i did look at the asus tablets, and an HP that was similar (but ran full win 8 - much like an ultrabook that snapped into its keyboard), but i decided on the surface based on my personal preferences. I actually started out with a Nexus - it was great, but found i would consistently put down the tablet to do something on my pc that i got frustrated trying to do on the tablet. Further, the surface hardware quality was worth the extra 130$ over the transformer in my opinion.

TDLR: Hardware quality + preference of metro over android