I often hear a lot of complaints from people I meet here in India about the Surface tablets and the Nokia Lumia 2520 not hitting our shores. We could either believe or argue the reasons offered by Microsoft and Nokia about the same, or look at all other options available in the market right now and make an informed purchase decision.
In a Microsoft event last week, I learned about twenty Windows 8.1 tablets from seven original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) that are on the shelves at the moment or coming in a couple of weeks or so. In this post, let’s take a look at few of them.
Acer Iconia W4
The Acer Iconia W4 is a good successor to the Iconia W3, the dubious tablet that was the first 8-inch one in the market but disappointed with the lackluster display.
Powered by an Intel Atom Z3740 1.33 GHz processor, the 8-inch tablet features a 1280 x 800 display. The tablet comes bundled with the complete Office 2013 Home and Student Edition, and is available in two variants – 32 GB and 64 GB. The W4 sports 8-hours of battery life and is available in the stores and online for ₹26,499.
Asus Transformer Book T100TA
The Transformer Book T100 is a compact ultraportable that combines the productivity features of a laptop with the easy portability of a tablet — and you can switch between the two in an instant. At just 1.07kg, T100 is one of the lightest laptops around, but detach the 10.1-inch display from the keyboard and it becomes an equally lightweight tablet.
This Asus tablet features the Intel Atom TZ3740 processor with 2GB RAM and includes 32 GB on board storage. At ₹34,099, it’s actually a great buy compared to several low cost laptops in the market.
Dell Venue 8 Pro
The Dell Venue 8 Pro is another 8-inch Windows tablet to rival the Acer Iconia W4. Powered by the Intel Atom Z3740D processor and including 32 GB Storage, the Dell 8-incher is available for ₹26,499. This one also features the Office 2013 Home and Student Edition.
Lava XOLO Win
The XOLO Win is the maiden Windows tablet from any Indian OEM, and is coming soon to the market for about ₹21,999.
Powered by the AMD A4 - 1200 dual-core 1.0 GHz ‘Temash’ processor with AMD Radeon HD 8180G graphics, the XOLO tablet is the only AMD tablet in the stable. The 10.1-inch display features a modest resolution of 1280 x 800.
Lenovo Thinkpad 8
Lenovo Thinkpad 8 is actually an 8.3-inch multimode tablet that features three modes - Tablet, Desktop, and Tent.
Featuring the latest Intel Bay trail - Z3770 Processor and a lavish 128 GB storage, it’s a solid device. It’s not yet available in stores, and there’s no indication of price, but it’s coming soon as we are told.
HP Omni 10
HP has a had a series of convertibles since Windows 8 arrived, but the Omni 10 powered by the Intel Atom Z3000 processor is a great 10.1-inch tablet. Again, it’s not yet available in stores.
Panasonic Toughpad FZ-M1
The Panasonic’s are a different league altogether. The Toughpad FZ-M1 is world's thinnest and lightest rugged 7-inch tablet. It does not compromise on specifications as well and is powered by the Intel Core i5 vPro processor with 4GB RAM. The Toughpad comes in two storage variants – 128 GB and 256 GB.
At ₹1,25,000, it is expensive, but the ruggedized tablets serve a specific purpose obviously. There’s also the Panasonic Toughpad FZ-G1 at ₹175,000 which is a 10-inch variant.
Which one of these do you think is a great buy as a personal, consumption device or a secondary device for business productivity? Which one would you like to buy for yourself or a family member? Tell us in the comments!
