We recently had to work through this problem. While are situation may be somewhat different than yours, maybe some of what we learned will be helpful.
We needed a solution for our warehouse workers when they are walking around or on a forklift. With our legacy warehouse management system we had used ruggedized windows mobile handhelds. We replaced this system with Dynamics AX and needed something for the warehouse workers to use.
We first tried a couple different Windows tablets. We quickly came to the conclusion that we needed something different than the standard Dynamics AX windows client. I have nothing against the Dynamics AX client, however it is a desktop application intended to be used on a desktop with a large monitor, a keyboard, and a mouse. It is not designed to be used on a small touch screen device, and in my opinion trying to use it that way will make for a very frustrating experience.
There are a number of companies that make frontend applications for Dynamics AX that are designed specifically for warehousing. These applications are designed to work very nicely on a mobile devices. Or if you have developers available it is not terribly difficult to use the Dynamics AX web services and create your own basic front end. Whatever you do, I would strongly advice that it be web based. Having a web application gives you a lot of freedom on what device you use.
We did a lot of experimenting with devices. We tried some of the ruggedized windows mobile handhelds. They worked, however it is difficult to find a good modern web browser for these devices, and they are fairly expensive. We also looked at iPhones and iPads. We felt the iPhone screen was too small, and we could not find a way to connect a bar code scanner to the iPad that we were happy with. We also tried the Microsoft Surface but felt it was too big.
Ultimately we ended up settling on the Nexus 7 tablet. We picked the Nexus 7 for the following reasons:
• It seemed to be a nice size for mobile use in the warehouse.
• The battery is able to last an entire shift.
• They are inexpensive.
• While they are not a rugged device, if we put them in a rugged case they end up being pretty rugged. And with the price difference between this and a ‘ruggedized’ device we can easily afford to have them break more frequently.
• We were able to find a nice mount for the forklift.
• Using USB OTG we were able to plug our existing bar code scanners into the Nexus 7.
