ASUS Transformer Book T100 Review: Redefining the Entry-Level Windows Notebook
by Anand Lal Shimpi on October 18, 2013 12:00 AM ESTBattery Life
The Transformer Book T100 features an integrated 31Wh battery. As the keyboard dock doesn’t include an extra battery, that’s all you get. The good news is that Intel’s Atom Z3740 is built on the company’s first 22nm SoC process and it’s paired with LPDDR3. At least on the silicon front, the T100 should be fairly power efficient. Granted there are still the PMIC, display, WiFi and other components to worry about, but here’s to hoping ASUS did a reasonable job there as well.
Unfortunately ASUS delivered our T100 review sample less than 48 hours ago and I’ve been using it non-stop since then. I think I technically broke embargo by using it at a press event but it’s the only way I’d get enough time with the thing under my belt to feel comfortable writing about it. The bad news is that I only had enough time to provide a battery life teaser. I’m still running more data but for now all I’ve got is our WiFi web browsing test.
The T100’s results are presented with the keyboard dock attached and with the display calibrated to 200 nits:
Battery life looks decent at just over 8.5 hours on a single charge. In practice I had no complaints about battery life while using the device. It feels more like a tablet in that regard and less like a notebook, which is a good thing. Once again we’re seeing ASUS redefining what we’ve come to expect from an entry level notebook PC here. Even compared to Chromebooks we see the T100 do extremely well. I’m curious to get a better feel for how Bay Trail performs in the battery life department, which I’ll be doing over the coming days. So far the results look good but not quite stellar if you compare it to traditional Android/iOS tablets. I am curious to see how BT running Android would turn out.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
158 Comments
View All Comments
dihartnell - Sunday, December 22, 2013 - link
If just the CPU then I'd agree with you but they have clearly tried their best to reduce the overall price in a whole lot of areas such as Screen, CPU, storage, Battery capacity (eg not in dock), plastic body instead of metal etc in order to meet the overall price point they were targeting. . Its entry level, and I think decent for the price point. There are lots of options out there that have better specs but the come with a bigger price tag as well.DanNeely - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
The spec table on the first page is listing it as a 11.6" screen instead of 10.1 like in the article text.AnandTechUser99 - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
Small error on the specifications chart located on the first page."11.6-inch" --> "10.1-inch"
sri_tech - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
I was about to say the same.Muyoso - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
Welp, guess I wont be getting up and running to Best Buy tomorrow morning to purchase this thing. . . .Disappointed. Kind of a device that does everything OK instead of one or two things very well. OK display, OK battery life, OK performance.
erikiksaz - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
Considering this thing is $350 dollars, you've got to cut corners somewhere. You and the person below you are expecting a little too much for this price point. The factory display can probably be calibrated, I'm sure Anandtech can get to posting the calibrated figures when/if they have the time.purerice - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
Really these rebadged netbooks are 2 years ahead of their time. In 2 years they'll have to cut fewer corners at this price point.My current 6y/o Merom desktop is starting to show its age and the high end Bay Trails offer performance a tad below what my desktop can do CPU-wise. $350 is a very attractive price point, but if the performance is less than what I have it's not worth it at any price. In a couple of years we will finally get Atoms that can compete with low end Nehalem/Westmere/Sandy Bridge chips but capable of fitting in a fanless sub-2lb notebook with 128gb flash and 1080p screen in the $350 price range. Until then, we will have to keep cutting corners.
YuLeven - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
Your comparision with a desktop core makes little sense. This Atom a 2W, US$37 part. Comparing it to a more expensive, big core of years before is pointless, as absolute performance is not the target here.fokka - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
he just compared it for personal reasons, because that's what he's running right now.Flunk - Friday, October 18, 2013 - link
I all comes down to price, if you want more performance you have to pay.