Asus starts selling an affordable iPad rival with a detachable keyboard and built-in stylus
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You probably don't remember this now, but Asus was expected to bring a very promising 2-in-1 Chrome OS machine to the fast-growing tablet market way back in February. For some reason, it took the company almost six more months to commercially release its robust and versatile alternative to 2020's moderately successful Lenovo Chromebook Duet.
The latter may not be quite as popular as Apple's top-selling iPads, but at a regular price of $279 and up, Lenovo's convertible mid-ranger undoubtedly contributed to a healthy increase in global sales numbers during the final six months of last year and 2021's opening quarter.
Both models come packing 4 gigs of RAM in a single Mineral Gray hue, and at least for the time being, both are available exclusively from their manufacturer's official US website, although an Amazon listing is also live without a price tag, an active "buy" button, or any sort of an ETA.
It remains to be seen if the Asus Chromebook Detachable CM3 can do the same for a much smaller player in the worldwide tablet game. As far as we can tell, this is the Taiwanese company's only slate officially available stateside right now, but if you're willing to overlook that "flaw", you might find the quality/price ratio to be extremely compelling, at least on paper.
Get the 64GB variant here
While slightly costlier than its direct rival, the CM3 offers a lot of cool stuff for $369.99, including a detachable keyboard, stand cover, and a "garaged" USI stylus. Although we obviously don't expect the latter accessory to be as useful, accurate, and cool as the S Pen accompanying Samsung's best tablets available in 2021, it's sure nice that you can easily store and quickly charge this built-in stylus with little to no effort on your part.
As you can imagine, the Asus Chromebook Detachable CM3 is nowhere near as powerful as the overall best tablets money can buy right now, packing a middling MediaTek 8183 processor and running Chrome OS on the software side of things, which some of you could consider a major downside.
Get the 128GB model here
But Google's Linux-based and Android-related platform has come a long way in the last few years in terms of productivity, and the CM3's high-res 10.5-inch touchscreen sporting a 1920 x 1200 pixel count should deliver a satisfying content viewing experience alongside a decent set of stereo speakers.
Made from premium aluminum and guaranteed to last up to 12 hours between charges, this budget-friendly bad boy looks like a pretty great alternative to Apple's eight-gen "regular" iPad and Samsung's $350 and up Galaxy Tab S6 Lite, fetching the aforementioned 370 bucks in an entry-level 64GB storage variant, with a 128 gig configuration setting you back just $30 more.
Both models come packing 4 gigs of RAM in a single Mineral Gray hue, and at least for the time being, both are available exclusively from their manufacturer's official US website, although an Amazon listing is also live without a price tag, an active "buy" button, or any sort of an ETA.
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