ASUSVivoTab RT TF600T-B1-GR 10.1-Inch 32 GB Tablet (Gray) 2012 Model

When I asked my Mom if she wanted a refresh of her iPad for Christmas she said, "refresh yes, another iPad not so much". We looked at all the new tablets and she picked this Asus Vivo Tab. I played with it for about a week before Christmas so I would be able to help her with any problems, (she is 75) and was totally impressed with the build quality and design--I would go as far as saying they are outperforming Apple here which is obviously not easy to do. The design and build quality are that good.The removable tablet/keyboard dock form factor is spot on IMO. The tablet was fairly easy to attach and remove from the base, it feels a little awkward at first as you get used to it. It vibrates and plays a chime tone when you have attached it correctly which helps. It takes both hands to dock/detach which is fine with me as when it is attached it really feels attached--I only mention it because it is not as effortless as the cute little magnetic click covers. Over our Christmas visit, (4 days) I noticed my Mom tended to just keep it attached to the keyboard dock so I mentioned and demonstrated several times that the tablet could be removed--she finally just told me she actually preferred it with the base attached for most uses as it "held itself up perfectly". I think she felt more secure being able to set it on her lap or the table and even preferred holding it by the base as it felt "safer". I was able to type pretty well on the chicklet style keyboard even though I have quite long fingers. I could match the 20-30 wpm I type at on my desktop keyboard without any problem. My wife who has very small hands but can type at 80-100 wpm took to it instantly. Tactile feedback for key presses felt very good to me. Key layout and spacing is well thought out. My only complaint would be the lack of back lighting--something I tend to like. Not a deal breaker by any stretch as the keyboard is obviously pretty close to the screen and it does cast some light on it. Touch typists won't care at all of course.The screen is great with excellent brightness/contrast/viewing angles etc. I did not see any ghosting or artifacts so refresh rates are good. No pixelation in movies during action sequences and explosions and playback was smooth as butter.I forgot to check the NFC "tap to share". Sorry.The gyroscopes and accelerometer seemed to work fine in the few games I tried. The screen oriented pretty rapidly when rotated. The closer it was to "upright" the faster it seemed to register--as with all tablets.Sound was better than any other tablet I have used but still lacks enough volume for all uses IMO. Headphones and my Nu Force UDAC 2 sounded excellent.The wireless NIC was great. I got 4 of 5 bars out on the front porch, about 30 feet from a typical Link-Sys home router, and her house has a brick exterior. Anywhere inside I usually had 5 of 5 bars.I really liked the Windows 8 live tile Touch UI --Metro or w/e they are calling it now. I also found the "desktop" portion of RT to be quite usable, especially with the touch pad and pointer on the dock. It was usable (but just barely) with a finger. I would miss the button I was aiming for about 40% - 50% of the time. My Mom already uses a stylus on her iPad so I was able to try one in the windows/desktop environment and it makes it a LOT more usable. The included office apps were all excellent. Being able to use files and folders was also very useful/comfortable for me, especially with either a stylus or the track pad and cursor. The track pad seemed fine to me but to be candid I detest them and am NOT a laptop person, so it could be awesome or horrible compared to other products and I would not know. My Mom uses a lap top and liked the track pad, as did my wife who also uses a laptop. I tried my Logitech Performance MX mouse with it's tiny little USB RX and it was detected and worked fine. I also tried various USB memory sticks and my Galaxy S2 phone and all were auto detected and worked without issue.Windows joined my Moms home network without any problems and adding a printer was going fine...right up until we got to the HP drivers list and her laser printer model was not listed. To be fair to HP the printer is older than dirt and my Pops has to run Windows XP on all their machines because he can't find printer drivers. The drivers list had a LOT of printers so I doubt most people will have a problem. When I was "testing" the Vivo Tab RT at home the week before Christmas I was able to print to my Canon color printer which is about 5 years old, and the Wife's HP 3 in 1 Photo Smart.The Windows 8 App market is not as filled out as Apple's or Androids--not sure what she will do without 50,000 Baby Shaker and Fart Apps--but she had all her Board Games and Bottle Cap type games loaded in about an hour. Think Yahtzi, (SP?) Bejewled, MahJong etc. She also had her Cook Book program and Kindle App and all her Solitaire games. The news paper and magazine selection seemed pretty good to me. She liked the FaceBook and Skype Apps. Her Yahoo email worked fine and the live tiles are actually kind of useful/cool. The mult-tasking is functional...not so sure about the way they split rhe dual view as a third of the screen...though everything seemed to re-size itself correctly when it was in the "little half" of the screen.To sum it up for Windows 8 RT: I really like the Metro touch UI a lot, (can't wait to get a windows 8 phone in fact) and the more traditional desktop portion of the OS is quite familiar and usable with either a wireless mouse, the track pad, or a stylus. Not so much with a "clunky" finger. My only complaint would not be with either environment, but the clunky way Microsoft dumps you from one to the other. The duplicate programs like IE for example. There is a Touch version and a "windows" version. They may have done that for people who are going to spend a lot of time in one or the other I guess, meaning if I was "plugged into windows" and had a mouse running and was working in office the windows version of IE might be more useful then the times I was on the couch just tooling around the web. I could use this OS as is right now without too much trouble and be very productive (and happy). I think it feels about 80% polished and I feel comfortable that future versions will cover that last 20% pretty quickly. I also think that the App store will fill out pretty rapidly for those needing more specialized apps like medical charting, pilots, engineers etc.I took advantage of the free dock deal Asus was running and I have to say that their customer interaction is not great by any stretch. The online form I had to fill out was pretty clunky and I could not get logged into my "VIP" account. Getting any information from their FAQ and forums was a waste of time and getting a person on the phone took a while. Once I did get a person, (who surprisingly spoke English) they were competent and got me squared away pretty quickly. Asus makes exceptionally good products in my experience, but their PR, and customer support still have a ways to go. I got the Dock 15 calendar days after I filled out the online form which seems reasonable for a rebate type "free" item.The hardware from Asus is just flat out WONDERFUL and I am very satisfied with this purchase. I will be buying their Transformer Book in 14" or 15" the minute it is available. Running pure windows programs (with a wireless mouse or stylus) on a beautiful ultrabook/tablet sounds great to me!

ok... like the other good reviews said. there is nothing wrong with this tablet. It's a thousand times more capable than any ipad or android tablet. Can you hook up any ipad or tablet to 10s of thousands of different periferals and not have to worry about scrounging through dozens and dozens of apps and or unneeded accessories in order for it to work? seriously. I recently was promoted to a store manager and this device was a godsend. I use it to show power points on the job to prospective customers rather than lousy brochures. I use it to print off important documents and pdfs that I can edit and submit via email from hooking up any printer either wirelessly off my phones hotspot or via the usb connection from the keyboard attachment or from the usb dongle adapter included. (... I do wish it came with one more; but hey what the heck. this this is still awesome, id gladly pay for a dozen of them to keep next to other periferals around my work and house from how much space this thing saves!) I'm still getting used to windows RT, but... I switched to windows phone about the same time. I have to say W8 Phone is still a little more polished and has some less bugs, but its been around longer!.I am typing this entire review with the same speeds as I normally type off my normal keyboards.THANK you for the other reviews pointing out the FN key (bottom right) with the F9 key to disable the trackpad. Honestly trackpads ... I hate all of them, they're a horribly designed setup for any ergonomics since your thumbs rest above the spacebar key and if any of your fingers happen to slip or need a rest on the stand... youre going to hit that stupid thing and its going to make your mouse and cursor jump a lot. Why many manufacturer's aren't placing the trackpads in the bottom right corner or where a numspad would be.. I have no clue.I was torn between this and the surface pro and the RT. but the battery life was my main thing I didn't want to worry about. Since some days working I just keep it on standby inside one of my desk drawers and I swear this thing lasts 3 days or more just on standby without the keyboard attachment that has a battery inside it as well to give it a lot more life. Also... the surface keyboards were way to gimmicky for me... I prefer a physical response for typing. not some touch clicky response that would annoy me when im listening to music while i'm filling my office documents.The only thing I would like to see is a backlit version of this keyboard. It's not a big deal but I still miss a beat here or there with adding 's to some of my typing.I always get tons of people asking me what type of device i'm using and it's hilarious to see them being surprised its a windows rt based one and that im also using a windows phone. They all say that im the only person they know that enjoys the "new" windows. I don't know who theyre talking to but to me Im guessing they're just some close minded snobs that are too dug into their precious android or ios investments. To each their own, but you can't deny the better productivity from these devices. (android has it's toys and tweaks, ios has it's simplicity, and windows has it's productivity)Screen is bright, speakers are nice; I'm hoping to find a case that will direct the sound towards you with an inbuilt "cupping" like method, but I've yet to find one yet, so maybe I'll create my own DoItYourself thing. Battery life is astounding. Peripheral list is mind blowing. Apps? ... pfft I have a webbrowser....with Flash. If I absolutely need something I'll just skydrive a note to myself when I get home and than skydrive it back to me to show off on my tablet since in those situations it's not something very important.I can't really say a bad thing about this device..except, I've been having it crash sometimes on me when it's not doing anything. Which isn't really an issue since the boot time is 3-5 seconds typically. Didn't do it at first so im guessing a bug just worked itself into one of the updates or I downloaded an app that has a quirk to it or something. Whatever. Still a Stabler OS than android. (better love story than twilight)9.5/10. {4.5/5 Amazon}