At a mostly disappointing Samsung press event today, I got to play with their weird, wild, wonderful SPH-P9000 folding laptop. (To some extent, the whole product seems like a joke on Microsoft's codename for their Ultra Mobile PC project, which was 'Origami.')Announced last month at a WiMax show in Korea, it's definitely unique: it unfolds from something the shape and size of a paperback book into a bonafide Windows XP PC, complete with 1 Ghz Transmeta Efficeon processor, ATI Mobility Radeon graphics, 1.3 megapixel camera, Bluetooth and of course WiMax. The spec sheet said it has a 30GB hard dirve, but Windows XP reported only 24.4 GB and, oddly, 224 MB of RAM. The 5-inch, 854x580 display (according to Engadget) acts as a scrolling window on an 800x600 or 1024x768 desktop, which is a bit disconcerting. More details, and unfolding shots, after the jump.



You navigate on the P9000 by using a teeny, tiny touchpad (at left), which is a total nightmare - it's very twitchy and very small, making it hard to place the cursor exactly where you want. The keys on the keyboard are also pretty small, but more manageable, and I noticed one USB port where you could presumably plug in a real mouse. Windows XP felt quite responsive (albeit in Korean.) I could definitely hear what sounded like either the hard drive spinning or a fan churning on the right side of the device, which was a little distracting at first but then blended in with background noise.

While the gadget is coming to Korea early next year, Samsung execs at the event said the SPH-P9000 is unlikely to appear in the US. If it does, it will show up in 2008, probably as part of Sprint's national WiMax rollout. It costs around $2000 right now, though that will drop with time, and it will be Vista-ready.

So how does it unfold?
At first, it's a little, glossy white book with a tiny power switch on the front.

Halfway open ...

Then you swivel the screen into place. The screen doesn't fold back over the rest of the unit like a tablet - it isn't a touch screen. The swiveling is just for storage.

Ta-da! Origami laptop!