Asus Transformer Pad Tablet with 2560x1600 to Ship Soon

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"The new ASUS Transformer Pad is perfect for on-the-go entertainment, thanks to a durable metallic design that's just 8.9mm thick and weighs 585g," reads the listing. "A high-quality speaker with ASUS SonicMaster audio technology gives loud, clear sound for music, movies and games, while the 17-hour battery life when docked means the new ASUS Transformer Pad lasts for two full working days between charges."

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Kevin Parrish has over a decade of experience as a writer, editor, and product tester. His work focused on computer hardware, networking equipment, smartphones, tablets, gaming consoles, and other internet-connected devices. His work has appeared in Tom's Hardware, Tom's Guide, Maximum PC, Digital Trends, Android Authority, How-To Geek, Lifewire, and others.

16 Comments Comment from the forums

deftonian

I love ASUS tablets... but I would have expected at least 3-4gb of RAM. I'm not familiar with Tegra 4 either so not sure about that either. The display is the only thing that catches my eye. Will hold out for reviews.
Reply
DarkSable

And yet we can't get high resolution, smaller sized computer monitors... why?

If a $200, 15" tablet can have a 1080p screen, and a $500 tablet like this can have a 1600p screen in a TEN inch screen, why in the world can't we buy a 24" monitor with the same resolution for the same price? It's not that it can't be manufactured, as has beens said before, and there's obviously a market for it.

If nothing else, make a tablet with a decent PPI and an hdmi-in. I guarantee it'll sell like hotcakes.
Reply
antilycus

Im a pretty big "power user". work in network infrastructure support and blah blah blah. I have TF700T (tegra 3, 1920x1080) w/ the keyboard dock. The most useful thing about this? The keyboard/extra battery. For the year I've had it, what have I actually used it for? Thing's in a pinch as long as the work apps have a "tablet" / mobile version, which of course don't support a mouse at all (like the keyboard has). If you build it, THEY WONT COME. There is no market for it. I.T. people are 50% slower and to the power user, these things offer NOTHING. If I could load DEBIAN on it, great, but that makes the touch screen useless. If I could actually use it as a PC, great, but that makes the touch screen useless...

I struggle justifying the $500 w/ keyboard I spent total. Like everyone who buys and Apple product, I am constnatly trying to justify to myself why these things are needed and I have ZERO idea.

Good programmers are a dying breed. (thank you .net and MS). X86 vs ARM...it's not even worthy of a comparison and don't even bother throwing Intel ATOM into that. I love NVIDIA and Tegra, but I HATED HATED HATED the early 90's GPU chipset race and that's all that is happening w/ tablets right now. NO reason to buy, no demand for the product. These things are glorified big phones without the option to dial (VOIP excluded). It's a waste, IMO and I'd like someone try actually justify these things past email/web browsers w/ long battery life
Reply
DirectXtreme

11793918 said:
And yet we can't get high resolution, smaller sized computer monitors... why?

If a $200, 15" tablet can have a 1080p screen, and a $500 tablet like this can have a 1600p screen in a TEN inch screen, why in the world can't we buy a 24" monitor with the same resolution for the same price? It's not that it can't be manufactured, as has beens said before, and there's obviously a market for it.

If nothing else, make a tablet with a decent PPI and an hdmi-in. I guarantee it'll sell like hotcakes.

http://www.ebay.com/sch/items/?_nkw=2048x1536+ipad+replacement+display&_sacat=&_ex_kw=&_mPrRngCbx=1&_udlo=&_udhi=&_sop=12&_fpos=&_fspt=1&_sadis=&LH_CAds=

http://dp2retina.rozsnyo.com/

It is possible to forge a high PPI PC monitor from an iPad Retina display for a fairly low price if you're willing to work with a 9.7" screen. They also sell boards that work with 13" and 15" Macbook Pro Retina displays. Also if text and graphic size is an issue just set the Windows DPI scaling to a higher value. I've heard many people complain about poor scaling, but I work on a 19" 4:3 CRT monitor which I run at 1920x1200 (letterboxed to a 17" screen) and most programs work fine with Windows DPI scaling set to 140%.
Reply
DirectXtreme

@DarkSable

http://www.ebay.com/sch/items/?_nkw=2048x1536+ipad+repl...

http://dp2retina.rozsnyo.com/

It is possible to forge a high PPI PC monitor from an iPad Retina display for a fairly low price if you're willing to work with a 9.7" screen. They also sell boards that work with 13" and 15" Macbook Pro Retina displays. Also if text and graphic size is an issue just set the Windows DPI scaling to a higher value. I've heard many people complain about poor scaling, but I work on a 19" 4:3 CRT monitor which I run at 1920x1200 (letterboxed to a 17" screen) and most programs work fine with Windows DPI scaling set to 140%.
Reply
DirectXtreme

@DarkSable

http://www.ebay.com/sch/items/?_nkw=2048x1536+ipad+repl...

http://dp2retina.rozsnyo.com/

It is possible to forge a high PPI PC monitor from an iPad Retina display for a fairly low price if you're willing to work with a 9.7" screen. They also sell boards that work with 13" and 15" Macbook Pro Retina displays. Also if text and graphic size is an issue just set the Windows DPI scaling to a higher value. I've heard many people complain about poor scaling, but I work on a 19" 4:3 CRT monitor which I run at 1920x1200 (letterboxed to a 17" screen) and most programs work fine with Windows DPI scaling set to 140%.
Reply
DirectXtreme

Sorry for multiple posts. My reply didn't initially show up.
Reply
dark_knight33

I have a TF700 Infinity Pad.

They skimped on the damn NAND speeds! The tablet is beautiful, but the interface lags a lot because of it. I've even gone so far as to root and use SDbooster to copy as much onto a class 10 MicroSD card as possible to help boost performance. It's severely RAM constrained, laggy, and the external speaker is a damn joke. Even with DSP manager I can't boost the sound to acceptable levels without putting a hard object behind the speaker port to reflect the sound, FYI Volume+ doesn't always work properly with JB 4.1+. My older HP Touchpad blows this thing away when playing back media, and that's just insulting.

That said, Skype works wonderfully. I use it more than anything else on the tablet. I've used Netflix on the go, and that also works well. Internet browsing can be a frustrating experience, but the slow speed is an acceptable trade off for the larger display over my SGS3.

The battery life is phenomenal with the Keyboard dock. I rarely use it without it.

Also, the first one died exactly 45 days after I purchased it. Netflix stopped playing back properly, so I rebooted it and it just never came back up. Had to exchange it.

I don't really regret my purchase, but I'm not as happy with it as I thought I'd be. Most of these flaws aren't apparent when you are demoing the unit in a store.

The TF701 may have addressed many of these issues, but be forewarned about them before committing to buy it.
Reply
teh_chem

Yet again another boring overpriced rehash of every TF model since ASUS came out with them.

@ DarkSable; there is a big difference between the quality of a tablet panel and the quality of a desktop monitor. It goes beyond just the resolution and PPI. It's for the same reasons that a good 24" 1920x1080 computer monitor can cost as much or more than a 50" 1920x1080 LED-LCD TV.
Reply
halcyon

11794107 said:
Im a pretty big "power user". work in network infrastructure support and blah blah blah. I have TF700T (tegra 3, 1920x1080) w/ the keyboard dock. The most useful thing about this? The keyboard/extra battery. For the year I've had it, what have I actually used it for? Thing's in a pinch as long as the work apps have a "tablet" / mobile version, which of course don't support a mouse at all (like the keyboard has). If you build it, THEY WONT COME. There is no market for it. I.T. people are 50% slower and to the power user, these things offer NOTHING. If I could load DEBIAN on it, great, but that makes the touch screen useless. If I could actually use it as a PC, great, but that makes the touch screen useless...

I struggle justifying the $500 w/ keyboard I spent total. Like everyone who buys and Apple product, I am constnatly trying to justify to myself why these things are needed and I have ZERO idea.

Good programmers are a dying breed. (thank you .net and MS). X86 vs ARM...it's not even worthy of a comparison and don't even bother throwing Intel ATOM into that. I love NVIDIA and Tegra, but I HATED HATED HATED the early 90's GPU chipset race and that's all that is happening w/ tablets right now. NO reason to buy, no demand for the product. These things are glorified big phones without the option to dial (VOIP excluded). It's a waste, IMO and I'd like someone try actually justify these things past email/web browsers w/ long battery life

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