Best Keyboard Alternatives: Wacom Bamboo, Surface Pen, Dragon Home, Tap

I tested the voice-recognition system Dragon Home 15, the pen input of the Microsoft Surface Pro 6, the Livescribe Aegir smart pen, the Wacom Bamboo Folio smartpad holder, and the hand-mounted Tap.So, do any of these products really replace the keyboard for me? Add the $70 Microsoft Surface Pen to the $899 Surface Pro 6 laptop running a Windows Ink–enabled program like Microsoft OneNote, and you get a new way to input text: scribbling on the screen. When you are done, you can convert your handwriting to cut-and-pasteable text by selecting it and choosing Ink to Text in the menu.While the handwriting-to-text part of this process worked well, the writing part just didn’t feel right. The Inkspace app can then convert the handwriting into text with a tap.The Folio can use pretty much any paper you want, either single sheets or a notepad. It doesn’t need batteries, as the Folio powers the pen wirelessly and itself has a built-in rechargeable battery.I found that it worked pretty well: My scribbles were faithfully captured and synced over to the software, and the handwriting-to-text conversion was fairly accurate. With the included pen, you can write on it like it's a piece of paper. It feels remarkably authentic and comfortable to those, like me, who were raised on analog paper.A recent update to the Remarkable Tablet's software (a custom version of Linux OS) added the ability to convert handwriting to text on the device itself: Tap on the Text icon at the top of the screen and it converts your scrawl to text.That’s the theory, at least. Like the other pen-based devices, it also works best if you write tidily and cleanly; messy notes and joined-up writing confuse it.