Ctitanic wrote about it the other day so I decided to send Christoph over to the VIA stand to see if he could find anything.

Bingo! We have new UMPC. And another new design. Rather than centering the screen and leaving a huge frame, FIX have moved the screen over to the left and added an info window. I’m not sure if that’s a Vista sidebar capable screen. Possibly not as the device seen is running XP. The device shown is a prototype.

More images in the gallery.

The iDot / CE260 is a VIA 1.2Ghz-based Ultra Mobile device with a 7″ screen (looks like 800×480 to me but this is unconfirmed) and a wacky 180 degree folding screen (folds back over itself. Sorry no pics of that.) WiFi, Bluetooth, LAN, USB(x2) and a 4-in-1 card reader are included. VIA are talking about a 5hours battery life, 850gram weight and there’s talk about a 600 dollar price point. (assume trade price.) A fold-over screen does indicate touch capability but that’s not been confirmed. The keyboard felt ‘very similar to my keyboard on the notebook’ and ‘very good IMHO’

This one is due for launch tomorrow but there’s a preview going on at the Hyatt as I type. We’re on the case and will bring you info if Christoph can worm his way in.

Update: Now tracking all the specifications and news on a new product page.

Update2: I didn’t know this but iDOT is part of the VIA group. So we’ve got a platform provider (VIA), a design company (iDOT) and a manufacturer (FIC.) There’s one thing missing, a brand and distribution company.

Just in. A little bit of info from the ASUS stand. They are talking about releasing an updated version of the R2H (they called it the R2) on an Intel base. One assumes that it will be the McCaslin platform. There’s also talk about a possible keyboard which kind of puts this rumor into the ‘revisit in Autumn’ category.

Apart from that, there was nothing to report on from the ASUS stand. No T83 UMPC info. Shame.

Roughly translated, that means nice legs, shame about the face. (boat race=face. Cockney rhyming slang me ole china.)

Azentek have taken an Amtek T770 (my hands-on review, video here) and given it some nice legs. A car headrest mount to be precise. Something I wouldn’t mind having myself for the odd family journey. The problem is that they’ve plastered a rather nasty looking brand name on the front. Tut tut. They style police will be after you Azentek. Only huge huge brands with huge huge followings can get away with that. The worst thing is that they’ve decided to call it the AxSS! That’s nearly as bad as the SA1-F00KS.

Excuse my flippancy. I’ve just got up and its 0520! More info on the Azentek over at GottaBeMobile. Specifications in the product portal.

I’ll be honest up front. I don’t like the Flipstart UMPC. I haven’t used one yet so I could be wrong but the combination of that keyboard, the big battery and high-end price don’t get me going like other UMPCs do. Having said that, this version (I assume its using the same core design) does get me a bit more interested. The Go-Book MR-1 looks a whole lot better and with my record of breaking UMPCs, this is one I should think carefully about!

The Go-Book comes with a mil-spec price too!

PCMag via Gizmodo.

I’m not sure if this is going to be a marriage made in heaven. A digitizer-loving tabletPC expert has got hold of a Q1 Ultra over at GottaBeMobile and is talking about vectoring already! Hey Dennis, get your consumer UMPC-head on man ;-)

Fortunately, I, and many others, know that Dennis is going to do a pretty good job at reviewing the Q1 Ultra so I’m pleased, if a little jealous as my Q1 Ultra isn’t due until next week, that he’s one of the first people to get hold of it. We’ve seen user reports already but it will be nice to hear the opinion of someone that’s handled a few UMPCs in the past (he’s also a Q1P owner) and it will be nice to see a hand-on video.

Questions from me, Dennis, are:

• Battery life figures. What does Notebook Hardware Control say? Minimum and average figures please.
• Can you do normal browsing successfully on the max battery setting?
• The mouse pointer, its not really is it? When I tried it it felt like something like an 8-way 3-speed joystick. Certainly not a synaptics device with pressure sensitive touch.
• Screen brightness. Outdoor useable? Compared to the Q1P?
• What happens to performance when you optimise Vista. I assume its a slug at the moment.
• Fancy installing XP to see how different the experience, battery life and performance is?

Q1 Ultra Specifications.

Misleading title alert! Its not actually ‘our’ man. Christoph is Assistant manager of Epiacenter.com and is working part-time for UMPCPortal while he’s out there. ‘Groundbreaking’ isn’t my choice of words either. Its from Richard Brown, senior marketing manager from VIA.

I can say with confidence that we are going to make some ground-breaking announcements

All I can say with confidence at the moment is I’m not going to get much sleep over the next three days. I love expo-time!

Christoph has his first video up already. An intro to Taipei (on YouTube here.) Unfortunately, no UMPCs to be seen yet!

The end-of-life Fujitsu P1510d, a well-loved convertible 8.9″ notebook appears to be re-surfacing at Computex. A California-based company called Dreamnovia have taken the P1510, given it a paint-job and are promoting it as the Dreambook.

Specifications appear to be unchanged from the P1510 but the pricing seems to have gone up! $2000 for a 256MB/30G device running XP Tablet Edition isn’t going to impress too many people. I guess they’re intending to hit a high-end style-oriented customer but the quality of the website and photography certainly doesn’t reflect the term ‘high-end.’

I’ve been waiting for Neil Balthaser to post this. Its a multi-part review of the OQO Model 02 and its an extremely good read.

Neil is a pen computing fan and goes into good detail about why the OQO’s flat screen makes it ideal for handwriting. He talks about ergonomics, heat and noise and makes comparisons with the Q1P (which he also owns so he’s no stranger to UMPCs)

The OQO’s form factor is ideal for my needs. It is small enough to carry around like a PDA but has a large enough screen to be readable and useful. Quality and craftsmanship are high.

Part one of the 5-part review is up now