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First Bay Trail Windows 8.1 Convertible To Start At $349
crookedvulture writes "Bay Trail has its first convertible design win. Intel's newest SoC will be available in Asus' Transformer Book T100, which combines a 10.1" Windows 8.1 tablet with a keyboard dock that includes a gesture-friendly touchpad and USB 3.0 connectivity. The tablet is powered by an Atom Z3740 processor with quad cores clocked at up to 1.8GHz—600MHz slower than the Z3770 chip benchmarked by the press. The screen has a relatively low 1366x768 resolution, but at least the IPS panel delivers wide viewing angles. Asus clearly intends the T100 to be an entry level device; the 32GB version is slated to sell for just $349, and the 64GB one will cost only 50 bucks more. Those prices include the keyboard dock and a copy of Microsoft Office Home & Student 2013. They also bring Windows 8 convertibles down to truly budget territory, completing the collision between tablets and netbooks."
Seems rather pricey for a 10" netbook.
Lets hope ASUS will use fast nand chips, faster than in it's TF200 -TF700 family.
Does a "gesture friendly touchpad" mean its one of those completely flat surfaces with no edges that randomly make shit flip down/out/over what I'm trying to work on because there's no way to tell when you're moving the pointer and when you're swiping the charms bar?
Or does it mean one where the damn gestures are turned off by default without having to install synaptic drivers and dig through their driver menus, or hunt around in the registry, or say fuck it and replace windows entirely?
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
Another windows 8 tablet. Quad core 1.8GHz, 1366x768 resolution. Meh.
Where is the linux angle? Not even a conversion coupon code?
What I wouldn't give to be able to travel back in time and prevent 1366x768 or '720p' from being defined as 'HD' resolution. Ideally with some sort of plan that involves more explosions than a braindead summer action movie. What a pox upon the eyes of the world, especially with so many applications making poor use of extra horizontal space (so it's barely better than 1024x768, circa 15 years ago) and 768 pixels being pretty narrow for the 'well, just flip it 90 degrees' strategy that saves other widescreens for non-movie purposes.
seriously, everyone who voted for this "article" needs a spanking.
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
Neat-o! Although, I don't understand why I wouldn't just use a full-featured, full-power laptop...
I don't respond to AC's.
Am I the only one who is sick of those right-shift-key-right-next-to-up-arrow keyboards?
"If anything can go wrong, it will." - Murphy
holy crap , $349, with the keboard included ?!!! And it's a less crappy keyboard than the current crop of surface POSes.
This a real game-changer, it's almost not deludedly idiotic.
Any Atari 8-biters out there remember the dirty membrane keyboard peasants that could only afford the Atari 400 back in the day?
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
lol Asus
More disposable crap for gadget kids who never grew up.
MSFT with their "golden touch" is poised to ruin tablets just like they did with netbooks. When netbooks were introduced, they had a lightweight version of Linux and no harddrive. MSFT made them into impractical laptops which ran XP. Now that ASUS is selling a Windows "tablet," I guess we can look forward to the same "innovation" that killed the netbook.
Ok, I don't get the "meh" posts. Touchscreen. Keyboard. $400 for 64 gb version. Real Windows (i.e.: Windows 8.1, not RT).
This is a pretty nice computer at a very nice price.
Panasonic CF-AX3
will be available ... for Japan market
Well crap, and it has a Japanese keyboard too. Damn it.
that I had that had one....along with the zx80 and zx81 I saw in Radio-Electronics.
The roomie I just moved in with was appalled when I discovered for her that her newly purchased notebook was actually a slower and worse-off computer than the laptop she was hoping to "upgrade" from. So we sent it back and now she has the credit and wants me to shop for her.
She kept mentioning the RT and liking it, but I warned her away and told her that tablets are still a developing technology, that it's in its awkward stages and next year she'll have something worth picking up. She said "okay, maybe next year it would be a good idea" but still seemed lost.
I'd like to say she has some good news when she gets home today, but the tablet isn't much better than the notebook. There's no removable media, not even a full-size SD slot?
I see these things as glorified palmtops. They're just slightly larger, but they fit the same niche -- something to pull out of your backpack or Euro-wallet at the airport or cafe and use within serious constraints on time and space. It's a useful gadget to complement a fully functioning PC at home, but IMHO it doesn't really qualify as a principal or "base" PC.
But oh, look: it's priced like a PC.
Scratching my head / not catching on.
"Stratigraphically the origin of agriculture and thermonuclear destruction will appear essentially simultaneous" -- Lee
Metro/Modern is actually a decent UI for tablets. The desktop is where it sucks. Maybe Win 9 will have a dual UI mode as 8.1 doesn't seem to fix this gap.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Hmmm, with mainstream Intel platforms approaching the power savings of SoCs, maybe Microsoft should drop the other shoe and kill off RT. If standard Windows will run acceptably on these devices, there's no reason to keep RT going!
But you don't have to actually use Metro to get things done. The normal desktop is still there, and if you start typing in Metro, then what you are looking for quickly pops up in a search result.
I don't understand peoples' dismissal of Metro, considering it's not even the star of the OS. It's just a weird-looking box house that you can, for all intents and purposes, totally ignore and go on without really using. I only acknowledge its existence because I see it every time I go to start searching for something, like group policies.
And there's another thing: typing for what you want. A lot of people don't do that. There are tons of Windows users who still click through the control panel and then click through admin tools and then yada, yada. Well if you hit the windows key and start typing, what you want shows up pretty quickly.
Metro isn't any different. And I personally hated the Start Menu, it was slow to render and was a cluttered mess. Metro's a cluttered mess but at least it's immediately there when I ask for it.
"Stratigraphically the origin of agriculture and thermonuclear destruction will appear essentially simultaneous" -- Lee
Metro is dismissed because we don't fucking want it. End of discussion.
Took me all of 5 minutes to find an app to give me a start menu in windows 8, and I use it purely in desktop mode on my laptop. Seems like a lot of Win 8 complaints are complaining for the sake of complaining. I daily switch between win 7 at work and win 8 at home with no issue.
I'll repeat my title: this is what the Surface RT should have been. I would be happy to trade in my netbook + Nexus 10 tablet for one of these. And the price is very right, especially as it includes basic MS Office capability.
The Windows 8 interface is perfectly fine for a tablet. Worse in some ways than Android, better than others. The real advantage over Android is that you have a full web browser, none of those dumbed-down mobile versions that can't handle standard web sites. If you're really wedded to the Android app-world it's probably not so good for you, but remember that there's so much free Windows software that would do the job just fine. Android has been wanting full VLC and smoothly working Flash for years...
And as a netbook, it's the real deal. You can install *any* Windows software on it, unlike the Surface RT. And Bay Trail makes it that much more capable that the netbooks of old, that cost about the same, couldn't turn into tablets, etc.
People complaining about this being "slashvertisement" need to chill. This is news for nerds: a new category of consumer device that could really shake things up.
It works for you, great. Other people don't like Win 8 for a variety of reasons besides the Start Menu. Don't be so dismissive od other people.
Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
Really now? Show me a netbook with an IPS screen and 4 cores that sells for less than $349. What? Can't find one? Whoops...!
See Samsung Galaxy Tab 3, S4, etc.
tab 3 is first of all arm(people wouldn't call it a netbook.. ), keyboard costs extra and it's base price is 400 and it's also just dual core at that and with just 1 gig of ram...
galaxy S4 on the other hand is definitely not a netbook and it's off contract price is somewhere around 580.
if they can get this to shops for 350 it's a steal.
world was created 5 seconds before this post as it is.
Finally someone has figured out how to build and sell a Windows 8 tablet. I think that $349 is a very attractive price point. Especially when you consider that it comes with Office, a physical keyboard, and an SD card slot for storage expansion. Ok, so the screen isn't going to set the world on fire but it's very usable. I could see something like this as a good note taking device for school/meetings. Maybe some light internet browsing or Netflix viewing.
The big mistake Microsoft has made is trying to compete head to head with Apple on price. The iPad is seen as a premium product. And the Surface? Well, it's a Microsoft product. If they would drop the price, like Asus has done, they could see a ton of them. Windows 8 on a tablet is actually not a bad OS.
Well, someone has a problem distinguishing tablets, transformers, phones, and netbooks.
Don't complain about syntax, grammar, or spelling. There is no.hell like input on android.
windows sucks....
I'm thinking this would make a great Android/Chromebook device.
But can it be upgraded to Windows 7?
Took me all of 5 minutes to find an app to give me a start menu in windows 8, and I use it purely in desktop mode on my laptop.
So every time you use a Windows 8 PC at work, or while traveling, or at a friend's house, you're going to download new start menu software and install it on their PC to make it work something like it should have worked to begin with?
As I understand it, this is a Win8.1 x86 device, so the obnoxiousnesses you and others mention about RT do not apply.
But you don't have to actually use Metro to get things done. The normal desktop is still there, and if you start typing in Metro, then what you are looking for quickly pops up in a search result.
If I wanted to type to run programs, I wouldn't be using a fscking GUI.
It has Windows 8 though so nobody wants it.
Not the first time you've trolled with this exact same remark. I'm somebody who just bought Windows 8 a few weeks ago. I love it, start screen included. Then again, I'm not an Anti-MS zealot and have enjoyed ever release of Windows dating back to 95.
Works great for me too, except I don't use a start menu replacement. I think the new design is awesome. People have been crying, complaining, and trolling about EVERY new release of Windows. The idiotic nature of people makes it inevitable. Fuck em'.
By "convertible", I assume you mean I can convert it to Android?
(-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
It's definitely more worth getting on around that price (could be a little lower) but still a lot better than the old crappy atom architecture we have now that needed an update for a long time.
Metro/Modern is actually a decent UI for tablets. The desktop is where it sucks. Maybe Win 9 will have a dual UI mode as 8.1 doesn't seem to fix this gap.
As much as I dislike Apple (my work issued me an ipad; after a week I gave it back), they understand touch interface in a way that Microsoft probably never will. Yes, with diligence you can figure out how to make Win8 do most things, but it's not an OS you can just pick up and use, as you can any Apple device. Conveyance, I think someone said. They eye is not led to what the fingers should be doing. It's a major defect, and it may not be fixable.
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
> But you don't have to actually use Metro to get things done. The normal desktop is still there, and if you start typing in Metro, then what you are looking for quickly pops up in a search result
Ok, agreed. Given that, why do you need touch?
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
But you don't have to actually use Metro to get things done. The normal desktop is still there, and if you start typing in Metro, then what you are looking for quickly pops up in a search result.
If I wanted to type to run programs, I wouldn't be using a fscking GUI.
Mod up. This is a key point that Microsoft doesn't seem to get. If we're going to be typing the names of programs, why not just boot into a CLI? Why even bother with that garish refrigerator-door interface?
Oliver's law of assumed responsibility: If you're seen fixing it, you will be blamed for breaking it.
How are Windows 8 AND Office supposed to fit comfortably (and be usable) on 64GB of storage, much less 32GB?
"Nobody" is pretty strong. For example, I'm pretty sure that more PCs are running Windows8 that Linux, yet nobody in their right mind would say "Nobody wants Linux so who cares?", would they?
Sure. The difference is that with: Win 8, Win Vista, Win ME, Win 95.... the critics are right.
Win 8 works for you? GREAT! Congratulations!
Don't think that this doesn't mean that for we who have to support OTHER users who can't tell a GUI from a wad of GUM that we shouldn't be rightfully bitchy when any company decides to completely redo their interfaces such that it costs MY business hours and hours of unnecessary troubleshooting / help desk time so that people can do the same job they did yesterday but in a completely different interface.
This is almost exactly what I want. It's only missing a few things. 1.) Better Screen Res and drop the 16:9 aspect ratio it sucks. Go back to 16:10. 2.) Add a Wacom digitizer 3.) Add a battery in the dock. 4.) Remove Office from the package I don't want it and I know it's costing me extra 5.) Make sure I can install whatever OS I want on it. Even better sell it with no OS at all that way I can pick the OS.
They do all that and get it in under $650 with the dock and I'll be all over it.
And therein lies the issue. Metro is supposed to be a tablet gui, yet it requires a keyboard ...
Why did they bother? It has Win 8 so it's already DOA.
It's not an ARM device so secureboot should be unlockable per the windows 8 certification standards right? (Or is 8.1 changing the rules?)
Is it soldered to the board. This is the x501a https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=06-HlMu7DCY the x502a you cant even do.
My chromebook cost $200 + just under $20 in tax. The extra 4GB of RAM was another $30 & the cheapest 7mm 2.5" SATA I could drop in was $50 at 320GB. So, I've made a laptop that maybe specs a little lower on the processing side in just $300 & I expect it to last me well into & past the 2.5 years one of these overly-integrated Microsoft Phabtops are expected to last. Google's point-of-entry is still lower & really seems to be picking up steam, especially when only half the top sellers on Amazon don't pay royalties to 'the man'.
How long will people think that x86 and/or x64 instruction set compatibility is a selling point?
That depends on how long Hollywood and the game industry insist on a proprietary software business model, and how long ARM remains correlated with cryptographically locked bootloaders that the user either can't unlock or can't unlock without wiping the device.
That depends on how big of an SD card you have plugged into your EverDrive plugged into your Nomad. As for the other Nomad, it started out with only 64 MB of flash memory.
So every time you use a Windows 8 PC at work, or while traveling
While traveling, I'm more likely to use my laptop.
or at a friend's house, you're going to download new start menu software and install it on their PC to make it work something like it should have worked to begin with?
Yes. Here's how it typically goes in my experience: "Are you sick of the Start Screen covering everything up when you want to start a program? I am too. That's why I installed Classic Shell on my aunt's PC and my PC at work. It makes Windows 8 look like Windows again. Want it? OK, put in the admin password and I'll install it for you. If you want to get back to Metro, you can always Shift-click the Start button."
Even if it turns out that this tablet can't run Windows 7 well due to driver issues, you can still install a reasonable facsimile of Windows 7's UI inside Windows 8. Google classic shell and your Start menu will be back to how you remember it.
And yet the keyboard is one of the focal points in Unity, as well as GNOME 3 for launching applications as well. It works really well - typing quickly is faster than using a mouse.
A GUI doesn't mean ZERO use of a keyboard. I'm sure you use Ctrl + C/Ctrl + V to copy and paste instead of using the mouse all the time. Why? Because it's faster. But you'll also click on radio buttons for example because it's faster than tabbing to their group and selecting up/down for the right one.
That doesn't mean I like Windows 8 though (it's aesthetically crap and boring and takes us back to the early 90's of GUI design). But when I use Linux I also prefer having the ability to summon a means of typing in a few characters of a program I want to run instead of moving the mouse. Particularly if I'm already typing something and think of something else to run.
It should have had 4GB of RAM. 2GB really isn't enough to run Windows well. Aside from that it looks like a decent value.
you got a deal