transformer

iPad rivals catching up: Can iPad 3 keep them at bay?

Apple should be blowing us away with the iPad 3, but it probably won't.

The latest rumors call for a higher resolution screen on par with the iPhone's Retina Display, a possible upgrade to the iOS software, and possibly a few other improvements. That's certainly enough to draw the Apple faithful and sell a ton of iPads. But with the rapid advances that the competition is making, will it be enough to secure the company's continued dominance in the tablet business?

Sure, the iPad has been a blockbuster franchise for Apple. In the fourth quarter alone, … Read more

Putting the Transformer Prime in perspective

The Asus Transformer Prime is currently the highest-quality Android tablet on the market. It rivals and sometimes surpasses the the iPad 2 in games performance, has a fantastically bright screen, memory expansion, various CPU performance modes, HDMI, and a thin, sleek, and sexy design.

All that said (and I bet you saw this coming), it's not perfect. Since its release, the Prime has been saddled with reports of performance issues, bugs, and stuff just outright not working.

How severe are these issues, and maybe more importantly, just how widespread are they? As a new or potentially new Prime owner, just what are the chances they'll crop up for you?… Read more

The wily Asus Padfone set for MWC release?

Many a gadget hunter has searched for the mythical beast known as the Asus Padfone, but new reports suggest it could officially arrive at Mobile World Congress next month.

From the Motorola Atrix phones to the Samsung Galaxy Note, convertible or hybrid mobile computing products are a new trend to watch. Asus also made waves with the Transformer Prime, a tablet that connects to an external keyboard letting it morph into a laptop.

Now another of the company's fabled gizmos, the Padfone, is likely to become reality at the MWC show in Barcelona, Spain. Android site Android Central reports that Asus sent out press event invites all but confirming a genuine and imminent Padfone launch.

What makes this device so interesting is that instead of using a laptop dock to change it into a netbook-style computer, users can place the Padfone in an accessory that gives the phone tablet capabilities.… Read more

Ice Cream Sandwich on the Transformer Prime: Our definitive verdict

When the Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime launched in late 2011, the hope was that it would be the first tablet to have and hold Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS), the latest version of the Android OS. While the tablet eventually launched with Honeycomb, no other tablet has yet to be released running ICS (although, the Xoom has received an update for it by now), so as of this month, it actually is the first.

A couple of weeks back, Asus began rolling out over-the-air updates of ICS to Transformer Prime owners in the U.S. We at CNET finally got our Prime unit updated and spent all day poring through the sweet deliciousness that is ICS.

The thing about ICS for tablets, though, is that while smartphones previously topped out at Android 2.3, Honeycomb (version 3) has been on tablets for nearly a year now and going from 3.0 to 4.0 just isn't as huge of a jump. Still, although the changes are minor, they are noticeable.

Check out the full Transformer Prime review, and skip to the Ice Cream Sandwich section if updates and changes are all you're interested in.… Read more

Familiar names dominate Oscar visual effects nominations

When the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences unveiled its Oscar nominations this morning, there were some very familiar names among the honorees.

Joe Letteri, for example. And Tim Burke and Scott Farrar.

These may not be people that appear regularly in the pages of "Us Weekly," but to those who follow the visual effects industry, they're on par with Meryl Streep and George Clooney.

Only one film can win the Oscar for best visual effects, but today, five films were nominated.

As usual, George Lucas' Industrial Light & Magic was honored, this year for its … Read more

Why my iPad can't replace my laptop: It's the trackpad

I'll let you in on a little secret: I haven't been thrilled with any iPad keyboard case solution, despite testing and reviewing about half a dozen of them.

Sure, some of them are excellent products. Still, I don't find them essential. This is why I don't use my iPad during mission-critical trips to trade shows and live-blogged events. This is why I don't use my iPad as a laptop replacement. Not entirely. Not yet.

I agree with a lot of what Harry McCracken refers to in his experience with his iPad and the ZaggFolio keyboard case. Ideally, having such an ultraportable, flexible device with a long battery life would be a perfect travel tool. For me, however, that perfect tool hasn't materialized yet.

I'd love to have some sort of evolved hybrid of an iPad and a MacBook Air. I've been dreaming of it for a while, actually. Apple's clearly leaning toward a fusion of sorts between iOS and Mac OS X. Lion was the first step. iOS gets a bit more advanced every year, taking baby steps toward being a true operating system for hard-core computing tasks.

There are several reasons it won't work right now, and the biggest by far is the good old-fashioned trackpad--or lack of it.… Read more

Ice Cream Sandwich update failing on some Transformer Primes

The update to Ice Cream Sandwich is apparently leaving some owners of the new Asus Transformer Prime out in the cold.

Released by Asus last Tuesday, ahead of schedule to users in the United States and Taiwan, the tablet was supposed to receive the Android 4.0 update over the air. But instead, several owners of the Prime are complaining that their tablets are displaying a serial number error, preventing the update from installing, according to posts on the XDA Developers forum.

Asus is aware of the issue and is close to a fix, according to a message posted Sunday … Read more

Ice Cream Sandwich update dripping out to Motorola Xoom

Ice Cream Sandwich is finally providing some flavor to Motorola Xoom tablets.

A Motorola representative confirmed to CNET today that the company has deployed the Ice Cream Sandwich update, aka Android 4.0, to a small number of Xoom users for testing. The company has promised to confirm additional details when the upgrade is more broadly available, added the rep.

Motorola initially seems to have teased the update, without specifically mentioning ICS, in the following e-mail sent to select Xoom owners yesterday, according to tech blogging site AndroidCentral:

Thanks for your patience as we've waited for this project to … Read more

ARM's secret to success: Not doing things the Intel way

LAS VEGAS--ARM believes that its success is tied to doing things very differently from Intel. And you can't argue with its success.

I spoke to Ian Drew, executive vice president of strategy at chip design firm ARM, on the CES show floor here on Tuesday.

Q: You've seen tremendous success over the last few years. ARM chips are in virtually every smartphone and tablet out there. Can you comment? Drew: We shipped 8 billion (processor) cores last year. Look at the growth of smartphones. The diversity of our product lines. Look at how this business has changed over … Read more