Asus Transformer Pad Infinity TF700 Now in Malaysia

Once again, Asus delivers a complete package with its Asus Transformer Pad Infinity TF700 Android tablet. The long-awaited Infinity maintains the slim, stylish, multipurpose tradition of its predecessor, the Asus Transformer Prime, while bringing an improved Nvidia Tegra 3 processor and a 1920-by-1200-pixel display along for the ride. This tablet blasts ahead of the pack to establish itself as the best-performing Android tablet we've seen to date, on all of our metrics except battery life.

The Infinity has some minor physical difference changes from the Prime. Asus moved the volume rocker from the top left edge (when held in horizontal orientation) to the upper edge, at at right. The Micro-HDMI port moved lower along the left edge, and below the Micro-HDMI port now sits the headphone jack (a more convenient location as compared with the Prime's upper right edge location).

The Infinity comes loaded with Android 4.03 Ice Cream Sandwich, 1GB of DDR3 memory operating at 1600MHz (an improvement over the type of memory used on the Prime), and a quad-core 1.6GHz Nvidia Tegra 3 T33 processor. When in single-core operation, the new Tegra operates at 1.7GHz. By comparison, the Prime's Tegra 3 processor operates at 1.3GHz for two to four cores and at 1.4GHz when a single core is in use; for its part, the processor in the Acer Iconia Tab A700 runs at 1.3GHz/1.2GHz.

Elsewhere, Asus has made a few other evolutionary improvements. Like the Prime, the Infinity has a rear 8-megapixel camera, but now the camera has a slightly wider aperture for low-light shooting--f2.2 instead of the Prime's f2.4. Asus updated the camera software, too, as well as the sensor and flash; but in my casual shooting the benefits of these enhancements were minor in low-light and daylight shooting. In side-by-side comparisons, I preferred the images captured by the Infinity; the colour and clarity was simply better than the Prime. (Another note: The high-res display made it easier to capture images, too.) The front-facing camera has been updated from 1.2 megapixels to 2 megapixels, so you can now obtain high-definition video chat.

Asus retains some of its now-standard Android customization features, including a custom keyboard that includes white keys with black text and a number row, and a control panel for quick access to the tablet's power settings, display controls, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth toggles, rotation lock, and other settings.

Preloaded apps include Polaris Office, SuperNote, App Backup, App Locker, Asus Sync, MyNet (for streaming 1080p content across a network), and Asus Webstorage (with 8GB of free storage space for the "lifetime" of the unit, up from the Prime's one-year of free unlimited storage followed by paid storage).

The Transformer Pad Infinity comes in two variants – 32GB and 64GB. Both are Wi-Fi only and there’s no word on whether ASUS will bring in the 3G version. The 64GB retails for RM2,599 and is available now. Meanwhile the 32GB (RRP RM2,199) will be available somewhere in August. The price includes the ASUS Mobile Dock that packs a full-featured QWERTY keyboard and additional battery. Unfortunately, Malaysian did not have the option to purchase the tablet separately as the US and European consumers.

The Asus Transformer Pad Infinity TF700 takes over from its predecessor as the top Android tablet available. You get high performance mixed with high style, and you don't have to make a lot of sacrifices to get both. Other tablets--including the Prime, which is expected to drop in price once this model gets into the market--may provide better value, but no other Android tablet will give you the full package that the Infinity does.

Source: PC World, Video from Tablet News.