Samsung Series 7 Laptops - 15.0" and 15.6" Models (NP700Z4 & NP700Z5)

This notebook at least on paper addresses most of what I'd like to see. I hope they didn't skimp on the palmrests as I don't think the cost savings would've been worth it.

As for integrated notebook speakers, I hardly ever use them. It's either headphones or desktop Logitechs.

 

I don't think a plastic palmrest is "skimping." As others have pointed out, not only is it cheaper, but it's more comfortable (it's not cold when you first touch it). Also, if you wear a watch with a metal band, the scraping sound of a metal watch on a metal case while you type can be annoying. I noticed this more with my Powerbook G4 than my MacBook Pro, but regardless, it's worth mentioning.

 

Weight is also a consideration with the use of some plastic.

 

I wish speakers would be like Dell XPS 15 quality and the network card is Intel Advanced-N 6230 or Ultimate-N 6300.

 

Betcha anything they couldn't physically fit the XPS's speakers or equivalents into the Series 7. The XPS isn't as thick as it is for the fun of it, and I'm not seeing ANY spare space on the Series 7.

I like high-quality sound in my laptops too; I'm just saying that when it comes to high-quality sound, thin bodies, and low prices, you have to choose two out of three.

 

Yeah, at best, people should hope that the Series 7 comes with average sounding speakers. I personally would be more than happy if Samsung can achieve the sound quality of the Macbook Pro 15, which I think are great when you consider its thin profile.

 

MacBook Pro 17 has very nice speakers and is thin, the 15" MBP doesn't sound bad either, but of course not as good as the XPS. I wish they included at least a small subwoofer to compensate for the lack of larger wide frequency speakers

 

May be it depends upon personal choice. But I can see all are waging war who can make ultra-thin laptops. Why such fight for ultra-thins ? Dell XPS 15 thickness is not bad and why Samsung has not considered for such size. Having a little more thickness helps better heat management, better placement of internal components, and of course can have better audio.

 

What if they can accomplish all this in a thin chassis. The series 7 is just slightly thinner than the macbook pro so not really thin like the airs.

 

You will not find a discrete video card in a ultra-thin laptop. At least, not for now.

 

Because thin/light appeals to more. Good speakers aren't noticeable to most just based on a lookover.



Thin/light form factors are what appeal to the mainstream. I think the main gripe a lot of posters here are having is that mainstream products don't appeal to them in every single way. A good example is the removable battery. I'm not so sure the batteries on this Samsung will be easily swappable. If it doesn't come with it, that's tough luck. Not to ruffle any feathers, but in real life, you won't come across people who carry extra batteries around to swap out. If you need a 10+ hour battery life notebook, there are always alternatives. Part of the reason Apple was able to successfully make thin/light laptops with high battery life so early is they integrated the battery into the notebook's chassis and parts. That allowed for a lot of weight and space savings.


TL;DR - Sometimes, it's not possible to "have it all" in a thin/light form factor. We can't keep asking "Why didn't Samsung make it thicker for speakers" or "Why can't Samsung make the battery swappable (even though it would be virtually unrealistic given the compromised form factor and battery life?)." Samsung has learned you can't please everyone.

 

Last year's MacBook Air had a 320M. And the new Lenovo U300 ultrabook has a Radeon 5470M (1 GB memory).

 

Like I just said, thin, cheap, good sound...pick two. You don't get all three in one computer. The MacBook Pro starts at $2500, more than twice the price of the Series 7. Hence, the two it picked are "thin" and "good sound," NOT cheap. The two the XPS picked are "cheap" and "good sound," NOT thin.

 

Sorry but any laptop sound is mediocre at best to audiophiles.

 

Not just audiophiles. I don't go in for "cable supports" or $6000 power supplies, but "good sound" is not something I expect from any laptop. The speakers in my Samsung Series 3 15.6" are not notably better than those in my 10.1" Acer netbook. If I really want to hear stuff, I use headphones or earbuds.

It's much the same reason I don't expect much out of built-in TV speakers. If I really want good sound, I hook the TV up to a stereo system.

 

There's an incredible difference between a McDonald's hamburger and a Wendy's hamburger. Neither is Top Chef caliber dining, but that doesn't mean they're all the same.

I'm not expecting the same sort of sound from a laptop that I can get from external speakers. But that doesn't change the fact that there's a huge difference between XPS sound and Vaio S sound.

 

The battery are probably user replaceable but require removing screws.

 

If so, that's great. Then again, I think it's the same with the Macbook Pro, but not the Air's battery.


I'm just slightly baffled at the complaints I'm hearing here. Boggles my mind that people are still saying they want better speakers in a thicker package. For goodness sakes, get an XPS and stop whining! Complaining about speakers on a thin/light notebook whose quality we have yet to confirm is the equivalent of screaming at a dealership that the Corolla doesn't come with $3,000 speakers standard. Come on, people. You're essentially paying $1,300 for a thin/light notebook whose equivalent specs would cost $2,000+ with Apple.


I'm going to guess Samsung got it down right. I really hope they don't get swayed and pulled around by the opinions of the 0.0000001% of their consumer base who bawl and cry about the little things.

 

^ Hahaha I agree. Just be happy you aren't throwing down $2000+ for the high spec MBP! On paper, I think Samsung got it right.

 

The Amazon page for NP700Z5A-S02US 15.6-Inch Notebook (which is now back up for preorder) has some images (old ones with the scuff mark on the left side of the palmrest that doesn't seem to have the aluminum finish) and a video I haven't seen yet (it's hidden on Amazon's little popup media browser when you select a picture).

I uploaded the video here, but the quality wasn't as great... sorry if it has been seen already, I haven't seen it before: Samsung Series 7 Chronos Official Video - YouTube

 

Let us hope so. The wireless issue on the Series 9 shows that they don't always get everything right. Apple can get away with such problems (eg the signal strength problem with the iphone) by just persuading its fans that they are doing things wrong but Samsung doesn't have such an ardent fan club.

John

 

The new Amazon video that was posted shows the non-elbow power connector as well. What problems did Series 9 owners experience with the non-elbow connector?

 

which one is better..

Samsung 7 Series, HP Envy14 (Beats Edition) or Samsung QX411-W01 ?

HP Envy 14 (Beats Edition) and Samsung QX411-W01, both they have..
great 'edge-to-edge-glass' screen,
nice sound quality,
realy stunning looks,
low heat..low noise,
tough-built design,
discrete graphics (dedicated graphics),
switchable graphics to save battery life (QX411)
cheaper than Samsung 7 series ??
almoast every modern feature Sammy's 7 series will have,
and their status is 'Available'!!

 

I know nothing about the QX411-W01

But the Envy 14 has:
heavier weight
bad screen quality with glossy finish and lower resolution
weaker GPU
possibly inferior touchpad
possibly lower battery life
it also lacks the whole express drive thing

 

I can't wait for this to come out, it looks great and its specs are awesome. I just hope the 6750 in it doesn't over heat the laptop

 

Does Samsung 7 series has 'WiMAX'?
(A Wi-Fi connection that blankets an entire city (often referred to as 4G wireless). It spans an entire city, as opposed to Wi-Fi, which covers a short-range. Throughput speeds range from 3 to 8Mbps, which is as fast as many home DSL packages. Best of all, pricing plans are cheaper than many Broadband Internet packages, and you don't have a dongle hanging off of a USB port.

One more thing, .. does Samsung 7 series has a Wireless Display 2.0 (WiDi 2.0)?
With WiDi 2.0, you can display what's on the laptop to a HDTV without the use of a physical cable (Think wireless HDMI). This is the second iteration of Wireless Display, which means the laptop can now stream 1080p video (without choking), as well as protected content from your DVD/Blue-Ray collection which was recently enabled by an Intel software update (firmware version 2.11.1.1). A 'Netgear Push2TV Receiver' is required. The receiver is tethered to the HDTV through TV's HDMI port, mirroring whatever's on the laptop.

Samsung QX411-W01 has Widi v2.0 and WiMax!!!

 

That's great and all, but the QX411-W01 has much, much worse performance in games and other graphics programs. Heck, it has much, much less performance overall.

Ask yourself what you need to do with a laptop. If you want to play games at higher settings, both the Envy and QX411 aren't for you. If you want to use WiDi and WiMax, there are cheaper laptops out there that can do both.

 

Any thoughts on the GAMER version of the 7 series?

Samsung Series 7 Gamer Notebook Hands On at GamesCom 2011 - YouTube

Samsung Series 7 Gamer notebook offers 3D and specs | News | TechRadar UK

 

Would it be a good idea in getting this over the envy then?

 

Definitely Samsung (Series 7 Chronos) has more powerfull processor and graphics, but the difference is negligible in the real world. High-powered processor in such a portable device like laptop/notebooks, runs hot and noisy and very hard to keep it cool when overclocked. Remember, laptop/notebooks are not complete gaming consoles. So if you play high-end 3D games frequently, better way go for XBox, PlayStation or other gaming console. And play latest blue-ray 3D games on your big-screen Home Theater HDTV.

By the way, Samsung QX411 (with nVidia GeForce GT 520M dedicated graphic chipset) provides a pretty good significant boost in gaming performance, albeit at mid-low resolutions. It is fast enough to handle any photo editing suite, including the most demanding one: 'Adobe Photoshop CS5. The QX411 comes with automatic switchable graphics technology. Means when the dedicated GPU is not in use or the system is unplugged, the laptop automatically reverts to an Intel integrated graphics chip to save battery life.

My question is still there..
Does Samsung 7 series has 'WiMAX' and 'Widi 2.0' ?

If not, then why they do keep saying that..

"The Samsung Series 7 is a laptop that does not know the meaning of compromise!?!?"

 

I think the laptop will have Widi 2.0 (all depends on what wifi card they choose to use i think?) but maybe not Wimax. Not needed for me because 1) We have no such thing in the UK and 2) i tether my phone to my laptop and charge it using usb.

Anyway, apparently the speakers are located in the hinge of the laptop. source

Samsung Series 7 Chronos laptop first look video review | Which? Tech Daily - News and views without the hype

 

If its in the hinge like the MBP, hopefully it will sound as good as the MBP does.

 

Depending on your need, the extra processing and graphical power that the Series 7 has over the QX411 is either of great use or is completely necessary. Sure, you can get a console to play games, but some of the most popular games on PC are exclusive to the platform while also being perfectly playable on a laptop. League of Legends and Starcraft II are great examples. But if you plan on just web-surfing, checking email, and watching movies on it, the i7 processor and Radeon HD 6750M GPU are kind of an overkill.

I think what is undoubtedly the biggest selling point the Series 7 has over the QX411 a lot of other laptops in this class is its 1600x900 screen. Those who do work on their laptops find the 1366x768 resolution very bothersome. At 1366x768, programmers can't see as many lines of text at a time while coding, students have to alt+tab through all their studying material, and graphic designers can't view the multiple images their editing at the same time. There are just a lot of benefits to having extra screen real estate.

 

This laptop is going to be my next laptop.
However, I saw a video somewhere (forgot where) that it only has windows index of less than 4...very low
Also, the screen looks blueish to me:
http://www.blogcdn.com/www.engadget.com/media/2011/08/samsungseriesseven13.jpg

 

As has been said before in this thread, judging a screen based off photos in unreliable at best. Even in comparison to other screens.

Anyway, even if bluish, colour can be adjusted like any other screen. Worry about viewing angles, contrast and colour gamut.

 

MBP is MBP. In history many brands tried to imitate MAC but failed to stand aside. And this time its a try from the Korean company. I do not think people will stop buying MBP after Samsung series 7 release. Thickness is not only about speakers, its about better thermal management and better internal layout for the long life of the internal components (=laptop). Always thin can not be better.

 

Well, if you happen to find that video, I'd love to see it. I fail to see how a Windows score of less than 4 is even within the realm of possibility for this machine.

Also, judging the LCD via pictures of a prototype when you don't even know what the screen settings were is a worthless exercise.

 

I saw the same video with the 3.5 Windows Rating. Here it is ... I can only assume that its because its a prototype laptop.

Hands On Samsung 7 Series Chronos at IFA Berlin 2011 - YouTube

 

Except I never said thin is always better. My point has always been that it's most desirable in this day and age of light and portable machines. Increasing the weight and size just to augment speaker quality only leads to this notebook becoming less distinguished from its $500 plastic Costco counterparts.


Seriously. Part of the problem with HP's Envy is HP allowed the Envy to lose its sense of identity. They tried to keep a low price, recession notwithstanding, to cater to people who in the long term don't give a rat's about the kind of details many high-quality notebook buyers care about, and they ended up having to make compromises in the process. The result is we got a half-baked solution called the Envy 14 2nd generation. They compromised on lid thickness for price and didn't bother to invest in their own unibody machinery or set up joint ventures with companies that have the technology. They also got rid of the high-quality display, which pretty much outs the Envy as my next notebook. They even kept the optical disk drive in response to a few outcries even as more and more companies are going down the path of ditching it and making an external one optional. [See Apple rumors about plans to ditch the ODD and LG's P330]


Now I know that putting cheaper speakers is literally speaking, its own compromise. But let's face it. We don't need audiophile speakers, especially if installing a stronger subwoofer would require making the machine thicker. Let's think about it for a second. Speakers are rightfully the last area people really care about. My own desktop Logitechs cost me $80 and they beat the crap out of any laptop speakers out there in SQ and power. I'm even coming across portable laptop speakers that cost $20 and sound better than the MBP's oh-so-nice speakers. Furthermore, I think a good chunk of us listen to our music on headphones and external speakers. It really should make you wonder whether it's worth it to turn the Series 7 into a brick just for better speakers when the laptop speaker functionality is easily displaced by other portable solutions.


Installing laptop speakers of reasonably decent sound quality while maintaining a sub-1inch form factor is a good compromise to make when you consider how more people are going to want power and extreme portability in a package. Most reviews I've come across showed the Envy's speakers were decent SQwise, but just lacked bass. The MBP's speakers didn't sound as nice on tunes that don't utilize bass, but had higher bass levels.


Now the Series-7? It would seem to me based on initial reviews and vids Samsung got it right. They did raise the price to compensate for a "Superior LCD" and the engineering that follows a superthin design. I need to read more reviews on the display, but knowing Samsung, they probably didn't cheap out on it. They're the one company on Earth that seems to have a lot of patents, core technologies, or at least a pretty wide access to supplies for advanced smartphone and TV screens; I'll bet some of that technology was ported over to laptop screens.


Bottom line: If you want an XPS, get an XPS. Screaming about a thin notebook having ok speakers is tantamount to more/less asking Samsung to make compromises in form factor and price. If the XPS is thin enough for you, just buy that instead.

 

Indeed. I'm going to wait. The Radiance Display didn't look any better than a regular LCD display when I first saw it in photos and Youtube. I didn't get to see how great it was until I actually powered my Envy 14 up.

 

Seems that way. The thing shows 4GB of RAM. But isn't the RAM configuration on the Samsung 7 like 4GB + 2GB onboard? Makes me wonder how easy it'll be to open this up if I wanted to change RAM...

EDIT: And it looks like it has a i5-2520m Intel CPU Info

 

The video's config has the lowest processor available to this model (i5-2520) and the worst GPU (6490M), as well as 4 GB of RAM.

That and windows experience tends to be pretty wonky as a standard anyhow.

 

Not to mention windows probably benched the intel 3000HD and not the 6490M by default.

 

BestBuy and Amazon are two that I know of.

I wouldn't rule out Google Product search. Try this Google Product Search

 

Pre-ordered the 15.6 version on Amazon. Next day shipping was only $17 so did that as well. Come to a total of about 1167. Hoping it has a decent color gamut screen. Anyone else pre-ordered?

 

Remember, you can always adjust the screen colors. Well you SHOULD ADJUST the screen colors. Windows 7 accommodates thousands of PC's while OSX is on like 10 macs. Apple can easily adjust their screen to look awesome at default.

The demo version is probably just a prototype with a crappy processor in it. Don't worry. No computer can get a 4 WEI with such great hardware.

 

I am slightly confused about the models and I don't think Samsung has made this easy on us.

I want the 15.6 model with the keypad, not the 15".

According the specs and price sheet there is $150 dollars price jump in the ram price. 6gb to 8gb.

I would prefer to get the 6gb model and upgrade it. BUT I am scared this model is actually the 15" w/o the keypad. Is anyone else sure about this?

Here are the two on Amazon.

Amazon.com: Samsung NP700Z5A-S02US 15.6-Inch Notebook - Silver: Computers & Accessories

Amazon.com: Samsung NP700Z5A-S01US 15.6-Inch Notebook: Computers & Accessories

Also, Is the only difference in these models is the RAM? right?

 

there's only 14, 15" and 15"6
so if theres 15"6 written, it has the numpad.

 

But does the 15" offer the same configuration options as the 15"6?

15" 6750 and 8GB is my selling point.

 

^We don't know for 100% sure yet. But it seems likely based on the spec sheet that has been floating around this thread.