Transformer Prime Gets 4.0.3 (ICS) Update
by Anand Lal Shimpi on January 11, 2012 3:25 AM ESTA couple of days earlier than originally expected, ASUS pushed out an update to its Transformer Prime bringing the tablet up to Android 4.0.3 (Ice Cream Sandwich). I brought my Prime with me to Vegas just to be ready for when this update went live. I installed the update last night and have played with the platform a bit since then. Tegra 3 definitely does a better job of handling the ICS UI compared to OMAP 4 in the Galaxy Nexus (more on this in our review tomorrow). In particular, bringing up the task switcher on the Prime is much smoother than it is on the Galaxy Nexus.
ASUS kept the quick settings menu in the lower right as well as the CPU governor settings we loved from our original review.
JavaScript performance actually appears to have taken a step back compared to Honeycomb on the Prime. I'm no longer able to get < 1700ms scores with ICS installed (even in the Normal power profile, SunSpider 0.9.1 is up at 2253ms now). I'll be digging into browser performance over the coming days to see if I can find out what changed between Honeycomb and ICS on the Prime.
I'm very pleased to see such a quick turnaround on the TF Prime ICS port. If we can get similar progress on Tegra 2 based tablets I'll be very happy.
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shaboinkin - Wednesday, January 11, 2012 - link
We would like a lovely ice cream sandwich!Is there any release date for ICS for the transformer?
Sesire - Wednesday, January 11, 2012 - link
http://www.androidnext.de/wp-content/uploads/asus-...End of January
MrPrime - Wednesday, January 11, 2012 - link
Anand, if you could take a look at wifi again that be great. I've found it's not as good as with the last version of HC that the Prime was running. I had a horrible time with netflex last night; seems very hit or miss.coder543 - Wednesday, January 11, 2012 - link
I'm sure it's a little smoother on a quad core with serious graphical power, but it's no slouch on the Galaxy Nexus either. It stutters a little, but not that much.Matias - Wednesday, January 11, 2012 - link
Meanwhile we Nexus S users are still waiting for a fix the battery consumption issue by Android OS in 4.0.3...V-Money - Wednesday, January 11, 2012 - link
If it makes you feel better, I'm running it on my Nexus one. It works great except for the camera, I just can't seem to get it to work. I do want to upgrade at some point though.steven75 - Wednesday, January 11, 2012 - link
It's amazing that Android still hasn't caught up with the 5 year old original iPhone in this area.LordSojar - Friday, January 13, 2012 - link
"It's amazing that Android still hasn't caught up with the 5 year old original iPhone in this area. "Excuse me? What drug did you take, and where can I get some?
bryanb - Wednesday, January 11, 2012 - link
Preordered my prime from Amazon in November and still only have the keyboard part.jonny13 - Wednesday, January 11, 2012 - link
"In particular, bringing up the task switcher on the Prime is much smoother than it is on the Galaxy Nexus."This isn't because of the hardware, this is because the task switcher was fixed in 4.03. Using ROM's based on 4.03 are night and day faster at using the task switcher. I'm sure the prime is faster, but this speedup is software, not hardware.