In our original review of the ASUS Eee Pad Transformer Prime I did the best I could do given limited testing opportunity with the platform before the NDA lifted on all the reviews. I made the commitment back then to come back with additional findings after I had spent more time with the platform. Today I'm back to make good on that promise.

Two more Eee Pad Transformer Prime samples later and here we are. Next week retailers and etailers should begin shipping the first orders of the Prime out to customers. There were a number of gaps I wasn't happy with in our original review of the Prime, I've spent the past couple of weeks trying to fill them. Even what I'm presenting today isn't perfect, but when combined with the original review it should paint a more complete picture of the Eee Pad Transformer Prime.

And I've got video, something I had to cut out of the original review due to time constraints:

Read on for the follow-up!

Going from making good motherboards to going head to head with Samsung for Google's affection is a pretty big step for ASUS, but it's one that the company has taken and done very well with. None of its peers have made the same transition, especially not while continuing to thrive in their existing businesses. I don't think anyone can say that ASUS' motherboards have suffered over the past several years as the company has transitioned, much like Apple, into the world of being a mobile computer manufacturer.

ASUS' first Android tablet was a knock out of the park. The original Eee Pad Transformer gave us a glimpse of the future with its keyboard dock while delivering a good Honeycomb experience for $100 less than the competition. As many sacrifices as ASUS had to make to reach its price point, the original Eee Pad remains one of the best Honeycomb tablets on the market. But the show must go on and simply being the cheapest on the block doesn't work anymore, particularly with companies like Amazon redefining what cheap means. It was time for a new flagship and today we have that tablet:

Priced at $499 the Eee Pad Transformer Prime will be available in North America during the week of 12/19. Read on for our full review!

I understand the appeal of tablets. Regardless of OS, they all provide a far more intimate experience when browsing the web and reading emails. I genuinely prefer doing both of those things on a tablet than on a notebook or desktop. Then there are the apps. Photos, maps, ebooks, videos and even IP cameras are comfortably accessible from tablets. Obviously you can do the same on a notebook or desktop, the tablet form factor combined with a responsive touch UI simply means you can do these things in a more relaxed position.

What has always frustrated me with tablets however is what happens when you have to give any of these apps a significant amount of input. While the virtual keyboards on tablets are pretty mature, the form factor doesn't allow for quick typing like on a smartphone. A smartphone is easily cradled in both of your hands while your thumbs peck away at the keyboard. A tablet however needs to be propped up against something while you treat it like a keyboard. Put it on your lap and you have to hunch over the thing because the screen and input surface are on the same plane (unlike a notebook where the two are perpendicular to one another). Try to type in a reclined position on a couch and you end up lying awkwardly with your thighs and thumbs supporting the tablet. Ever see the iPad billboards and note the really awkward leg placement in them?

ASUS' latest attempt to deal with this issue is the Eee Pad Slider. The follow-on to the Eee Pad Transformer integrates a sliding keyboard into ASUS' Honeycomb tablet. How does it fare? Read on to find out in our full review!

Back in June, Google announced that Android 3.2 would be arriving beginning this summer for Honeycomb tablets. Motorola, being Google's launch partner for Honeycomb, was first to get the update. Next on the list was ASUS and as of late last week, Eee Pad owners in the US started getting their version of Android 3.2. I updated my Eee Pad over the weekend and the process went seamlessly. As long as you've got more than 25% left on your battery you're good to go. If you haven't updated your Eee Pad since the launch you'll need two updates to get to 3.2.

The 3.2 update on the Eee Pad brings about a new splashscreen as well as a TegraZone app. TegraZone is NVIDIA's custom marketplace that leverages the Android Market. TegraZone is used exclusively for games that are optimized for NVIDIA's Tegra 2 SoC.

The update itself is relatively minor from a feature standpoint. Read on for our quick look and performance analysis of Android 3.2 on the Eee Pad Transformer.

Want to know if you're the winner of our first Summer of Honeycomb giveaway? Congrats to AnandTech reader jdobratz for winning our first Eee Pad Transformer. Be sure to respond to my email to claim your prize! If you didn't win last week, don't worry - there are still three more chances to win!

We've got three tablets left and this round we're giving away our second Eee Pad Transformer! Read on for details on how to enter!

We're all out of memory, congrats to AnandTech reader raimondi1337 for winning our last giveaway of 16GB of G.Skill DDR3-2133 memory. Be sure to respond to my email to claim your prize! The giveaways aren't over however, in fact we've got a great month ahead of us thanks to our friends on the NVIDIA Tegra team. Last week a big box full of four new tablets arrived at the office in Raleigh:

In the box were two Eee Pad Transformers and two Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1s, our two favorite Honeycomb tablets. We'll be giving one away every week until they're all gone. We're kicking off the giveaways with the ASUS Eee Pad Transformer.

Read on for contest entry details!

I ran into a number of hiccups in my review of the Eee Pad Transformer last month. Some of the issues were of course due to the early nature of Honeycomb, while others were just problems with ASUS' implementation. Just yesterday ASUS gave me a drop of the OTA (over the air) update that's coming to all Eee Pad users on Monday. This update will give the Eee Pad Android 3.1, the long-awaited point release to Honeycomb that is supposed to fix bugs, improve performance and even enable some new functionality. Xoom owners got access to the update earlier this month thanks to it being Google's launch device for Honeycomb, but ASUS isn't far behind.

I haven't had a lot of time with the update but I wanted to go over some of the enhancements and give you Eee Pad users a preview of what's to come on Monday. Read on!

ASUS was at the forefront of the netbook revolution thanks to its close partnerships with Intel and Microsoft. ASUS has been all but absent from the smartphone and tablet revolution again, because of its two key partnerships: Intel and Microsoft. Both Intel and Microsoft lay dormant while the smartphone and tablet revolution pick up speed; granted this may all change around Windows 8, but for now it's the truth. If you're a partner of both Intel and Microsoft, you too lay dormant while competitors like Apple, Samsung, Motorola and LG take your cake. After more than enough thumb fiddling, it was ASUS' turn for a slice. 

Read on for our full review of ASUS' first Honeycomb tablet: the Eee Pad Transformer.