by Dan Nystedt

CES – Samsung to launch ultramobile PC with flash memory

News
Jan 7, 20072 mins

Samsung Electronics on Monday will launch the latest addition to its family of ultramobile PCs, a device that uses a 32G byte solid-state, flash memory-based hard drive to store data instead of a conventional hard disk drive.

The Q1P SSD is designed for users requiring speedier access to data. It also takes a beating better than devices using HDDs, Samsung said in a statement.

The boot-up time for the Q1P SSD is 25% to 50% faster than systems using a HDD, Samsung said. It is also capable of reading data 300 times faster than HDDs, at 53M bytes per second, and writing data 150 times faster, at 28M bytes per second.The Q1P SSD can also withstand twice the impact of an ultramobile PC equipped with an HDD.

The company should know. It is offering both kinds of ultramobile PCs in the U.S. market immediately, the Q1P with an HDD for $1,300 and the Q1P SSD for $2,000. The launch of the new ultramobiles prompted the company to lower the price of its first ultramobile PC, the Q1, to $999.

All earlier Samsung ultramobiles used 1.8-inch HDDs.

The spec sheet of the Q1P SDD shows that Samsung has returned to using Intel microprocessors after turning to microprocessors made by Taiwan’s Via Technologies microprocessors in the Q1B, a lower-priced ultramobile PC.

The Q1P SSD runs on an Intel Pentium M 1.0GHz microprocessor and carries 1G byte of double-data-rate, second-generation memory. It has a 7-inch screen, weighs 1.7 pounds, and holds a rechargeable lithium ion battery that lasts three hours.