Transformer Book T100 and Why I Bought a Tablet Without 3G/LTE

I've now used the T100 a little bit more and I can say that the machine is good value for money indeed. There haven't been any major letdowns and the versatility has been a definite plus. While all the solutions are not as elegant as they could be, I still appreciate the fact that I can for example hook up my multifunction printer also to the tablet part (with a USB OTG cable), scan documents, and do whatever I need to do to documents before archiving or uploading them.

I've also claimed that I wouldn't buy another tablet without built-in 3G/LTE support, so how come I still bought the T100? The answer is capabilities in Windows 8.1 and the fact that I carry also a Windows Phone with me. The major gripe I had with the wifi-only iPad 2 I had before my 3G-equipped iPad 3 was that it was too much of a hassle to get tablet connectivity on the road. I had to take out my iPhone, activate hotspot in it, and connect to the hotspot from my iPad. After putting my iPad away, I had to go to my phone to shut down the hotspot in order to prevent unnecessary battery drain. So typically when I needed connectivity on the road, I just used my phone since using the tablet was too cumbersome. However, with Windows 8.1 and Windows Phone 8 Update 3 I just need to have my Windows Phone 8 device paired with the T100 over Bluetooth and the T100 can tell the phone to activate its hotspot and connect to it. If I just have Bluetooth enabled on my phone, I don't even have to take the phone out to initiate the connection, so when the only drawback compared to built-in 3G or LTE is the little wait while the connection is initialized, it seems like a wifi-only tablet is once again usable to me. As an added bonus, the phone seems to notice when the connection is no longer in use and disables the hotspot within a few minutes of me putting the tablet away.

Of course there's still the other downside to tethering, i.e. battery draining on two devices instead of just one, but for me that's currently not an issue since I have also my Lumia 620 lying around, so I can just pop in the additional SIM (which I would need for 3G/LTE tablet anyway) into the 620 and toss it into whatever bag I carry my T100 in. That way my 620 becomes a 3G modem with a dedicated battery while also serving as a backup phone. Neat.

Transformer Book T100 - First Impressions

So I've now had my ASUS Transformer Book T100 for a couple of days and it's time to gather some first impressions.

The build quality is not iPad grade, but that shouldn't be a surprise when the price is considered. It's still good enough and my only major gripes are with the loud touchpad and minor backlight leak in the bottom right corner.

The keyboard dock is usable although the layout is a little bit cramped and especially the right shift's location takes a little time to get used to, but I got familiar with it rather quickly and I'm writing this post on it even though I'd have a full-size Bluetooth keyboard available in the next room. The touchpad could be better, but still it's something that gets the job done when touch isn't optimal (i.e. in the desktop mode). If ASUS chooses to improve the touchpad in some manner, I hope they start from the insanely loud click noise. But in general the keyboard dock feels maybe even little bit sturdier than I thought it would.

Software-wise Windows 8.1 was nothing new for me, but the T100 was the first time I really got to use the Modern UI on the full tablet mode and that works quite well. The new UI definitely makes sense in the tablet mode, although I'm still not that convinced that we should have it on desktops and especially servers too!

What I especially like about this little machine is its versatility. Thanks to the full Windows 8.1 running on it, I can do pretty much everything I can imagine needing to do on the road without denting my wallet too badly. What's more, even though it's the full Windows, the battery life seems quite good. Looks like the Bay Trail Atom strikes a good balance between performance and power consumption.

I'll be writing more about this machine once I get to use it a little more, but so far the machine has lived up to the expectations I had for it.

More New Hardware

Even though I just got myself the Lumia 925 and haven't blogged about it that much (I will soon though, especially now that I got some wireless charging capabilities for it), seems like my lust for new hardware wasn't completely satisfied. For after all, there was one interesting tablet category I hadn't tried out yet, i.e. Windows 8 tablets. 

I had actually thought about getting a Surface device lately, but the unclear future of the Windows RT was always a bit of let-down regarding that. However, then I noticed the release of the ASUS Transformer Book T100, which is based on the new Bay Trail Atom processor and runs actual Windows 8.1 instead of the RT version, comes with a keyboard dock AND an Office license for not too bad a price. That sounded like quite a bargain so I just had to find out if this device is any good. In principle such a device sounds like something I could bring as my only travel device in addition to phones.

So I went and bought one today and I've been setting it up for the rest of the night. Tomorrow I'll get more taste of the actual use as I can disconnect the charger and really try how it fares as a tablet. Stay tuned, more posts coming soon.

Could I Switch? - Upping the Ante

It looks like I'll get this speculation into a higher gear as I now have a high-end Windows Phone device in use. My company-issued phone changed from Lumia 800 to Lumia 925, so now I can actually enjoy all the camera goodies Nokia has to offer.

The device is also equipped with quite a bit larger screen than what I've used so far in phones. Lumia 800 was 3,7", 620 3,8", and the iPhone 5 4", so the 4,5-incher in the 925 is quite a step up. Having used the device for little over a day now, it's already making my Lumia 620 and iPhone 5 feel somewhat cramped. However, despite the increase in screen size the device doesn't feel that bulky in my hands. Kudos to Nokia's design folks for that. The added screen real estate is really welcome since now e.g. the lack of an official Google+ app is much less a problem as using the web version is much more tolerable compared to my previous Windows Phones.

I've been playing around with the camera apps and it seems like I need a little more time for mastering the features available in them, but the overall camera functionality looks quite promising even though the camera is not 1020 grade. It's still quite a decent snapper and the software features provide quite a deal of extra flexibility.

Maybe I'll have to invest in a wireless charging cover and a wireless charger to test out also that feature. It could be useful as currently my desk is a horrible mess of wires. A little less of that wouldn't hurt.