Samsung Announces P80 and P30 Series Business Notebooks and Road-Ready NB30 Pro Netbook

The word of the day over at Samsung is business: the Core i3- and i5-powered laptops and the rugged netbook it announced today are all aimed squarely at road warriors.

First up is the P80 series ($999), including the 14-inch P480 and the 15.6-inchP580, both of which have Core i5 processors, integrated Intel GMA HD graphics, 320GB hard drives, and can accept up to 4GB of RAM (not that you’ll need more, but 8GB is the max on most notebooks these days). They also have wireless-N connectivity, Bluetooth 2.1, VGA webcams, and matte, fingerprint-resistant finishes. Expect similar battery life of up to 4.3 hours on the P480 and up to 4.4 hours on the p580.

The less expensive P30 series ($849), including the 14-inch P430 and the 15.6-inch P530, are actually nearly identical on paper, except for the fact that they have Core i3, not i5, processors, and smaller 250GB hard drives. Their battery life is supposed to be a bit longer than the Core i5-enabled P80 series’, promising up to 4.5 hours for the P340 and up to 4.6 hours for the P530.

Finally, the NB30 Pro ($519) is basically the rugged NB30 netbook, marketed toward road warriors and with a much higher price tag. Other than running on Windows 7 Professional and an extra gigabyte of RAM (bringing the total to 2GB), the specs and features of this 10-inch mini– namely, a hard drive accelerometer, rubberized design with a carrying handle, and spill-resistant keyboard– remain the same.

Expect all of these systems to hit stores in late May.