Microsoft Origami - A mini laptop, unveiled
Microsoft Corp. unveiled its 'Origami' project Thursday, a paperback-book sized portable computer, which is a hybrid between a laptop PC and a host of mobile devices that the world's biggest software maker hopes will create an entirely new market.
Lighter than two pounds with a seven-inch touch-screen, the new "ultra-mobile" PCs (UMPCs) use microprocessors from Intel Corp. and run a modified version of Microsoft's Windows XP Tablet PC edition. Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd., Taiwan's Asustek Computer Inc. and China's second largest PC-maker, the Founder Group, are expected to release the first three ultra-mobile PCs, which Microsoft had code-named "Origami" in an elaborate marketing campaign.
South Korea's Samsung's product goes on sale in April.
"This is a single ultra-mobile computer that combines the functionality of many different products," David Steel, the vice president for marketing at Samsung's digital media group, said at the CeBIT technology trade show in Hanover, Germany.
