The Christmas season is obviously a big sales period for electronics equipment and this year there’s one more market segment that will be competing for your money. UMPC’s.

Over the last few quiet months in the ultra mobile PC world, we’ve been hearing about new products that are going to be launched and it looks like these are all aiming for the Christmas sales period. In the far-east, work will be starting right now on production lines in preparation for production runs in August. Here’s an update on the long-awaited devices.

Asus R2H UMPC
The latest news from Asus is that the production and delivery (to resellers) starts in early August. This information is direct via Asus Germany and is their latest information.

Tablet Kiosk ultra mobile PC x2
The latest news is that Tablet Kiosk have two devices that will be announced in late July. This information comes from Tablet Kiosk. I assume that production will start soon after the announcement is made.

Mo-bits UMPC
The latest news is that the 7″ version of the device is due for launch in September. This information comes direct from Mobits in Taiwan. The reseller for this device is as-yet unknown.

Pepperpad 3
The Pepperpad 3 has already had it’s press release and its due to be available through reltailers in August for the Amrericas. There’s no news about availability for other regions.

Averatec AHI.
We’ve had confirmation that the Averatec will be “formally announced in late Q3 and begin shipping shortly thereafter.” Once again, that means they’re aiming for Christmas sales.

DualCor.
Confirmation has been given through VIA’s press release that the DualCor will be launched. “The DualCor cPC is expected to be available in the first half of 2006” was stated in the recent VX700 chipset press release. It’s now the second half of the year so we can expect something soon.

Other unconfirmed UMPC’s
There’s still the Samsung Q2 VIA/AMD rumor to confirm along with rumors of a new Nokia UMPC/mini tablet and, of course, the omni-present Apple ultra mobile PC rumor! The Flybook V33i is overdue and the Founder Mininote/ECS H70 still only seems to be available in the far eastern markets.

Regards
Steve / Chippy.

Many of you will have read about Microsofts rumored Ipod-like device. Personaly i’m not really interested in another Ipod as I believe its days are numbered. Mp3 players belong on smart mobile phones or UMPC’s where you can connect to the internet and download/stream new music. However, when I read a little footnote comment/rumour on an Engadget posting about Microsoft wanting to launch a virtual mobile operator business using HTC phones, my ears pricked up.

HTC are almost the same company as VIA (family businesses) and we already know that VIA/HTC want to launch the ‘OnDemand‘ media service and that VIA started calling UMPC’s ‘PC-Phones.’ at the Via Technical forum in Taipei last month. We’ve also had an anonymous comment stating that HTC is indeed trying to get into the ultra mobile PC market. Is it possible that Microsoft are thinking about using the OnDemand platform for media distribution?

If Microsoft want to use the ‘OnDemand’ service then they will need to use VIA’s chips (hardware encryption/decryption seems to be a core part of the OnDemand service) and that means building something like the DualCor ultra mobile PC device which VIA has been promoting heavly in its press releases this week.

Could all these businesses be getting together to start offering subsidised media devices/UMPC’s on a virtual mobile operator network? I tipped this before and it still makes sense to me. The 300,-Euro ultra mobile PC on 24 month data contract with unlimited 1Mbps internet access and media download service for 30,-Euro per month is something I think I could find useful!

Steve / Chippy.

Tablet Kiosk resellers PocketPC-solutions in the UK have emailed us to let us know that they have another image of the extended battery for the eo on their eo 7110 web page.

Pictures are good, so here it is!

Click to enlarge.

Steve/Chippy

[url=http://jkontherun.blogs.com/jkontherun/2006/07/excellent_head_.html]jkOnTheRun[/url] posted a link today to [url=http://meansquare.info/UXReview/vsOQO2.html]a great OQO versus Sony UX Article[/url].

The article is very thorough and goes through everything from size to outputs all the way to which fits in your pants better. (the pants part even includes a picture to demonstrate which looks better in your pocket)

If you are trying to decide between each of these systems or just want to get an idea about each one, this is the best article you could possibly ever find on the subject. Read the full story

A few readers emailed in to ask what the availability of the UX50/90/180 devices in Europe is. We double-checked again with Sony UK and there are still no plans to release it in the UK or anywhere alse in Europe.

Its probable that the UK is too small of a market and most of the rest of Europe requires different keyboards, manuals and software. It’s just not going to bring returns for Sony which is a real shame. Yesterday we read a really great review of the Sony UX and a head-to-head comparison of the UX and the OQO. We’re convinced that you get what you pay for with it. Its a high quality device.

However, there is a solution if you’re happy with a U.S. keyboard.
Dynamism.com are able to sell the U.S. model in the UK (shipping starts today!) and it appears from their website that the UX50 and UX90 models are also available. They are still working on getting the flash-disk version of the UX90.

We’ve contacted Dynamism for confirmation of availability and to find out if they’re able to deliver into mainland Europe but they haven’t got back to us yet. In the meantime, you can check out their UK website info and our product portal for more info and links.

[update: Dynamism kindly answered our queries. They have stock and are able to ship worldwide. The UX90 with flash drive is expected late July.]

Regards
Steve / Chippy.

Alot of the complaints with the ultra mobile PC devices have been the low battery life the system come standard with. Some have reported battery time under 2 hours.

Well, Ervetzin posted a picture [url=https://www.umpcportal.com/modules/newbb/viewtopic.php?topic_id=508]in our forums [/url] of The Q1 extended Battery that supposedly netted him 5 1/2 hours of useage.

[img]https://www.umpcportal.com/umpc/images/q1_extended_battery.jpg[/img]
As you can see it is running my favorite site origamiportal.com

And Steve at [url=https://www.umpcportal.com]CarryPad.com[/url] posted a [url=https://www.umpcportal.com/journal/2006/07/amtek-eoeasybook-5-hour-battery.html]picture yesterday of the eo/Amtek/PaceBlade extended battery[/url]. which is said to get 4-5 hours of use out of the UMPC.

[img]https://www.umpcportal.com/umpc/images/eo_extended_battery.jpg[/img]

Slowly battery life is becoming less of an issue with these devices which could help with better market adoption. Read the full story

In the Origamiportal.com forums, ervetzin has posted a pic and made a few comments about the extended battery for the Samsung Q1 UMPC. [click image to enlarge]

ervetzin paid a rather heafty $164.21 for the part (#BA96-03130A) from samsungparts.com

The battery is about twice the size of the original. It extends about 3/4″ below the bottom of the unit. For me this is actually a welcome added space for resting my hand while inking. The added area is black, but not polished like the rest of the front. The Q1 will still fit in the sleeve that came with it, but it is a tight fit. I have to use the “hold” switch to keep it from turning itself back on when I slide it in.

So, how long does it last?

In my initial test (low brightness, moderate browsing via wifi & listening to mp3s) I got approximately 5 1/2 hours out of it.

In my opinion, for 5.5 hours (plus the use of the original as a 2.5hr spare) its worth the money.

Steve/Chippy

Dailytech.com have an article up about the R2H and FCC aproval which means its moving towards release in the U.S. We were told that there would be a July launch for the R2H and it looks like it’s on target.

The R2H has some unique features among UMPCs including the fingerprint reader and camera and we’re also expecting a a GPS option, single-sign-on software and competitive price,

All the details we have on the R2H are in our product database here.

Steve / Chippy.