13
Jan
Introduction
The Samsung Q1 Ultra is the second generation Samsung “UMPC” – Ultra mobile Personal Computer.
UMPC’s are a class of machine developed by Intel, Microsoft and Samsung. Wikipedia has an extensive article on what UMPC’s are.
It was Samsung that revealed the very first UMPC back in 2006; the Q1. The second generation UMPC hit store shelves in July 2007, Samsung foolishly named it “Q1 Ultra” instead of Q2 which makes things quite confusing.
The Samsung Q1U-V
The Q1 Ultra version tested here is the Q1U-V. It has an 800MHz low voltage Intel CPU, 1Gb of ram, a 60Gb harddisk, dual webcam, Bluetooth 2.0EDR, 802.11g WiFi and a 7″ LED backlit touchscreen.
Samsung makes quite a few models of the Q1 ultra which makes things even more confusing than the naming issue.
Q1U-XP – Q1 ultra with 800MHz CPU, 60Gb HDD, fingerprint scanner and Windows XP Tablet Edition.
Q1U-SSDXP – Q1 ultra with 800MHz CPU, 32Gb solid state drive and Windows XP Tablet edition.
Q1U-CMXP – Same as Q1U-XP but with added HSDPA cellular modem integrated.
Q1U-EL – Q1 Ultra with 800MHz CPU, 40Gb HDD, no cameras, and Windows Vista.
Q1U-ELXP – Q1 Ultra with 600MHz CPU, 40Gb HDD, dual cameras and Windows XP Tablet Edition.
Q1U-V – Q1 ultra with 800MHz CPU, 60Gb HDD, dual cameras, Bluetooth and Windows Vista.
During the 2008 CES tradeshow, Samsung announced a seventh Q1 Ultra with a faster 1.3GHz CPU, an 80Gb HDD and several bundled accessories. This model is called the Q1 Ultra Premium and will cost around $1399.
Prices for the Q1 Ultras start around $800 for the Q1U-ELXP up to $1799 for the Q1U-SSDXP (SSD drive technology is still quite expensive).
Needless to say that having so many models doesn’t make it easier to pick the right one. A simple digit different in the model number could mean you end up with the wrong one, or without features you need.
The one feature all these machines lack is more than 1Gb of memory. Any computer with just 1Gb of ram will have major problems running Windows Vista. Samsung does not offer a simple way for users to upgrade the Ram. Thankfully there are tutorials online on how to open the machine and install a new memory module. This was the first thing I did. A 2Gb memory module will cost around $65 and can be installed in under 20 minutes. It’s not for everyone, but with the easy video tutorial I found, anyone with some basic experience will be able to do this upgrade themselves.
Let’s start by taking a look at the physical features of the Q1 Ultra.
On the left side is the power slider button (with hold feature), the “AVS” instant on media player shortcut key and a metal slot for the wrist strap/palm strap.
On the right you’ll find the power connector, USB, Ethernet (10/100) and VGA (all hidden behind a plastic protection flap).
On the top is an SD card slot (SDHC compatible), a headphone jack, USB slot and a shortcut button for the camera application. There is also a vent to help cool the CPU. After longer periods of use, the air coming out the vent became quite hot, so it’s not somewhere you’ll want to hold the machine.
On the back is a (flimsy) stand, battery latch, rear (1.3mp) camera and a slot for the palm strap. The stand is made of very thin plastic and is both hard to open and to close. The way the wrist strap is positioned also means it usually gets caught in the stand when you close it.
The left front side has one half of the mini keyboard, mouse pointer and shortcut buttons to enable the “dial key” keypad and to switch between mouse and joystick mode. It also has the left speaker port.
The right front has the other half of the mini keyboard, cursor keys and the mouse buttons. Of course, this is also where the right speaker is found. On the bottom right is a slot for the stylus (only one is included, so be sure to order some spares).
The front in its glory. On the top of the screen are touch sensitive shortcut buttons for volume and for the on-screen settings popup. On some models the Q1 Ultra logo (in the bottom left) is replaced by a biometric fingerprint scanner.
The display on the Q1 Ultra has a 1024×600 resolution and is LED backlit. It’s extremely bright and very easy on the eyes. The size/resolution ratio is just perfect. Browsing the web or working in Office is quite easy. Other UMPC’s (like the Sony UX series) feature the same resolution with a much smaller screen. Even after a few hours of work on the Q1 Ultra I didn’t feel any strain on my eyes.
The screen is nice and crisp and looked great when playing a movie. But if you try and play any movies with high(ish) resolutions you’ll notice the 800MHz CPU struggle. I did not test the 600MHz version, but can only assume that it will have even more problems coping with video playback. When I reformatted a few of my videos to match the screen resolution of the Q1 Ultra I noticed a much better playback quality. Two other things improved video playback a lot; turning off WiFi and installing the newest version of the Intel video drivers.
The on-screen experience
The on-screen settings allow you to easily change the brightness, volume, WiFi settings, power settings and to check the battery status.
The front webcam is a 300k pixel camera, which is fine for instant messaging or Skype chats.
Text Entry
Entering text on the Q1 Ultra is fairly efficient. You have several options;
Popup keyboard – the text entry keyboard can popup automatically on many fields. It’s large enough to use your fingers on. Sadly you can’t configure much, it’s always blue and it always has the same font. You also can’t resize the window, and it takes up almost the entire bottom half of the screen.
The Samsung Dialpad is pretty useless, it’s impossible to hold the notebook and type efficiently at the same time. And without tactile feedback, typing for any length of time becomes painful.
Windows Vista includes a fairly decent handwriting recognition package, most words I tried were recognized without any mistakes. But it’s still a slower way to enter text than on a normal keyboard.
Accessories
The Q1 Ultra comes without any accessories (unless you consider a cheap fabric bag to be a true “accessory”). So if you do order one, consider some of the official Samsung options. For this review I ordered the Q1 Ultra “easy carry” case (49.99) and the Portable USB keyboard ($89.99).
The keyboard has function keys for brightness, volume and battery. But to make it worth what Samsung charges for it you also get a trackpoint style mouse pointer. Below the space bar are 2 mouse buttons. Sadly the keyboard is not wireless, so you’ll need to connect it to the machine to use it.
The Q1 Ultra in its case with the keyboard installed. They machine slides into 2 leather clips, but nothing holds it in place, so if the case were to slide off a table it’s going to fall out. The keyboard is held in place by a plastic clip.
Before you close the case, a piece of fabric goes over the keyboard to protect the screen on the Q1 Ultra.
The magnetic latched flap also functions as a stand on the back to keep the machine at the right angle for viewing.
At $139 (for the case and keyboard) I was unimpressed by the usefulness of these accessories. The case is great quality, but it just doesn’t feel right, and adds a lot of bulk to the package. There is no handle to hold it, so you’ll need a dedicated laptop bag to hold your laptop and bag…
The keyboard is decent, the keys are well spaced and have good tactile feedback, but the mouse is quite bad, most of the time I had it connected I just went back to using the touch screen and stylus.
The assortment of other accessories includes a docking base, external DVD drive, 6 cell battery, 8 cell external power pack, GPS navigation kit and a DC car power adapter (not Empower capable). For some reason US users don’t have access to the official Samsung car mount for the Q1 Ultra, but it can be found on Ebay for $150.
Finally I put the machine on my scales;
The weight of the UMPC on it’s own (no accessories)
The weight of the UMPC in the case + keyboard.
The Q1 Ultra for travelers
As usual, we’ll look at this product from the perspective of someone on the road. And honestly; there really isn’t a better target market for this product than the road warrior. It’s light, has good battery life and powers on/off in around 3 seconds (from sleep mode).
You get WiFi, and in most models Bluetooth. Even though Samsung does not offer an air power adapter, iGo tip S22 can be used (together with a suitable iGo power adapter).
Since Samsung charges a whopping $80 for the car adapter, buying an iGo charger would be a good investment for this machine. A universal iGo everywhere charger would replace the delivered Samsung AC adapter and offer Empower, DC and AC in one unit.
The stand on the back of the machine makes it great for watching movies during a flight, and the small(er) size helps ensure that reclining passengers in front of you won’t snap it in half like with a normal notebook.
Having a VGA port on the machine means you can use it for PowerPoint presentations when on the road.
Slingplayer ran fine on it, so being away from home does not have to mean no access to your home TV.
Conclusion
PROS
The idea behind the UMPC platform has come to reality in the Q1 Ultra. Back in 2006 I briefly tested the original Q1 and was quite unimpressed. This newest version has an upgraded screen (including higher screen resolution), better CPU (slower clock speed, but better performance).
Battery life was quite impressive, I fully charged the Samsung and left it on with medium settings on the power management. After 3 hours and 49 minutes Vista finally decided enough was enough and powered down into hibernation. Playing an mpeg video file was equally impressive; at medium brightness settings I got 3 hours 9 minutes of playback. Samsung offer a larger battery pack which promises up to 8 hours of usage.
The screen is literally the brightspot in the Q1 Ultra. LED technology means the screen is simply awesome and that it uses less power than a normal (cold cathode tube) lit display.
In previous models, Samsung followed companies like Dell and Sony by filling the harddisk with heaps of bloatware. Thankfully that seems to have changed, and only the necessary applications were installed. The 60Gb harddisk only has 32Gb available when you first turn it on; a 10Gb recovery partition is hidden on the drive. If you feel lucky, or have access to an external DVD drive you can use the included recovery DVD’s to restore it (if needed) which means you can remove the partition and enlarge the main one. In my case I used Acronis Disk Director suite to accomplish this. After installing Firefox, Thunderbird, Sling Player and the Office 2007 suite I had 39Gb available, which means extra space for movies, music or anything else you want to bring along.
CONS
Things that really disappointed me were the lack of extras in the box. For $1199 you get the machine, 4 cell battery pack, AC adapter, USB data transfer cable, fabric slipcase, wrist strap and ONE stylus. That’s right; your hard earned money does not even get you a spare stylus. In my opinion anything at this price should at least come with a good quality case and a spare stylus. The wrist strap is a bad joke. I never dared carry the machine with it as it looks like it will break after the first use.
The 800MHz CPU will always feel slower than most current desktop and laptop machines, and the factory delivered 1Gb of memory is an insult to Vista. It simply does not work well unless you upgrade it. Be prepared to invest an extra $65 for more memory (and possibly more if you can’t install it yourself).
Naturally the price of the machine itself it also an issue. $1199 is a lot of money for a machine with these light specifications. $1199 will buy you an Apple Macbook or a well specced Dell, but at 4 times the weight it’s naturally comparing apples and oranges.
FINAL THOUGHTS
In closing; the Samsung Q1 Ultra is a usable machine for basic tasks when on the road. You get the familiar XP or Vista interface, WiFi access and several text entry options.
Any basic tasks like web browsing and email access are perfectly acceptable. Office 2007 runs just fine, as do most video playback applications.
Buying a UMPC means you are looking for a very specific kind of machine, there are many alternatives to a UMPC. Basic web access can be found on the Asus EEE PC which costs a third of this device. The Nokia N800 or N810 (from $230) is a much smaller device with WiFi and Bluetooth.
But at under 2 lbs. you will have a hard time finding the power the Q1 Ultra has to offer. Nothing at this weight/price will run Vista as well as the Samsung. If you are interested in a Q1 Ultra, I can only suggest finding a retailer who has them in stock so you can feel it. Hold the Q1 Ultra and play around with it before committing to the $1200 investment. Then get one online at a vendor with no sales tax…
Want to buy one now? Amazon.com Q1 Ultra Q1U-V link
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