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Samsung Updates Its Series 9 Ultrabooks with the ATIV 9

By Dr. Jimmy Tang - on 21 Jun 2013, 3:02am

Samsung Updates Its Series 9 Ultrabooks with the ATIV 9

The new Samsung ATIV Book 9 series. Seen here with the ATIV Book 9 Plus (in black) and the ATIV Book 9 Lite (in white).

Samsung today updated its Series 9 ultrabooks by unveiling the new ATIV 9 Plus and ATIV 9 Lite. The flagship ATIV 9 Plus will come with an updated Intel 4th generation processor (codenamed Haswell) that promises to give users even more processing and graphics performance. With on-the-go usage that lasts as long as 12 hours on a single charge, the new ATIV 9 weighing at only 1.39kg will be the perfect companion for those looking out for a thin and light notebook that they can carry without breaking their back. 

Apart from being lightweight, the new ATIV 9 Plus will come with a super vivid and high resolution screen. At QHD+ resolution (3200 x 1800 pixels), the ATIV 9 Plus will blow you away with images that's crisp and sharp on its 13.3-inch 10-point touch screen. The screen reinforced with Gorilla Glass technology is also OCR bonded to give users more precise touching experience. Optimized to run Windows 8, the ATIV 9 Plus measures only 13.6mm thick and is enhanced with SSD to make it boot blazingly fast in less than 5.9 seconds. It also wakes up from sleep in 0.9 seconds.

The QHD+ screen on the ATIV Book 9 Plus makes icons and text appear tiny in Windows 8, but there is a Zoom Scale option native to the OS that allow you to tweak their appearance.

In terms of flexibility, the ultrabook will allow you to put the screen in two positions via a unique hinge design. When opening the screen and tilting it to about 105-110 degrees, the hinge will lock the screen in position so as to allow users a comfortable viewing angle while keeping the screen firm and wobble free as the user touches and interacts with the screen. When given a slight push past the 110-degree mark, the screen will continue to move up to the 180-degree mark where it will allow users to work on the ultrabook in a flat position.

For something more affordable, you can pick the ATIV Book 9 Lite which comes in a similar design. Weighing slightly heavier at 1.44kg (oxymoronic, yes we know), the ATIV Book 9 Lite is also thicker at 16.9mm. With a lower resolution screen, the affordability of the ATIV Book 9 Lite is further enhanced with the use of a non-Intel processor. Using a special quad-core processor designed by AMD exclusively for Samsung's use, the processor is said to be optimized for performance. Although no further details about the processor was disclosed, we can only venture a guess that it's based off an AMD APU that comes with a Radeon graphics core. Although built for mainstream users, the ATIV Book 9 Lite is also equipped with an SSD giving decent 8 seconds boot-up time and 2 seconds wake from sleep. The Book 9 Lite will be available in two colors, Black and White.

In addition to enhancements in its hardware offerings, both the ATIV Book 9 Plus and ATIV Book 9 Lite will come with Samsung's SideSync and HomeSync Lite.

The new ATIV Book 9 series are expected to hit the store shelves some time in the third quarter of this year. Retail pricing is not known at this time.

The specially customized quad-core processor could not be identified by Windows although Samsung indicated to us that it's from AMD. Speed is rated at 1GHz although that could change at release.

The thicker ATIV Book 9 Lite (on top) as compared with the ATIV Book 9 Plus (below). The thickness difference is only about 3.3mm, but it's visible.

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