Asus brings Android and Windows together to laptops, adds a pen to tablets

If last year’s triple hybrid experiment was just a little too over the top for you, Asus is this year pulling it back a notch, with an Android and Windows hybrid that you can fit in your lap.

One of the many things Asus is showing off at the Consumer Electronics Show this week, the TD300 is the next move for the long-running Transformer series, with the initials standing for the Transformer Book Duet (that’s the “T” and the “D,” at least; we’ll excuse Asus for missing the “B” this time).

A slight change on last year’s late-year Trio, the Duet is a 13.3 inch laptop with all the insides in the screen section, and the ability to detach the screen with a simple button.

But that’s not all you can switch with one button.

With one button the TD300 can jump between Android 4.3 and Windows 8.1, making it a dual-operating system device that takes both the apps of Android and that of Windows.

To make this happen, Asus is packing in up to an Intel Core i7 processor, 4GB RAM, either a 128GB solid-state drive or a 1TB hard drive, 802.11a/b/g/n/ac WiFi, and Bluetooth 4.0, all of this sitting underneath the 13.3 inch Full HD 1920×1080 IPS touchscreen display.

A keyboard section is also included, and this provides a single USB 3.0 port, two USB 2.0 ports, Ethernet, HDMI, power, and a headset jack, making it a tablet that can be quickly converted into a laptop in a jiffy.

It’s not the only tablet Asus is talking up at CES, though, with a keyboard-dock-less model also being showcased at the electronics expo in Las Vegas.

This other model continues the Vivo line-up, with the Note 8, an aptly named tablet sporting an 8 inch HD screen, Intel Atom processor, 2GB RAM, up to 64GB storage, and Windows 8.1.

It’s also one of the few tablets outside of those produced by Samsung and Wacom to feature Wacom’s own digitiser technology, as it comes with a pen supporting over a thousand levels of pressure sensitivity, meaning you can write or draw with it, replacing a standard notebook.

With other 8 inch Windows 8 tablets on their way to stores now, such as the Acer Iconia W4 and the Dell Venue 8 Pro, it’ll be interesting to see how this goes.

In fact, it’ll be interesting to see how both devices go, but typically, there’s no release or availability currently for either of them.

We’ll let you know when that changes, though, so stay tuned.