ASUS Prices Eee Pad Range: $399 Android EP101TC, $1k EP121

ASUS CEO Jerry Shen has confirmed pricing for the company's upcoming tablet range, with their Android-based model slipping in beneath the iPad's base price.  According to PCWorld, the ASUS Eee Pad EP101TC will cost under $399 when it arrives in March 2011, and will be the third in the company's new line-up; first will be the ASUS Eee Pad EP121, announced back at Computex and set to cost around $1,000.

That's significantly higher than the iPad, but ASUS's machine will offer full PC functionality since it's based on an Intel Core 2 Duo ULV processor running Windows 7 Home Premium.  It also comes with a keyboard docking station for speedier text-entry, and has a 12-inch display.

Interestingly, while the EP101TC ditched Windows 7 Embedded Compact in favor of Android 3.0, according to Shen there will be a third model in January 2011 which will in fact use the Microsoft OS.  That will have a 10-inch touchscreen, ARM processors and a price tag between $399 and $499, but lack the EP121's docking station.

Finally, the ASUS Eee Tablet – a monochrome LCD slate intended for reading and annotating documents – will drop globally in October priced at around $300, considerably cheaper than the $500 tipped recently.  It will run a homegrown Linux OS rather than Android, have WiFi, 2 -megapixel camera, touchscreen and audio recording, together with a browser, microSD card (augmenting the 2GB of onboard storage) and a battery good for 10hrs runtime.  ASUS are considering renaming it to the Eee Note, so as to avoid direct tablet comparisons.

[via Engadget]