The upcoming Viliv S7 [Portal page] is currently at the #6 spot on ultra mobile PC Portal’s top 10 chart and is still on its way out the door to a consumer release. If the recently released and oft-glorified Viliv S5 [Portal page] and Viliv X70 [Portal page] are any indicator, the Viliv S7 is going to be a solid ultra mobile PC with good build quality. Setting it apart from the S5 or X70 is the fact that the S7 has a hardware keyboard while the aforementioned Viliv devices use an on screen keyboard with vibrating feedback for their default text entry method. While many claim to be waiting for their dream device which would be “an S5 with a hardware keyboard, inch the S7’s keyboard is actually going to be the device’s biggest challenge.

What do I mean when I say challenge? Well for one, it is going to need to impress its users if the Viliv S7 is going to build a reputation as being a great device as the S5 and X70 seem to have done.

If you’ll come back with me to a time that seems not so distant, most of the original netbooks were released with 7 inch screens, and keyboards with diagonals not much larger or smaller than that size. Shortly after the first round of netbook contenders, screens increased in size from 7 inch to 8.9 inch almost unanimously across companies and eventually up to 10 inch which is around the area where the average user doesn’t feel they are compromising too much on screen size. Screen size is only one part of the story, however, along with the increase in screen size, keyboards were able to grow as well; up to a point where consumers felt that they could type nearly as well as on a full sized laptop.

Now here comes Viliv with the S7 which has a 7 inch screen during a time when netbooks are nearly always released as 8.9 inch or 10 inch devices. Now I know many of you realize that the S7 is definitely not a netbook, it is a UMPC, however, if there is a keyboard on the device, people are going to be dissatisfied based on how similar the typing experience on the S7 is compared to a full sized keyboard. This is a potential issue for the popularity of the device and especially for its word-of-mouth based marketing which is very important for a niche product such as a UMPC. If people come away dissatisfied with the keyboard, the likely result will be that this is the largest complaint about the S7 and instead of hearing people say (as they do now about the S5) “The Viliv S5 is great, it would be even better with a keyboard! inch, you’ll hear “The S7 could have been a good device if only it had a good keyboard. inch But unfortunately size isn’t the only potential challenge for the S7’s keyboard.

Full specs, details, news links and more at the Viliv S7 Portal page.

Pocketables.net picked up a story that has a nice cache of Viliv S7 photos from Korean site Lazion.com. In addition to the photos there are some impressive battery life figures from a few battery tests.

Viliv claims that the 2-cell 4700Mah battery can last for 9.5 hours and while that might be technically possible, some real-life usage tests have clocked in under that claimed time, but are still impressive.

Test: Video Playback – DivX 3.11 / Resolution 720×400 / bit rate 1.64Mbps / wireless – Bluetooth off / screen brightness maximum / max volume
Result: 6 hours, 13 minutes

Condition: Video Playback – XviD / Resolution 640×360 / bit rate 1.64Mbps / wireless – Bluetooth off / brightness medium / volume 20%
Result: 7 hours 28 minutes

Test: Korea@Home distributed computing client – Wireless LAN on / screen brightness maximum / sound off
Result: 5 hours 45 minutes

Check out the original article for more images.

I hope the answer is no, however, if yes someone has already beat you to the punch.

As you’ll recall, the OQO Model 2+ was shown off at CES 09 where it made a pretty big splash around the web with its OLED screen and Intel Atom CPU. Unfortunately OQO went under before the Model 2+ made it to market.

A pre-release model made it way onto Ebay, and the ensuing bids pushed the unit up to $4,500 for the winner. It would be pretty cool to be one of a few people to actually own a Model 2+, but I think for most of us, it would be hard to justify that price!

[Engadget]

Over at GottaBeMobile, Xavier Lanier has a nice video showing us how he uses his Viliv S5 [Portal page] as a mobile photo studio. Its a pretty cool setup. Xavier uses an Eye-Fi card to import photos to his S5 as they are taken. No USB cords or SD card transfers involved. After snapping a few photos, he pulls out the S5 and they are already right there, waiting to be tuned. Using Picasa 3, he is able to make basic but powerful adjustments to his photos on the go. Xavier mentioned that this is a particularly useful setup because he knows how he wants a photo to look just after taking it, but with a traditional setup, he might forget the exact adjustments he wants to make to a photo by the time he gets around to uploading them to a computer back at home base. Using this mobile setup he can edit his photos practically on the fly. Click through the link above to watch the video.

Looks like a Chinese company called Inkia plans on creating two MIDs and is looking for partners to bring them to North America. All we can see for now are renders of the devices, but specs seem to be listed in full. We’ll just have to do with the names Inkia 5 inch &” 7 inch MID for now as they aren’t officially named at this point:

Inkia 5 inch MID

• 5” TFT ( 800×480) touch screen
• Operation system support: Microsoft XP, Linux
• CPU: Intel Atom Z510/Z520/Z530
• Chipset: Intel US15W
• HDD: 1 inchSSD(PATA) 8GB/16GB/32GB
• RAM: DDRII memory 1G on board
• Network Access: Wireless LAN 802.11b/g
• Network Interface: USB adapter
• Support Bluetooth & GPS
• Support 3G
• Storage device: Micro SD (T-Flash)
• Audio: AC’97 Controller + speaker + headphone + stereo Mic
• USB2.0*2
• Webcam: 0.3 mega pixel
• Camera: 3.2 mega pixel
• Switch Control: Power On/Off Switch, Camera button
• Led Denote: Power Denote, Charge Denote, Wireless Denote
• Lithium Battery: 2-cell Lithium polymer 7.4V 1900mAh
• Power adaptor: Input 100-240V  Output: 12V 3A
• Size: (L)160x(W)95x(H)22mm
• Weight: 350g

Inkia 7 inch MID

• 7 inch TFT ( 800×480) touch screen
• Operation system support: Microsoft XP, Linux
• CPU: Intel Atom N270 1.6G
• Chipset: Intel 945GSE+ICH7-M
• HDD: 1 inchSSD(PATA) 8GB/16GB/32GB
• RAM: DDRII memory 1G
• Network Interface: 10/100M Ethernet (RJ45)
• Network Access: Wireless LAN 802.11b/g
• Support Bluetooth & GPS
• Storage device: Card reader module (SD/MMC)
• Audio: AC’97 Controller + speaker + headphone + stereo Mic
• USB2.0*2
• Webcam: 0.3 mega pixel
• Switch Control: Power On/Off Switch, direction keys, volume up/down, brightness up/down
• Led Denote: Power Denote, Charge Denote, Wireless Denote
• Lithium Battery: 2-cell polymer Lithium 7.4V 3000mAh
• Power adaptor: Input 100-240V  Output: 12V 3A
• Temperature: 5°C ~ 35°C; Humidity: 20% ~ 80%
• Size: L 205 * W130* H20.8mm
• Weight: 700g
• Support 3G

There is also plans for a VIA based version of this model which will run Windows CE or Linux. More info from these devices as we get it.

[Thanks for sending this in Robert]

Viliv has managed to create some great UMPCs which have been receiving quite a bit of praise over the last several weeks. A reader in the comments suggested a size comparison of the devices which I thought was an excellent idea.

Products compared: Viliv X70 | Viliv S5 | Viliv S7

You can also click through to the Size Easy comparison to hide/show different devices, and add your own items for comparison.

Below you’ll see a video of WebOS running on the Aigo P8860 MID [Portal page]. One little caveat, its an emulator. Still, everything looks to be running fine, and WebOS is certainly better oriented for a touch based computing experience, so maybe it even has some viability for usage?

It seems that the emulator was given out to developers, though you may be able to find it yourself if you search hard enough.

Several days ago I put up a post asking which device was most anticipated by readers of our site. 648 of your responded and I’m here to share the results. Take a look at the graph below:

For readers who didn’t have a chance to participate in the poll from the previous post, here is the list of devices which readers could have chosen from (click the link to be taken to the product’s Portal page).

Crunchpad | Asus Eee T91 | Archos 9 | Always Innovating Touchbook

As I watched the results roll in, the Eee T91 stayed the leader for nearly the entire duration of polling. The CrunchPad came in second, followed by the Archos 9 and then the Always Innovating Touchbook. There was a good amount of ‘other’ responses. in fact enough to tie the CrunchPad for second place (I’ll add more devices to the poll next time!). What I found interesting was that some people filled in the ‘other’ dialogue with existing devices, and some filled it in with devices that they would like to have, but might not be products at this point. Here is a short list of ‘other’ entries for existing products:

• Viliv X70 [Portal page]
• Viliv S7 [Portal page]
• Asus Eee T101H [Portal page]
• Kohjinsha SK3 [Portal page]
• Asus Eee Keyboard PC
• Open Pandora
• ION/Tegra based netbook

And a short list of ‘other’ entries featuring devices that don’t yet exist:

• Apple tablet
• Archos 5 inch Android device
• LG ultra mobile PC (this person must be old school!)
• Next Nokia Internet Tablet (several people called this the N900)
• Viliv S5 with keyboard

Interesting suggestions everyone. Thanks for participating in this poll. Its good to know people are looking forward to these devices. We have quite a few nice products lined up that we’ll be reviewing for our readers. Chippy has the Viliv S7 coming eventually, and we’ll also hopefully have our hands on the Asus Eee T91, and the Always Innovating Touchbook in the near future.