Android Tablet/Phone Combo (Videos)

Padfone: Asus Officially Announces Its Android Tablet/Phone Combo (Videos)

Today, on the first day of the yearly Computex Taipei exhibition in Taiwan, Asus took the wraps off the Android tablet/phone combo it teased last week. Dubbed Padfone, Asus is relatively mum on details (specs, pricing, availability) at this point.



But the general idea is to dock the handset in the tablet for a wider view, charging it through the tablet’s bigger battery or making use of the phone’s 3G connection on the tablet. Users can also avoid data transfer and sharing hassles between phone and tablet.
Asus says that the layout of applications running on the phone adjusts automatically once you place it into the tablet to get an expanded view (see clips below).

Newegg selling ASUS Eee Box with Red Flag Linux pre-installed

Well, Newegg just seems to be full of surprises these days. The latest example is this ASUS Eee Box (model EBXB202-BLK-E0037), which wouldn't be so remarkable if not for the fact that it comes pre-installed with the Chinese Linux distribution, Red Flag Linux. That helps bring the price down to just $189.99 after rebate, which also gets you the usual Atom N270 processor, 1GB of RAM, a 160GB hard drive, and the standard Intel integrated graphics. No word on the whole back story here, but it looks like this may well be the only readily available Red Flag Linux-based system available in the US right now.

[Thanks, Michael]

RT-N56U Router From The Starship Enterprise Lands...Err, From ASUS, I Mean

I just don't know what to think about this router. I've been staring at it for minutes now, wondering how in 802.11n's name it was created in ASUS' laboratory.

ASUS hasn't been too forthcoming with details on the RT-N56U, which was announced at CeBIT this week, and until we hear back from them we'll just have to entertain you with these small slivers of detail: it has dual band support with the 5GHz band being used, is compatible with both printers and scanners, and is very fast apparently—with 300,000 concurrent sessions available.

Time to go back to boggling over that inconceivably thin frame. [ASUS]