A small startup from Hyderabad called Smartron started operations in 2014 with ambitious plans. The company came into limelight after the announcement that Sachin Tendulkar was an investor in the company and would act as its brand ambassador. Soon after the announcement, Smartron pivoted to promoting itself as an Indian IoT (Internet of Things) company. Aiming to differentiate itself from the crowd of generic device makers, Smartron decided to launch a 2-in-1 device – the Smartron t.book.
This is the first device from the company as part of its plans to create an exhaustive ecosystem of devices leveraging IoT. Despite the aim, the company, for now, is concentrating on conventional computing devices that will target the general consumer market. Soon after the launch of t.book, Smartron sent us one of the devices, and we have been using and testing it extensively. Let us see how the first device from this relatively new startup performs in the real world.
Build and Design: 7.5/10
The first thing you notice when you open the Smartron t.book is the fact that the device is premium. It doesn’t look like any other 2-in-1 which may seem flimsy and barely worth investing money in. The magnesium-alloy body feels sturdy and has a good finish, though the orange colour may be distracting for some. Despite the premium quality the device feels significantly heavy and not suitable for prolonged usage in tablet mode, though you get accustomed to the weight. But the entire concept of 2-in-1 devices is to be portable and lightweight to use in the tablet configuration.
The keyboard feels great and keys are built for extended usage. The kickstand at the back is useful but does not provide that much flexibility as compared to the Surface Pro 4. Beyond a point, the kickstand looks slightly delicate, but there is nothing to worry on that front. One thing to mention specifically is that the charging cable is good; it does not look delicate like the Surface Pro 3 charging cable.
The design of the device with the speaker grill on top with the front camera in the middle give it a retro look. The capacitive button on the right side of the display works as intended and you can use the tablet in landscape mode. Landscape mode works well for reading, making notes or general word processing. Overall, there isn’t much to complain in terms of the build quality of the tablet portion, at least.
Keyboard and Trackpad: 6/10
Smartron t.book offers a detachable 6-row chiclet keyboard. Typing is a breeze with the keys giving an excellent tactile feedback. I was surprised with the quality of the material used for making the keyboard and the trackpad. But one must beware of the fact that the keyboard has a proclivity to flex a slight bit when you’re typing really fast around the periphery and the t.book is on a flat surface. Lappability is not its strongest feature and the keyboard tends to wobble when typing. It is preferable to have the t.book on a flat surface while typing.
The magnetic connector to connect the keyboard with the t.book was not up to the mark. Sometimes you had to attach the keyboard manually instead of the automatic lock on at some occasions. The area between the magnetic connector and the actual keyboard was a bit delicate. It is worth mentioning that when the keyboard is closed, it latched on to the t.book securing the screen in any orientation.
Coming to the trackpad on the keyboard that comes with the t.book, there’s only one thing to say, it is poorly implemented. Out of the box, settings make it seem sluggish and after tweaking the mouse pointer speed, there is still no improvement. The size of the trackpad is really small and it is oversensitive in terms of applied pressure. During the review, it continued to register ghost touches and made usage a pain. Scrolling down a webpage for instance would end up minimising it, selecting text would at times end up moving around the browser window and so on. You are better off using a dedicated wireless mouse while using it.
