subject: The Asus Padfone Is Announced [print this page] The line between Smartphone and Tablet has become blurred. Today at the Asus just announced the PadFone, a Smartphone that turns into a tablet, at the Mobile World Congress 2012 (WMC) in Barcelona, Spain. Like the Asus Transformer, the PadFone will be billed as one device with different docking accessories that turn it into a nifty tablet or a notebook with keyboard.
The PadFone Station is somewhat of a Marsupial. According to Nick Mokey, Digitial Trends, The PadFone Station basically just a tablet with no brains accepts the phone via a trunk in the back, just like in prototypes. Asus proprietary Dynamic Display technology allows it to precisely mirror whats on the screen of the phone on a larger 10.1-inch display with 1280 x 800 resolution. Besides just blowing things up for easier reading and watching, the PadFone dock has a 24.4 Watt-hour battery to extend the life of the phone, and its own speakers. Asus hasnt yet clarified whether the PadFone station will need a specific dock, or function with the existing dock from the Transformer.
Whats under the hood of the phone itself? The new PadFone will have a 4.3-inch qHD AMOLED display with Gorilla Glass, an 8-megapixel rear camera using a Fujifilm sensor, and 16GB, 32GB or 64GB of built-in storage, with 1GB of RAM. The PadFone runs on a 1.2GHz dual-core Snapdragon S4 processor rather than the 1.5GHz quad-core Nvidia Tegra 3 powering many of the other new phones unveiled at MWC, like LGs Optimus 4X and HTCs One X. Hmmm It does make me wonder why it didnt shoot for the faster OS.
Pricing is up in the air. Asus did announce all the specifications for the new PadFone but didnt give any clue as to the price of this jewel. With the Asus Transformer dock running $160, that put the price of the whole unit at over $400, almost the cost of a new laptop. Since Amazon is selling the Kindle Fire for $200, Asus will have to price the PadFone competitively to be in the race.
Is a 3-in-1 device worth having? It sounds like it would be convenient to be able to attach your phone to a docking station and have your interface stay the same. With a 64GB card option, the PadFone turned tablet would be great, and of course there is always DropBox to maximize your additional file storage needs. I have DropBox installed on my Droid X, and every time I take a photo it automatically uploads it to DropBox for me. DropBox is accessible from any computer or tablet so the convenience is outstanding. The only question for Asus now is when will the PadFone be available.
