I don’t use my Android tablet as much as I should. Despite reporting on Android hardware for sites like Android Police, my tablet of choice is an iPad. I know, I know, it’s my only Apple device, I swear.
I always like to have an Android tablet on the go for testing purposes, and at the moment it’s the Xiaomi Pad 8. But it spends a lot of time gathering dust when I’m not using it.
Or it did. Recently I found another way to use it to solve a personal problem. For the last few weeks, the Xiaomi Pad has seen daily use as a second screen for my laptop.
Plenty of Android Police writers have tried using a tablet instead of a computer.
We’ve written about how replacing a Windows laptop with an Android tablet was painless, troubles that arose when ditching a laptop for a tablet, and how one writer replaced their desktop monitor with an Android slate.
But I wanted to try something different; my slate wasn’t replacing a laptop, but adding to it.
An Android tablet to solve a problem
Instead of being a problem
I’ve been using two screens on my computer for my entire professional career.
After working full-time in an office that offered a dual-monitor set-up, I became used to it, and ensured I had two when I became a freelance tech writer.
However, I recently moved to a new house, and haven’t been able to set up my PC. For several weeks, I’ve been using a laptop at the dining table to work.
That’s not ideal. As someone used to having two large monitors, having one tiny screen was absolutely frustrating.
How was I going to see all of my tabs at once?
When I was unpacking my assorted tech box, I stumbled upon the Xiaomi tab, which is when I decided it was going to be the reprieve from my problems.
Using Spacedesk to transform my tablet
Getting simple and complicated
There are a few ways to control your PC from your Android device, but doing things in reverse is a little more complicated.
I wanted to use my tablet as a second screen for my laptop, but it wasn’t as simple as plugging it in with a USB cable.
I did a lot of research, and the app that most people recommend for the job is Spacedesk.
This tool, which is available for download on Windows laptops and via the Play Store for Android devices, is designed to let you use secondary devices as secondary displays.
So it was exactly what I needed. I installed the app on my laptop and tablet, and it worked a charm.
I expected to use a USB-C to USB-C cable to connect the devices, but they recognized each other over my home Wi-Fi. Within a minute of installing the apps, my Xiaomi showed me my desktop wallpaper.
It’s worth knowing that Spacedesk is free for a non-commercial private license, but if you’re using it commercially, as part of a business, you must buy a license.
Working around some teething problems
What to know if you follow suit
Problem solved, and article over, right? Not quite — a few quirks occurred during my testing that are worth knowing about.
None of these majorly affected my experience, as evidenced by the fact I’ve been using Spacedesk for weeks now, but it’s worth knowing about.
As you can see in the images, despite the connection being wireless, my dining table workstation quickly became a mess of wires. And it’s (mostly) all because of power.
Using a tablet as a secondary screen means it’s turned on all the time, and I found this drained the power fairly quickly.
So as well as plugging my laptop into mains power to keep it running, I also paired it to my tablet with a USB-C cable to keep everything powered.
There was also some lag between my laptop and the tablet, something that a little pop-up notified me of every time it happened.
It wasn’t a deal-breaker by any means, but it meant I needed to be smart about what I did with this secondary display.
I decided the best use of it would be as a little permanent display for important feeds, like Slack or my email. I don’t need to access these all the time, but dedicating a screen to them meant I wouldn’t miss a notification.
We all know how unreliable Windows notifications can be, so having them visible all the time is the only way to ensure I was in the loop.
One last thing: Often when I’d swipe down on my tablet to see its power, I’d touch the desktop screen and move the mouse over that side.
But sometimes, the cursor would get stuck there, as though I was holding my finger down in the same spot. Moving it away on my laptop trackpad would only drag it away temporarily.
I never worked out a foolproof way of stopping this from happening, beyond avoiding accidental touches as much as possible, so I did that.
Since I began using my tablet to squeeze some extra productivity out of me, I’ve been using it far more than I’d expected; it’s really given the thing an extra lease on life.
It’s also helped back up some of my tablet beliefs. Since this mid-range slate is mainly useful to me as a screen with a battery, a premium Android tablet is totally redundant.
