ASUS Fonepad 8 Hands-on, First Impressions: A Taste of Moorefield

ASUS Fonepad 8 Hands-on, First Impressions: A Taste of Moorefield

ASUS Fonepad 8 08

We go hands-on the Fonepad 8!

A few days ago ASUS announced that their 8-inch Fonepad, aptly called the Fonepad 8, has officially reached the PH. ASUS reps handed us a review sample of the new tablet yesterday, and today we’re going to share with you what we think about it so far. The Fonepad 8 is relevant because it’s running Intel’s newest Atom processor family, dubbed Moorefield, which is the same processor family that the Zenfone 2 uses when it finally ships in a few months. Our complaints about Intel’s previous Atom chips in ASUS’ Zenfone lineup is well documented, something that the new batch of chips aim to fix.

ASUS Fonepad 8 FE380CG

  • 1.33GHz 64-bit Intel Atom Z3530 quad-core processor
  • 2GB of RAM
  • 8-inch WXGA IPS display, 1280 x 800 resolution
  • 16GB of internal storage, expandable via microSD up to 64GB
  • 5-megapixel rear camera
  • 2-megapixel front camera
  • Dual SIM
  • 3G
  • WiFi, Bluetooth, GPS, A-GPS, GLONASS, Miracast support
  • Android 4.4 KitKat with ZenUI
  • 15.2Wh li-polymer battery
  • Php 11,995

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Initial impressions: fast, responsive and beastly – is this a taste of things to come?

Before we start talking hardware, let’s take a look at the exterior of the Fonepad 8 first. The overall design of the Fonepad 8 is typical ASUS, and sports a mainly plastic construction. Unlike the rather generic looking MeMo Pad 7 that we reviewed last year, the FonePad 8 looks and feels more premium. The bezels are somewhat thinner, and the silver trim on the side of the tablet is thicker and more prominent. The Fonepad 8 sports a tasteful shade of gold and sports a textured back that helps you get a better grip on the tablet.

ASUS Fonepad 8 02

You’ll see the volume rocker, power button, 5-megapixel rear camera, 3.5mm jack and USB port all clustered on the right side of the Fonepad 8, while the dual SIM slot and the microSD slot reside on the left side of the Fonepad 8, neatly hidden behind a plastic flap. Before anyone asks, yes, the Fonepad 8 can receive and send SMS as well as calls, though good luck putting that tablet to your ear and not looking like a doofus in public. Maybe invest in some good pair of headphones or a hands-free device?

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The display of the Fonepad 8 is effectively only HD, but it’s still pretty good – viewing angles are okay, and the display itself is rather bright, with good color reproduction. Like most of ASUS’ other tablets and phones, the Fonepad 8 comes with their ZenUI overlay over Android 4.4 KitKat. Sorry guys, no Lollipop here…yet.

Anyway, on to the hardware. The Fonepad 8 comes with Intel’s 64-bit Z3530 Atom processor, paired with 2GB of RAM. We’ve been told that this is the lowest tier of Moorefield, running at just 1.33GHz. Other flavors of Moorefield will run at 1.83GHz (Z3560), 2GHz (Z3570) and 2.33GHz (Z3580). To put things in perspective, the Zenfone 2 is slated to use the Z3560 and Z3580 processor variants when it officially comes out.

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It seems that Intel has managed to bump the power of their Atom chips this time around, at least, according to AnTuTu. The Fonepad 8 managed to get a whopping 35K points in AnTuTu, though it failed to impress in another benchmarking app, Geekbench. Benchmarks arent’ everything and other metrics need to be considered when reviewing a tablet’s performance – things like thermal management and battery life matter more than just raw performance. As an aside though, we installed Real Racing 3 on the Fonepad 8 and ran a few races with it and the game played surprisingly smoothly, which wasn’t the case with the previous iteration of the Atom processor. We’re happy that Intel may have finally found the right mix in their new processors, but only a full test will reveal if Moorefield delivers on the goods.

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We’ll be using teh Fonepad 8 in the next few days to see if it’s really worth the Php 11,995 asking price.

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