Others say...

"Don't waste your time/money"
I purchased this because I have to do a lot of math online and was hoping I could use this for that purpose. Also I was hoping to be able to use it for taking notes.

So far, I'm not impressed. The pen is a crummy little plastic thing and not very satisfying to use. It is actually very uncomfortable -- particularly when you consider you have to press VERY hard to get your entire note set to be recorded. Talk about writer's cramp!

I'm also disappointed that you can't write on it and have it instantly displayed to the computer interactively. My fault for not understanding the functionality better but I thought this could double as a writing tablet.

I can't speak to the size of the paper since I haven't tried any other size.

In general, a big disappointment and 90 dollars that I would have been better off just setting on fire! Another item destined for Craigslist.

p.s. -- to the reviewer who was wanting handwriting recognition -- my pad did come with a trial version of a package that would convert to text. Of course, that was of very limited use since the stooopid thing failed to capture my handwriting accurately in the first place. But the capability is there...

"Works quite well"
I use this notepad to take notes during meetings. The great advantage to me is that there is an electronic version of my notes that I can file away.

Other reviewers have made adverse comments about product quality -- I have had a good experience. The unit I bought seems well made, and has so far (3 months use) functioned well. Also, the paper pad for this is easily available. Look for the CVS or Mead brand 6x9 writing tablet and it should fit the Digimemo 692 perfectly.

There are three drawbacks you should be aware of:

Sometimes, there are ghost lines, or some words get dropped off. Generally this is not a big issue, but nevertheless, it is an annoyance. It is remedied (for the most part) by holding the pen straight, and using uniform pressure.

It is a digital note taker -- but will require extra software if you want to convert your notes to text. I've not felt the need, but be advised.

The Mini-USB cable's mini-USB end is thinner than the regular mini-USB cable. So if you lose your cable, your choices are to (a) buy a new one from the manufacturer or (b) take a regular mini-USB cable and file off the plastic around the part that goes into the device until it fits in.

With these caveats, the digimemo is a good device for taking notes and preserving an electronic copy of them on your laptop. Paired with software like PDF995, you can easily and inexpensively store all your notes as PDF documents.


"Great Concept - Poor Execution"
This is a wonderful idea, but is apparently before its time or the product designers didn't check with with the paper manufacturers. It is easy to train the system to interpret bad handwriting, but accomplishing that, it is impossible to find replacement paper pads. The only replacement pads I have been able to find are steno pads and these don't have the same page/space productivity as the original paper which comes with the AceCad. Either make replacement pads available or make the writing surface a different size to conform to writing pads that are more readily available.

"Works as advertised - light inexpensive alternative to laptop in the field"
The Digimemo 692 Digital Notepad made sense to me for several reasons; 1) it is cheap - $90 + or - is a small risk to take on a new technology; 2) if you use it and the technology fails, you are left with the ultimate safe, low tech backup - ink notes on paper 3) it is lighter and easier to use when on the move (walking through a building taking notes, or sitting in a meeting where a laptop would be awkward for instance). The main question for me was how well the handwriting recognition could be made to work.

So far I am cautiously pleased. DM works as advertised. The unit is light, the pen comfortable in the hand, and writing is faithfully recorded.. The image on the computer screen is a faithful representation of the page (occasionally small strokes are missed),

The software interface for dumping pages on the PC is acceptable - it could be smoother but works without any glitches or major hassles. Actually, I rarely used it, since most of my uploading is done directly to the Hwr recognition program (more below). It is surprisingly good a recognizing tables as tables/spreadsheets.

For me, this unit would be largely useless without HWR. I found that Myscript does a surprisingly good job of reading my scrawl (it is a scrawl - my handwriting is terrible, I often print more than write, but found it reads script about as well as printing). If you write neatly the whole process is much easier.

Myscript is particularly useful if you 1) use the built in training program (helped some) and 2) create lists of words ("Personal Lexicon") and shorthand conversions ("Auto replacements"). The former is good to aid recognition of specialized and technical terms, names, etc. The latter is the most useful feature, though. With it you can create an entire shorthand ("&" becomes "and" "sy" becomes "Sincerely Yours" etc.). Best of all, I discovered an undocumented feature. Instead of entering shorthands or lexicon words one at a time you can simply open the .txt file ("Autoreplacements.txt" and "lexicon.txt" in the Myscript folder) and enter these wholesale. I now have hundreds. The handwritten "Wed td" at the top of a page comes out as "Wednesday To Do List."

My old Newton learned from corrections, so it became increasingly accurate. Myscript doesn't (I asked - the nice people who answer my emails told me that it is trickier to implement than I suspect). People do learn though, so what happens to me - and I'm sure most people - is that my own style adapts to what the system has shown it can recognize. People are good continual improvement machines.

This is not the ultimate system. The paper size is too small for some uses (unlike some reviewers, though, I have found 6X9 pads easy to find at drug or office supply stores). It would be nice if the system had a video out and/or drawing table functionality. The more expensive Cyberpad takes 8.5" X 11" paper and serves as a tablet, I am told, and the Acecad folks indicated that the next version of Digimemo ("out soon") will also.

The batteries really do last a long time (100 hours as advertised seems about right). It would be nice if the lcd screen on the clipboard did more than show if a page is written or blank, but thast feels like niggling.

This is a very good device but not all people or purposes. This is not for you if you need HWR but aren't willing to spend time making it work. But...if you hate taking out a laptop in meetings or classrooms, if you are disorganized and like having your written notes together in one place, if you need to draw something and shoot it off in an email (the ability to connect to mobile web for this would be a killer app for DM), if you need to take notes while standing or walking and don't want to have to re-type them all, then this may be a great device for you.

"Surprisingly good"
I do agree with previous reviewers that the size is deceiving. That's why I don't give it 5 stars.

The price is right if you also get the handwriting recognition software. With that this device can substitute a tablet PC if your main concern is taking notes in a digital format. The downside is that you still need physical paper but you get what you pay for. You do get the benefit of leaving the tablet safe and sound at your desk.

The best thing for is that the device works like a CF card reader when it connects to the PC. Why is this so good? Not only can I use it for backup purposes but it will also work on my linux machines and should work on apple machines as well. You can't read the notes without the Acecad software but that can be solved with special software like wine, cedega, vmware and win4lin for linux; and parallels and bootcamp for apple machines.