Samsung today unveiled its line of Windows 8 devices that it hopes will make it a contender for a share of the PC market. This comes a week after Lenovo overtook Hewlett-Packard at the top, setting the mark for Samsung to fight for the top PC makers spot.
The line up (some previously announced at IFA 2012) include the ATIV Smart PC, Series 5 Ultra Touch, Series 7 Notebook, Series 9 Premium Ultrabook and the Series 5, Series 7 all-in-ones. The devices will be available starting the October 26th Windows 8 release date.
The Series 5 and Series 7 tablets were previously unveiled and have now been rebranded as “ATIV smart PCs”. This comes barely a week after Samsung was relegated to the “others” category below Acer, Asus and Dell.
Included in the list is non-touch notebooks that will be upgraded to Windows 8 and key among them is the Series 9 Premium Ultrabook.
Tablet PCs
The ATIV suite features four new devices, two hybrid notebooks and tablet PCs: the ATIV Smart PC and the ATIV Smart PC Pro. Both pack an 11.6-inch bright, full HD LCD display, the Pro being marginally thicker at 11.9mm.
The Smart PC houses a next-gen Intel Atom processor, while the Smart PC Pro packs an Intel Core i5.
“I see that as an opportunity for choice. There’s fragmentation that’s occuring within laptops, tablets and smartphones. That’s leading to these opportunities.” says Mike Abary, Samsung’s senior vice president of consumer marketing in the U.S.
Android vs Windows 8 tablets?
Interesting to note is that Samsung also makes Android tablets, and while Windows 8 would seem to compete with these already established devices, the Korean giant has a clear strategy for them different from how the Windows 8 devices will be positioned and priced.
“We want to position Android tablets as more of a living-room complimentary device,” Abary says. “What that means is that there’s tablet-to-TV capability — the transfer of content between devices. With a Windows 8 tablet, that consumer has a multitude of different utilization options on that device.”
Pricing of this units will depend on the final setup and offering, but chances are you will find something that suits you from the Korean giant’s PC feast.
What do you think of Samsung’s Windows 8 lineup?
