Bang for the buck ultraportable - Samsung NP350U2B

While Intel is focused on its new Ultrabook, Samsung has released the Samsung NP350U2B, which shows that a well designed laptop can bring some of the benefits of Ultrabooks at a lower price. The Samsung NP350U2B A01PH sports a 12.5-inch screen but weighs in at a light 3.1 pounds. This is the weight of most 11.6-inch laptops as is within 0.1 pounds of the target weight of an ultrabook. The laptop is also fairly thin at 0.98-inches. Samsung promises 6-hours of battery life, though we have no means to verify this claim. But it is pretty safe to assume that this 3.1 pound laptop can give at least 4 hours of real world endurance. The Samsung NP350U2B A01PH, comes with a conventional 500 GB and not an SSD so don't expect quick boot and quick resume.

Basically, the Samsung NP350U2B is not an ultrabook, but it is thin, light, powered by a reasonably powerful Intel Core i5-2410M backed up by 4GB of RAM. It comes with Windows 7 Home Premium pre-installed. The only spoiler in the package is the absence of USB 3.0. All this can be had for just Php36,500. We need to give this laptop a closer look and get some hands on time. As it stands right now, it looks like it could be our favorite budget ultraportable.