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Comment by nextparadigms | Hacker News Reader

You can have both with an Asus Transformer - integrated keyboard that turns it into a laptop and with 15-18h battery life, and tablet for when you need it on the couch/whatever. Why compromise? Those accessories for the iPad are not integrated at all, and they look rather silly.

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Asus Transformer

- Android - 10" screen at 1280x800 - 2.9 pounds (with the dock) - 16GB HD + 1GB ram - 15hr battery

11" Air

- OSX - 11.6" screen at 1344x756 - 2.3 pounds - 64GB HD + 2GB ram - 5hr battery

The only thing that Transformer has going for it is the battery life, everything else is a compromise.

Well, the fact that the Air can't be used as a tablet and does not have a touchscreen can be considered a compromise as well :).

Exactly. For the comparison to be valid (I'm typing this on a Transformer BTW) you'd have to compare to the Air plus an iPad. You'd also have to compare prices, and there the Air loses badly even without including the iPad.

I think the point of contention is the necessity of tablets. As ultrabooks get lighter and more power efficient they muscle their way into the 3rd device slot that tablets are meat to fill, all the while holding on to the 2nd and even 1st device slots.

I can identify with this. Our family got an iPad, and while the kids like using it, I much prefer my MBP for basically everything: reading HN, blogs, news, watching videos. The larger screen, better viewing angles, and keyboard just makes it superior. I'm not sad we got it, but I don't personally find it that useful. The biggest thing it made me realize is that it'd be really nice to have a laptop with a good touchscreen. I've been thinking about the Transformer, but I do wish that docked it'd behave more like a laptop-ish machine and less of a mobile-ish one.

I don't think that really works, though. It certainly doesn't for me. Much of the time, I like the lighter, smaller tablet form factor (even compared to the several netbooks I've owned). I definitely like being able to flip between horizontal and vertical screen aspects on a whim. Other times, I really need to have a keyboard, but I do have to increase weight and bulk for that. Therefore, my ideal would be a single device that does both without having to deal with syncing data between two devices. An "ultrabook" cannot do that, by definition; if it could, it would be a tablet with a dock. It's therefore not true that an ultrabook can fulfill the third-device role. Its far more likely that tablets will evolve to become adequate second (i.e. near-desktop) machines while retaining their third-machine attributes, but it's flatly impossible for ultrabooks to become adequate third machines. For many people it's not the tablet but the monolithic laptop that is likely to become superfluous in a two-machine instead of three-machine world.

MBA 11" is actually 1366x768, but I'd prefer the 16:10 screen of the Asus over the 16:9 MBA. Also, unless the panel has changed, the Transformer has a beautiful IPS screen. The colors and viewing angle on my MBA suck compared to an iPad or Transformer.

I have never used a 11" Air, but they get quite warm; don't they?

In contrast, the iPad 2 has never in my experience got even noticeably warmer than its surroundings, and I tend to believe that the Transformer line will also have that (very welcome, IMO) property.

If you're playing an FPS or running a coupla VMs, it gets warm, but not too warm to sit on your leg.

Only Flash and StarCraft II heat up my Air, otherwise the fan stays off and it's completely cool and quiet.

If 'bigger screen' rather than 'desired screen' is the required spec, then surely a 17" laptop handily beats out the MBA? It'll have a bigger hard drive, and more RAM as well.

How about price?

Air also has a 1.6 GHz Core i5 processor.

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