As Pocket-Link points out, just before CES Samsung has announced an addition to their Series 7 lineup, the Series 7 Ultra — an Ultrabook targeted toward professionals who need performance, battery life, and mobility.

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Hector, a guest poster and CloverTrail Windows 8 tablet owner has another post for us today. He’s been looking at navigation applications in Windows 8 on his Samsung ATIV SmartPC 500T. Don’t forget to subscribe to Hectors YouTube channel here. Follow him on Twitter here and check out his blog here. Thanks Hector!

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Hector, a UMPCPortal reader, has sent us a review of the Samsung Ativ PC 500T keyboard dock. Don’t forget to subscribe to Hectors YouTube channel here. Follow him on Twitter here and check out his blog here. Thanks Hector!

The Samsung ATIV XE500T has been somewhat a bit hard to find in-stock, that goes for other Clover Trail devices that we were supposed to see released in October. I was able to get a hold of the ATIV keyboard dock which again  has been in short supply at the moment. The keyboard dock works great, but not without some cons. Read-on for the review, images and a review video.

Reviewed by Osiris
Many thanks to Osiris for the review which was sent to us a few days ago. Osiris is a Samsung ATIC SmartPC owner and has submitted this review as a guest post.

For the last decade I have had an on-going, on and off again, love-hate relationship with Windows based tablets. Some of these tablets have included and spanned hefty Windows XP tablets, tiny Vista based tablets right through to modern more effective Windows 7 tablets. Despite these varieties and many more shapes and sizes, typically over this time the same limits have persistently dogged these tablets; poor battery life, heavy weight, poor performance and high niche pricing. In many instances the latter two were forgivable; however trying to use a tablet for day to day, study or business purposes with the first two deficiencies makes it an uphill – and often – inconvenient battle. With the advent of Windows 8 another era of hope and optimism dawns over the Windows tablet landscape. Promises of light devices providing all day battery, choices of performance at all levels and a true windows experience in a mobile platform abound. I am familiar with these promises from almost every generation of Windows tablets since their inception, the question is could this year finally be the year it all comes true? The short answer is Yes…but we are still in an era of compromise, this goes for all tablets.Keep that in mind as I will speak more about that at the end although without further delay let’s get into looking at our first Atom clover trail based Windows 8 tablet, the Samsung Smart PC.

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This is the feature that we’ve been waiting for low power states in Windows that match what you might see on a smartphone. Always on! Personally I  think it’s a feature that Intel haven’t promoted well enough, possibly because it makes Ultrabooks look a little old fashioned.

The new low power states have been available in hardware since Moorestown chipsets were available and you can experience them in action in Android tablets and smartphones running on Intel but in the world of Windows PCs, only the CloverTrail platform /Windows 8 offers this new level of of idle efficiency. It means you’ll get a big improvement in battery life and the possibility of always-on action.

In the last 24hrs I’ve had feedback from a user in Germany that proves it’s working.

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Hector, a UMPCPortal reader, has sent us a great owner review of the Samsung Ativ PC 500T along with some really useful videos. For anyone considering a Clover-Trail based tablet or ‘transformer’ convertible, this is a must-read; Especially the battery life section!

Don’t forget to subscribe to Hectors YouTube channel here. Follow him on Twitter here and check out his blog here. Thanks Hector

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You know what’s coming? The biggest personal computing fight, ever.

Windows  8 and the expansion of the laptop into smartbook territory will go head to head with an important launch in the handheld computing space the iPad Mini. Following that, Windows Phone 8 and a non-desktop Windows tablet, Microsoft Surface with Windows RT, will start shipping. There has never been a month in history where the personal computer has had such an upheaval. No-one really knows what’s going to happen.

Some of these products could fail showing us again that what people want is not always what the manufacturers think. Touch-enabled sliding and convertible Ultrabooks is one of those risk areas. Windows RT, I believe, is another, at least for the time being but I think there’s a product category that has fantastic change. The SmartPC, Smartbook could finally succeed with Windows 8 on Intel Atom.

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The naming convention used by various Samsung marketing departments around the world has left us confused for quite some time but it looks like everything is slotting into line today with Samsung giving details on final branding and pricing for their touch-enabled Ultrabook and ATIV dockables. The Ativ SmartPC Pro 700T , the Ativ SmartPC 500T and Samsung Ultra Touch are the new touchscreen models. There’s a marketing twist being introduced now though as the ‘SmartPC’ name is used. Actually the name fits well, we wonder whether it might catch on faster than Ultrabook! [We’ve just picked up smartpcnews.com, just in case !]

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