Dane-Elec DA-DP1-01GC5-R Z-PEN Wireless USB Digital Pen

[Z]-Pe[n] Wireless USB Digital Pen / B00[13]JHJWE

I bought this [Z]-Pen because I wanted a way to quickly and easily convert handwritten notes into computer text that could be easily copied into word-processing programs. [A] quick look online told me that handwriting recognition for [s]canned documents just isn't "there" yet, but that if you can save all the pen stroke information, th[e]n transforming the writing into computer text becomes much [s]impler. My other major requirements was that I didn't want to spend money on special paper (expensive over time[;] a major commitment to the [m]anufacturer; I like the pap[er] already buy and use), and I wanted a pen that could be easily refilled with fresh ink as needed.

The [Z]-Pen fit all my requirements, and it definitely works, but I have to admit that it took a LONG time to get to that point.

First off, fresh out of the box, you'll want to open the pen[']s battery case and pull out the battery tab. My model came with extra batteries loose in the box; they're pretty common watch button batteries that you can get replacements for at superstores. The battery inside the re[c]eiver, however, gave [m]e some trouble initially, the receiver wouldn't charge for me. To charge the receiver, you plug it into a computer [U]SB Port and the red power light is supposed to blink. It wouldn't blink for me, though, so I wrote the Dane-E[l]ec support team (link below in the comments), and they suggested that I change the receiver battery the receiver has a single AAA battery that you can replace if you remove the four screws on the back. Once I replaced the receiver ba[ttery], it wo[rked]d like a charm, but it would [hav]e been nice if this had been [m]entioned somewhere in the user [m]anuals that come with the pen!

Secondly, the pen comes with a blue ink insert. I'm kind of an ink snob and I do not like blue ink, so I immediately purchased about seven different brands of ballpoint []pen refills to [t]ry them out. The pen takes "mini" ballpoint pen refills one of the brands I tried was a Schmidt Refill Pack that can be purchased here on Amazon. Replacing the insert is easy grab the tip with your fingers or your teeth, and gently pull; stick the replacement in with your fingers. I was disappointed that all of the seven brands I tried wrote basically the same I really miss my [r]o[lle]rball pens, and I feel like I have [to] really press down with this pen, but it doesn't really matter since the intent is to get the writing onto the computer, not the paper. But I still [m]i[]ss my rollerballs.

Once you're ready to use the pen, it[']s pretty self-explanatory. You clip the receiver to the top of the page and turn it on; then [s]tart writing. The big thing to remember is to not grip or block the clear head of the p[e]n in any way that will [m]uck up your writing. When you get to the end of the page, the [a]ct of unclipping the receiver signals the start of a new page I once forgot to unclip the receiver because I had it resting on the table in front of my notebook, and all my "pages" of notes were superimposed over one another [o]n a single electronic page, because the receiver hadn[']t realized I was turning the page (since [l] wasn't unclipping it each time). I read several reviews that said that the tops and bottoms of the pages don't register, but I never really had trouble with that. ([O]f course, I use [A]4 size paper mostly, so I can't speak for larger sheets of paper.)

All this is great, but the pen is only as good as its conversion software, right? I had a spot of trouble with that, too, because you're supposed to register for the software, and whoops! the registration site seems to be offline, so it was back to the help boards again. [A]t least they responded to me within 24 hours, and they got me a registration number, so al[l]'[s] well that ends well. The MyNotes software that comes with the pen can be used right away, or you can write out some scripted notes in your [o]wn handwriting to ''[]train" it to understand your writing better. I went ahead and went through the entire training program and then decided, as a demonstration, to write out this entire review. Mistakes/Corrections are noted with square brackets, and seem to be largely limited to [c]apitilizatio[n] [iss]ues (A, M, S, etc.) and letters that aren't a single [c]ontinuous stroke (for instance, "letters" where I cross the two t's at the end, with a single stroke). [As] you [can see], the software is [n]ot perfect, but most of the errors can be caught with a spell-checker.

All in all, l['m] pretty happy with my [Z]-Pen and I['m] glad I got it. It does the job (albeit imperfectly[)], it meets my requirements, and outside of the cheap ink refills it's not a continuing investment or cost. Getting it set up was time-consuming, but not too bad, and the help forum was very responsive. My biggest complaints are that (a) the receiver is more bulky than [I] had first realized (I'm getting a custom notebook bag made specifically to accommodate it, actually) and (b) the ballpoint pen writing is NOT comfortable or smooth compared to the roll[er]ball pen writing that I['m] used to. [S]eriously, if anyone knows of a rollerball insert that will work with this p[en], [*]please* drop me a link, because I will happily try it [o]ut. Overall, it[']s a small complaint, though[,] and worth it to avoid tedious typing out of my notes at the end of the day.

[~] Ana M[ar]do[ll]

I have been anticipating this product for about a year, so I was probably set up for the mild disappointment I experienced when it arrived. The early user review I read was almost certainly a plant since it pretty much was a rewording of the promotional materials preceding the product's release. For sure, the pen is pretty "cool" and quite a conversation piece, but there are a few drawbacks that are evident to me.

First, you have to hunt around for the electronic documentation since there are no printed instructions at all. That's not impossible, but somewhat annoying, especially when the documentation you do find is not all that clear. With a little time it can all be figured out, but it's certainly not plug and play out of the box. That brings us to the second issue, actually using it.

Very often the "recorder" doesn't start when the pen starts to move, so the resulting image (words or hand drawn graphics) has a lot of blank or missing parts. Slowing down a great deal helps a little, but still there are quite a few gaps. And slowing down to check the little light while taking notes during a presentation defeats the purpose of the thing anyway.

Finally, the resulting proprietary file which can only be exported through the cumbersome pdf format rather than the easily and widely used jpg format is very inconvenient. And the character recognition is actually sort of humorous in its inaccuracies. I suppose if I took the time to carefully print each number and letter the accuracy would improve, but again, that's not notetaking as it is usually performed.

I guess it's amazing that the thing works at all, but it's still just a little disappointing. I'll hang on to it because it's fun to have and show people, but it's probably easier just to scan the notes.

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Practically speaking, this is a one or two star product. I gave them 3 stars because it is a product in a quite new market with a reasonable price. If you think it's a cool toy, buy it. If you need it to do serious work next week, don't buy it.

Here's the quick summary:

BOTTOM LINE:

The product is basically good, but the tendency of the receiver to drop information is a fatal flaw to practical use. The conditions under which information gets lost are detailed below.

PRO:

Good feature set. Good price point. Comes with lots of nice software stored conveniently on the receiver/flash drive. Writes on any paper. Uses common ink cartridges (and batteries, sort of see below). MyScript notes software does surprisingly well at handwriting-to-text conversion.

CON:

Receiver is finicky; it can drop entire recording sessions, or parts of a page, even though the activity LED is flashing correctly. Top 20% of page is usually not recorded at all. Page turning is cumbersome. Careful placement of the receiver is important. Pen component is cheaply made. No off switch (so you need to remove batteries to save power). Resolution can be poor, especially near the bottom of a page. Limited number of output formats, and saved PDFs are not efficient (they are bigger than equivalent SVG files containing the pen lines).

In more detail:

I was pleased that the pen and software were easy to set up and use. I was also pleased that the pen viewer supports Linux and Mac, that MyScript Notes software was easy to register, and that MyScript works nicely, and sufficiently quickly, in VMWare Fusion Windows running on my first gen MacBook Pro. I was also pleased that the pen does what it says it does: it digitized my first few handwriting samples. Yay!

I was not pleased with the pen itself. I am sort of a pen snob, and usually write with a Namiki fountain pen. This pen feels like cheap plastic junk, and writes like the free ballpoints you get at conventions. To be fair, my Namiki and the zPen have about the same price, and the Namiki doesn't do any digital tricks (but oh man does it ever write nice!). One nice thing about the pen is that it takes common refills of the sort used by most multifunction pens, and some of these are pretty nice for ball points. Pilot PhD Multi refills and Fischer pressurized "universal" refills both fit, and write better than the included refill.

As a previous reviewer mentioned, there is no off switch on the pen, and so once you take out the little plastic isolator, it may drain your watch batteries in a hurry. This is annoying, but not fatal, since you can pull one of the batteries out and store it in the receiver cap to save power. Also, although I was not able to find the included GP393 batteries in my local store, I found that size 13 "zinc/air" hearing aid batteries fit, and work, just fine. I got an 8-pack of these at my local CVS pharmacy for $6. I live Bozeman MT (USA), which is certainly no shopping paradise, so when I can find what I need at the drug store across the street, I call that "easy to find". The receiver has an onboard rechargeable battery that charges via USB. Annoyingly, it will only charge when connected to a computer, so you can't use an AC->USB adapter (for example the Palm, Griffin, or Apple models) to charge it.

I tested the pen in a number of configurations. I quickly found out that there is a very large "dead zone" near the receiver. The manual says that within 1 inch of the receiver signal quality may be poor. I beg to differ. Within 4 inches of the receiver, signal quality may be entirely absent. I tried drawing a grid of lines on many types of paper, and almost every time the digitized result had a 3"-4" hemi-circle of missing lines centered on the receiver. I got my best results using an A5 notebook, and rather than clipping the receiver to the book, I just set it about 3 inches above the top of the page, at the same horizontal level (stacking it on top of my iPod touch worked well :). When writing this way, though, be careful not to move the notebook!

I did my best to have very careful handwriting, but I shouldn't have tried so hard. The resolution of the digitizer is not that great, and it gets worse farther from the receiver. By the bottom line of my notebook, my digital text looks like it was written by a guy with Parkinson's disease, even though the ink text looks fine. In the end I decided that, on an 8.5x11 college ruled pad (with the receiver set at the top of the pad), I could start writing 3.5" from the top, stop writing 2" from the bottom, and the intervening text digitized OK. Be careful that the receiver is oriented in exactly the same horizontal plane as your paper, or it won't work.

Well, except when it didn't record at all. I have had half a dozen experiences where I turn the receiver on, it flashes, then becomes steady as normal, I write, and the "pen down" LED turns on and off as normal, and then when I plug the receiver into the computer, there is a blank note file, and all my writing is lost.

Changing pages requires compressing the spring clip on the receiver. This seems to work OK, but you have to remember to do it, even though you can't have actually clipped the receiver to your paper if you expect the digitizer to work.

Be careful of your hand posture. If you grip too low, curl your hand around, or put your weak hand above the pen, it will block the digitizer.

Basically, all these constraints make the process of hand-writing a lot less pretty, and I feel like I should just type. There is, however, one redeeming merit: MyScript Notes. I hate Windows-only software on principal, and I don't tend to like non-open-source ware either. Despite this, I think MyScript is a fine program. It isn't perfect, especially if you have small writing, sloppy writing, writing with an unusual stroke sequence, or too little separation between words. However, if you write carefully, it can be 95% accurate in converting cursive script to digital text. That's a hard problem, and having usable accuracy at it is a major achievement. Kudos to MyScript.

Note that MyScript does care about the order of pen strokes. I can get a nice SVG file by tracing (e.g. with Illustrator or InkScape) a scan of a page, but this can't be recognized. For one thing, the SVG format MyScript understands is the Anoto format, and tracing with InkScape doesn't generate compliant SVG, but even if you convert it, without the correct stroke order, recognition doesn't work.

Anyway, I've now written a few dozen pages of fiction with the zPen, and put them in my computer. I can definitely go faster by writing normal ink with my Namiki and transcribing later with my keyboard, but it was a cool experience to see my writing turn into ascii automatically, hence the 3 stars.

I haven't tested an Anoto technology pen (eg the LiveScribe Pulse), but I bet they are much more reliable and accurate. If you really need the thing to work on demand, I'd try that solution, and just live with buying special paper. Alternately, go old school and use real live ink. If you do that, I suggest unlined Moleskin softcover notebooks and a Namiki Vanishing Point fountain pen running J Herbin ink. There's nothing in the digital wold that compares. Oh, and when you transcribe, use a dvorak layout keyboard :)

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Updated Review: (I tried to update from 4 to 5 stars but it won't let me)

I left a review a few months ago saying, among other things, that I had trouble changing the ink cartridge. Since then some people have emailed me asking if I figured it out, so I think its time to give an update. I did manage to change the ink cartridge-it was stuck at first, but if you pull on the tip of the ink cartridge with tweezers it should come out. After I got it out the first time it was easier to do with fingernails, but you have to get a good grip on it.

I have been using the Zpen for the past several weeks to take notes in class, and it works very well. I see some people saying its finicky but I haven't noticed that very much. As long as I stay in the main area of the paper (not above the clip thing, for instance) it works great. I had a few times when I went too far out to the edge of the paper or to the side of the clip part, and it didn't sense my handwriting very accurately but I have learned to stay within the lined part of a piece of A4 paper (normal notebook paper for americans) and it works very well. I bought a bunch of ink cartridge and battery refills so that if one runs out during class I can replace it right away. I do have to remember to charge it every night because I am using it for 3-4 hours of notetaking each day. I'm not sure exactly how long it lasts, I'd say maybe somewhere between 4-6 hours of solid notetaking it runs out of batteries.

The pen is very useful to me, because I am a mathematics grad student, and it is essentially impossible to type equations quickly enough to take notes on a computer in a math class. Because of that, everyone still uses paper and pen (or tablet PCs, but those are very expensive). I use my Zpen to take notes in all of my math classes and have a digital copy later, and I really like it. It works surprisingly well-when I bought it I was suspicious that the ultrasound and infared technology would actually work, but it does very well. Also, its nice that I do have a physical copy of my notes as well, so if anything goes wrong I can scan them later. I've heard of some people having their tablet PC crash during class and losing all their notes.

Another good thing about this pen vs other digital pens is that it is compatible with a Mac (the handwriting recognition software is not, but the part that gives you the images of what you wrote is). As of summer 2008 when I bought this one, the Zpen was the only digital pen I could find that would work with a Mac.

I don't have much to say about the handwriting recognition software, because I haven't been using it. I tested it once on a PC and it works fine on normal writing but it can't make anything of my math notes, and I wouldn't expect it to. The equations turn into gibberish. It would be awesome if someone invented software that could read my math notes and turn them into nicely typed up equations, but I'm not holding my breath.

I also really like that the peninkviewer software is on the clip thing so you can use it on any mac without preinstalling anything.

--Original Review:

This product works perfectly as advertised. I bought it for taking notes in my graduate math courses which are about to start, so so far I have only tested it a few times, but it seems to work great. I like how the software is on the device itself so you don't have to worry about which computer to use.

I do have one question though. I have not been able to figure out how to change the ink cartridge. The directions are useless-they literally have a drawing of the end of the pen with fingers next to it. I'm afraid to force it becuase I don't want to break the pen or ruin the pressure sensitivity. (See update above)

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The pen works as advertised. Right out of the box, I got it to recognize a simple sentence. It seems to have trouble when I write less neatly. You can't go back and fix up an error, it gets confused.

The product is not going to win any awards for text conversion, but for those of us who misplace our notes, it serves a need. Both Dane-Elec and the people who make MyScript Notes are helpful. When I asked, Vision Objects gave me a free upgrade to their MyScript software. Dane-Elec sent me a link to upgrade PenInkViewer. Their Note Search software is still in beta and I won't pass judgment at this time. In all I am happy, but if you use a scanner religiously, it might work better for you.