The Samsung Ativ Book 9 Plus is an Ultrabook that’s been designed to rival Apple’s MacBook Air and Pro. It also looks very similar to the old Series 9 laptop it replaces, which is no bad thing. The thin aluminium unibody looks sleek and attractive in its blue tinted ‘Ash Black’ colour, with arcing lines and cleanly finished silver edges. The Plus has a classy, premium feel with excellent build quality. There’s no scrimping here as even the underneath of the laptop is metal, matching the MacBook Air.
It’s a 13in laptop, measuring 13.5mm at its thinnest point and only a millimetre more at its thickest, and weighs 1.4kg. That’s as portable as a MacBook Air, but Samsung has included specifications that rival the MacBook Pro.
We like the backlit typing experience, even if it is the same plastic keyboard found on the Ativ Book 9 Lite (opposite). The trackpad is outstanding with a smooth feel and responsive nature that only requires the lightest of touches.
The star of the show here is the touchscreen, which has a resolution of 3200x1800 pixels and a high pixel density of 275ppi, the highest we’ve ever seen on a laptop. Windows isn’t equipped for this, though. You’ll need to change the display settings to 200 percent zoom to make the desktop a usable size. And even then, many Windows applications aren’t compatible with this scaling, so you’ll be peering at the tiniest of small print when using these.
Aside from the high resolution, the display has good contrast, rich colours and great viewing angles with Samsung’s IPS-like PLS panel. All are slightly tainted by the highly reflective glossy sheet of glass, though. If you should want to, it folds flat and the hinge cleverly stiffens at around 105 degrees. This means you can easily open the laptop, and the screen isn’t pushed back when you use touch input.
The Plus is powered by an Intel Haswell (4th-gen) processor and built-in HD 4400 graphics. In this case, it’s a 1.6GHz dual-core Core i5-4200U that’s backed up with 4GB of memory and a 128GB SSD.
Samsung says it can boot up from cold in under six seconds, and although our review sample couldn’t achieve this, it managed a still impressive eight seconds. Note that this isn’t a cold boot, but Windows 8’s restore from hibernation mode.
The Plus fared well in benchmark tests, too, achieving an impressive 4648 points in PCMark 7, but only outpacing the MacBook Air by 50 points, or one percent.
Graphic performance is capable at low quality settings but the laptop is no gaming rig. In Stalker: Call of Pripyat at our lowest standard test of 720p/Medium-detail, the Ativ Book 9 Plus managed a playable 31fps. Increasing the resolution to 1080p halved the framerate to 16fps, while cranking it to the screen’s full 3200x1800-pixel resolution made the game plummet to 7fps.
Samsung claims a battery life of up to 11 hours from the 55.5Wh non-removable battery. In reality, the Plus was found to last for a considerably shorter time. Our usual video rundown test comprises looping an MPEG-4 HD video, streamed over Wi-Fi, with screen brightness set to 120cd/m2. It lasted just five hours and one minute.
Connectivity is good, even if there isn’t room for full-size ports other than USB. The Plus has two USB 3.0 ports, Micro HDMI, mini VGA, mini ethernet, combined headset jack and an SDXC card reader is hidden behind a flap on the underside. To use the VGA or ethernet options, though, you’ll need to carry around Samsung’s proprietary dongles.
A 720p webcam for video calls and a decent pair of stereo speakers also make an appearance. There’s no 11.ac wireless, though, meaning the Plus is behind the curve here, which is a shame.
Like the Ativ Book 9 Lite, Samsung pre-loads some software in the form of SideSync and HomeSync Lite. These only work with certain Samsung Galaxy devices, though, and respectively allow you to take control of the smartphone or tablet and share content between devices.
Verdict
The Samsung Ativ Book 9 Plus is one of the nicer Windows ultrabooks around, with stylish design and impressive specifications. But it comes at a high price and has disappointing battery life. Unless you specifically want Windows 8 and that super high-res display, the equivalent MacBook Air has better overall performance and is cheaper.
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