What to buy - tablet or notebook?

Hello to anyone who might be able to help me! I am looking for something 'smalland lightweight' - tablet or notebook - that I can use to email, skype, and use microsoft office on. I want to be able to carry it easily around with me in my bag and use it to work on and keep in touch with people when away from home/work eg on holiday, on a training course. I have tried to read up on this myself but am really confused as to what would best suit my needs. I dont want to spend more than £300 if possible. Many thanks. Ali

For £300 you are limited in regards to a tablet. First question you need to ask yourself is which operating system do you want or need...

tablets do have enough oomph to do what your after, have a look at the asus transformer range, they transform into netbooks with high quality keyboards which double as a second battery, thye also come in windows rt and android, a tablet by itssellf can be a pain to type on so any asus transformer... i use the the asus transformer prime, the ipad2 beater on all fronts, i say that as a mac only user..

May I jump into this discussion. I've just got home from visiting new great-grandchildren. My needs are similar to the original request - but I am keen to share photos. I use windows 7 and have a Samsung Galaxy mini. Need to travel light, but need a decent keyboard. etc - look forward to hearing more. I'm not familiar with asus transformer prime but will try to find out more. Thanks - Dorothy

transformer prime is android os, front facing cam is 8mp, and extremely good with full 1080p video, screen is 1280/800, 16-9 format and so bright its usable in full sunshine. however, its only flaw is the full metal case, the wifi is about 15% weaker, and gps effectively does not work, asus provided a click on bar to make it work. i would recommend the transformer tf700 and tf 300, and the vivo for windows rt, all of which are similar spec to the prime but slightly cheaper, the keyboard itself is a chicklet key one, superior to any netbook i tested bar none, i'm not a touch typist but i am a macbook pro user and i am delighted with the typing experience on the prime tf201, keyboard also has a full size usb and a second full size memory card slot 'tablet itself has a microsd card slot' the trackpad on the prime is multitouch and very usable, total weight of tab and keyboard is 2.6lbs, the battery life is around 18 hours, thats 18 hours of use from videos to browsing to photoediting with pixlr express, a great free app.
i have never been able to run battery down to below 10%, thats in 1 years ownership, the prime uses the tegra 3 processor, it is 1.3ghz quad core 'actually 5 cores' and provides a silky smooth fast experience, the free apps for android are incredible, via the google playstore you can relax about safety etc..android is now up to 4.1.1, called jellybean os, so as good as your galaxy mini is, i have the galaxy ace myself, you can expect a similar but more expansive compuetr like experience, sharing photos is as simple as two clicks, the front camera on the prime is superb, 8mp stills are truly outstanding in all conditions, the 1080p video mode can be twitchy, which it also is on my £2000 macbook pro, but the 720p video is beyond belief, smooth detailed . iheartily recommend these tablets and keyboards, having used this for a year, i find it hard to see why all tablets didnt go down this road, instead opting for poorish keyboards and missing the way forward all together.

Hi Zardon...I want to use Windows as my operating system!

Thanks Alan - that all sounds like it answers my question! I will do some looking into what you recommended...its tricky when you know what you want to do but dont know or ubnserstand fully the technical terminology etc!

Hi Alison, i m a professional singer of 45 yrs,not a pc whizz by these guy's stanards, i needed a platform for using backing trax and storing lyrics. It also had to be reliable and portable, i use the Archos 10" netbook, small enough to carry about, plenty of storage space, 3 usb and windows xp, i find it xlnt. Hope this is some use to you.

Thanks Pauline...thats really helpful. Will get looking it up! Alison