I would suggest the new Asus TF300 instead of the prime. It has all the features of the prime, but a plastic case instead of metal. The metal case on the prime seems to cause problems with the wifi and gps antennas, so they sometimes do not work. The TF300 has a plastic case, so these problems went away. Both have the tegra 3 processor, but some reviews say the TF300 is clocked slower than the prime. However, there is a setting that allows one to increase the clock speed to the max of the tegra 3 spec, so the difference is moot. I was able to install Ubuntu on it in a chroot, so I get the best of both worlds - android and Linux side by side in separate windows. People are also dual booting linux and android with these tablets.
If you get one, be sure to root the tablet before you run any software updates. It can only be rooted (so far) fresh out of the box; once it finds a wifi signal it updated the firmware and you cannot root it. You need root to install ubuntu. I find it very useful with the keyboard dock for traveling. A great feature is the keyboard batteries charge the tablet, so when it is docked it gets about 12-14 hours per charge; about 8 - 10 hours on just the tablet. Mark On Wed, Jun 6, 2012 at 8:13 PM, Matt McKenzie <[email protected]> wrote: > On Wed, Jun 6, 2012 at 5:26 PM, Chaz Sliger <[email protected]> wrote: > > > I'm going to need a new computer pretty soon and was wondering if a > tablet > > might work for my mobile needs. > > > > Mostly I would need internet access and the ability to handle a > spreadsheet > > and email. > > > > Sooooo. Net + Email + Spreadsheet > > > > Are there any tablets out there that would qualify? > > > > ~chaz > > > > [email protected] > > > > > > > For something that is available now, my suggestion would be the Asus > Transformer Prime. > It has a removable keyboard/touchpad dock, which basically turns it into a > laptop. This would be handy for needing to type more than a few words > (long email, spreadsheets), but for just consuming info (net, videos, > music, etc), you can undock and just use the tablet. > > This page has a good rundown of the capabilities. > > http://www.androidcentral.com/asus-transformer-prime-review > > I myself do not have first hand experience with it, except a few minutes > here and there. > > I have a Viewsonic GTablet, got it during a Woot sale, and also because it > has a good active developer community behind it on places such as > slatedroid.com (formerly on xda-developers.com). That tablet is all but > forgotten by Viewsonic, but with custom ROMs you can run Android 3.2 > Honeycomb, and there are even early ports of Android 4.x Ice Cream > Sandwich. > It has similar specs to the iPad 1, and works well enough for me for now. > I use it mostly for reading ebooks, web browsing, etc. > If I need to type a lot I go to my desktop PC. > > HTH > > ---------- > Matt M. > LinuxKnight > _______________________________________________ > PLUG mailing list > [email protected] > http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug > _______________________________________________ PLUG mailing list [email protected] http://lists.pdxlinux.org/mailman/listinfo/plug
