Transformer Prime up for preorder

The almighty Asus Transformer Prime tablet is now up for preorder both on Amazon in the US and on sites in other countries. On Amazon US it’s priced at $492 for the 32GB version and $584 for the 64GB version, both prices being without the $150 keyboard dock. Here in Norway, the 32GB tablet is priced at 5000 NOK with the docking. That’s a $100 premium on the original Transformer (which will stick around) but cheaper than the iPad and several other tablets because the starting price is for 32GB. Black Friday, a yearly sale on the Friday before Thanksgiving (this coming weekend) in the US, will likely bring some significantly discounted prices on tablets as well but even so the Prime should see a fair share of preorders. A release date isn’t quoted on Amazon, though some Norwegian stores report an unconfirmed delivery date of December 1.

To recap, the Transformer Prime is a beast of an Android tablet that will be the first one released to use the Tegra 3 chipset. A 8 megapixel camera that actually seems to produce good photos is included, there’s 1GB of RAM, it runs Android 3.2, has a 10.1-inch 1280 x 800 pixel display, and has a stated battery life of 12 hours. Adding the $150 keyboard dock will increase the battery life, give you a keyboard, and give you more ports while making it more of a netbook. There’s also a Smart Cover for it. Personally this would be my Android tablet of choice if I were to buy one and I didn’t have an iPad, and in my opinion the 1280 x 800 display is a huge advantage over coming tablets with 1920 x 1200 resolution screens as I don’t believe that the Tegra 3 will be capable of outputting 2.5 times the resolution on graphics heavy tasks when it already has to make up for interface lagg that has plagued Android through all of the Tegra 2 era (aka 8 months).

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