[hyde01]

I am thinking of buying winBook or similar tablet with windows and full USB port but I am concerned about longevity of the battery with HTPC running/charging constantly, and whether it can handle the heat.

Did anyone try using a windows tablet like surface, etc with full windows as their HTPC?

[Ned Scott]

I bought a WinBook TW700 a few months back because it was on a really awesome sale for $60. It has an HDMI port, USB port, and all of that. A weak little Intel ATOM processor, but it was more than enough to run Kodi. Even on Windows, it's one of the best little HTPCs I've bought. I was really surprised by it. I've never had any heat problems, using the tablet by itself or as an HTPC connected to an external HDMI display.

The battery in the cheap tablets aren't great, but they're not horrible either. I haven't had mine always hooked up to a TV, but I doubt it would be a major impact to the battery life for HTPC usage vs any other common tablet usage.

Windows 8.1 sucks as a tablet OS. It's not entirely horrible, but it's like Microsoft forgot to finish making touch-friendly screens for all of the settings. For Kodi this really isn't a concern, but it does help explain why these tablets are so cheap. It's also not a concern if you just need a cheap x86 machine with Windows, so long as touch isn't your only interface.

It's probably more accurate to think of these things as Windows netbooks. You can do all of the things you normally can do with a Windows portable, like disable the internal display, use a USB ethernet adapter, use USB hubs, work with bluetooth keyboards and mice (or a fire TV bluetooth remote control), or even install a linux-based OS. It can really come in handy to be able to run the larger library of x86 programs out there, even if you only intended to use Kodi.

I would actually recommend this kind of thing above most of the Android options out there, assuming people don't need something like a remote-control friendly Netflix client. If you're okay with using a mouse or airmouse, the Winbooks will still do Netflix and Amazon video services just fine.

A lot of people don't consider them because they think "I don't want a tablet" or "I don't need another tablet". However, at the under $100 prices that a lot of Windows tablets are being sold at, you can just pretend that it doesn't actually have a screen. Put black tape over it, if you must. A 7 inch model is about the same size or smaller than some of the ARM boxes out there.

If you're not bothered by the internal display, then you can also use it when someone else is watching TV, or set it up as an extended display by putting Kodi on HDMI, and a web UI remote on the internal display. You could have the tablet display the current movie poster, or build it into the wall for a "star trek" like interface to control the HTPC or maybe the room lights :D

[hyde01]

I was thinking more like a permanent use of the tablet, and only when I am on the go, I'd just undock remove and leave.
I just received a UnBranded 10" tablet (Best Buy Brand) and I realized it had only one USB port which is also shared with charging function, so I was thinking if I should just go with WinBook instead of getting something like HP Stream.