Broken Laptop, Asus T300 or Nexus 7 possible 100% replacement?

rento

Senior Member
Sep 8, 2012
2
0
I'm sure you guys get tons of these questions and I apologize in advance, however I can't find anything this in-depth...

The tablet is actually for a friend of mine, a college student. I tried to save her laptop a month ago, but to no avail, it finally died yesterday after I did what little I could do for the poor laptop.

So she's in the market for a replacement. The budget is under $600, preferably $400.

I instantly thought BAM! Asus Transformer! So I headed over to my buddy's house who has followed Android everything since he first got a Droid Bionic.

He told me about the Nexus 7 being the absolute best tablet currently on the market and half the price of the Transformer T300 (I didn't even know they had a T700...)

Now. Here's the question, now I know the basic don'ts like downloading Minecraft won't work for example.

But, this thing will be a complete replacement for her laptop. Meaning she will need to write 3-10 page essays on it and have to print them out... I personally own a Droid RAZR Maxx and with my somewhat newer printer (Kodak ESP 9) it can't print off it.

I know she doesn't even have a network capable printer and from what I hear, the Nexus 7 has a single USB 2.0 input. All I can find for answers on tablet printing is using cloud-printing or airprinting... This won't be an option for her. Will the tablet print via USB?

Productivity aside, she loves Netflix, and I gave her my account for when she gets a replacement, hopefully a tablet. She loves games and I know most of the apps will be good enough. I still don't know if Tetris on Facebook will even run on a Droid Tablet, I assume it will as we got Flash, I may try it on my RAZR Maxx in a bit... But I don't know how much different Jelly Bean is compared to 4.0 ICS in terms of browser capability...

However, i'm mainly concerned about productivity, what can and can't she do?

TD;DR: Friend's laptop broke, she needs a replacement. College student.
- Budget is roughly $400
- Thinking of Asus Transformer T300 due to it's 15 hour battery life, but Nexus 7 is better than a Transformer T700 at a fraction price
- Needs mouse and keyboard (I know you can do bluetooth Keyboards, but what about a mouse? There's no docks for the N7)
- Needs to be able to write 3-10 page essays and print from it without the use of cloud services
- Productivity is the main goal.
- Can external HDD or flash drives work with either tablets to expand storage?

I really appreciate the help guys... She wants to order the N7 on Monday otherwise she's just going to get the Transformer T300, but I want to save her money... I think a tablet would easier for her maintain, her laptop went through hell... I don't know people kill laptops so easily... Had mine for nearly 4 years.
 
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