At GPSWorld.com in the Defense / Warfighter category, Don Jewell posted a very nice review of the Trimble Yuma Rugged Tablet PC. Jewell is a 30-yr veteran of the Air Force, involved in GPS systems virtually from their inception and currently a consultant for the government on various technical advisory boards for the Air Force and the Defense Scientific Advisory Board. (Photo from GPSWorld.com)
Everything I’ve read about the Yuma so far sounds pretty awesome. It’s got all the tech buzz words crammed onto it’s little 2.5-lb form factor, like GPS, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, two cameras (one forward facing, one rear facing) and a solid state hard drive all contained in a dust-proof, water-proof, extreme temperature tolerant case. Of course it will set you back nearly $4k, but it’s not too hard to see why the Military and first responders are looking at the Yuma for mission critical computing.
But I think it will see much use beyond these obvious field applications. For example GIS and perhaps even geotechnical and geological professionals may find uses for the machine. Field mapping, interfacing with well dataloggers or deformation monitoring instruments or perhaps just logging soil borings. But I can also see various municipal agencies using this to track infrastructure such as manhole locations, bridge inspection info and even more.