LAS VEGAS–Samsung has a Galaxy NotePRO, but Asus may have a Galaxy Note killer. I spent some time with the VivoTab Note 8 this afternoon, a little Windows tablet with a monster feature set: a full version of Windows 8, plus a pressure-sensitive Wacom stylus for only $299.
The VivoTab Note 8's secret, of course, is the Intel Bay Trail chipset, which lets low-cost devices run Windows at an acceptable speed. There are a bunch of Windows 8 tablets around like this one, not only from Asus but most notably from Acer, Toshiba, Dell and Lenovo.
We haven't seen a Wacom stylus at this price point before, and that's where things get interesting. The 8-inch tablet is comfortable to hold in one hand, and you can take notes in your favorite Windows application, whether it's OneNote, Asus's own Supernote, or for that matter Photoshop.
I scribbled around for a while with the pen, and I was very impressed by the lack of lag. Pen input lag input is something with which Android tablets continue to struggle. Samsung's Galaxy Note line is the best because of the active Wacom digitizer, but the VivoTab Note 8 felt even more responsive; drawing on this tablet really felt like drawing on paper.
It's $299; no, it doesn't feel premium, but neither does it feel flimsy. It's a little less than half an inch thick and well under a pound. Most notably, it's $60 less than Samsung's Galaxy Note 8.0 , which, while slimmer, sports the same 1,280-by-800 screen resolution and doesn't run any of those useful Windows productivity apps.
The VivoTab has 2GB of memory and either 32 or 64GB of storage, plus a MicroSD card slot. Asus says it has 8 hours of battery life. I can't wait for our hardware team to test it out in the PCMag labs, as this little tablet could be an excellent digital notepad if it performs as promised.