Things have changed since I went to high school and college. Back in the day—and I’m aging myself here—students basically needed only a Trapper Keeper, a ruler and a calculator.
Today, everything is high-tech—and that goes for both high school and college kids. Here are the latest and greatest devices that will make school a breeze.
E-reader:
Textbooks are notoriously heavy, and if your kid is carrying a load of them from class to class, he’s likely to get a backache.
Amazon’s popular e-ink reader, the Kindle ($69 for the Wi-Fi version from Amazon), is affordable, plus Amazon has a Kindle Textbook Rental program that allows him access to his annotations even after the rental expires. (Get up to 40% off electronics at Amazon.)
Tablet:
A tablet is useful for studying, browsing the Web and reading (as with the Kindle, students can read books or magazines on a tablet and download the free Kindle app if they’re not using Amazon’s tablet, the Kindle Fire).
And it goes without saying that your child can also stream TV shows and movies on the device. Choose from one of the three smallest and most affordable tablets: the Kindle Fire ($159 at Amazon), iPad Mini (starting at $329 at Apple) or Nexus 7 (starting at $199 at Google Play). (Through September 6, students can get a $50 gift card on any iPad purchase at Apple.)
Laptop:
If your kid is in college or high school, she is going to need something to type all those term papers on. A basic laptop doesn’t have to be really heavy or expensive. The Netbook is basically dead, but that doesn’t mean your wallet needs to be empty.
CNET recommends the Acer Aspire M5-481PT ($635 at Overstock.com) and the Samsung Chromebook ($249 at Google Play). The former is a full-fledged laptop with a Windows 8 operating system replete with a touchscreen. The latter is a stripped-down Chromebook with no hard drive (all data is created and saved on Google’s cloud).
This might work if your child only needs to surf the Web, write on Google Docs and send emails, but the Chromebook won’t work for someone needing more extensive photo-editing or video-editing software. (Enjoy free shipping on orders over $50 at Overstock.com.)
See the rest of the story at Business Insider