I used to have to search through stacks of notebooks and manually archive digital recordings. Retaining, organizing and recalling new information is crucial to my day. You may be wondering, is it really worth the extra trouble to carry around a special notebook and pen, not to mention the hassle of keeping it charged? In my case, the answer is yes. But I expect these bugs will be temporary. When I tested it, the connection between my LG G Vista and the Livescribe 3 pen dropped repeatedly. In addition, saving backups to OneNote or Evernote requires a robust Internet connection and reasonably generous data plan, neither of which was readily available in New Zealand or can be taken for granted in much of the world.Īndroid users who are new to Livescribe should also be forewarned-the preview version can be quite buggy. The fact the pen charges via the same micro USB plug as many Android phones and tablets only partially compensates for the inconvenience. Today it is yet another gadget that needs to be periodically plugged in and topped off. Luckily, I had written down the address with a Livescribe pen in a Livescribe notebook, which meant a copy resided on my iPhone. And Livescribe really saved the day when I found myself at the bottom of New Zealand’s South Island, needing an address I had written down in a notebook I had left in my hotel on the North Island. Having hand-written diagrams together with audio recordings and written explanations made getting up to speed much easier. Livescribe came in handy for interviewing experts in power engineering, my current subject du jour. Twisting the pen to extend the writing tip, another design change, prompted it to pair with my iOS device, making syncing second nature. Design tweaks meant the pen was smaller and lighter than earlier versions, resembling a heavier Montblanc ballpoint. It’s no surprise journalists are among Livescribe’s biggest enthusiasts.īy the time I tried Livescribe 3 earlier this year, the pen was in its third generation. You no longer have to suffer through hours of droning playback to double check a quote or a fact. If you are a person who spends a lot of time recording interviews or listening to lectures, access to synchronized recordings is like having a superpower. The Android app does include two of Livescribe’s most compelling features-the ability to synchronize audio recordings with specific snippets of text and to convert your chicken-scratch scrawl into digital text with the swipe of a finger. For now, users can send their notes to OneNote and Evernote manually via PDF. A company spokesperson said those abilities will be coming in future versions of the app. Some other features, like the ability to organize snippets of text via tags and favorites, are also absent from the preview. For now, those abilities are missing from the Android app. In addition to the digital version that is stored on your phone, last year a software update gave users the ability to automatically save their notes to OneNote and Evernote. One of the main benefits of Livescribe is that your notes are always within reach. But it is the Livescribe 3, released in 2013, that offers the most complete functionality thanks to its integration with iOS, and now, Android. A model released in 2012, known as Sky, offered direct syncing with Evernote. An early model, known as the Echo, is a stand-alone smartpen that connects via USB to your computer. The notes and audio can then be accessed from anywhere via the smartphone apps or an internet connection if a user has backed up his or her notes to the cloud. Livescribe is unique from competitors like the Logitech io2 or the Wacom Inkling in that it also offers the ability to synchronize an audio recording with the written text or pictures. Instead of writing out notes and retyping them, or sketching a drawing and then scanning it, smartpen users simultaneously create a digital representation of their thoughts as they write or draw on paper. Like other smartpens, Livescribe bridges the digital universe and the world of pen and paper. But Livescribe may be about to enjoy a boost in popularity thanks to a new Android app, released this week in preview mode in the United States, Australia and New Zealand, that will introduce the smartpens to a whole new audience. Some would-be users abandoned them after trying earlier versions with limited functionality and then failed to return as the pens steadily improved. The Livescribe smartpens caught on slowly.
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