Hands-on with Fujitsu's FMV-U8240 UMPC
Akihabara News got their hands on Fujitsu's new FMV-U8240 UMPC and have posted their impressions from using the device over a three day period. The first point worth referring to is the enclosure, which is undoubtedly compact but which also gives off a distinct mid-90s gadget vibe. (One of the machine's quirks are two little LEDs for night typing: cute.) If you can stomach the style, you've got good ergonomics to make up for it: apparently the keyboard is acceptable, which is the closest you can get to a compliment for a keyboard that's just under 7 inches wide. As is to be expected in a UMPC that only weighs 1.28 pounds (584 grams) the feature set is a bit of a compromise, with an 800MHz A110 Intel CPU appearing to be the weak point at first, although it's apparently capable of playing 720p DivX video flawlessly. Battery life is a rather disappointing 2.5 to 3.5 hours of real world usage, and the reviewer had issues with the swivel screen and the touchscreen: he hopes that these are pre-production problems, and at $1,190-$1,360 a piece depending on configuration, we'd hope so too.
