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The Bay Trail+ devices thread

7K views 61 replies 6 participants last post by  @ruantec 
#1 · (Edited)
After thinking about it i decided to create a dedicated thread for Bay Trail tablets as it seems to be the start of a new era of Tablet wars. I'm saying this after owning several tablets from different vendors and different OSes. So far i've owned many Android and even iPad myself and i have to say those were great devices. However something was missed and that is the freedom to actually do whatever you please without annoying hacks or half-backed OS limiting you here and there. So far my first two attempts were not exactly what i was expecting.

My first attempt was the WeTab a x86 tablet that was relatively thin and quite nice to have in the hand but it lacked CPU/GPU horse power and it even failed to run Windows 8 propertly. The worst thing was battery life obviously as it ran out of power quite fast. Still the tablet was not that bad to run some applications on the go and it did the job sometimes.

My second attempt was the ASUS VivoTab Smart(which i still own) and it was much better. Battery life is quite impressive and performance did increase a lot in comparison to the old WeTab. Areas where the WeTab failed the ASUS VivoTab just worked like a champ and to complete the combo it runs Windows 8+ very well. However as great as it may sound the GPU isn't that impressive which killed the fun out of it as many games just don't run. Still that tablet is the first x86 tablet purchase i didn't regret.

My third attempt is the new Lenovo ThinkPad 8 which so far has been a pleasure and almost every game tested so far works with minor tweaks. So far the performance is great and the tablet quality as well. Today i made a battery test and got around 9 hours of battery life... which is interesting since most reviews say about 7 and half hours. Devil May Cry is the only game that refuse to run for some extrange reasons as it crashes on start. Obviously i'm not targetting super high end games but some good oldie ones that are great to play now and then.

Emulators: so far every emulator apart from PCSX2 and Dolphin run games at full speed. The only game i got playeable framerates was Final Fantasy X using PCSX2 but it goes around 35-40fps at times causing slowdowns and cracky sound.

With that in mind i think x86 tablets are finally reaching the level i've been expecting for such a long time now. They aren't only very thin and have great battery life but also are quite powerful. With the release of Bay Trail Intel finally started to bring something to the table which is great and healthy for the monopoly ARM and co. have in the tablet sector. Of course everyone is free to buy whatever he/she wants but i personally believe that tablets should be capable of far more than just internet surf, mail check, some random gaming and third party apps and tricks to get few of the things done that we can do in our PCs. That is actually the reason why i prefer Windows tablets over Android or iOS but as i said.... that's my personal opinion. With that in mind i'm very excited at what Cherry Trail is going to be capable of and then Broxton which promises even more.

Here is a serie of videos i've made so far to show you what Bay Trail tablets are already capable to do(next ones are HearthStone, Diablo 3 and World of Warcraft which should run just fine with minor tweaks):







Share your thoughts here and in the future maybe videos of your Bay Trail+ devices.
 
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#4 · (Edited)
I can test Autocad and Revit... any special scenario? obviously the 2GB is limiting the device but as you can see on my videos it performs quite well. I guess if i had the 64bit version of Windows things would be different. Will post a video later to show more about it. So far i can work without problems using Visual Studio 2013 to compile the @ruanTuber, @ES and the @ruanHawk Emulator project as well as other applications such as photoshop. As of now it can totally replace my VaioTab 20 for my daily usage. Performance-wise the Lenovo ThinkPad 8 seems to be slightly better. The only advantages of my VaioTab 20 so far is the 4GB Ram and HDD space.
 
#6 ·
Kinda confused lol! what do you expected? most of the games run fine tho. also don't forget that some of those games get stretched to 1080p. Right now i think it provide just what i expected from such a tablet but at the same time i'm now sure that Cherry Trail and Broxton are going to rock.
 
#7 · (Edited)
I just uploaded another video showing a very nice game that runs quite well. Going to test some more and write a full list of results so we can see what is possible and whats not. So far is the most impressive Tablet i've had in my hands.



In this video is where you can see the differences between the real thing and toys. Both the Emulator and the game are stored in my network and not localy on my Tablet:

 
#8 ·
Today i just found a really nice comparison video and eventho. the guy german accent makes it hard to comprehend some words(would be easier for me if he had a German version) it clearly shows some of the things people oversee right now on Bay Trail tablets and Windows Tablets in general. In fact it clearly shows how good Windows 8 on a tablet is which sadly people tend to mix it with Desktop experiences:

 
#10 · (Edited)
Here is a good comparison video which pretty much compares the dell venue 8 pro against a Tegra 4 based tablet and it gives a great view on how fast this new bay trail tablets are. I love my ThinkPad 8 but the dell venue 8 pro at just 249€ offers an insane power for the money as well as value. I'm very happy to own the two most powerful 8" tablets out there.



I'm mostly interested in how Autodesk's Autocad and Revit perform with these new tablets. The biggest problem I can see is the integrated graphics performance and 2gb ram, but I'd love to see how adept they are at running the software.
Just going back to your post... i haven't tested those apps yet but i found a video that can give you an idea. The guy on the video is using blender as well as other apps that usually require a nice hardware. As you can see it performs quite good:



As a reference here is a video of a guy running Blender on Android:
 
#12 ·
Cool.

Baytrail-T and 4GB might hit the right spot for my needs.
Yeah, i don't know if you should better wait for Cherry Trail tablets tho. as those are going to be more powerful and cheaper if the current rumors are true when they come out by the end of this year. Whatever the tablet it may be just don't forget NOT to install any third party antivirus and use the default windows one until better ones appear else you will end wondering why battery life drain so fast.
 
#15 ·
I started to try a few others, but the battery was around 4% when I started these tests and it was nearly my bedtime.


I tried starfox 64 through retroarch, but after changing from interpreter to the dynarec, it just gives me a black screen and crashes. I've got to get in there and change some things around, might do that tonight if I'm not too lazy.

I must say, it's kinda fun seeing what these little baytrail tabs can do.

Also I love this thread.
 
#16 ·
I've never used retroarch myself on my tablets but the recent builds of Project64 which works great. It's interesting you haven't tried anything above snes and n64 tho. In my case i can almost play anything below PS2 and GC where those two get some nice fps with some games at times. The emulator that impressed me most was PPSSPP as i got most games working like a charm. Obviously not with super high details but most at full speed.

PC games are a little harder tho. since many will simply crash on start if you don't have a keyboard and mouse hooked and some simply don't start at all. However, there are a bunch of games that do work great but require you to lower the settings and resolution.
 
#17 ·
I haven't had much time to get everything configured right, plus my connection is slow as balls to upload videos to the youtubes, but I'll get there.



I've got Starfox on Retroarch and Project 64 videos waiting to be uploaded, plus some others in the works, but its slow going for me. I'm having fun with this little thing however.
 
#22 · (Edited)
I'll be certain to give ruantuber a shot, I'd love to see how the tab handles it. Although, I don't think I'll be streaming much content, my paltry 130kb/s is a bit of a pussy.



You know, I've wanted to ask you this for a while King Bomb Dude. If you can leap to the top of a mountain without difficulty, why do you walk so slow?





Also made a couple of Starfox 64 vids, Project 64 totally playable, Mupen64 through Retroarch however experinces some difficulty.


 
#21 · (Edited)
Btw Snicko... i will recommend you to install TouchMousePointer. Is simply the best way to work with the desktop mode. It basically turns your entire touch screen(or partof it) into a mouse pad and it all supports lots of gestures and have awesome things. Pretty useful when you have to be very precise or just want to work with your desktop almost as fast as if you were using a laptop.

Here the link:
http://www.lovesummertrue.com/touchmousepointer/en-us/

And while at it... you can give @ruanTuberHD for Windows tablets a try if you wish(the link is in German but not the app):
http://apps.microsoft.com/windows/de-at/app/ruantuber-hd/b11defe8-8813-4ab1-bf2f-5bea10a2cf0d

There are few things i have to fix tho. but some feedback could help me to improve it. Also i would like to know how it performs on such a high resolution.

Enjoy!
 
#25 · (Edited)
The game runs but not at playeable Speeds. At 1024x768 i get around 10-15fps in game. Intros and everything else run smooth tho. Baytrail is great when comparing to most low-Budget Android tablets but is simply not fast enough in the GPU department. Upcoming Intel tablets with core-m are going provide the Performance we probably expect and something similar(or better) to what a Surface pro 3 delivers today but obviously at a lower Price later.

Here few videos of one of the tablets using it already:




This two Videos are particulary impressive judging by the Settings and Image quality:

 
#28 ·
That's why i said "in the future" since right now those core-m tablets are expensive. Later this year the new wave of tablets is going to come out at the range you are expecting and most specially those nice and cheap chinese tablets as the one Snicko has.
 
#29 ·



3D games in ePSXe struggle and stutter a bit, but it's not completely shonky. I'm sure if one spent some time with game configs something good could come from it, but default settings are what I tried to run with.

RE4 is mostly ok, it struggles to reach 30fps, mostly sits somewhere in the mid 20's, but for all intensive purposes it's playable.
 
#30 ·
Great videos Snicko! i recommend you to use the TouchMousePointer for your desktop as it makes it far easier to use. Also when dealing with emulators i would suggest you to use DirectX instead of OpenGL. Sometimes OpenGL works better/faster tho.

What do you think about Baytrail tablets now?
 
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