ASUS' Transformer Book T100: Atom Z3740 Inside, Available October 18th at $349
by Anand Lal Shimpi on September 11, 2013 8:16 PM EST
Earlier today, ASUS CEO Jerry Shen teased their first Bay Trail tablet: the T100. Today at ASUS' IDF press conference we got some more details on the tablet. The official name is the Transformer Book T100 and it's a 10.1-inch Windows 8.1 tablet. The IPS display features a 1366x768 resolution. Normally I'd complain about that, but the T100 starts at $349 for a 32GB model.
Internally, ASUS settled on the Atom Z3740, a quad-core Bay Trail SKU clocked lower than the one we previewed earlier today. The max non-turbo frequency on the Z3740 is 1.33GHz, with a max turbo of 1.86GHz. Since this isn't a D-SKU, ASUS settled on a dual-channel (2x64-bit) LPDDR3 memory interface.
Much like the Bay Trail FFRD we tested, the T100 is equipped with 2GB of LPDDR3. NAND storage options include 32GB or 64GB eMMC. There's also a single microSD card reader.
Other IO includes a micro USB port for charging (and/or external USB devices), a micro HDMI output and a headphone/mic jack. There's keyboard dock included (!!) that adds a USB 3.0 port. ASUS claims they used the Thinkpad and MacBook keyboards as the benchmarks to evaluate the T100 against.
The T100 ships with an integrated 31Wh battery. ASUS promises up to 11 hours of battery life thanks to the Bay Trail silicon inside. The tablet measures 10.4" x 6.7" x 0.41" (0.93" thick with the dock) and weighs 550g/1.2 lbs (2.4 lbs with the dock).
On the software side, in addition to Windows 8.1 you get a pre-installed copy of Office 2013.
The T100 is extremely interesting as it's truly a reimagining of the netbooks of 5 years ago. It's thinner, lighter and much faster.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
102 Comments
View All Comments
ShieTar - Thursday, September 12, 2013 - link
A lot of people will walk into an Apple Shop and ask for an Ipad, because thats what they have heard is good at the lunch table.And lets be reasonable and wait for an actual review of the T100 before we call it better?
euskalzabe - Thursday, September 19, 2013 - link
Agreed. On paper it seems great, but we don't even have final product BayTrail numbers yet. Let's wait to see this T100 reviewed.p303 - Thursday, September 12, 2013 - link
You should try out one of these low cost Win8 tablets before disparaging the iPad. The last round of RT tablets were atrocious, performance-wise. Also, with a 16gb iPad, you start with 13-14gb of free space after the OS is installed. After Pages, Keynote, Numbers, twenty or so other apps, not to mention four or five magazines, a few books, and 20-30 comic books, I still have 3gb free.I remember when the first round of RT tablets came out, I was sitting next to a guy in Starbucks chatting with his friends about the three he had on hold. I went to check one out at the MS store that afternoon, and I gotta say, I felt sorry for the guy. It was worse than a $99 Chinese knockoff Android tablet.
My guess is for $350 you're going to get another cut-rate paperweight. I don't understand why people think they're going to get the moon for nothing.
rahuldesai1987 - Thursday, September 12, 2013 - link
Its just that Apple fleeces us and makes huge gross margins and people still flock to buy.nerd1 - Thursday, September 12, 2013 - link
iPad is basically a enlarged ipod touch running phone OS. Jjust every other tablets has sd slot so you can spend $5 to get another 16gb.euskalzabe - Thursday, September 19, 2013 - link
You're quite wrong, and you don't seem to have used RT devices more than 5 minutes. If you used them on launch, they've gotten a LOT better/snappier. They're nowhere close to being GOOD, I'll give you that, and they're far from my Core i5, but frankly, I've been using a VivoTab RT for work for the past 8 months and it's served me perfectly fine. Far from atrocious.Regarding your $350/paperweight remark, do your homework. BayTrail is pretty decent performance wise and will be able to push through Win8 at a good-enough performance. Again, far from Core i5, but far from atrocious too.
JNo - Thursday, September 12, 2013 - link
Exactly. ipad vs this? THIS IS SPARTA!r3loaded - Thursday, September 12, 2013 - link
I'd really prefer it if they'd used proper SATA storage. eMMC is full of fail, especially on something that will run Windows 8.JNo - Thursday, September 12, 2013 - link
This is true. M.2 sata performance storage would rock.SrRaven - Thursday, September 12, 2013 - link
So I'm starting Uni in October (CS) and for Coding...I really don't need something too powerful as I have a descent PC at Home (and I won't be in Uni much anyway, as I need to work most days).Will the Bay Trail processor cause problems if I want to code for it?
Also any idea if they will allow a true digitizer pen input like the surface has?