My first impressions, I sell computers as a full time job, and as you can see I have played with many laptops, ultraportables, and tablets over the years. These initial impressions are about 24 hours old of me having the asus t100, and this was all written (all 2000 words) on the t100 when docked with the keyboard, or using on the onscreen keyboard.
So far I am thinking about giving the asus t100 a 9/10
Nice Screen. The Asus has an ips screen at 1366x768.
Speed
I got hate for posting this earlier in a different thread at anandtech.
Play briefly with a transformer 100 today. Was not happy with it, it is better than my clovertrail dell latitude and while it wasn't SLOW, it was not a place I would be happy with it. It took too long to load a 1080p quicktime file. That is probably the emmc storage and not the cpu and gpu, but it is still not what I would want for a laptop replacement.
With a non windows os and the same loading time I would probably not complain, but when you are used to windows 7 / 8 with a ssd it was quite noticeable the difference in speed.
And I stand by the initial hypothesis then. The limiting factor of the new baytrail atoms for normal netbook use is not the processor or the 2gbs of ram, the limiting factor of baytrail is the emmc. The t100 uses the faster sandisk emmc and is a large improvement over my 2012 nexus 7 and my dell latitude 10. Random writes max out about 5 MBs according to task manager. You can easily obtain this by updates, installs, or large wifi transfers. When the computer is bogged down with random writes it is sluggish and hard to use. Guess what most people including me do with a new computer, install updates and drivers.
The cpu is markedly faster than Clovertrail. Anand calls the iPhone 5s cyclone cpu a desktop class cpu, baytrail is roughly the same. To me Clovertrail very much fells like a tablet cpu, baytrail on the other hand feels like a computer cpu. It loads webpages noticeably faster than Clovertrail not as fast as my desktop, but if you do not have the latest and greatest or you used to laptop CPUs then you will not be complaining. I have not done anything that seriously stress the cpu yet which did not stress the emmc more. If connected to an external monitor or load the right program and I have no doubt you can make the cpu cry but it is hard to do so in this form factor with casual tablet and netbook type programs. For example typing this with the Netflix metro app in the background you see cpu usage at 50% to 66% percent.
Do not expect a laptop out of this, expect a netbook and you will be fine.
The screen is nice. IPS should be a requirement on all new laptops in my opinion. The resolution is 1366x768, yes you can see the individual pixels but it is not painful and is fine for me. I do wish the screen is a higher res not for PPI but for more of a webpage shown at once and more options for windows snap. One thing that is different about Baytrail atom vs Clovertrail atom is that baytrail uses Intel instead of powevr for graphics. Powervr only supported 1:1 resolution, thus if the computer had to use a smaller resolution for a program you got black bars on the left and right as well as the top and bottom. For example play Diablo 2 on Clovertrail and due to the highest resolution supported being 800x600 and thus the game only takes up 45 percent of the screen.
I have no complaints about the speakers.
The weight of the t100 without dock is is 19.2 oz vs 23.2 oz those 4 ounces is a substantial differences of usability.
The dock is sturdy, the keyboard is nice with firm keys and the right amount of travel. The keyboard does not use full size keys but all netbooks smaller than 12.1 inches have to use a smaller keyboard. One thing I do not understand the dock is why there is only usb 3 port on the left side, they could have put a usb port even a usb 2 on the right side.
Webcams in the front none on the back. I do not webchat so I am fine with the quality.
For some reason Asus ships these tablets at 0% charge. I understand not having a full charge but most suppliers ship devices with a partial charge about 30% for this is better for the battery and if you do not finish a windows or android initial setup you may corrupt your install.
Under the volume button on the side they put a windows start key button, to make it easier to go to the start screen.
What programs do you want me to try?
