Asus prices up five-core Eee Pad Android tablet Asus' Eee Pad Transformer Prime, the first Android tablet to be based on Nvidia's five-core Tegra 3 chip, will arrive in Blighty early next year. Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime The 10.1in successor to Reg Hardware's Editor's Choice high-end Android tablet will come with Android 3.2 Honeycomb pre-loaded, but Asus pledged the …
"Alas, Asus didn't say when such an update might be made available."
Alas, NO one but google knows when ICS code will hit the wild.
Unless you're MOTO or the launch partner of ICS (ie Samsung) there's no knowing when you'll get the code in your hands and that's before you even start gauging just how easy or not it will be to port it.
As a proud TF owner, I can testify that Asus is the fastest most reliable updater of their kit bar none!
As the owner of a first generation linux based eee-pc, I've managed to keep that up to date and still use it.... No thanks to Asus though.
First problems showed up in less than a year when the (out of date at launch) awful version of Xandros Linux couldn't be easily updated to provide a Flash plugin that worked, due to the use of old/incompatible system libraries.
At that point, I just gave up, wiped the SSD and stuck a better Linux distro on there:- Gentoo, believe it or not. Still got that installation on it now, and it's still up to date, although the regular re-compiles of Chromium to keep it up to date take a loooooong time.
I too have an EEE 701 and I effectively bricked it after a day trying to tweak the Asus managled version of Xandros (an OS so bad that even Xandros themselves wanted nothing to do with it). So from then on it was semi-freqently rebuilt with Ubuntu EEE/EasyPeasy. Though the past few years I've used it less and less, moreso when I got my iPad2.
As a precursor to flogging it, I thought I'd rebuild with stock Xandros. The CD/DVD that came with it was a bit trashed so had a look round the web to help out. I found an extremely useful page that told me everything I needed to know (and where to get it) whilst also pointing out how bloody useless Asus are for anything that isn't a BIOS update.
So I'll have to agree. I'm pretty sure Asus will get bored after a few months and effectively abandon any useful support.
I love my Eee Transformer and it seems plenty quick enough with its dual cores of power. The reason I went for the northern tablet was that it offered a really good spec for a great price - my fear is that Asus won't sell many of these because its more expensive than a lot of the competition (namely the iPad). Seems heavy too.
But good luck to them..
My daughter has an Eee Transformer and she treats it rough, but it is still functioning well. Every day she throws it in her backpack and subjects it to two daily bicycle rides and playground breaks to boot.
My wife has an Eee PC netbook and I know for a fact it has fallen from counter tops to a marble floor on at least 17 occasions (yes, I count) and all it takes is a squeeze around the outer edge, to reseat the plastic latches, and it is as good as new!
If the new transformer has similar construction it is recommended.
While it is the fashion: I have an Asus Bamboo laptop which is gorgeous, but I am torn between this and the Toshiba AT200 (whenever that might come out). I worry I might just be waiting for "the next best thing" (TNBT?).
Still, at £499, I think I *can* afford to hesitate because there are much cheaper dual core alternatives.
Considering we got the latest update just five days ago and that ASUS has publicly confirmed the ics update (but declined to commit on time due to release uncertainties) there aren't many other makers that can boast such responsiveness.
I jst feel sorry for the guy above as it seems their eeepc support wasn't as good as for the tablets.
They've put a lot of thought and effort into the Honeycomb experience, as well as decent keyboard integration - not just a gimmicky add-on - it also gets its own updates. Speaking of updates, very good, so looking forward to see if they push ICS as well.
My only bugbear comes with their proprietary power cable and lack of accessories - which to be fair is more the fault of resellers and accessory designers. Replacement cables only available through their online shop. It's a crying shame for this has to be one of the best tablets on the market currently and deserves more uptake.
fyi - I picked up an official ASUS charger/dock cable - 1.5m, a useful .5m longer than the in-box cable - from a retailer here in NZ recently for $30 (15 of your English pounds, approximately).
So the accessories are starting to appear. 3rd parties will no doubt follow.
At least in this case it wasn't merely a question of gouging consumers by forcing them to by a proprietary cable for which a generic cable would do.
ASUS have contrived to pump 15V down their cable, which is what makes the device able to re-charge so much more quickly than certain other similar devices.
If they had stuck to a generic interconnect on both ends they would have had to comply with the specifications attendant with those interconnects, or risk liability exposure when someone uses their ASUS charger to try to recharge some other device only to see it melt or go up in a puff of smoke (not to mention a slap on the wrists from the standards body overseeing the interconnect standard).
Here endeth.
f.t.r I was miffed at the proprietary'ness myself when trying to source a longer replacement/additional cable for my Transformer and had the glimmerings of anger beginning to well up inside me directed at the hardware guys at ASUS ... but I calmed down once I learned why it was proprietary.
And I took comfort from knowing that ASUS were unlikely to leave punters high and dry, and sure enough, longer cables are now appearing in the market place - see other comment.
This is quite simple. Get any usb 3.0 extension cable and you're good to go. It's one of the extra pins of the 3.0 connector that signal the charger of the existence of the tab and it subsequently boosts to the 15V. Otherwise, the charger works as a bog standard 5V/2.1A usb thingy.
A USB 3 extension cable will extend the one cable you get in the box, but if you want/need additional charging facilities without taking that cable with you (or if your original cable goes to the Great Cable Rat's Nest In The Sky) then you still need an additional/replacement, proprietary cable. :(
I've bought quite a number of Asus motherboards, graphics cards, a few notebooks etc. The two reasons I hadn't gone for the first Transformer tablet is
- I actually did not need one (only wanted it)
- I never buy first-gen stuff.
That said, a few of my friends has the first-gen transformer. And of all the Android tablets out there, this one seemed the best. Android 3.x seems teensy bit stuttery at times (when compared to the ipad), but it is way more useful.
I am looking forward to the ICS toting 4+1 core speedy Asus.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2025
