I want to follow-up on the SlashGear news about the Medion RIM 1000 UMPC.

 
Take a look at the SlashGear image above and then the Arima ULV650 below. We already knew that the Arima was the OEM but as you can see, the product has had a few modifications since the original CAD images came out. The most interesting is that the mouse button has gone from the keyboard and is now a thumbpad on the bottom right of the frame. Personally I like mouse buttons more that thumb pads but the positioning on the frame is much better. I could get used to that with no problem I think and if its possible to use gestures on the pad, that would be even better.

But what about the keyboard? Is it going to be any better than the Sony UX? Well its bigger and as you can see below with my high-quality, life-size mock-up, its possible to thumb the keyboard but its really tight. The Y, H and N keys are a stretch too. The other possibility is to peck the keyboard with one hand. As its only 680g, it shouldn’t be too much of a problem.

Specification-wise I think its great. For standard browsing, emailing, PMP functions and Navigator functions its got enough power. I love the fact that there’s a docking station shown on the Arima website and I really hope this makes it through as part of the package. 4-5 hours battery life is much better than the 2 that I get out of the i7210 and we know it’s possible as the Q1b has no problem with that.

Unanswered questions? Yes I have a few. The main one being, does it have a light or heavy touch screen. I prefer the light touch as I don’t see this being used much as a tablet PC. The other question is about the GPS and DVB-T options. Are they really built in? There was a report that they were but I don’t see any mention of it on the Arima website.

Anything missing?  Yes. A built-in cellular data modem and as it’s based on the VIA Unichrome Pro graphics, there’s no hardware support for Direct-X 9. That means problems with certain programs, games and in the Vista media center. Not a problem for me as I rarely do anything that requires DirectX-9 support but it could be an issue for others.

Price? I can’t see Medion attempting to charge more than 1000 Euros for this. They have to hit the same mark as the R2H and Q1 consumer UMPCs which means a price closer to 900 Euro. Fingers crossed for something even more competitive than that!