Asus seems to be at it again
LoopyByteloose
Posts: 12,537
Hi all, I loved the EEEpc and wore one out in 3 years of daily use. Of course that morphed into the netbook craze and everybody was making something similar.
Of recent, Asus came out with the EEEpad Transformer and the 'Taipei Times' today claims they are ramping up production as they are being well received with Android 3.XX. In other words, this looks like another winner for Asus in the making.
Meanwhile, Acer is suffering from lack of direction. They let go their Italian CEO. I guess Ferrari notebooks were not quite as appealing as good solid technology. The did look really cool though.
Of recent, Asus came out with the EEEpad Transformer and the 'Taipei Times' today claims they are ramping up production as they are being well received with Android 3.XX. In other words, this looks like another winner for Asus in the making.
Meanwhile, Acer is suffering from lack of direction. They let go their Italian CEO. I guess Ferrari notebooks were not quite as appealing as good solid technology. The did look really cool though.
Comments
My only problem with them is they don't seem to be very good at ramping up production. The Transformer tablet is nice and they could have sold a ton of them right away if they weren't originally released in such small numbers. But, the competition for tablets seems to be changing very quickly - there's always a new and "better" one right around the corner (it seems to be faster than a lot of other devices). If you don't have them available right away, it makes it much easier for consumers to wait until the next round.
it doesn't help that a lot of Android devices are abandoned at a certain Android version with no upgrade path. Why should someone buy a tablet now when Google is talking up the next version of the OS. The tablet manufacturers seem to have learned from the phone manufacturers - don't offer an upgrade, make the customer buy a new one. I don't think Google is doing anything to help this, either.
I am not including all of the hacks, roots, and ROMs available out there for people to modify their tablets/phones themselves. While I appreciate the work people are doing and have taken advantage of it myself, this does not create a very stable environment for the general public.
It really makes you appreciate the ability of the end user to put whatever OS (within some constraints) they want on their machine.
OK, I guess that finishes my rant.
Android is like Linux in that it is possible to build and install the OS on your own (including the Google Market) as long as your vendor releases the source code. But this is either too hard or time consuming for most people. So if you want to do more than use a stock OS build, it is best to pick a tablet that has an active community around it. In looking at the traffic on XDA developers it looks like the Transformer has an active community. BTW I don't think everyone should root their tablet. It's more of a power user thing and helpful when the manufacture loses interest in old hardware.
eLocity announce the A10 a few months back, but it never materialized. Acer then introduced a tablet which is suspiciously similar to the ComPal A10" which eLocity planned to relabel. So if it is the next gen A7 it should be pretty decent.
My only problem with this is that I think manufacturers are relying too much on the community and not providing enough support and updates directly. These communities can be fickle; they often revolve around only a few people providing the real technical core of the work. When those people move on, the device effectively gets abandoned.
I agree that not everyone should root their device. But, there are a lot of updates and modifications that make the device much more useful which don't require rooting. For example, I have an Archos 101 tablet and I've taken advantage of the community to get things like Android Marketplace on it. I haven't needed to root the device. (By the way, the Marketplace limitation is because of Google and the restrictions they place on the manufacturers and not because of Archos.)
It would be nice, though, if Archos would provide updates to the version of Android my 101 is running. Instead, I expect they will just move on to their next generation of tablets which will run Android 3.0 (I get tired of the cute names).
If the products are viewed as commodity products (disposable, unfixable, relatively inexpensive) and the lack of a feature puts it into the "unfixable" category, then teh average consumer demographic is willing to purchase a new product to "fix" their current product. The manufacturers and society are making technological inadequacy a negative trait that can be fixed with an upgrade.
Many more things used to be fixable and therefore not a commodity and not subject to upgrade churn.
Then:
Toaster is broken -> needs a plug/wire fixed -> rewire at home -> toaster fixed = $0 to prodcuer, 0 gain in social status
Now:
Toaster is broken -> replace toaster with latest bells and whistles - problem solved = $$ to producer, personal gain in social status
More an more things are sinking ot the toaster level.
Given the means and opportunity many of us in this demographic (forum users) would still fix the toaster and would be willing to upgrade our Pads, Netbooks, etc. on our own. The majority of the consumers...not so much.
We derive our social status from "can do" others place social status on "can have".
The same thing happens with device drivers in the Windows world and closed source drivers with Linux.
mindrobots, I tend to scarf up old hardware I know I can upgraded. I get the hardware cheap and get the utility as well.