Samsung just announced the Galaxy Book S, a new ultralight laptop powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8cx processor, onstage at its Unpacked event. It looks a little less like a Surface Laptop than we originally thought when we first saw the leaks, but it’s not far off. More importantly, with that Qualcomm processor it will perform much differently: with much longer battery life, but much less horsepower.
Samsung’s new Galaxy Book S is a Qualcomm-powered laptop with 23 hours of battery life
With a 13-inch screen and LTE connectivity
With a 13-inch screen and LTE connectivity
Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
The 8cx is Qualcomm’s 7-nanometer chip designed for PCs, and Samsung says that this version of the Galaxy Book should have “40 percent greater CPU performance, 80 percent greater graphics performance, and added memory bandwidth” compared to the Galaxy Book 2. It is fanless, too, and the best feature of all is the battery life. Samsung says that it will last up to 23 hours of continuous video playback — but of course actual use will get you much, much less than that.
The big question with this — and all ARM-based PCs, really — is whether the processor can be powerful enough to really feel like a viable main computer. Intel chips may have a bad rap for being power-hungry and a little behind the times, but ARM-based Windows laptops have disappointed us too many times for us to say we can trust this device’s power without testing it first.
Samsung says that it supports Gigabit LTE and instant-wake, and that it weighs just a little over two pounds. It has a 13.3-inch display that supports 10-point multitouch input. It comes with either 256GB or 512GB of storage, expandable up to 1TB. It will come in pink and gray when it starts shipping in the fall in “select markets.”
“It looks like a laptop, but it has the essence of a smartphone,” Samsung’s Hassan Anjum said onstage. It runs Windows 10 and features a 13-inch touchscreen, but, like a smartphone, offers LTE connectivity and a promised 23-hour battery life.
1/9Photo by Chris Welch / The Verge
Here are the basic specs:
Display: 13.3’’ FHD TFT (16:9) Touch: 10-point multi-touch screen
Dimensions: 305.2 x 203.2 x 6.2-11.8 mm, 0.96 kg
Processor: Qualcomm Snapdragon 8cx, 7nm 64-bit Octa-core processor (Max. 2.84 GHz + 1.8GHz)
RAM: Memory 8GB RAM (LPDDR4X),
Storage: 256 / 512GB+ microSD slot (up to 1TB)
Camera: 720p HD
Battery: 42Wh, up to 23 hours video playback
Other features: Gigabit LTE, Bluetooth 5.0, fingerprint sensor, Dolby Atmos, Windows Hello support
It’ll be available starting at $999 this September.
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