 27, 2005: Day 196 incompatibility of EVDO Kyocera cards
August 12, 2005: 241 days of Tablet PC Ownership
September 1, 2005: Day 261: Tablet PC sales projections being downshifted by market researchers
September 15, 2005: Day 276 Current office main configuration includes Tablet PC, 3 PCs, Mac
October 12, 2005: Day 302 as Tablet PC owner: email, chat and gaming
December 13, 2005: Day 365: looking back at one year with a Tablet PC
January 22, 2006: Day 405: Dual monitor on Tablet PC alert!

Hardware problems begin
March 4, 2006: Day 445: Tablet I/O board problems
May 5, 2006 Day 508: 10% broken and easy to forget about Bluetooth
Day 577: New Tablet PC purchases being caught in the Vista waiting game
Feb 2, 2007 Day 780: The amazing disappearing wire smell act
January 22, 2008 Day 1135 (R.I.P): Office burglary, Tablet PC stolen.

Related Posts

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• Day 276: Current office main configuration includes Tablet PC, 3 PCs, Mac
• Register lost or stolen property and get it back for free
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• Microsoft releases Office 2003, not available to playtesters as comp