Asus introduces VivoTab, VivoTab Smart Windows 8 tablets for $499 and up

Asus is launching a new line of Windows 8 tablets with Intel Atom Z2760 Clover Trail processors. At $499, the VivoTab Smart is the cheaper model, with a 10.1 inch, 1366 x 768 pixel display, while the $799 VivoTab has a larger display, an optional keyboard dock, and an active digitizer for use with a digital pen.

Asus VivoTab

Asus VivoTab

The Asus VivoTab features an 11.6 inch, 1366 x 768 pixel display, 2GB of RAM, and a 64GB solid state disk.

It has a Wacom active digitizer and digital pen (but no place to store the pen). The tablet has a 30Whr battery, a 2MP front-facing camera, and an 8MP rear camera.

Asus also offers an optional keyboard dock with a 25Whr battery. When using the tablet and dock together, Asus says you should be able to get up to 19 hours of battery life.

You can find video, photos, and more details in our hands-on look at the Asus VivoTab.

Asus VivoTab Smart

The VivoTab Smart is a cheaper tablet that’s basically what you’d get if you took the VivoTab RT and swapped out the NVIDIA Tegra 3 processor for an Intel Atom chip and replaced Windows RT with Windows 8.

The VivoTab Smart and VivoTab RT are about the same size, shape, and weight. Even the $499 starting prices are the same.

Asus will offer an optional sleeve which attaches to the tablet via magnets. The sleeve doubles as a kickstand, and there’s an optional Bluetooth keyboard.

Pricing for the sleeve and keyboard haven’t yet been set.

This model is thinner and lighter than the VivoTab, but offers similar performance. Unfortunately it won’t work with the VivoTab keyboard docks and there’s no active digitizer, so if you want to use a pen you’ll need to find a capacitive stylus.

Check out our Asus VivoTab Smart hands-on article for more video and photos.

Asus VivoTab RT

The first member of the VivoTab family to go on sale will be the VivoTab RT which is a 10.1 inch model with an NVIDIA Tegra 3 processor and Windows RT operating system. It’s available for $599 and that price includes a keyboard docking station.

You can check out our hands-on post for more details.

: Asus VivoTab

: Asus VivoTab

: Asus VivoTab Smart

: Asus VivoTab Smart

: Asus VivoTab Smart

Posted on Tuesday, October 23rd, 2012, 3:05 pm by Brad Linder | 30 Comments

jb82

Does the dock come with the vivo tab at $799 or is this going to be an extra $100-$150?
artinvent

OK, the more expensive Vivo Tab is something I’ve not seen mentioned before and is pretty cool. Really kind of unique in having a true stylus and hi-res 1080p screen with an Atom. Could be a real contender for me.

The only other choices with stylus and 1080p screen are the Sony Duo and the Samsung Ativ Pro, which are both more like $1200 and have Core processors, much shorter battery life, and more heft. I’m a little leary of only Atom processor and 2GB of RAM with Windows programs. Hmm, will be looking for reviews of this pretty closely.

I do wish Asus would bring out one with a Core proc and second battery in the keyboard. They do such a good job with these Transformer style units, they could make a real contender.
gadgetfann

TigerDirect already has this for pre-order as the Asus TF810C ($799 without keyboard and $999 with), however I checked the images and several videos on Youtube and there’s no SD or MicroSD card slot on it. Hopefully we’ll learn something different on Friday, but there’s no way I’d buy this without a memory card slot.
ruudboek

The GPU on this Intel Atom Z2760 will be a PowerVR SGX545, which is an older gpu being outperformed even by Tegra 2.
So if i understand correctly, you can just about forget about doing any decent gaming on this thing.
http://twitter.com/efjay01 Ef Jay

The Vivo Tab screen res is incorrect, just 1366×768, not 1080p. At least no mention of it in the video here http://www.youtube.com/user/asus/videos?view=0
http://www.liliputing.com/ Brad Linder

Yeah, I just checked my notes. It looks like I must have heard something wrong.

I’ll update the post.
http://twitter.com/efjay01 Ef Jay

Hope that $799 price for the tablet alone is going to come down or it will be left in the dust by the cheaper options from Lenovo, Samsung and dell.
voleheart

$799? way too much
voleheart

ativ smart pc is $749 with keyboard and stylus included and Atom is rumoured to be an excellent performer on Windows 8
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100002143491884 Kevin Mai

That Vivo Tab Smart looks like a great value
jb82

I guess everyone was at the apple event as there is barely any coverage of this. Bad date Asus. Thanks for covering Brad as the vivo tab is one on my radar.
http://www.liliputing.com/ Brad Linder

I have some hands-on photos, video, and impressions… but I’ll probably post them tomorrow. I do need to sleep sometimes.
gadgetfann

Finally was able to confirm that the ASUS has a MicroSD card slot on the left side of the screen next to the headphone jack so I cancelled my order for the Samsung ATIV Smart PC and pre-ordered the Asus VivoTab. The Vivotab has everything that the ATIV has, plus it seems to have a brighter display. The ATIV had a Micro SIM card slot, though, but the Asus has longer battery life.
gadgetfann

PC Connection and MacMall both has these up for preorder too under ASUS TG600C & TF810
jb82

Ativ is cheaper $750 for the complete package vs $1000 + an integrated pen slot and some samsung pen apps. If thishad a full sd slot I’d be buying one right now.
gadgetfann

Typo should be ASUS TF600T and TF810C
CyberGusa

The TF600T is the 10.1″ Vivo Tab RT (Tegra 3) and the TF810C is the 11.6″ Vivo Tab (Clover Trail) with digitizer pen.

Keep a eye out for sales, apparently Asus will include the keyboard dock at launch… at least that’s what some are saying they stated recently. No word on how limited the offer may be…
http://www.facebook.com/jethricruz Jeth Cruz

Where’d you see that the Vivo Tab has 1080p display?
CyberGusa

In terms of PC gaming, neither ARM or ATOM are really up to it. The most powerful ARM graphics are only reaching the level of game consoles, which are themselves 5-7 years old now and well behind the curve for PC gaming graphics.

Besides, you’re likely confusing the Clover Trail with the Medfield. It’s Medfield that uses the much older SGX540, but Clover Trail’s SGX545 is newer and significantly more powerful PowerVR GPU.

Even the Tegra 3 is out performanced by a dual SGX543MP2 at 200MHz. The SGX545 is a bit more powerful per GPU than the SGX543 and is clocked at a much faster 533MHz. So it most definitely does better than the old Tegra 2.

PowerVR also adds hardware accelerated media decoding and encoding for Clover Trail. So it can handle full HD playback and recording without burdening the CPU and at very low power usage.

For Cedar Trail, which also uses the SGX545. it has already been shown it can play over 20Mbps bit rate Blu Rays with ease.

So for mobile gaming it should just be fine, it’s just PC gaming is far more demanding and is where it will falter but as pointed out already so too would a ARM solution.

Provided the drivers are good and the game properly optimized, you should be able to play PC games like WoW on lowest settings. Pretty much anything playable on a netbook counts.

Though if you want a little bit more on graphical performance then keep a eye out for models based on the AMD Hondo. CPU performance is actually a tiny bit below the Clover Trail but the graphical performance would be around 3x better and it supports USB 3.0 and full 64bit, along with possibly getting more than just 2GB of RAM.

But anything more and you might as well either get a Pro tablet model with Core i-Series processor and preferably a HD4000 GMA. Or just get a real gaming laptop if that’s really a concern as PC gaming can be very demanding and nothing really handles them like a high end CPU coupled with a really good discrete graphic card.
CyberGusa

Resolution is actually 1366×768 for all three models…

The Vivo Tab RT is basically based on the Transformer series and is a 10.1″ Tegra 3 model.

The Vivo Tab is similar but it’s 11.6″ in size and running on the Clover Trail Z2760. So PPI is slightly less with a larger screen and same resolution but the digitizer pen helps add value.

The Vivo Tab Smart is the actual new model that wasn’t mentioned before now, and is similar to the 10.1″ model but running W8 and on Clover Trail… Along with a lower starting price but that’s counter by the fact it apparently won’t be getting a KB dock and instead will only offer a cover that doubles as a kick stand and a optional BT KB.

In terms of performance, Windows 8 is much better optimized for mobile usage than Windows 7. So as long as you stick to the Modern UI it should perform quite well.

Legacy apps, however, may not be as well optimized and that’s where it may still feel like a netbook, but you can at least run x86 apps that you won’t be able to run on ARM based tablets with RT.

The Core i-Series tablets may cost a lot more and have much shorter run times but they also offer about 10x or more performance. So depends on just how much performance you really need.

Btw, the Asus Transformer Book will be a Core i-Series based tablet with keyboard dock. Basically a Transformer version of their Zenbook.

Only 13.3″ will be available for now and it won’t offer the digitizer pen, but the dock will have more ports, including Ethernet, and the dock also adds a 500GB HDD in addition to the 128GB SSD in the tablet.
CyberGusa

There are reports from the announcement Asus made on the 23rd evening event, which indicate they’re going to be offering a sale that’ll include the keyboard dock with the tablet pricing.

Originally it was suppose to be separate and they would charge up to $199 for the Keyboard dock but they seem to be reconsidering that now.
gadgetfann

This is getting confusing but you may be correct, afterall. I’ve found two Mfr Part #s for the VivoTab MacMall lists Mfr Part # TF810C-C2-GR as the Vivo Tab with 1920×1200 resolution for $942.99. TF810C-C1-GR has1366x768 resolution for $799.
http://www.facebook.com/jaredwestfall Jared Westfall

The Vivo keyboard dock has a battery in it which the ATIV does not.
jordanfr6@aol.com

that vivo tab smart looks like it’s going to be a great value! i’ve been waiting for somebody to come up with a tablet that has a standard USB and attachable keyboard for years now! ( now i don’t have to buy a printer with WiFI or airprint!!!!!!!) the fact that this one is (on the high end) of a resonable price range ( for a college student) will definetly help.
Brown4eva

So the 10.1 inch,you can’t get buy an optional keyboard or cover for it only the 11.6 inch ??? I’m confused here
Bob

The ATIV does not have a GPS and the digitizer is not as good as the Vivo Tab. Also the ATIV is all plastic, vs the Vivo Tab Aluminum housing. That’s why the Vivo Tab costs more.
Jacob B

Where can I pre-order the Vivo Tab, I checked everywhere
Jacob B

There selling this with everything (the pen, the keyboard dock) at the amazon store for 799$

http://www.microsoftstore.com/store/msstore/en_US/pd/ThemeID.27509700/ASUS-VivoTab-TF810C-Tablet/productID.256540300
Ed

Writing this comment on the VivoTab itself, just bought from B&H.

This is the full model with digitizer, and tomorrow it’s going back for a refund.

Why?

1 – Digitzer is separate, doesn’t stow away anywhere either on tablet or on expensive dock option. Gonna lose it within a week.

2 – NO decent graphics acceleration from the crappy chipset. 1080p MOV from Gopro plays OK, as do 720p MKV H264′s once you have a decent codec pack installed, bu this machine cannot handle playback of 1080p H.264 MKV files. For me, it’s a dealbreaker – want to be able to take my TV and Movie files with me, and even if I can only display at 1366×768, I cant allow a limitation of 720p for the input file. No way.

3 At this price (over $1000) for tablet and keyboard dock together, I SHOULD be getting full HD playback, even a full HD screen. The ‘droid machines from Asus do it for much less

4 the form factor is horrible. Why would I want 11.6 inches for 1366×768 when I can get the same in 10″? No justification at all for the extra bulk.

5 The keyboard base dock, although being very solid with good keyboard and doubling the battery to a claimed 19 hours, has just 2 USB2-only ports on it. No extra speakers (unless tablet is in your hands and sounds is “bounced back” towards you, this machine sounds weak and crappy), no full-size HDMI or other external display port (leaving you with only the little micro-hdmi slot in the top-right corner of the slate when docked – horrendous config!), no Ethernet port, no USB3.

Overall, for $1000 I expect better. I’m returning this and will spend $300 more for a Fujitsu that addresses ALL of the above issues, much better value for money.

As is, this machine was overtaken and supplanted in specs by the TF Infinity over a year ago. This is a poorly thought-out, poorly equipped overpriced slab of metal junk. VERY disappointed with ASUS.
Martin Schuldt

I got a demo Asus VivoTab Smart and it came with a non funktional Touchscreen Since is was a demo device I had to get ist repaired. I am waiting since 6 weeks for the device to be sent back. The VivoTab is a great device on the datasheet and what I have seen when I had it in my hands looked great. However Asus does not seem to do a lot of quality checks before shipping and it takes them forever to ship replacements. If that does not worry you then good luck!!

Asus introduces VivoTab, VivoTab Smart Windows 8 tablets for $499 and up

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