My two weeks with the Asus Eee Pad Transformer

With all the tablet and iPad hype going on, Skool (www.skool.nl; Google will translate for ya) is also interested in how tablets can be managed and prepped in such a way that they do what they do best: Just Work!

In an attempt to familiarize myself with the use of tablets, I was given the opportunity to try out an Asus Eee Pad Transformer with docking station/keyboard. Here's a brief report of my experience so far.

The Good
The tablet looks really slick. It's stylish, comes in a decent color and even the keyboard feels good. The keyboard even comes with dedicated keys for search, lock, home, settings, bluetooth/WiFi toggle and even has a key for returning to "auto brightness". The touchpad that comes with the keyboard also supports multi touch, which is nice if you want to scroll a web page without touching the pad itself.

Of course there is direct access to all the goodies in the Android market. After setting the whole thing up with my personal Gmail account, I noticed almost all of my apps I run on my HTC Sensation got automagically installed on the Honeycomb device. Really quickly I had most of my regular apps available.

Asus also included a few goodies of its own. The Transformer comes with software that allows you to connect to your PC. You have to install a little piece of software on your PC for that, but then you are able to connect to it in a remote desktop kind of way. Of course until Windows 8, you still will be stuck with a UI that is not made for touch. Don't think you can easily use Outlook from your Transformer. Not even with the keyboard attached. It's just not made for touch.

The Bad
After setting everything up, running a few updates and waiting for all apps to be installed, I noticed that that was all it did. No backup of the app settings or data had been restored. So, it took me another hour or so to get all those apps configured the way I am used to.

Furthermore this is typically one of those type of devices that when in the house, it gets hogged by the rest of the family. My 5 y/o son asked me the first time he saw me with it: "Does it come with Angry Birds?" It's addictive. Not just for the kids, but also for me. I like to have it around, if it was only for being able to check things online on a screen larger than on my phone.

The Ugly
I haven't noticed any ugly yet. One thing that's going to be a pain to get device management done right for the schools will be the fact that there is no way to do some kind of initial provisioning for the WiFi connection. Aside from that, the Transformer (like most others) forces you to go through a wizard as soon as you turn it on for first use. In schools you most likely don't want teachers to have to go through that initial setup.


But how do we get to proper (manufacturer independent) device management without working with the manufacturers directly? An interesting technical challenge!