Cheer up you miserable blogger.

I have just reread my last posts and I am a little concerned that I may be coming over as a bit of a wingeing negative gimmer.

To redress the balance a bit what do I like about the ASUS Transformer?

• The screen is beautiful , colours are bright , the high resolution makes photographs and videos beautiful. (make sure you install Moboplayer and QQplayer, both free from the android market, and you have support for many codecs such as DIVX and MKV).
• Software is nippy.
• Battery life with the tablet on its own is great, when you attach the keyboard , which has another battery built into it, the battery lasts for 12 hours plus. This is where the tablet scores over a laptop and my netbook.
• Buy the keyboard dock, it adds 2 full sized USBs , the extra battery , a good fullsized keyboard and it acts as a stand for the tablet. When closed it protects the screen.
• When mounted on the keyboard the device recognises a wireless mouse , I plugged in my Logitech Mouse,( it has the mini universal transmitter that plugs into the USB), and the mouse worked straight away without installation of any extra drivers. It also recognises full sized wired keyboard and a wired mouse each plugged into a different USB.
• The keyboard makes the unit into a good netbook replacement for email, word processing and excel . The ASUS Transformer ships with Polaris Office which is a Microsoft Office compatible suit of programs.
• It supports a wii remote control to play N64 Emulators.
• Browsing with the tablet on your knee is great .
• Media streaming from other PCs works smoothly.

So smile you cheerless blogger.

The Problem Connector : The curse of the ASUS Transformer.

The picture shows the proprietary connector used to charge the tablet and the keyboard. The tablet and the keyboard each have a socket to receive the connector and so can be charged individually or as a unit. News flash 24th August 2011 Asus are stocking the power pack and spare cable I received one today see post below

 

UNDERSTAND THIS matey, it is not possible to charge the tablet using USB slots contained on the keyboard dock . The only way to charge the tablet or the keyboard is to use this special cable. Let me put a simple way if you lose, or if you break, that cable you are well and truly STUFFED.

I cannot find a source for a replacement cable.

This worries me I have a £429 device which relies on the cable which should cost £10. By making this unique connector ASUS have introduced a failure point which gives people a good reason not to buy the device.

This is where the iPad wins, because the android market for devices is not standardised individual manufacturers are free to include their own skins for the android software and their own connectors and accessories. The sales figures for Android device may have overtaken iPads but  the sales figures of individual devices have not. We have a series of mini markets within the maxi market of android devices. The Ipad is a single device, same interfaces, same ports ,same connectors and therefore a flourishing market for third-party accessories. ( another article bemoaning the fragmentation of the android market is here)

It doesn't help that the Asus transformer has had initial supply problems and so the number of units sold are really relatively low-level.  I  really hope that our friends in China believe that the volume of Transformers in the market is large enough for them to manufacture third-party replacement connector  for the for the ASUS transformer . Until then guard this piddly little connector with your life.

Oh and by the way the charging device is also special as it puts out 15 V, you need to source a USB 3 charger ,as the normal wall chargers don't work( Forum link)

stuffed

What do you get in the box?

This is what you get in the box, the keyboard dock, the tablet , the connector, and the mains charger. (Oh and a small instruction book) All components , with the exception of the connector (more on that later) feel solid and well made. The tablet clicks into the keyboard dock with the minimum of fuss and together they feel like a solid , if a little top heavy , netbook.

The tablet has a mini hdmi socket and a Microsd slot which will take upto 32GB . The keyboard dock has two full sized USB slots and an SD Card slot , which will take even more memory , Ive got 16GB in there without a problem.

MINDSHIFT time:  it’s NOT a phone

An obvious one this one but took me a while to grasp a quite a subtle shift for the Android phone user. The Android tablet is not a phone and you don’t have to use it like a phone, let me explain…..

I've had an android phone for around a year, an HTC Desire and I love it. It has taken over from my itouch as my media player of choice , I synch podcasts each week and play them through my radio on the way to work, it  handles social networks , calendars and emails, it even takes photos of technology equipment reviews in WHSmiths so I can avoid buying magazines! (cheap)

Because screen size is so small, phone users rely on apps to deliver content and perform processes; Apps are dedicated to a single use and are configured to the small screen size. To use the browsers on the Desire is doable but a pain in the backside, text visibility is difficult without Panning and scanning across the website.  Apps are great, but apps are only as great as the developer and there are quite a few p*ss poor apps about.

When I got my Asus Transformer I initially treated it like a phone I downloaded a shed full of apps and my home screens look like I've thrown a handful of apps across the room and they have installed where they have stuck.

The Android Marketplace has only a limited number of apps which are optimised for the large screen size (although most work in some form or another) The number of Honeycomb apps are increasing all the time but why rely on apps anymore? We now have a lovely big screen that the browser can now be used alongside of apps.While apps are being scaled up to match the honeycomb screen resolution, the HTML world is scaled up and ready be used  ... For example  if you are looking for a news aggregator there are many sites that can do this www.news now.co.uk is one such site.

A big positive for the ASUS Transformer and Android tablets in general is the support for Flash, most websites just work.

All this may seem obvious to some but a little MINDSHIFT opens the potential of the tablet.

A thumbs up for the Transformer

Welcome to the blog. Ive recently taken delivery of the ASUS Transformer Android tablet along with the optional keyboard dock. I would like to share with you my experiences. Im not convinced that I have made the right decision so I keep this account hopefully to help others.

Instead of pimping articles and reviews of other people I will try to make sure that I quote references and give credit where it's due then include a link to article. If I miss giving due credit please let me know and I will sort it out.

I have had an Android phone, the HTC Desire , for the last year and I love it, I also have a netbook, the Samsung NC10 and the love doth flow in that direction as well. Im going to use these devices as the comparators , why did I buy a tablet, and what can and cant I do with my new toy ?