ASUS exec confirms Eee Pad tablet plans, picks a bad day
By Donald Melanson 
posted January 27th 2010 10:39AM
posted January 27th 2010 10:39AM
We've been hearing rumors of a Tegra-powered Eee Pad tablet for quite a while now, and it looks like ASUS exec Eric Chen has now finally confirmed the obvious, responding to a question about ASUS' tablet plans by saying, "yes, sure. We have the Eee Pad." Unfortunately, he didn't offer too much else in the way of details, saying only that it will have an ARM CPU and a 3G connection, and that Asus is paying particular attention to the user interface (even citing the iPhone as an example). Somewhat curiously, Chen also apparently dropped the term "Eee Book" when talking about ASUS' other plans, which would seem to be the first time it's been used in any sort of official capacity, although it's not clear exactly what he was referring to.
iTablet/iSlate/iMeh killer already, lawl
@CntrlZ That's why it comes with a butcher knife instead of a stylus.
@Bosco Haha, true
@CntrlZ Apple Apple is so great! "i" just love the new iSlate! Goooooo Apple!
@CntrlZ
ASUS FAILdozer tablet. What a puke device. All hardware and not a lick of content. Bad day for ASUS tablet? More like a bad year.
Asus looking for attention :( we still love you Asus, you don't have to do things like this
@Luffy Actually if this tablet is half the price of the iTablet it will probably put a licking on itablet sales
@Luffy
Ah, gotta love the "PC companies" and all their beautiful designs...
*vomit
Why is it a bad day? Why is Apple's pending announcement of a possible tablet more important than Asus' announcement of a tablet?
Why isn't Engadget running numerous articles about the Asus tablet, like they are about the Apple tablet?
Why do you feed the Apple PR machine, and then poo poo the competition?
@Spiny Norman
It's because this IS engadget. That's just the way they are.
@Spiny Norman
#1 Engadget is already trying to give ownership of the product category to Apple.
#2 "Bad day"? Engadget posted it, "unfortunately" bumping down the iPad photo post that you bumped back up with nothing new added to the post.
#3 "Why do you feed the Apple PR machine, and then poo poo the competition?"
Would be nice to get an answer. Of course they will just pretend they dont.
@Spiny Norman
I say to follow the money
@Spiny Norman
Lol !
Don't take it seriously!
@LAY
Josh will just say, "come on guys, the cache was cleared"
Look, I'd feel like a jackass too if there were MULTIPLE videos on youtube showing the opposite of what my "review" showed.
Oh wait, wrong article... eh still applies. They're apple fanboys for one reason or another.
@Spiny Norman
It is a bad day because all eyes are on Apple. Man this is crazy!! News of this are on frontpages alongside the State of the Union address!!
@Spiny Norman
am i the only one who noticed that the "Is this the Apple tablet?" article was bumped up to the top of the page at 10:29 when that 2nd update was posted hours before then?
@skyblaze
Saw it too.
@skyblaze I as well.
I'm staying away from that post. Reading the comments, it looks like a Fanboy World War going on in there!
Fanboy 1: It's just a big iPhone, lulz!!!11
Fanboy 2: no it aint, apple hater. It will revolutionize everything forever!1!
N900: .......
and Engadget editors are just sitting there laughing their asses off.
@Spiny Norman because Apple's products are sexy and ASSus' Tablet is little more than taking abandoned day old dog poop fom the park, putting it in a ziplock bag, letting it age for a good month, theb opening it up and taking a big wiff. thats an asus unboxing. apple apple is so great!, it owns asus with the iSlate! goooooo Apple!
@onlymyrailgun
Huh? State of the Union?
@Spiny Norman
No - Slate of the Union (aka Engadget)
When did Tablets suddenly become such a hot item? More importantly though: who actually buys them?
@Leindurstit Because its been knowledge for some time that Apple is releasing a tablet. All the manufacturers want on board, because they know Apple are trendsetters, whether the itablet is actually a good product or not.
@Leindurstit
Since the tech blogs saw that they needed to switch from blogging to Apple marketing machine mode. They have been manufacturing a market for weeks, based on astroturf, and this is when it gets kicked into overdrive.
@Luffy
"Because its been knowledge for some time that Apple is releasing a tablet."
So tablets only came about in the past 6 months?
Oh, that's right, they invented that too.
@LAY Duh, tablets have been around forever. They have had a poor adoption rate due to price, and the fact that they've never had a really intuitive interface. I think the Apple tablet will be a lot more about its interface and input, rather than just being another tablet. Really small ultraportable laptops [before the netbook moniker] have also existed for a long time, but they didn't really boom until the Asus EEE pc came out. The Apple tablet will be to the tablet world as the Asus EEE was to netbooks. [well this might not be a sure thing if its anything above $800]
@Leindurstit
Let's not start the "tablets have been tried and they failed" argument, because that's bogus. No reasonably priced tablets have seriously been offered so far. Who buys them? Let's put it this way: offer them at the netbook price point and let's see who DOESN'T buy them. I use my G1 as a "tablet" all the time, since the majority of what I do with it is browse the web and read email. What I mostly wish for is for the damn screen to be bigger so I don't have to constantly zoom in and out. A $200 or so tablet would be perfect for that use case. The only thing that's been wrong with tablets so far has been the price point. Just look at what most people use their laptops for: most of the households I know are littered with laptops, one on the coffee table, one in the kitchen, perhaps even one in the bedroom, mostly to catch up on news, or the fb feed, or watch youtube clips or whatever. I would be VERY surprised if a $200-$300 Eee tablet would fail. Just make sure it has a usable capacitative screen, none of the resistive stylus sh!t.
@Leindurstit I guess it's a convergence of ideas. People want a combination of an ereader, small handheld computer (or keyboardless netbook) which does some of the things that an Android phone or iPhone does. Maybe it reminds them of a tricorder from the old SPock and Bones reruns. Maybe mobile phones can go back to just making calls if we can carry around a tricorder-like device.
I know I read more since I have started reading on my iPhone. It's easier to pull it out in a subway, streetcar or waiting room.
Asus, HP and others are waiting to see what the Apple tablet specs are so they can compete with it. (That's why no details)
@One Love that actually makes sense.
@One Love, and if the iTablet is an atom the rest will make them just as underpowered like always.
Wish they would just put a decent CPU, and figure out how distribute heat already this is 2010.
@One Love
Doubt it. Let's face it. Anything delivered by any non-Apple company will completely blow away anything Apple delivers spec-wise. Apple doesn't sell because of great specs. They sell on the user experience and their marketing machine.
Of course, by the time we see an iTablet 3GS in 2012, the specs will be comparable to something delivered by HP this year.
@Spiny Norman
The key is that Asus, HP, and others, NEED TO ADVERTISE.
The tech blogs, tech publications, and drones that source them as a result, are openly rooting for Apple, and will not give the time of day to anyone else. No mater what they announce, this is the template that these guys use.
Tablet announced before today: "Oh well you are just trying to steal Apple's thunder from their rumored Apple Tablet!"
Announced today: "Somebody's looking for attention."
Announced tomorrow: "iPad wannabe ripoff!"
My advice to them is to saturate the airwaves NOW. Counter Apple's media fan machine by going directly to the consumer. Yes, the tech blogs will trash you, and Apple's fans will go ape, but you will come out stronger if you don't sit around and wait for these guys to post about you, filtered all to hell to make you look pathetic.
@One Love
I don't care what the "iTablet" specs are. Asus just needs to strip a 1005HE down to the very bare essentials, add a capacitative touchscreen and Android, price it at $200 and they will sell a ton. Basically close to what the original flash Eee PC was, only with a touchscreen and an instant-on OS. Oh, and bitchslap Adobe to release the damn Flash player already so we can at least navigate those annoying flash heavy websites.
@LAY
You've hit the nail on the head. Asus, HP, Acer, HTC, and the rest of the gang need to hire a good marketing firm.
I'd say go with the firm that made the recent Verizon ads. They made AT&T look like idiots.
@Spiny Norman
I have to agree with you because just look at the cellphone market, IPhone were not even able to send picture messages until July 2009, the camera is sad. When you look at HTC and their phone specs, spec wise the kill Apple but everybody wants an IPhone, which is so limited it's sad.
@LAY
I also must agree with you also, because when you look now at how HTC is advertising and popping up everywhere, everyweek with a new announcement, they are gaining sales.
@cherryboom This obviously isn't your generic tablet, since Windows doesn't run on ARM cpus
@cherryboom
Or place orders for tons of generic tablet form factors then toss in the iPhone OS.
Big wow.
@kando
How many netbooks has Apple sold vs. Asus. That's right. Zero.
Give Asus a little bit of credit. Along with Acer, they helped define the netbook market. IMHO, without the growth of low cost netbooks, we probably wouldn't be seeing a birth of low cost, keyboard-less tablets.
Bad day? Potentially.
However, as us commenters are now proving, it is not a bad day to announce a tablet if you are not Apple. It is still getting some attention, and this is probably a marketing decision by Asus to attempt to steal some of the Apple hype. Will it keep us from watching the Apple liveblog? Not a chance.
But I probably wouldn't have ever noticed this tablet on the Engadget site if it wasn't January 27th, 2010 (which is a: my 19th birthday, b: Apple Tablet day and c: The state of the union address, so it's a pretty big day for me).
You guys like it's out of nowhere people love Apple, c'mon guys.
On topic: i agree, this is not the best day to confirm this Eee Pad, any day a month after apples event would have been better.
@iBoss you guys do like*
@iBoss
Hmmm. Don't like the name Eee Pad. 'Sounds too much like Pee Pad.
it would be half the price with replacible battery and it should be called
a preemptive strike!
Can people just discuss this gadget rather than wonder off to comparisons and other gadgets!
@sibyy
Would be great! But Engadget is purposely trying to do just that.
E-book reader post: "Too late for those , cause the era of the stand-alone reader is over!"
Asus tablet: "Picked a bad day for that!"
@LAY agreed, can't be helped with Engadget throwing oil to the fire....
Anyway back on subject, I don't think the whole tablet category will be all that successful. Hard to fit something in between 10" netbooks and current 3-4" smart phones. Only nice concept so far has been the Lenovo U1.
@sibyy
I think they should change the name Engadget to Igadget.com, I enjoy coming to this site to read everything about all gadgets but the biased feel put out is putting me off this site more and more.
Everything is refered to as tho it will be inferior to anything other then made by apple.
@kando
If Igoliath releases something that looks like engadget's spy photos with a $1000 price tag. I, for one, will not be buying one.
Hopefully, Asus will fix this problems
@Luffy Well, that's even worse because Asus will have to come up with a sane OS and UI, and applications, and so on. If it was x86 they could at least play the "it runs all of your apps" card.