The Asus Padfone is nearly here

Incoming from Rob Fisher:

The Padfone is supposedly going to be available in April and now has a keyboard attachment too. There's a good chance I will buy one.

The point of the Padfone is that it is a mobile phone, a tablet, and a regular computer with a regular keyboard, all in one big clutch of stuff. It has just the one "brain" so to speak, and it is all in the phone. When you want the tablet or the computer to power up, you stick the phone inside the tablet, and the phone does everything from in there.

This is what it all now consists of:

And this is how the phone goes into the back of the screen:

I found those pictures here.

And here is video of the(se) thing(s), being demonstrated by someone who knows his way around it/them.

Also prompted by Rob Fisher, I did a posting here about this same gadget last July, when it was merely due Real Soon Now. I am especially proud of this bit of commenting on that from me (which follows on from a bit about how Apple kit (such as my Apple keyboard which I use with my otherwise totally PC PC - which still works absolutely fine) just works more nicely:

And I am starting to love Asus in a similar, and yet also completely opposite, way. They too are now setting new standards. Not in the sense that their stuff works, the way Apple stuff works. It doesn't. But, it does work, as a specification. Their stuff says to everyone else: this is what you now have to make work, and this is what you have to charge for it. Look at all the people blogging about this, and even pre-ordering it, poor fools. This is the next Thing, people. Just do it.

Not every commenter agreed that this Padfone idea was a runner. Many thought the demand just would not be there for this new set of toys, and some who did think the idea a good one doubted whether the Asus version would be a success. We shall soon be finding out who was right.

Personally I love the idea, but have my doubts about Asus making it work well (based on bad experiences with the Asus Eee-PC). If I am wrong, and this spec doesn't catch on, it will be Asus and their immitators who lose money, not me. If only the world's financial system could work this well.

If this set of toys, or some set very like it, does catch on, my non-geek sense is that this will maybe represent a huge breakthrough for Google and their Android operating system, because Android was all along designed with this kind of integrated all-in-one system in mind? Yes? Maybe: no. What do I know? But, comments on that last point in particular would be much appreciated.