My ASUS Eee Pad Transformer arrived via Fedex today WOOHOO

[DarrylB]

What a glorious day, I finally own my first ever Android tablet!! I felt just like a kid on Christmas day today when Fedex came to the door! Oh I'm going to have so much fun with this new tablet! Will be working on doing an in-depth review too. Sorry about the lighting in the photo, I just snapped it quick but you still get the picture I'm sure. I'll take better pictures for the review. As it turns out I did get the charging/keyboard dock bundled with it after all which is a good thing!

 

[Walkop]

Oh, great! Congratulations. And you did get the bundle! Good thing, too - you usually save $50 off the regular price by getting them together. What size did you get? 32GB or 16GB?

I recommend getting a large MicroSD card regardless - it really helps with storage. I have two 16GB cards and they work great - if you get any, Class 10 cards are some of the better cards and work faster than others. The slot can be a bit tricky, though - you need either quite a bit of pressure or something that is thin enough to fit in the slot to push it in or out.

Also, if your tablet came with Android 3.1, I recommend you update it to 3.2 as soon as possible. It would also be a good idea to update the firmware on the keyboard dock (you do this by checking for updates in Settings while the tablet is docked). Also, if you don't like the circular cursor that appears when you use the touchpad on the keyboard dock, you can change it back to the regular arrow cursor under the Input Settings (this will disable the multi-touch gestures on the touchpad, however).

Regarding the keyboard, it works great! It may take some getting used to, though, if you're used to using larger keyboards. However, there are a lot of functions that work really nice. For example, pressing Shift-Backspace it acts like the 'Delete' key on a regular keyboard. There are also the various keyboard shortcuts; brightness controls, a button to turn the keyboard touchpad on and off, the Home button, search, etc.

Also, here are a few good tablet apps:
Sprinkle (really great Tegra-optimized game; $1.47 I think)
Apparatus (good tablet-optimized puzzle game)
Firefox (good browser, eliminates quite a bit of keyboard lag in web browsing)
Dolphin HD/Dolphin for Pad (another good browser, eliminates some lag as well)
PULSE (great news app, compiles stories really well and stores them for offline viewing)

If you have any questions at all, too, feel free to ask - anyone here will be happy to help (including myself)

 

[DarrylB]

Thanks for the MicroSD card recommendations, this is very good to know as I'm sure I'll be investing in at least a couple of them. It came with a dummy card which gives you a rough idea of how it would feel like with an actual card, you do have to get a feel for it I can tell and certainly it does require some pressure I find more so when ejecting the card. By the way, in response to your question I got the 16GB version, which is fine but also all the more reason to know what a good MicroSD card is to buy since I can't see that it will take me long to fill that up. Thanks again Walkop.

 

[Walkop]

You're very welcome

Yeah, it does require a bit of pressure. Did yours come with a dummy card in the tablet itself and the dock? If you're just talking about the dock, it does require a bit of pressure (and any normal SD card (not the dummy) strangely sticks out a bit from the side). Its not that bad, but still strange nonetheless. The MicroSD port actually on the tablet, though, is really tricky - I usually can't get it with my fingers (and I have fairly small hands). A MicroSD card adapter to full SD usually works good, or something of similar size.

I also updated my previous post - I added quite a bit

Looking forward to that review!


Sent from my Transformer TF101 using Android Tablet Forum

 

[DarrylB]

Hey Walkop thanks again, your advice has been a great help! I did manage to update the firmware and as it turns out it already had Android 3.2 installed. I'll surely check out those tablet apps as well. Regarding the MicroSD card, turns out no 'dummy card' came for that, my mistake as I'm still getting familiar with all this, the dummy card was for the MMC.SD.SDHC slot, hey you learn something new every day! So far I'm liking the keyboard, does take some getting used to but like anything you get a feel for it after a while.

Thanks again for all your help and advice. I think one of the next things I should do is install the androidtablets.net forum app, which I probably should have done already!

 

[Walkop]

Hey Walkop thanks again, your advice has been a great help! I did manage to update the firmware and as it turns out it already had Android 3.2 installed. I'll surely check out those tablet apps as well. Regarding the MicroSD card, turns out no 'dummy card' came for that, my mistake as I'm still getting familiar with all this, the dummy card was for the MMC.SD.SDHC slot, hey you learn something new every day! So far I'm liking the keyboard, does take some getting used to but like anything you get a feel for it after a while.

Thanks again for all your help and advice. I think one of the next things I should do is install the androidtablets.net forum app, which I probably should have done already!

No problem at all. I'm glad to help out! Nice that 3.2 was already installed - most of the newer units come with it now. That's one thing about ASUS - it seems they are very, very speedy getting updates out to their customers.

Also, no problem regarding the MicroSD card - mine didn't come with a dummy card, I was just curious if yours did as you didn't specifically mention it. The dummy card is good for keeping dust, etc. out of the port. I use it whenever I don't have a card in there - although it's definitely not a necessity. I'm still learning stuff about the Transformer as well, so yeah you do learn something every day!

About the Android Tablet Forum app - it's definitely really useful. Typing is a LOT easier through that than the webpage. I'm hoping the online text input lag is fixed in Ice Cream Sandwich - it is REALLY annoying sometimes. But it's endurable when you need it (that's also why I recommended those other browsers - they're better for text input).

One last thing - if you get poor battery life in standby, try going into the settings (I think it's under Wireless and Networks) and set the Wi-Fi to shut off whenever the screen turns off. After a certain amount of time with the screen off, Wi-Fi will shut down and you'll save a LOT of battery life when your not using the tablet. You won't get notifications from online sources, though, but if you don't need them; it saves a lot of battery life.


Sent from my Transformer TF101 using Android Tablet Forum

 

[Spider]

Congratulations on the early delivery. I remember thinking when you said it's coming early next week that it would have been nice to play with it over the weekend. Now you can.

 

[DarrylB]

One last thing - if you get poor battery life in standby, try going into the settings (I think it's under Wireless and Networks) and set the Wi-Fi to shut off whenever the screen turns off. After a certain amount of time with the screen off, Wi-Fi will shut down and you'll save a LOT of battery life when your not using the tablet. You won't get notifications from online sources, though, but if you don't need them; it saves a lot of battery life.

Another great tip, thanks, I had no idea this would impact battery life and I have adjusted my settings accordingly. Personally I don't really need notifications, at least not at this point, so it makes total sense to increase battery life whenever possible.

Congratulations on the early delivery. I remember thinking when you said it's coming early next week that it would have been nice to play with it over the weekend. Now you can.

Thanks Spider, I wasn't expecting it really until Friday or so, and it doesn't hurt my feelings that it came earlier than expected =)