Firstly, thanks to everyone that dropped by for the live Q&A on the Medion ultra mobile PC last Friday night. It went on longer than I expected but I think we were all happy with the findings. I’ve finished taking the photos [Gallery here] and here’s a hands-on report. Remember its based on the production sample that I have but there shouldn’t be any major differences to the final production version.

I think Mike had the same amount of time as I had on the Q1 Ultra before getting moved on but he did well, collected a lot of onfo for the melting pot and reports it all here. Its good to read.

He likes the screen, doesn’t lilke the keyboard, like the stylus but didn’t like the speakers. There’s lots more info there too.

Unit is joy to hold. Feels lighter than the Q1 Classic. Weight balance is extraordinarily good. It looks much smaller than a Q1 Classic, but there’s one next to it and only the height is really different.

Mike Canes blog. Samsung Q1 Ultra links.

What is it with me? Every UMPC I touch seems to fall apart in my hands!

I’ve got the Samsung Q1b HSDPA up and running now so I thought I would wander into the local Vodafone shop and see if I can get a second SIM card. It turns out that Vodafone don´t have the multi-SIM option that allows you to have both devices active at the same time but no worry, Ive just transfered my data contract onto a new SIM card which is now sitting in the Samsung Q1b. Lets see how that goes for a few months. So far it seems pretty good. The guys in the Vodafone shop where certainly impressed!

Whats the first thing you do when you get a new UMPC and new HSDPA contract? Go to Starbucks and show-off of course! And whats the first email I read with my Latte Grande? “Please can you send the Q1b back to the distributor as it looks like you have a faulty unit.” Oh the luck of the gods!

Some of you might have seen me try to demo the organiser pack on the Q1b last week. There was a slight problem because it wouldnt work when plugged into the RHS USB port. (although a USB memory stick worked fine!) Its a major issue becuase the organiser pack will probably be an important part of my kit when I do the Solar UMPC tour so I contacted TheTabletStore yesterday and they quickly determined that its a fault. I promise you TTS, I didnt do anything! The funny thing is that just before I made the new data contract, I picked up the Nokia N800 that was in for repair. (new screen 150 Euro thank you very much.)

Looks like i´ll be on the Q1P for the rest of the week now which will give me a chance to optimise Vista. Having used the Vista T770 and Medion UMPCs for a few days I think i’m ready to dive into Vista again. Ctitanic will be happy!

Two items of UMPC Linux / Midinux news to report on today and both are positive. RedFlag and Ubuntu are moving forward with their projects.

Firstly RedFlag, the Asian Linux distribution developer who have already announced and demonstrated ‘Midinux’, the distro for UMPCs , have told me that their distribution is going to released to developers, OEMs, ODMs and independent software and hardware vendors this month. I’ve also been promised a copy to test so it will be interesting to get it onto an R2H or i7210 (or maybe even a VIA processor?) to see how it performs. That will definitely be one for the close-up studio cam and lots of videos.

Secondly, I was tipped (thanks Christoph) on this article that appeared in LinuxDevices yesterday. Canonical (developers of Ubuntu) are working on “Ubuntu Mobile and Embedded” which will ship in October.  It was announced in a post by CTO Matt Zimmerman this week. Looking at the post that made the announcement its clear that Intel are contributing too:

we are delighted to be working with Intel on this version of Ubuntu. Intel are making significant contributions of technology, people and expertise to the project.

So in general, good news as both Linux projects move forward. It also gives us an idea of timescales. If Ubuntu are working to an October release schedule, does this mean that we’ll see a few Midinux devices priced below the Q1 Ultra (sub $800) before Christmas?

Ubuntu news via LinuxDevices.

For all of you that have been trying to upgrade Samsung Q1b’s to Vista, there’s good news for you.  VIA have released new drivers through ViaArena and they’re available for download. “This driver has been specifically released for use on UMPCs with Windows Vista.” it says. Sound promising.

The new driver version is 6.14.10.0352 which is a few sub sub versions behind the ones on the T770 (.361) and the Medion (.358) but ahead of those on the Q1b (.323)

If you have a Q1b or any VIA-based device with the VX700, VX700M or VX700M2 and try these out with Vista and let me know your results.

ViaArena driver list for Vista. (VX700’s are at the bottom of the list.)

Thanks to PocketPCSolutions, I have the Amtek T770 here, the fist Vista on VIA device to ship and I’ve just posted a gallery and intro video below. Thanks to everyone who took part in the live unboxing (jkk grabbed a video of it here) and Q&A. It sounds like it was useful for everyone and was a good chance for me to hear/read peoples thoughts as we went through it. I’ll definitely keep the studio on standby for another session soon. Back to the Amtek T770 though, its a nice […]

Update: Live feed is over now. I should have a video, in fact a few videos, tomorrow. Thanks again to PocketPC solutions for sending the T770 over.

The UMPCPortal Live studio has been re-organised and improved. Following the success of the Friday and Saturday video and chat Q&A sessions I’ve improved the cam (out goes the web-cam, in comes my Sony cam with BIG zoom, great auto focus and high quality output. I’ve also installed new lights. Out goes the old audio set-up. I’ve brought in a mixer, mounted the mic from the ceiling and improved the audio routing so we can even take Skype calls live.

So, not forgetting that content is King, I’ll be unwrapping the Amtek T770 this evening at 22:00 CET (Central Europe = 18:00 New York = 13:00 San Fran = 0600 Sydney) and giving it the once over. We’ll run through everything quickly for a video recording and then we’ll go back and answer any unanswered questions and probably end up with a general chat like last time. I expect I’ll be around until about midnight here although the last two sessions went on for 4 hours!!! See you on the UMPCPortal Live page. (Please register and login first.)

Now that we are starting to get more and more info on the device, it’s worth posting that the device has some pretty unique features. Aside from the new Intel processors and longer battery life, I personally have a couple of favorites.

First, I love the new handstrap. It is quite a nice design, one that would definitely make me attach the strap to the device. For those that missed it, there is a silver circle on the back of the Q1u with a rectangular hole in it. The hand strap has an adjustable plastic plug that fits into the hole, and enables single-handed use of the device. Like what camcorders have, except here you can have it in one hand with better weight distribution and security. Click on the image to enlarge it.

Another compelling feature for me are the two cameras – they may not be great quality, but it will be fine for an occasional snapshot to attach to an email.

Also the price! You are getting one nice device for price it is offered at. Consider the Medion, which currently sells for 1000 Euro. For 200 Euro more, you get HSDPA, two cameras, a fingerprint scanner and the newest technology.

There are two things I’m worried about: Will the processor be good enough? 800mhz? The units shown at CeBIT we’re quite fast – but they were dual-core. We’ll have to wait and see till Steve gets one.

My second concern: will they have an organizer pack for it? That’s (in my opinion) one of the greatest features of the Q1. Sure the new one has a tiny split keyboard but Samsung would be making a very bad decision by not having a similar product for its new device.

So what in your opinion is the best feature of the Q1 Ultra? Are there any features you wish were included but aren’t? Make yourself heard in the comments.

Kornel