Right on cue, Asus started rolling out Ice Cream Sandwich to Transformer Prime tablets last week. The update not only brought Android 4.0 to the tablet, but also a fix for the lackluster GPS performance. But apparently the GPS is borked for some. Users are still experiencing poor performance and worse yet, some are even stating that the GPS no longer works in ICS when it did prior to the update.

The update reportedly enabled the tablet to obtain satellite information via Wi-Fi, which, in theory, should allow the GPS radio to lock-on quicker. But remember, as Asus previously stated, the Transformer “is not a professional GPS device.” So, you know, that means users shouldn’t expect certain functions to work as advertised.

The common theory prior to the update stated that the Prime’s metal back plate was interfering with the GPS radio. That could still be the case but it seems less likely now that satellite information is provided by a data connection.

Issues often arise after a product launch. Asus is not unique in this situation. However, the company is seemingly sweeping problems under the rug rather than directly addressing them. The company already removed all mentions of a GPS radio from the Prime’s product page (Amazon hasn’t though). Simply issuing a statement that the Prime is not a “professional GPS device” does not cover it. It speaks to the company’s inexperienced in the consumer electronic realm.

As many users point out on XDA, the Prime is still a fine tablet minus the GPS ability. Some users state the GPS works fine. But it’s completely broken for others. Consumers have a responsibility to hold manufacturers and companies responsible for their errors and mistakes. Only ignorant fanboys grin and bear it. The rest try to get issues resolved.

The Asus Transformer Prime was the latest tablet to wear the title of iPad killer. It was supposed to rise up, powered by the all-mighty quad-core Nvidia Tegra 3, and finally stand tall against the iPad. It was supposed to use its keyboard dock as a mighty quarterstaff and deliver a memorable blow against Apple’s champion. But that didn’t happen. Asus is letting the Transformer Prime wither on the vine.

There is nothing sadder than watching a promising product die early. In the case of the Transformer Prime, interest and hype peaked before the tablet even launched. Then when the tablet finally hit retailers, users and developers quickly discovered locked software and buggy hardware. The tablet still has a chance to sell well. It is, even with the early hiccups, a stellar product relative to its competitors.

This is new ground for Asus. Before the original Transformer tablet, the company never had a halo product. Three short years ago Asus was just flourishing PC component maker testing the consumer market waters with a relatively small notebook/desktop lineup. The Eee brand made Asus a household name. But the Eee PC netbooks were just another bulletproof Wintel product. Sure, problems arouse and the Eee PCs were far from perfect, but the company successfully flooded the market with enough models to counter any bad press.

Android tablets are a completely different product than Windows notebooks. They require more precises marketing and launch schedules. Consumers also expect a more complete experience from the products thanks to the high bar set by the iPad. Asus is learning this the hard way.

Asus started teasing the Transformer Prime back in October through a Facebook campaign. There was never any talk of the launch schedule or price point. The tablet was finally announced on November 18th, but Asus still didn’t include the release schedule. Eventually, over the following month, several leaked screenshot from retailers indicated that the Prime would hit stores prior to Christmas. Then finally, Asus put rumors to rest and announced the tablet would be in stores and online on December 19th.

That didn’t happen. Retailers pushed back pre-orders as Asus failed to deliver the product on time. Eventually, just before the end of 2011, several shops started shipping out their first batches. It’s still not widely available from Amazon and Best Buy, though. Even if it was available, would-be buyers would be smart to hold off for a bit. Early adopters are singing a song of woe right now.

XDA forum members collectively erupted in rage yesterday after it was discoverd Asus locked down the Prime’s bootloader. Apparently 128 bit encryption is employed to keep owners from accessing key components and flashing new roms and kernels onto the tablet. The Prime is effectively grounded. This move prevents owners from unlocking the full potential of the tablet. Owners are at the complete mercy of Asus for system updates and improvements (like the current GPS and WiFi bugs). So much for Android being “open”.

This practice of locking down the system files is not new. However, every time a vendor ships a halo product with a locked bootloader, the Android community explodes with frustration. This particular move by Asus speaks to the company’s naivety. They simply don’t know what the hell is going on or who buys their products. Transformer Prime buyers are looking for a digital sandbox to explore Android. Geeks buy Asus products. They’re not John looking up recipes on Epicurious. If Prime buyers wanted a completely curated experience, they would have bought an iPad.

The troubles keep piling on. Owners are now reporting that the Prime’s GPS function is nearly unusable and the WiFi support is flaky. It takes forever to lock onto GPS satellites. So, in a classic anti-consumer move, Asus simply removed most references to GPS from their websites. The sensor is missing from spec list on this swanky product page although it’s still listed under specifications on this one. Reportedly the tablet’s thin metallic casing is to blame for both although Asus just pushed an update that is supposed to address the issue.

Asus could recover some lost love by unlocking the bootloader, but conflicting statements from Asus continue to enrage and frustrate owners. The Asus US Facebook team posted a message several hours ago promising an official statement was in the works. However, the company posted a patronizing message on its Italian page that said, in part, “Finally speech root: our position in this regard is simple. The product is guaranteed as it is.”

Asus is clearly in uncharted waters here. The company flubbed the launch and alienated their key demographic. That’s the formula for failure. Even if Asus recants and unlocks the bootloader, some of the damage is irreversible. CES kicks off next week and there will no doubt be several Android tablets competing for the iPad-killer label and looking to steal some of the Prime’s allspark.

Update: Asus just announced via its Facebook page that a boot unlocker is in the works and Android 4.0 will hit the device starting on January 12. Asus claims that they had to lock the device in order to meet certain DRM requirements and if owners choose to unlock the tablet, it will void the warranty and remove the ability to rent videos from Google.

The argument stands, though. Asus a company learning how to properly handle consumer electronics. As usual, early adopters are in for a good amount of pain and frustration.

Asus clearly didn’t get the memo that netbooks are dead. Tablets killed them. Or rather so goes the popular narrative. In real life consumers will continue to look for low-cost alternatives to traditional notebooks and Asus will clearly be there, ready with new models to fill this increasingly niche demand.

The pics here come by way of ASUSDesign, a Asus site dedicated to highlighting products that won various awards, describes the PC Flare 1025/1225 as a “revolution of the Asus EeePC.” The quick blurb also talks about “perfect flowing curves” and “high taste of simple” but fails to mention the projected announcement schedule. And unlike other items on the Asus website, there isn’t a link to netbook’s product page. Still, with CES next week, it’s probably a safe bet that these netbooks will officially debut at the massive consumer electronic trade show.

Asus has always been the netbook champion. Its Eee PC line made Asus a serious consumer brand. The company is not going to simply close up shop and walk away from a product type that it help pioneer. The expensive groundwork of marketing and consumer brand recognition is done. Why not keep the store open a few more hours and hope for the best. Besides, Intel is not done with netbooks either.

Intel’s next-gen netbook platform is said to bring better battery life and increased performance to the sub-notebooks. Code-named Cedar Trail, the next player in the Atom line, will likely headline many netbook announcements at CES 2012. Asus won’t be the only company announcing new netbooks. If Internet rumors are believed, look for Cedar Trail netbooks from Acer, Toshiba, Lenovo, Samsung, and, of course, Asus.

These latest models seem to be from the same mold as the Asus Transformer Prime. They share many of the same lines although the netbook is slightly more curvy. The model numbers, 1025/1225, state that there will be a 10- and 12-inch model.

It’s unlikely that netbooks will ever be as popular as they were a few years back. Tablets will see to that. But with Intel’s next-gen platform righting many of the netbook’s wrongs, the mini notebooks seem like they’re dying right as they’re getting interesting.

Call me naive, but I just assumed that when Asus showed off a device called the Transformer Prime, they had some sort of deal to license or at least provide some kind of royalty to the Transformers franchise. Apparently not, as Hasbro has just filed a lawsuit alleging that Asus is infringing on the Transformers trademark.

Now, if the device were just called the Transformer, I think I would come down on Asus’ side here. After all, transform is a common word and although it may recall to mind certain memories from the 80s (and, to a lesser extent, the last few years), it is just a word and it also describes the transforming capacity of the device. But then they had to go and call it the Prime. What’s next, Soundwave speakers? A Bumblebee netbook?

No doubt Asus will try to excuse themselves by saying that both Transformer and Prime are common words that describe the device in question, which exists in a market totally unrelated to that of Hasbro’s toys and media. I don’t think that anyone will buy that, though. “Transformer Prime” is almost certainly a deliberate riff on Optimus Prime. And while Hasbro doesn’t make computers, Transformers games and accessories do exist for PCs and a judge is likely to agree that the whole thing is pretty blatant anyway.

What will happen? Hasbro is asking for damages and an injunction against sales of the product until they work this out. Asus would be wise to cop to the mistake, pay off Hasbro, and license if it can. Although the tablet hasn’t been a big seller, Asus has been pushing the brand pretty hard and will have to weigh saving it against paying what’s due.

Netbooks are still big business for Asustek. So much so that the hotness from 2009 outsold Asus tablets in 2011. Per numbers released at the company’s global sales meeting (and relayed by Digitimes), Asustek expects to ship 4.8 netbooks by the end of 2011 but only 1.8 million tablets. But that’s expected to change in 2012. The roles will be reversed and Asus sees big things for next year.

Once upon a time, the Eee PC was the netbook to own. It was loved by moms and modders alike. It was (and still is) cheap, well-equipped, and widely available at a number of retailers. In 2010 the Eee PC owned 20% of the netbook market and it’s estimated that Asus shipped 6-8 million units that year alone. But netbooks were always a stopgap product of sorts and never expected to be with us forever. With shipments predictable down in 2011, the company is likely looking to tablets to pick up the slack.

Asus offered basically one tablet model in 2011: the hot Eee Pad Transformer. This tablet was announced at CES 2011 where it instantly won over geeks with impressive specs but an even more tasty $399 MSRP. Even though it didn’t hit the retail market until May, it apparently sold pretty well for an Android device. It must have made up the bulk of Asus’ tablet sales. Besides the Transformer, there’s the Eee Pad Slider and the brand new Transformer Prime. But those three tablets stood tall against the company’s established but shrinking Eee PC product line.

Asus is predicting a total shipment amount of 1.8 million tablets this year. That number is expected to rise to 3 million next year, picking up the slack of the dying netbook, but also, per Asus, surpassing Samsung’s tablets. Yep, Asus expects to beat the Samsung Galaxy Tab army. That would be, in case you can’t keep up, the Samsung Galaxy Note, the GalTab 7.0, the 7.7, the 8.9, the 10.1 and all the different variations between them — those are just the models announced this year. If Asus follows its own recent path, it expects to best Samsung with a much more simple offering.

Netbooks shot Asus into the primetime and established the company as a consumer brand. But netbooks are quickly getting killed off by tablets. If Asus stays its course and things go as they hope, the journey between netbooks and tablets should be relatively painless.

The ratio of awful tablets to good ones in this year’s Black Friday ads doesn’t exactly inspire much confidence, but there are some good deals to be found even at this early stage. Case in point: Best Buy’s leaked Black Friday circular has the first generation 16GB Asus Transformer for $250, a respectable $150 drop from its current price.

Much like with Staples and their bargain-basement BlackBerry PlayBooks, this doorbuster deal is only for people with the guts to wait in line for it. The big question though, is whether or not it’s worth risking life and limb to acquire. Let’s not forget, after all, that the Transformer Prime is barreling down the pipeline with a better processor and camera in tow as we speak.

Still, the Transformer’s solid Tegra 2 chipset and 10.1-inch display make it one of the better tablet options available during the post-Thanksgiving mayhem. Better one of these than a Coby Kyros or a “Polaroid Internet Tablet,” after all.

I’m sure the temptation of a low price already has some bargain hunters working out their Black Friday logistics, but here’s a thought — why not stay at home as see what Cyber Monday has to offer instead? Call me lazy, but in this case, I’d rather my credit card and clicking finger get a workout instead of schlepping around in the cold with 1,000 other people.

Now that Ice Cream Sandwich is real, manufacturers can start talking about the roll out. The good news is that ICS looks Tegra 2 friendly so it should run on most of the first generation Honeycomb tablets. Asus and Acer have both confirmed that their respective tabs will get the update but haven’t detailed the launch schedule. That’s the bad news, which really isn’t all that bad in and of itself.

Asus released several a statement across its social media platforms indicated that yes, the entire Eee Pad family including the Transformer and Slider will eventually see an official Android 4.0 release.

Via Asus Facebook

Here’s the official word on Android 4.0, Ice Cream Sandwich:

“Google recently announced the latest update for Android, Ice Cream Sandwich, which brings some exciting new features and capabilities. At ASUS, we pride ourselves on delivering a great experience with our products, thanks to frequent updates that further enhance our products’ capabilities. We’re delighted to confirm support for Ice Cream Sandwich on the ASUS Eee Pad Family – our aim is to bring the latest Android update to the Eee Pad Series, but at this time we are unable to set a date for its release. Please stay tuned for more news on our Ice Cream Sandwich upgrade plans.”

Tablet-online.pl received a statement from Acer Poland indicating that Ice Cream Sandwich will hit the Acer Iconia Tab A100/A101 and the A500/A501 sometime in mid-January. That’s CES time, folks.

So far Samsung and Motorola haven’t released info concerning its Honeycomb tablet update schedule although Motorola recently tweeted that it would release ICS updates 6 weeks after Google hands them the code. However, most of the current Honeycomb tablets run the same hardware, which should make porting an unofficial release to the tablets a non-issue.

Gasp! A new Asus Transformer tablet is in the works. This of course calls for a YouTube teaser trailer that doesn’t show a damn thing. The Next Transformation hints at the future of Asus’ convertible tablet. Giving Asus’ recent marketing strategies, prepare yourself for a healthy dose of viral campaigns until this thing is officially announced. But chances are the likely upcoming videos and teaser pics won’t hint at the only thing I care about: Does this tablet run Ice Cream Sandwich?

Sure this Padfone thing (yes it’s real) happened in May, but I just saw it and can’t stop laughing and can’t focus on the other thing I was writing so I am posting it here to get it out of my system, Arrington-style.

Asus‘ attempt to circumvent the innovator’s dilemma by Frankensteining two Apple products, punctuated by the “BREAK THE RULES” and “INNOVATION BEYOND EXPECTATIONS” graphics, has me rolling on the floor laughing my ass off.

Way to go Asus, between “Is this a Pad or a Phone in a Pad?” and “Who’s calling me? Whoah,” I am speechless.

Wired Senior Editor Bill Wasik mused earlier, “We need a term for cultural products that are (a) not joking but (b) someone involved in their creation clearly is.” Okay, will the stoner at Asus responsible for this please fess up in the comments?

Update: In case anyone was confused as to where Padfone fits into the grand scheme of things, the folks over at Digital Inspiration have created this handy Venn Diagram.

The promise of the ultra-cheap ultrabook hasn’t quite been fulfilled yet, but that doesn’t mean we can’t have a few sexy machines before the new ones hit. Acer’s Aspire S3 dropped yesterday, and we’ll have a review up soon, but the new Asus Zenbooks, rumored and pictured earlier but only actually announced today, are the ones I’ve been waiting for.

You’ve got two basic models: the 11.6-inch UX21 and the 13-inch UX31. But there’s more, much more.

Both laptops have 4GB of RAM, a Bang and Olufsun audio system, USB 2 and 3, micro HDMI and mini VGA out. The UX21, at $999, comes with a Core i5-2467M mobile processor that can be upgraded to an i7 for $200. Its 11.6″ screen is the usual 1366×768. You’re stuck with 128GB of space, alas.

The UX31 looks like the one to get, though: for just one more benjamin (that is to say, for $1099 total) you get a a much better 1600×900 13.1″ screen, a superior i5 processor (2557M), an SD card reader, and a more capacious battery. It too can be upgraded: you can snag a 256GB drive for $250 extra, and then get an i7 for another $100 on top of that.

As we heard, it’s thin and light: it’s 0.11″ at the front and 0.67″ at the rear. The case is aluminum, and there’s a nice brushed design on the lid. The UX21 weighs 2.43lb, and the UX31 is slightly heavier at 2.86lb. How the build quality stacks up against its biggest rivals (the S3 and of course the MacBook Air) will have to be decided after some hands-on time.

Update: Their battery life comparison page is pretty funny:

Asus does not plan on participating on the recent tablet price cutting wars. CEO Jerry Shen will not race RIM or HTC to the bottom and currently has no plans to cut the original Transformer’s price. This comes by way of a Digitimes report that also states the company is on schedule to launch the second generation Transformer tablet for $499 and meet their initial shipment forecast.

The company is also maintaining its 2011 tablet shipment forecast of 1.5-2 million tablet PCs (read: shipment, not sales). The forecast seems about right as Digitimes points out the company has already moved more than one million tablet in the first three-quarters of this year. With a new model hitting during the busy Christmas season, they shouldn’t have an issue achieving the target.

Asus has so far been an important, but somewhat niche player, in the tablet game. The Asus Transformer set the bar high for other Honeycomb tabs. It features a solid construction, a great screen and anti-iPad features such as numerous I/O ports. Unlike most other Honeycomb tabs, the Transformer is not a carbon copy of the iPad. The $400 MSRP helped get it off the ground, too.

The company’s relatively low shipment estimate shows that Asus knows its place in the tablet marketplace. The Transformer’s target demographic of spec-obsessed techies have largely been ignored by Honeycomb tab makers. Asus should be able to further exploit the nerd market with the next Transformer and further stake their claim as a major tablet player.

Asus is hoping to capture some of the Kinect’s good will starting this October by kicking off a marketing campaign for its motion controller clone. The WAVI Xtion was created in partnership with PrimeSense, the same group partly responsible for the Microsoft Kinect — hence the familiar design and capabilities. Asus demoed the device last January at CES 2011, but Digitimes is now reporting that Asus is set to start marketing the kit this October as Asus, which comes after its self-imposed Q2 release target.

This isn’t the first time Asus turned to the gaming world for “inspiration.” The Eee Stick launched several years after the Wii, but was targeted to buyers of its popular Eee netbook. The motion controller functioned and looked very similar to Nintendo’s Wii Remotes. Never heard of the Eee Stick? Yeah, that’s the problem.

The WAVI Xtion is supposed to bring the fun and function of the Kinect to the livingroom PC. Asus thinks (and hopes) that the device will bring the same sort of motion interactivity to the PC desktop as the Kinect did to the Xbox 360. The same Digitimes report indicates that the target price will be around $250-$300, which is a tad more than the Kinect’s $150 price tag. Reportedly the device will first go on sale in China where the 360 is banned by the government. No word on the release date, though.

The day of the Ultrabook is nearly upon us and per Asustek chairman, Jonney Shih, the PC maker has five to six models on the bill for an October release. Prices are said to start out at $899 but also reach $1,999. That’s notably higher than Intel’s target price of $999 and under. Still, if Intel has its way, ultrabooks will be the next big thing in PC notebooks. The ultra-thin, ultra-sexy notebooks are designed around Intel’s next-gen Ivy Bridge CPU platform that offers high but efficient performance at affordable price points and Asus is set to flood the market with a bunch of models.

Asus isn’t alone in this fight. Acer also has models on tap and the Aspire 3951 leaked last weekend before its IFA debut. This first-gen model sports a current generation Intel Sandy Bridge CPU and a rather cheap looking case, but it’s only 13mm thick and said to have a $800 price tag. HD Blog even states that it wakes from sleep in two seconds.

Intel previously stated that ultrabooks will make up to 40% of the notebook market by the end of 2012. Asus’s CEO, Jerry Shen, stated that this goal is “a very aggressive target that would be difficult to meet before 2013” citing numerous obstacles including a heat issue with Intel’s CPUs. He also stated that Asus’ suppliers have the ability to pump out a maximum of 200K ultrabooks without any additional supply chain investment. As the Financial Times notes, that’s a fraction of Asus’ current 1 million per month capacity.

Intel’s aggressive target will not be reachable if only Asus and Acer are on board. With HP slowly backing out of the consumer marketplace, Dell, Toshiba, and Lenovo will need to fully accept the ultrabook platform and target all segments of the notebook market. There will need to be ultrabooks at low and median price points. Right now that doesn’t seem to be happening as just the two aforementioned computer companies have talked about their ultrabook offerings.

Still, ultrabooks are likely going to be all the rage at IFA this week and next. Ultrabooks might be nothing more than MacBook Air rip-offs, but if they’re done right &mash; with quality specs and efficient batteries — they could signal a sales boom for the Windows PC notebook market.

Remember when the Asus Eee Pad Transformer was the hottest thing since Laserdisc? Remember when it was hailed as an iPad killer with its fancy IPS screen, low price and sweet name. Autobots, unite! Well, Walmart is currently selling it for $350, which puts it at the low-end of the Honeycomb tab price scale. Jokes aside, it’s actually a great deal for an Android tablet.

The model in question is of course the entry level 16GB WiFi model. It sports a fair amount of inputs/outputs, a great 10.1-inch IPS screen and dual cams. The build quality is actually quite nice. This doesn’t feel like a $350 although someone at Walmart clearly disagrees.

The tablet doesn’t seem to be any sort of special sale. Shipping is only $.97 and at $349, this is the lease expensive of the mainstream Honeycomb tablets. Wally’s World sells the Acer Icona Tab A500 for $398 and the 8GB Toshiba Thrive for $398. Spend more and get less, eh. Looking for an Android tablet and the ThinkPad Tablet is too pricey? Opt for this instead.

Western Europe is a tough place to be for PC manufacturers right now. According to a report from technology research firm Gartner, sales are down nearly across the board, with just a single exception: Apple.

In fairness, even though Apple was the only manufacturer to experience positive growth, the figure aren’t anything to write home about. Apple only picked up half of a percentage point — a very modest gain to say the least — but nearly all of Apple’s competitors ended up in the negative. Acer took the brunt of the damage with a 44.6% drop in units sold, but Asus (-22.9%), Dell (-12.7%), and runner-up HP (-6.1%) didn’t fare much better.

Netbooks reportedly accounted for much of the losses, with tablets eating up much of the demand for mobile computing tools. Asus and Acer’s sharp declines in sales is at least partially being blamed on their over-reliance on netbook performance. Both companies have made inroads into the tablet segment, but this could mark the beginning of a more concerted effort to win back some market space from the iPad.

So, for the second quarter in a row, Apple has taken the crown. Still, while growth is growth, I’m not sure anyone at Cupertino is terrible pleased with their performance: in Q1, they managed a 10% jump in growth. HP is slowly improving, and with their money behind the TouchPad, we may see them rally next quarter.

Asus and Acer, frankly, should be a bit worried. Both have dropped substantially since Q1 last year, and unless they get their game on, they’ve got more red ink in their future. Like I mentioned, I think their tablet efforts are going to be key in coming months. Acer in particular has always been a fan of the low cost PC, and if they start to eschew netbooks (at least for now) in favor of tablets, they may be able to pick up some much needed ground. It looks bad, but some solid steps over the next few months could turn everything around for Asus, Dell, Acer, and HP. All the companies listed here are going to have to tweak their strategies and hustle, because western Europe is beginning to look like the Wild West.

Asus’s next-gen netbook, the MeeGo-running Eee PC X101, is nearing launch and just earned its very own product page on the company’s website. This notebook, and its slightly more bloated brother, the Windows-ifed X101H, are nearing launch and ready to usher netbooks into a new age of prosperity.

Netbooks aren’t dead. As much as some feel that they hurt the personal computer cause, consumers seemingly have no issue trading computing power for portability. The little notebooks hit the big time several years back and would probably still be a hot ticket if it weren’t for the iPad.

The Asus Eee PC X101 made the rounds at industry tradeshows the last few months. Asus is understandably proud of the slender MeeGo netbook. It’s expected to hit the market sometime this month for only $200 with the Windows version running an extra bill.

Slashgear points out that the X101 runs a 1.5GHz Intel Atom Oak Trail platform that supports 802.11 b/g/n, dual USB ports, and 1GB of RAM. Meego is loaded on a 8GB SSD and runs on a 10.1-inch 1024 x 600 display.

The MeeGo OS should solve the lackluster performance aspect that plagued netbooks previously. The system is built for low-power computing platforms, which should make a difference.

Asus defined the netbook space the first time around and, if the netbook market is going to get a revival, it will come from the Asus tent with the X101 at the podium.

Asus has been working with Kinect co-creator PrimeSense to put together a PC-based version of Microsoft’s hit depth-detecting game controller. The thought, I presume, was that PC gamers and hackers would like a native device and an open platform for gesture-based game and OS controls.

Their creation has been around for a bit, but we haven’t heard much regarding it, perhaps because it isn’t really an exact copy of the Kinect at all, but an inferior product. Asus is launching a new version (the Xtion Pro Live, detailed here at VR Zone), but one can’t help being reminded of their ill-fated “Eee Stick,” another game-controller clone that never took off.

The Eee Stick was a knockoff of the Wii, cheapened by the lack of the Wii’s all-important IR bar. Accelerometers in teardrop-shaped controllers and a few tech demos masquerading as games. They had a hundred people on the development team at one point, so it wasn’t just a concept. Is the Xtion any different?

I think they’ve got the right idea in pushing a unique angle like gesture controls for a PC, but mimicking the competition so closely was a mistake. The Kinect is a gaming device, meant for living rooms with plenty of space where it can perch conspicuously on top of the TV or cabinet. It was never designed to be a PC peripheral (though to be sure, Microsoft is working on a version like that) so basing one off that design is the wrong move from the start.

The new version is more powerful than the old one, but still doesn’t match all the features of the Kinect — and yet it costs a hundred dollars more. Asus, a company with occasional (but by no means frequent) flashes of brilliance in notebook and PC design, should be focusing on miniaturizing the technology and embedding it, or implementing PrimeSense’s OpenNI ideas using existing technology.

If people want a Kinect, they’ll buy a Kinect. Asus is barking up the wrong tree here.

[via Electronista]

“Eee Pad Slider will be coming to the UK this Autumn” and ASUS will “confirm dates and pricing later in July.”

The ASUS Transformer, a tablet with removable keyboard, is selling well even considering the inventory shortages and this one promises to be similarly popular.

via Slashgear

Well now you can send Dad what he really wants. I’m going to run this contest until next Wednesday since it’s a pretty nice price so if you win you can pretend that you meant to send pops his present all along and you can just say you weren’t sure if you could afford it or whatever and then, suddenly, you were like “I love my dad. Dammit: he gets this gear.”

Here’s how to win:

Comment below to enter, describing your favorite moment with dear old dad. Comment only once. Include your email in the Disqus form (NOT IN THE COMMENT PROPER) or login using Facebook or whatever. If I can’t contact you, you can’t win. I will pick a winner at noon next Wednesday, June 22. I will pick one commenter at random.

Here’s what pops can win:
All-in-One PC ET2400XVT
with 3D glasses

23.6″
1920 x 1080 resolution
120Hz 3D Panel
OS Genuine Windows® 7 Home Premium 64bit
Touch Screen Multi Touch
CPU + Chipset Intel® Core™ i7 -740QM
Intel® HM55 Chipset
Memory DDR3 1333 MHz 2GB SO-DIMM x 4 slot, 8GB max.
HDD 1TB SATA II 7200rpm 3.5″
Optical Drive Tray-in Blue-ray reader
Graphics NVIDIA GTX460M 1.5G(3D)

soundscience rockus Speaker System

Desktop speaker system creates the ultimate personal theater experience & features 3Dsst™ technology
· Anodized aluminum satellites reduce vibration and minimize distortion, resulting in clear mid and sparkling high-range sound
· Active subwoofer with passive radiator technology, delivers an expansive range of bass comparable to larger footprint subwoofers
· 3D-tuned drivers to deliver audio optimized for soundscience’s 3Dsst technology
· Dual-mode operation: 3D mode for enveloping games and movies sounds, and music mode for faithful stereo music playback
· Optical input for playback of digital audio from game consoles (Xbox 360, PS3) and other, similarly equipped devices
· Remote control pod for volume adjustment, 3D/music mode selection, muting and digital/analog input option

soundscience halo 6 LED bias lighting kit™

Subtle white backlight optimizes picture quality and eliminates eye strain to enhance viewing comfort
Remedies eye fatigue by reducing the range of motion in the iris muscles when viewing images in a dark environment
Color and brightness are carefully calibrated to achieve the optimal viewing experience and increase your monitor’s perceived contrast ratio
Eliminating eye strain increases vision endurance and comfort during long viewing sessions
· Fits LCD monitors up to 24” placed against a light colored wall; available USB port or powered USB hub

Thanks to Asus and Soundscience for hooking us up.

Update – Chrissty won the kit. Thanks for playing.

Intel is using the yearly Computex Taipei exhibition in Taiwan as a platform to pitch a new category of laptops. Dubbed Ultrabooks, these devices are supposed to have three distinct features: they are thinner (less than 20mm/0.8 inches) and lighter than most existing laptops, and they should be priced below $1,000 in order to become mainstream.

Intel VP Sean Maloney says Ultrabooks have “tablet-like features” and boast “best-in-class performance, improved responsiveness and security in thin, elegant form factors”.

This all sounds a lot like the iPad and the MacBook Air, if you ask me.

But Intel doesn’t want to lose time: after rolling out a first wave of Ultrabooks with Sandy Bridge processors on board, the plan is to sell models with next-generation “Ivy Bridge” processors starting in the first half of next year. Intel is also speaking of an Ivy Bridge successor codenamed “Haswell” to be used in Ultrabooks from 2013 onward, claiming Haswell “will reduce microprocessor power to half of today’s design point”.

By the end of 2012, Maloney expects a whopping 40% of all consumer laptops worldwide to comply with the Ultrabook specification. The first Ultrabook, the Asus UX21 (pictured above), is currently slated for release this winter.