The long-anticipated ASUS PadFone is finally here in Malaysia, and boy, was it a journey. This whole new mobile experience started life as one of the biggest buzz in Computex last year, and now it’s in Malaysia and looking mighty great.
The ASUS PadFone is a 4.3-inch Android 4.0 smartphone, the twist here is its ability to be docked into a 10.1-inch PadFone Station (essentially a tablet) which will transition its display and usage into the tablet. The apps, videos or emails you’ve been doing on your PadFone? Just plug it into the PadFone Station and continue where you left off, now in a larger, 1920 x 800 display. Once docked, the PadFone Station also shares its 3G connectivity.
The PadFone specs, in a quick glance: 1.5GHz dual-core Qualcomm Snapdragon S4 processor, 8-megapixels camera, expandable memory via microSD and Android 4.0 OS.
The PadFone also comes with two optional accessories. One is the PadFone Stylus Headset, which is a stylus that doubles as a Bluetooth wireless headset (you can take calls with it, yes, and it even vibrates during oncoming calls). The PadFone Station Dock, on the other hand, is a keyboard dock that gives the PadFone station keyboard, USB and card reader capabilities (like the Eee Pad Transformer docks).
You can get the ASUS PadFone and PadFone Station bundle for RM2,399. The Stylus Headset prices at RM179, but the Staiton Dock is TBC at the moment, so we’ll update the price here once we get it.
For more info, go to my.asus.com. In the meantime, our upcoming July 2012 issue’s Tech Spelunk is all about the PadFone, so do look forward to it!