Sony Tablet S vs Asus Eee Transformer Prime

The Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime takes things a stage further, and it really is difficult to fault with the new quad-core processor and keyboard combo. With Ice Cream Sandwich built in and a stunning keyboard dock, Asus knocks our socks off.
The Sony Tablet S comes with a unique design and it is still a gamers’ paradise. It is also comparable to other top tablets including iPad 2 and Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 and this Sony Tablet S makes consumers very satisfied.

Display

The Asus Eee Transformer Prime serves not only as a tablet solution but also a suitable notebook replacement. Equipped with a massive 10.1-inch screen Super IPS+ LCD display which effectively boosts the backlight levels with great effect for outdoor visibility. Its resolution of 1280×800 and a pixel density of 149ppi is well above average in the current market.

The Sony Tablet S does not compromise on its specs too, featuring a monster 9.4-inch TFT delivering at 800×1280 and boasting a pixel density of 161ppi.

The Asus Eee Transformer Prime undoubtedly offers better screen technology, which easily takes a step further with its IPS+ display, while Sony’s screen is vibrant which brings the text, videos, webpages, and certainly games to life, but unspectacular display.

Winner – Asus Eee Transformer Prime

Software

Both tablets are Android based devices, the Asus Eee Transformer Prime runs the latest Android 4.0, Ice Cream Sandwich operating system, which has been optimised to provide a solid experience on a tablet PC.

However, the Sony Tablet S runs and older version of Android 3.2 (Honeycomb) which is upgradable to Android Ice Cream Sandwich.

ICS does improve on some of the default applications. Asus has also provided a number of quality third-party apps and games, but some of these would benefit from ICS updates.

There is no doubt that Ice Cream Sandwich represents a major leap forward for the Android community. A system that was already fast and intuitive has now been streamlined to deliver a highly polished user experience. Ice Cream Sandwich is most definitely a must have. On first glance this does not seem to offer any vast interface improvements over its Honey comb predecessor, but underneath you do get nice swipe transitions, a better email client, camera app and gallery experience.

Android 4.0 will bring about a number of changes to your tablet, both in terms of features and performance enhancements. The transitions, animations and general swiping around system will be smoother and faster. The instant response and removal of lag can potentially have a greater impact than anything else on how fast a device is perceived to be.

More tangible features that the update will bring include a vastly improved web browser with better support for tabbed browsing, improved multitasking UI, a better keyboard, lockscreen and notifications pane, and the latest version of the Google apps. Ice Cream Sandwich also introduced a whole new user interface which is polished and easy to use.

Winner – Draw

Camera

Sony has equipped theTablet S with a high quality 5MP camera with auto-focus, image stabilisation, geo-tagging, face & smile detection and 720P video capture, which is also thoughtful and ahead of iPad. The 0.3MP front facing camera does a good job for video calling via Skype.

The Asus Eee Transformer Prime boasts an excellent 8MP camera with autofocus, LED flash, geo-tagging and 1080p video capture, as well as a 1.2MP front facing camera for video calling. It is rare to see an 8MP camera on a tablet, as a result you can take some effective images and also shoot video at Full HD 1080p. The image quality is beyond expectations.

Winner – Asus Eee Transformer Prime

Power

The Asus Eee Transformer Prime has a quad-core NVIDIA Tegra processor which actually have five cores. The fifth core handles low power functions, meaning the quad-core handsets should be more battery efficient than current dual-core devices, while still offering significantly more power when it is need. The 1.3GHz Cortex A9 and ULP GeForce GPU also deliver a speedy performance over any other tablet on the market, and many laptops too. You can find games that really take advantage of the powerful processor. Its performance is fantastic for playing games or watching movies thanks to the quad-core processor and 1GB of RAM.

The Asus Eee Transformer Prime comes with a 32GB or 64GB of internal storage and the keyboard section provides USB and SD card ports and both can read and write to external memory. The battery life is excellent, it can survive a two-hour video. However, the Eee Pad Transformer Prime with docking station can give approximately 18 hours of battery life on video playback, making it easily the most powerful tablet on the planet right now.

The Sony Tablet S is powered by a dual-core 1GHz ARM Cortex-A9 CPU with ULP GeForce GPU, making it a capable performer. The tablet also offers the same 1GB of RAM and a 16GB or 32GB of built-in storage. The back end of the tablet houses the SD card slot for adding memory cards. The battery life is not as great as the Transformer Prime.

It is obvious that the Asus Eee Transformer Prime boasts an impressive speed and works well as both a tablet and laptop, making Sony’s device look a little bit laboured. Despite its lower benchmark scores, the Tablet S is still a solid device and better optimised than the other tablets on the market.

Winner – Asus Eee Transformer Prime

Form & Build

The Sony Tablet S is thicker at 10.1-20.6mm, and heavier at 625g. The back end of the tablet is thicker to allow for the SD card, power and volume controls, while the base is left ultra-thin. The slightly angled screen does allow for a more comfortable viewing experience.

The Asus Eee Transformer Prime is ultra-thin at 8mm thickness with a stylish metallic finish, weighing only 586g. The keyboard dock locks in seamlessly to transform the tablet. With its size, the Transformer Prime is quite a large tablet to hold, however it is sleek, stylish, and thin.

Winner – Asus Eee Transformer Prime

Conclusion

Overall, the Asus Eee Transformer Prime is a speedy beast and beautifully designed, it is solid and very thin. It is right at the cutting-edge of what Android tablet PCs have to offer. The tablet offers a fantastic user experience for watching movies, playing games and office work.

The Sony Tablet S is also a solid device with unique design, however some users might not like the tablet’s design. It is well built and has solid performance across the board but it is not as fast as the Asus Transformer Prime. These products are all so good for what they are, which one is better, depending on how it can meet your needs.