Oct 22

Written by: Jennifer Hill
10/22/2008 8:16 PM

 

Have y'all heard of this Pulse Smartpen by Livescribe? I saw it in Target for the first time, and I thought it was the neatest thing I'd seen in a while. Upon research, I found that the pen is as good as it looks!

PC World wrote a review on the Pulse Smartpen that I thought was very helpful in our decision. And, as they state, it is technologically advanced.

What is a Pulse Smartpen?

The Pulse Smartpen is a pen that allows you to record voice while writing; after recording, you tap anywhere in your writing, and the Smartpen plays back what you recorded at the time you recorded what you touched. Pretty neat, huh?

The Smartpen, created by Livescribe, uses special dot paper notebooks. At the bottom of each page there are "control" images. These images perform a specified action when you tap them with the pen. I'll describe the functions in a minute. Inside each cover of the included dot paper notebook, are other controls that also react when the Smartpen is tapped against them.

Smartpen Controls

On the inside cover of the Smartpen notebook, there is a calculator (including financial functions, statistical functions and scientific functions), a status box, a settings box and a printed keyboard.

So what do each of the "boxes" do? The calculator is pretty self-explanatory. You tap the Smartpen on the key you want to press. The numbers and result show up on the Smartpen screen.

The status box has 4 options: Time, Date, Battery and Storage. Obviously, when you tap either "Time" or "Date", the time or date is displayed on the Smartpen. To check the battery level of your Smartpen, you would tap "Battery". An icon will appear on the Smartpen indicating its battery level. The "Storage" option will display how much storage the Smartpen has free. The settings box is where you can set the date and time, set your Smartpen's display settings, and set advanced audio options, such as menu voice, sound quality and microphone sensitivity. When I tried the keyboard (wondering why I would ever need this on the Smartpen??) it said that this feature will be coming soon. So, I guess I will have to wait until they make it available! **just had a thought...it may be available on their website, I haven't checked that yet!**

Pulse Smartpen Interactive Demo Card

Also included in the Pulse Smartpen is an interactive demo card. On the front, are 2 sample "movies" and some sample sound. The "movies" are kind of tacky, and I'm not sure why Livescribe decided to create them.

On the other side are a couple of neat features too. There is a mini translator demo. You click on the translation you want: English -> Arabic; English -> Mandarin; English -> Spanish; and English -> Swedish. Cute, but a little weird; there is a limited selection of words, such as "hello", "goodbye", "beer"...but like I said, it was really neat.

The final demo on the Smartpen demo card is the paper piano. You can draw a keyboard on any Livescribe dot paper, write two menu items, "I" and "R", and you're good to go! Keep in mind it's a mini keyboard, in that you only have 8 keys. You can't play much, but there is a nice selection of instruments and rhythms to choose from. Just tap "I" to change instruments, and "R" to change the rhythm in the background.

Recording with the Pulse Smartpen

What haven't we covered? Oh yes, the recording section. The Pulse Smartpen has a microphone in the pen itself, and in the included headphones. The microphones in the headphones (ear bud variety) allow you to record sound in a lecture hall as well as a smaller room.

To begin recording, tap the "record" icon on the bottom of the Livescribe notebook page. There are icons you can tap to pause or stop the recording.

Speaking of page controls, I haven't discussed that aspect of the Pulse Smartpen to you. Although the Smartpen does use actual ink to write with, you do have to use the Livescribe notebooks in order to work all the features that...well, that make it a Smartpen. On the bottom of each page of the Livescribe notebook is a menubar. Here you can control your recording (like a VCR) jump around (like on a DVD player) or adjust the volume and playback speed (yeah, you can make yourself sound like a chipmunk! LOL).

Other Features of the Pulse Smartpen

I haven't even gone into any of the other features available. You can install the synch software on your computer and upload the contents of your pen. There are also other features downloadable on the Livescribe website.

Smartpen Comments, Opinions?

If any of y'all have used the Pulse Smartpen, I would love to hear from you! Did you like it? What do you use your Smartpen for?

 

Tags: