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I've had my Series 9 for about a week now and I figured I'd give it a review. The Series 9 is probably one of the best looking laptops I've ever seen. The build quality is excellent and it definitely feels sturdy. It's very lightweight but it doesn't feel like it's going to break if you handle it too rough. The screen hinge is easy to move, but it's tight enough that it doesn't fall back on it's own. The screen is gorgeous! It may be the best looking laptop screen I've ever seen. It's sharp and the colors just pop. Viewing angles are unreal on the Series 9! You can see the screen perfectly from almost any angle! The Series 9 comes with Windows 8 and I'll admit it took me some getting used to, especially since this laptop is not touch screen. It boots extremely fast and resumes even faster from sleep. I haven't done anything too extreme on it other than web surfing and some compiling, but the i7-3537U processor feels like it can handle most things I throw at it. I'm pretty happy with the keyboard and the track pad works quite well actually. In fact, I prefer it over the track pad on the Series 7 I used to own. Now onto my complaints... My particular unit had a dead pixel right in the middle of the screen. It almost looks like a speck of dust, however I find myself looking at it quite often when I'm displaying a white background. Honestly, I wouldn't mind a dead pixel(s), but considering this laptop cost me $1400 and the dead pixel is right in the middle, I find it unacceptable. The other issue I found with the screen is there is light bleeding on the bottom left of the screen. It's not a huge deal, however it is very noticeable when watching movies where there are black bars on the top and bottom of the screen. I know, screen bleeding can be common on LCD panels, however it is another defect I would rather not have on such an expensive laptop. I was a little disappointed with the battery life as I seemed to get 5-6 hours surfing the web with the screen brightness set to medium. I was hoping for closer to 9 hours, but 5-6 hours is pretty acceptable in my opinion. There is a lot of bloatware installed on the Laptop. Some people will not mind it, but I had a Windows 8 pro disk I got from school, so I performed a clean install on the laptop. BTW, that process was very easy. After installing Windows, I downloaded Samsung's Software update Utility, and I was able to pick and choose the drivers and factory software I wanted to install on the laptop. After a clean install I was able to free up the SSD to over 100GB. My only other complaint is that the Ram is not upgradable and I would expect a larger SSD (preferably 256GB) for $1400. I actually just exchanged my laptop for another one through Amazon.com because of the screen issues. Fingers crossed it will have a flawless screen!
Pros:
-Beautiful design and build quality is very nice.
-Gorgeous Full HD display with excellent viewing angels. One of the best looking screens on a laptop I've ever seen.
-Great performance. Boots up and shuts down fast! The i7-3537U has excellent power for this class of laptop.
-I found the keyboard and track pad to work very well and was comfortable to use. I love that the keyboard is backlit!
Cons:
-My unit had a dead pixel and screen bleeding. Hopefully these are not common issues with these models.
-Battery life is acceptable but not great, (Around 5-6 hours of web surfing)
-There is a lot of bloatware and Samsung Apps. (Easily uninstalled however)
-RAM is not upgradable and I would expect more RAM and a larger SSD for $1400.
Final Thoughts:
Honestly, besides the screen issues I ran into, this is the best laptop I've owned. I would definitely recommend it to anyone looking to spend $1400 on a laptop. It looks great, performance is excellent, and it's one of the lightest/thinnest laptops you can find on the market.
UPDATE!! (4/19/13)
I received my replacement Series 9 this morning! (Yes, I entered an exchange into Amazon.com yesterday, they processed it, shipped a replacement, and I received it the next day! Fantastic customer service!) This model doesn't have any screen issues! There is no back light bleeding and no dead pixels! Everything looks great on this unit and I'm very happy with my purchase! Changing my rating to 5 stars :-)
UPDATE!! (4/20/13)
Just thought I'd mention that my first Series 9 laptop had a LITEON LMT-128M6M SSD. My replacement unit has a Samsung MZMTD128HAFV-000 SSD. Interesting!
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The initial round of this laptop is temperamental. It was fantastic until a little over a week ago. The keyboard illumination started sticking to 'off' no matter what. The display brightness did weird things and then went all retro-manual on me, and the wifi started dropping every few minutes. What it seems like (to me) is a short manifested somewhere.Until the above happened I loved it. If they're on a three month production cycle maybe these issues will be addressed in July, 2013.
Read below for my opinion -sans issues-
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Four Stars!
I can tell you it' thin, it's light, it's fast, it's beautiful, tough-seeming, and the keyboard action is a tiny bit 'hard stop' at the end.
What I was looking for:
I purchased this laptop as a 'traveling dev' machine. I write software for a living, and having something I can easily throw in a small backpack/shoulder-bag. Total Pixel Count is important to me (I've had 1920x1200 display laptops since 2002). (I didn't want to purchase a Macbook Air in-part because reviews suggest the machine is under-powered).
I wanted a machine that performed well, was portable, not hideous, had a back lit keyboard, relatively light (4-5lb range would have been fine) and had a minimum 1080p resolution. After using a new Dell work laptop with 5+ hour battery life I was also mildly interested in a long running laptop.
When it landed it came with about 1/2 charge.
First Impressions:
It's very thin. It's very light. (Lighter than my Asus Prime tablet+keyboard by a large margin) Performance is excellent. If it weren't made of some suspiciously rugged feeling material I'd be afraid to put it anywhere but on a shelf. It's that thin.
Bootup is quick and windows is responsive.
Windows 8 is good looking and clearly touch oriented. My fingers went to the display more than once. (which is kind of a bummer since the screen isn't a touchscreen) There are some minor annoyances to windows 8 (how does one close an 'app' style program?) but by and large I get the impression it's as good as 7 *on top*
The display is beautiful with a matte finish that keeps away glare. I haven't done anything that would push it (I did pull up a hulu video full screen and it had no problems at all).
The keyboard is a nice chicklet-style keyboard, but the 'end' of the stroke is not quite as refined as I'd like, but that's my only complaint about the keyboard.
The trackpad is very nice and uses 'phone style' gestures for scrolling *flick up* takes you down. Personally I think this is a recipe for carpal palm, but what do I know? Other than the 'flick up' it's the nicest laptop trackpad I've used on a Windows machine.
After a couple weeks:
I love being able to put it to sleep, open the hinge and have it come alive.
Synaptics gestures on the trackpad are fantastic.
Windows 8 gestures are less fantastic but otherwise it's not much different from 7. Why are people complaining? If you know the app you want, just start typing! Luddites!
Auto screen brightness and keyboard illumination are very good but not flawless.
The speakers are optimized for having this machine on a hard surface but work well if they're not covered up by one's thighs.
I wish there was a very thin layer of rubber under the keys so end of travel wasn't quite so 'hard stop'.
Concerns and Annoyances:
* I mentioned keyboard action. I'll either get used to it or not. It'll probably be fine.
* Hardware controls. After using Dell machines for a decade now I really like having access to screen brightness and all those other little *Fn* keys without needing the operating system (on a dell they work through the bios, not windows). This means if I were to switch to windows 7 I'd have to make sure I had all the drivers. If I switched to Linux? S.O.L. Too bad, as this would make an extremely sexy debian box. This problem is a theme with Samsung. I don't know why they do it that way. Serious design flaw IMO.
* Lack of ports but what are you going to do? the thing has all the ports it has room for! (I think they struck a nice balance actually, but I would have liked to see a thunderbolt display port worked in there somehow. In place of HDMI but with an adapter? hm....)
* Battery Life is average. I didn't do a formal test, but I got about 4 hours out of it just writing up a report on google docs, installing ruby and other tools and apps. Normally this wouldn't bother much, but users can replace the battery, ever, so in two years I'll expect to be down to two hours of battery life.
* Non upgrade-able ram we know this going in, but while 4 gigs seems like plenty now, and ssds do a lot to mitigate the issue, increasing the amount of ram a machine is a pretty reliable way of getting extra years out of it.
* Some Windows 8 features make you want to use the screen as a touch surface. While you can touch the screen, the only thing that happens is you leave a little finger grease behind.
For the long haul:
I'll either find a way to upgrade it once it's out of warranty with a new battery, more ram (soldering iron anyone?) and a larger SSD, or I'll sell it to someone who doesn't need the horsepower I do.
Conclusions:
Do I like this laptop? Yes!
Am I going to keep it? Yes!
The screen is pretty much flawless, but I'd love for it to have touch.
Right now this laptop does everything I need, and most of what I want. It's beautiful and gives me hope for the future of *the pc*.
If you're a 3d gamer or plan on keeping your machine for more that a couple years forget ultrabooks. Get something with upgrade-able parts.
If you're an exec, or dev who doesn't need heavy lifting power, this laptop will suit you just fine.
*** P.S. 2013-04-27 ****
It's odd, but the laptop can get a little 'deformed' from time to time. I like to bike commute; I load up my bag pretty heavily. There have been three instances when I put my laptop down on an even surface and it didn't sit level. The metal seems to have a bit of flex to it and is 'hard' rather than springy. This makes it feel good in the hand but also subject to a bit of deformation. I've found applying a little downward pressure to the corners that won't touch the table while holding it in the air (a bit like bowing a piece of paper when holding it) fixes the problem. If you hear crunchy sounds you've probably gone too far!
Would I have purchased this laptop if I'd known about this little issue? I dunno. So long as it doesn't break and continues to lie flat I'm perfectly happy with it. It's darned thin. I love it's weight. These are things you're not going to find in a real laptop outside of an Airbook (I'm willing to bet Airbooks share this problem to a degree).
Series 9 baby.
Best Deals for Samsung Series 9 NP900X3E-A02US 13.3-Inch Full HD 1080p Premium
This is my first review, and I didn't even buy the laptop from Amazon. I got it from BestBuy for the same price. But I'm returning it after having used it for almost 2 weeks now. I like everything about about it...almost. I really really want to just keep this and stop wasting so much time shopping for laptops, but after trying to justify it to myself and saying, oh, it's not that bad, maybe I can learn to live with it.....I have finally made the decision that for $1300, this thing better deliver and make me glad to own it.The killer for me is the bad WiFi connection. My wife has a Dell Inspiron which cost ~$600 that gets MUCH stronger, more stable connection than this brand new Samsung! I am just flabbergasted that Samsung would make an "ultrabook" with bad WiFi hardware! Again, I have basically spent the last 2 weeks trying to justify the spotty connection and trying to live with it. But the more I used it, the more it annoyed me. I have now had a chance to take it to many other locations, like the library, several coffee shops, etc. Same issues! I've read a couple other reviews that commented on the bad wireless connection, and I thought maybe they were exaggerating, but no, they are not exaggerating. At home, even when I am sitting in the same room as my wireless router, I don't have full bars. My wife's insprion has full bars. My cell phone and her cell phone has full bars. What's the deal? Then at coffee shops and out in public places, I will loose connection all the time. I will have to disconnect and reconnect over and over again to keep the internet going. It gets really annoying when you are trying to do work, and open a web page, and it takes forever to load, and then you get the can't find the webpage, try reloading later message. Then you have go and do the disconnect, reconnect thing. Anyway, you get the picture.
I really wanted to keep this laptop, but at this point, I cannot justify spending that kind of money for a laptop that cannot even do a fundamental thing like connect to the internet. Sucks! Back to the drawing board. I hate shopping for laptops!
Honest reviews on Samsung Series 9 NP900X3E-A02US 13.3-Inch Full HD 1080p Premium
I recommended, received, and configured this laptop for a client, which is the reason I don't show up as a "verified purchaser."The Samsung Series 9 900X3E-A02US does not offer a Win7 version WITH a full HD screen, so we ordered the Win8 model. My client owns her own small business, and wanted the OS to match what she has deployed around the office (Win7) so upon receiving it I stripped out Win8 and installed Win7. Here's what I found:
Hold down the F2 key the moment you power it on to get into the BIOS. You'll need to disable Fast Boot/POST and Secure Boot and change the mode from UEFI to CSM. I found no way to access a temporary on-the-fly boot device menu, so you'll need to change the boot order to prioritize your CD or bootable USB key. I could only get it to boot off the USB3 port on the left edge of the machine (YMMV) however once you get to the GUI portion of the Win7 installer, you'll need to pull your drive out of the USB3 port on the left, and plug it into the USB2 port on the right. (Win7 doesn't have native support for USB3, so once the kernel loads you lose support for your install device. Not to worry, it will find it after you swap it.) If you go too far without doing this, you'll get a screen telling you a driver is missing. Back up, swap ports, and proceed forward. I chose to wipe out all those damn recovery partitions and claim the entire usable drive, but some of us are badass risk-takers. ;-)
After Win7 finishes installing, naturally you'll trot off to the Samsung support site to download drivers. If you search for "900X3E" you'll be disappointed. The only OS they provide drivers for is Win8. The auto updater tool they offer also will not pull down drivers for Win7, so skip it. Fortunately you can search for "900X3D" and the drivers available there will get your WiFi, LAN, USB3, and Chipset working just fine. Once the Network drivers are in, running Windows Update will get you full graphics support.
And there you have it!
As for the machine itself, it's impressive. Great construction quality, very nice keyboard, and the touchpad is significantly better than the junk on my HP Envy. I happen to like high pixel density screens, and full HD on a 13.3" laptop is pretty damn good. The screen quality is bright and easy to look at. I'd rate it on the high end of a quality office-grade screen. (I'm a photographer in my other life, and am accustomed to working on very expensive IPS panels. This is definitely not that, but for anything else it's wonderful.) The SSD isn't the fastest I've used, but still beats a magnetic drive. The power adapter is minuscule, and so is the little nipple that plugs into the machine. It's almost too small (will it bend or break?) but so far no complaints. The power of this guy is impressive especially considering it's diminutive size. I'd be tempted to get one myself if Toshiba hadn't just announced the Kirabook with even MORE pixel density. A huge "THANK YOU!" to Samsung for going with a matte finish screen.
In summary:
**Pros**
Size
Construction quality
Screen resolution
Good CPU
SSD
Matte-finish screen
Great keyboard
Usable touchpad
Tiny power adapter
Intel's integrated graphics are getting good enough that discrete graphics are unnecessary for anyone other than serious gamers. (No, that doesn't apply to you in the knitted reindeer sweater your Bejewled is not a "serious game" and will run just fine.)
**Cons**
Screen not IPS
SSD not a high performance model
Samsung doesn't make it easy to find the Win7 drivers
Lacks a BIOS key for temporarily changing the boot device
No recovery discs included in the box. Seriously manufacturers, stop eating precious drive space (especially SSDs!) with this garbage, and just include a disc!!
Find helpful customer reviews and review ratings for Samsung Series 9 NP900X3E-A02US 13.3-Inch Full HD 1080p Premium
I've had my Samsung Series 9 for about a week now and really like the form factor, design, weight and build quality. One thing that continually bothers me is the amount of money I spent on something so lacking in hardware performance. I keep having second thoughts and wondering if I should return it and get a slightly cheaper, heavier, but more powerful Asus UX model ultrabook. There are a few major flaws I found with the Series 9. The memory is slow and soldered directly to the motherboard so it cannot be upgraded. The SSD it comes with is a bit small, not as fast as most, and has almost 20GB used by recovery partitions (~118GB is free after they are removed with a clean install). The touchpad can be finicky at times especially when there is load on the system. The keyboard is easy to use even with bigger hands but it is a bit loud. The power connector is tiny and feels a bit cheap compared to the rest of the laptop. It's also missing a display port for some reason. The speakers sound great but can be muffled when using the laptop on your lap. The only thing that makes up for all this bad is the design, weight, sleekness and the amazing screen.Cons:
Comes with Windows 8 (A horrifyingly retarded operating system with only the benefit of UEFI)
Non-upgradable Memory (4GB is not enough these days especially with the slow memory that it is)
No dedicated GPU (Would be nice even if it made the form factor slightly larger)
No display port (Even my 1+ year old Dell has one)
Useless LAN port (Why build this is when a USB adapter can be used or included. This is where the display port should have been)
SSD is small and filled with recovery partitions (A clean Windows 8 install can fix this if you have a copy)
No recovery disc(s) (Lame. Why does every computer company do this now?)
Touchpad behavior inconsistent under load (sometimes even with no load)
Loud keyboard
Webcam does not work well in low light/florescent/CFL light
Battery life is about 5-6 hours not anywhere near 9 hours like advertised
Cheap tiny power connector
Pros:
Full HD matte screen (Amazing and surprisingly bright with great viewability at almost any angle)
Design
Weight
Keyboard works great even though it is small and loud
Large touchpad without buttons
Fast boot (less than 10 seconds from pressing the power button to login screen)
Ultra fast sleep/wake fuctionality (takes about 3 seconds to wake after pressing the power button)
Downloadable Samsung Update utility makes it easy to update/reinstall drivers/software after a clean install
I was planning on using the Series 9 for light mobile development work but I don't think it will cut it now that I have it and have played with it. If you are willing to spend the money on it would be more than powerful enough for browsing, watching videos, school work, office work, and some light gaming. Anything load more serious and it would definitely need more and faster RAM (at least 8GB), and at least a 256GB SSD.
NOTE: For those of you who like doing clean installs F2 enters the bios settings, F10 displays the boot menu. You have to hammer them as soon as you turn it on. You also have to disable the fast bios option in the bios otherwise USB devices will not boot or show up in the boot menu.
