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You are here: Home / Pre Departure / Packing Guides / What Tech Gadgets should you take travelling with you?

What Tech Gadgets should you take travelling with you?

June 22, 2013 by Travelbllgr 11 Comments

Tablet

We bought the Google nexus 7 literally at the airport as we flew out – it hadn’t been a planned purchase, but I’d received a last minute thank you bonus from work, so we thought we’d spend it on this! We ‘ummed’ and ‘arred’ before purchasing – do we really need it? Isn’t it just another thing to get stolen? However it turned out to be an excellent purchase. We used it constantly throughout our trip – most places had wi-fi and on the nexus we could book our next hostel in the time it would normally take me to power up my netbook.

In particular we found it useful for: skype, booking accommodation and showing our booking confirmation (rather than printing), quickly checking emails, Google maps, Facebook, currency converter and language apps.

Google Nexus 7 Tablet
Google Nexus Tablet by Gene Wilburn @ Flickr

Netbook

We took an Asus eee travelling with us due to its compact size and light weight. However, if it wasn’t for me – travel blogging – then we wouldn’t have needed this due to having our tablet. I tended to use the netbook whilst Ben used the tablet, I’d be writing my blogs whilst he’d be researching our next destination on the tablet. I quickly out grew the little netbook though as I found it very slow to use and editing videos on it was impossible, so I can certainly understand why people splash out and buy a MacBook. I persevered though (mostly due to lack of money) and my netbook stayed with me throughout my recent 6 month trip.

A netbook (or if you have the cash – MacBook Air) would be useful for: those whom need to type i.e. keeping a blog, writing to family and friends often – although it is also useful for watching movies on long bus / train journeys saved on a portable media device.

Jen on netbook - Thailand
Ben was a netbook widower

Portable Hard Drive

We bought a 500gb hard drive to put all our photos on when our memory cards got full. We didn’t use it as a backup as such, but a sole storage device. We tried backing up to dropbox / google drive, however due to the file size of each photo, our thousands of photos, together with the not so superfast internet speed in most countries we visited – it was impossible to do so. You can see why then we clung onto our portable hard drive for dear life – we did not want to lose a single photo we had taken. Before we left on our trip we also loaded our portable hard drive with music and movies that we could play through our netbook – the movies were great on long bus / train journeys.

I’d thoroughly recommend taking a portable hard drive with you – although I wouldn’t recommend using it as your ONE AND ONLY photo backup!

Portable Hard Drive
Portable Hard Drive by Iomega Corporation @ Flickr

Camera

We took a small digital camera with us as well as a ‘bridge’ camera (bridge cameras are half way between an SLR and a pocket camera). We decided to take both with us as we thought we may use the small camera in less safe areas, as it would stand out less, and it wasn’t worth as much to us if it got stolen. However, having a bridge camera would mean better quality photographs.

On the road however we used our bridge camera all the time and our pocket camera got no use whatsoever (we actually ended up posting it back home!)

The bridge camera we used was a Sony Cyber-shot DSC-HX200V. We thought it was fantastic – it produced awesome quality photographs, with lots of different options/modes, but just didn’t give the flexibility of changing the lens. This wasn’t a problem for us as we didn’t really want to add to the weight in our bags with different lenses.

Mobile / Smart Phone

We sold our smart phones before we left the UK due to the expensive data roaming charges, and also due to the fact we had a Google nexus tablet to connect to wi-fi.

We did however take two cheap mobiles for emergency situations or in case we got separated from each other. At first, we carried the mobiles around in our daypacks, but we found that we didn’t use them at all and we were forgetting to charge them up. We somehow managed to lose one mobile on our trip (goodness knows where!), and we posted the other one back home due to lack of use.

If you do want to take a smartphone with you then I’d recommended the Samsung Galaxy range of phones. I bought the Samsung Galaxy S3 as soon as I got back to the UK and it is extremely fast and easy to navigate, it operates on android – providing access to a huge range of free apps, and it has a great quality back camera, as well as front camera for those Skype video calls.

Samsung Galaxy S3
Samsung Galaxy S3 by MarkusBaumgartner @ Flickr

iPod

We considered taking our iPod’s, however we were already taking a lot of electricals away with us and decided to instead load some music on our portable hard drive as well as our tablet, so we could listen to music if we wanted.

So if you’re thinking of taking an iPod, it probably is worth taking, unless you have other devices on which to listen to music.

Filed Under: Packing Guides, Pre Departure Tagged With: camera, electricals, gadgets, ipod, netbook, Packing, tablet, tech, Travel, travelling

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Comments

  1. Sam says

    June 22, 2013 at 9:58 pm

    We travel with a smart phone (just one between the two of us), but we don’t use a UK sim and get charged for roaming. Instead, we buy local sims and use those (mostly for 3G data, which has been surprisingly cheap in South America so far). The only slight inconvenience is having to cut the sim down to fit in to the mini-sim slot, but after a few goes, we’ve become pretty good at it!

    Reply
    • Travelbllgr says

      June 23, 2013 at 6:16 pm

      Thanks for the tip Sam 🙂

      Reply
  2. Casi @HeyNoobz says

    June 25, 2013 at 6:02 am

    My husband and I each brought smart phones, and iPhone 5 for me and a Nexus 4 for him. We have found the iPhone 5 to be the easiest to find local SIM cards for (usually we don’t even have to cut it as they have nano SIMs ready to go most places in SEA. We also use our MacBooks (air for me, pro for him) a lot. And the Kindle paper white has been invaluable on long bus/train/plane rides. We didn’t bring a camera other than our phones. We find the iPhone 5 takes better photos than the Nexus, but I do wish sometimes that I had my DSLR. Then I remind myself that it would be just one more big expensive thing for us to carry.
    Casi @HeyNoobz recently posted..Part 3: Ubud Edition – Of Why You Should Immediately Empty Your Bank Account And Go To Bali Right NowMy Profile

    Reply
  3. Shane Todd says

    June 26, 2013 at 1:34 pm

    I personally can’t leave the country without my Ipad and Netbook!!!

    Reply
  4. Digital Nomads says

    June 27, 2013 at 7:49 pm

    Great list, I think all travelers share the same mindset when it comes to tech gears!

    We just renewed part of our gears and added 2 portable hard drives each for 1 TB for photo backups, it turned out that we took 1000s of photos in each destination e.g. Galapagos 6000 photos!

    We also bought 2 cases (water/shock proof) http://amzn.to/YR3VzI WD Nomad Rugged Case.
    Digital Nomads recently posted..On the Road Expenses and Statistics, Month TenMy Profile

    Reply
    • Travelbllgr says

      June 27, 2013 at 9:20 pm

      The waterproof/shockproof case is an excellent suggestion – very sensible! Thanks

      Reply
  5. Michelle says

    June 28, 2013 at 2:20 am

    Great post! I love having my iphone with me….I use it as my camera, for listening to music, checking email, skype….it’s great!!
    Michelle recently posted..69 Fun Facts about BrazilMy Profile

    Reply
    • Travelbllgr says

      June 28, 2013 at 12:19 pm

      Yes I must admit I missed travelling with a smartphone and being able to quickly take pictures and upload them to instagram / twitter!

      Reply
  6. kirsty says

    July 15, 2013 at 7:55 pm

    I would say from experience to get a mac book if you can afford it. We had a netbook and it only lasted 8 months! It’s a great little thing to carry around but if you want to edit photos etc its not very good.
    If you are not a blogger though I would recommend just taking a tablet or a phone only.
    kirsty recently posted..Random Traveller #91 with Agness & Cez of eTrampingMy Profile

    Reply
  7. Shawna says

    July 16, 2013 at 12:22 pm

    Thanks for sharing your stash! It’s always nice to see what other people bring along with them. It helps me judge were I’m at on the spectrum. 🙂 I tend to carry a lot of photo equipment with me, much to the dismay of my husband, not all of it expensive, but hey, I like options. I’ve been bouncing around the idea of a “bridge” camera too, just for times when I know bringing a big DSLR will be a hassle.

    Reply
    • Travelbllgr says

      July 17, 2013 at 7:57 am

      Yes it’s always good to see what other people take away with them – especially tech gadgets!

      Reply

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