Samsung might be a new entrant into the ultra competitive all-in-one PC market, but its first foray, the Series 7, is pretty striking and raises the bar by packing some truly nifty features. Having chosen a uniquely Samsung look, the Series 7 is a standout in a market crowded with umpteen bazillion "me too" machines.
Look and Feel
The Series 7, makes use of a crisp, squareish brushed alloy finish to give it a clean, and dare I say it, uncluttered look. That Samsung have also wisely chosen not to mar this design with garish controls and ugly ports, but have instead sensibly opted suitably subtle touch sensitive controls, also hiding ports from view (by shifting them to the rear of the machine). Practicality issues aside, it really works to deliver a crisp clean looking PC that'll be more than at home in a variety of settings.
Being an all-in-one beast, the Series 7's overall foot print is tiny, with virtually everything integrated into its largest component, its 23" LCD screen. This of course makes it a great choice in situations where space is at a premium (e.g. apartments, boats or dorm rooms and studies). About the only (albeit minor) design transgression I was able to find involved the slot loading optical drive, which protrudes slightly from the underside of the screen, making for awkward placement of both the mouse and keyboard. This said, it is a minor issue the other features of the series 7 more than make up for this.
On a more positive note, the series 7's screen also sports some incredibly responsive touch capabilities (which is especially great news with Windows 8 on its way). Better still, the entire screen can be laid down flat to make an already decent all-in-one PC into a stunning touch surface or tablet on growth hormones. This is of course very cool and transforms games such as top down RPGs, effectively giving the user a 23" tablet. At the end of the day the design of the Series 7 was pretty compelling and Samsung appear to have managed that all too rare feat of combining form and function with strong visual appeal.
Using a screen that lies flat is an interesting experiment. Games like air hockey or tennis type games become a whole lot more sociable, interestingly this also meant that the Series 7 was often relocated where multiple people can gather around its lie flat screen. If by now you're getting that I liked the touch screen functionality, you'd be 110 per cent right, did I also mention that frequent screen cleaning is downside to owning touch screen tech?
