Fair price

[3vodroid]

Hey guys/gals, A friend of mine has an Asus eee pad transformer for sale. It was purchased around Christmas. But if he's used it 3 times I'd be surprised. Needless to say it's in very good condition. It is the 16gb model. I haven't really played with these tabs much. I own a toshiba thrive currently and i love it. Here are my questions for you all.

1.Pros/cons about this tablet?
2.What should I offer him for it?


Edit: after reading some stuff on this forum and the transformer prime forum it seems like alot of people are unhappy with the Asus tabs. I'm starting to get scared... I know there will always be more problems than praise on the Internet. But some of the issues sound downright anoying! Can they be fixed with root? Are these tabs really that bad??

 

[superstretch]

Does it come with the keyboard dock? You can pick up a refurbed tablet for $250 and the dock for $80-90, so maybe offer $200 for the tablet and $75 for the dock.

The Transformer doesn't have the issues the Prime does.. the Prime was a bit of a flop because of the aluminum chassis and wifi interference.

I love my Transformer.. I don't use my laptop anymore, I don't have an insane drive to mess with my phone anymore, and I use my desktop about 50% less. The Transformer is built pretty well (far better than the plastic tablets from its generation). The CPU is very quick and the GPU handles most games pretty well (PSX emulation is pretty good!)

Its a solid buy for a bargain price

 

[shadders139]

I just bought this tablet (used) a couple of weeks ago from ebay. I paid

 

[shadders139]

Edit: I should say that I bought the tablet on its own, without the dock, so if you can get the dock at a good price- that's a bonus!

 

[superstretch]

The Tf101 pretty much got unanimous praise and rave reviews, so I disagree that "a lot of people are unhappy with the asus tabs". Asus tabs are very well regarded

Exactly.. I forgot to mention that they're so highly regarded that Google used ASUS to make the Nexus 7. From all I've seen, ASUS is the only company that's actually innovating in the tablet sector (and then crams killer hardware inside)

 

[3vodroid]

Yes it's the the Transformer. NOT the prime. And it's not a refurb. He literally took the plastic off of It and then put it back in the box. It was a birthday gift from his mother in law and he's held onto it to try and not hurt her feelings haha. It's just the tablet not the dock. Thanks for the insight! I really would love to get this thing for a bargain and then get the keyboard! I just got a little scared when I saw the issues but I'm glad this one isn't suffering from any of that. Also.. I assume it hasn't been upgraded to ICS bc its been sitting off for so long. So it's most likely running honeycomb. Is it hard to root?

Also, I was under the assumption that the bezel was aluminum and the back was plastic? I went to best buy last night to see if I could check one out but they only had the prime.

 

[superstretch]

Nope, it has ICS. I believe JB has also leaked for it. Rooting was so easy that I don't even remember doing it (one click maybe?). I run Android Revolution HD on mine.

 

[3vodroid]

Nope, it has ICS. I believe JB has also leaked for it. Rooting was so easy that I don't even remember doing it (one click maybe?). I run Android Revolution HD on mine.

But when you first rooted where you on honeycomb? I thought this tablet came with HC? or does it update automatically to ICS? Only reason I ask is bc I belong to a Toshiba thrive forum and we have a lot of people that took the ics update. Which came with a locked bootloader. Thus rendering it un root able. Unless you roll back to HC. If there is a method to root the Transformer while on ics I guess it wouldn't matter. But that's what I was wondering.

 

[El Presidente]

Yeah, root is a piece of cake, it's one click now or at most a couple of ADB commands. ICS root is much the same as far as I'm aware.

The initial ICS Update caused LOADS of problems, but Asus have managed to sort most of them out. I've just had mine back from RMA for the reboot issue (it's randomly rebooted again once already, but I'm hoping that was a one off) and it only took somewhere in the region of 5 days to repair. Time will tell if it's still a problem.

I'm a little soured by the debacle of the ICS update, but I still think it's a pretty good piece of hardware and would recommend it albeit with a little caution. It's well made and feels like an expensive, quality piece of kit and if you ignore what happened with ICS, I've no issues with it whatsoever.

 

[superstretch]

I remember getting my tablet like the day after ICS was released for it. I waited about 8 hours but the software update still wouldn't show there was an updated. So I rooted and rom-ed.

If you check: http://androidforums.com/transformer-all-things-root/448637-transformer-rooting-roms.html there's a one-click and a slightly more in depth method of rooting. I *think* the second method was similar to how I rooted mine

 

[superstretch]

The initial ICS Update caused LOADS of problems, but Asus have managed to sort most of them out. I've just had mine back from RMA for the reboot issue

The random reboots were the only issue for me, but the dev(s) for ARHD got them figured out pretty quickly. My current uptime is 281:44:50 (1 2/3 weeks, and that was only because I went 4 days without charging and the battery finally died)

 

[3vodroid]

Awesome sounds good guys. Hopefully I get lucky and don't get the random reboots. That would be a bummer. Like I said I use the Thrive daily. But when he mentioned this for sale I couldn't pass it up. I really think he's leaning toward 300 for it. But I'll throw 250-275 at him. Like I said he literally took the plastic off it and forgot about it. So 300 while being on the high side. Still wouldn't be all that bad. I'm really looking forward to getting my hands on the keyboard for it. I think that's so neat.

 

[3vodroid]

The random reboots were the only issue for me, but the dev(s) for ARHD got them figured out pretty quickly. My current uptime is 281:44:50 (1 2/3 weeks, and that was only because I went 4 days without charging and the battery finally died)

What is ARHD? Asus' tech department? Just curious. Lol

 

[El Presidente]

ARHD is one of the more popular custom ROMs. They do a number of devices, and the main dev, Mike, is a bit of a genius.

 

[3vodroid]

ARHD is one of the more popular custom ROMs. They do a number of devices, and the main dev, Mike, is a bit of a genius.

Gotcha.. Ok awesome. I Definelty plan on rooting. Good to know some issues can be fixed with root.

 

[AutobahnSHO]

I tried to buy mine the week they were released- had to wait a couple weeks. (May 2011.)

The advantage the Transformer has over anything else is the keyboard dock. It doubles the battery life (great for trips) and with a touchpad and keyboard, can make surfing/typing a breeze. Keyboard also has special buttons for the media player, settings, volume, etc...
Basically- GENIUS.

I too had the "random reboot" after the initial ICS but it hasn't been off in 580hrs, I think the kids let the battery run out..

I love mine and use it quite a lot. Google Play support, Netflix app, office if you really need it (although it's quite clunky/junky).

Look around on ebay and the refurb sites to see what kind of deal you can get. I wasn't too concerned about storage (got the 8GB) but would have liked to go bigger. Oh well, MicroSD cards are easy.

Amazon has a 9ft mini HDMI cable fairly cheap- I use it for watching netflix or other movies from time to time.

 

[AutobahnSHO]

ps- I use only the official software, no root. Haven't felt the need to. Also the tablet looks/feels somewhat cheaper than others but again, it's better than the Prime (GPS issues) and the keyboard is where it's at.

 

[3vodroid]

I was hoping this bad boy supported an sd card. Micro sd not full sd right?


I will probably stick with the one my buddy is selling. I never buy anything Refurbished,for a few reasons. I don't know how the previous owner handled it. Sure it was fixed but I'd rather not take that chance. The refurbs are going for almost the same as what I'm going to get it for and it was used 3 times. So I'm willing to pay a few bucks extra for that piece of mind

I haven't got to actually hold the transformer yet. Isn't the bezel aluminum and the back is plastic? That's what it looks like in the video reviews on YouTube.

 

[AutobahnSHO]

Tablet supports MicroSD only. The keyboard takes full-size SD cards and has 2 USB ports. Harddrives and thumbdrives both work fine, but the really tiny thumbdrives don't fit because the ports are slightly recessed.

Yes it's a metal bevel and plastic back. The back is textured so it doesn't slide out of the hand easy, but on some of them their is noticeable flex between bezel and glass. Doesn't bother me on mine, but I have several friends who bought also and one is particularly bad.

Gotcha on the refurb, but I've always had good luck with them. (mostly Sansa mp3 players.)

 

[3vodroid]

Well it all sounds really good you guys. I'm gonna go for it! I'm going over to his place tomorrow to talk price and whatnot. So hopefully this time tomorrow my signature will read sent from my Asus eee pad transformer

 

[3vodroid]

Where is a good place to get the keyboard? Amazon or ebay? I'd like to get one new. Is the transformer prime keyboard compatible? And one more question for anyone who has the keyboard... How badass is it? Bc the more I look at pictures ad watch videos the more I'm thinking my thrive might get to ride the bench for a little bit hehe

 

[helpifIcan]

Better return if problems on Amazon. You could also check out Newegg.

 

[AutobahnSHO]

Bestbuy sometimes has them in stock but I got mine from Newegg when they first came out.

The keyboard just absolutely rocks. All my posts on this forum are on the TF. (Transformer model TF101) I can type just as fast as a regular laptop. Plus the buttons on top are perfect for music playback, the touchpad good for scrolling.. Also you don't need a case to hold it up. My dad and I were video chatting and he had to keep fixing his Galaxy tab because it wouldn't stay at the right angle. Mine is just put it on whatever surface and forget about it..