Microsoft and partners will put a new face on mobile PCs at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas next week.

As part of a speech scheduled for Sunday 7 Jan, company founder Bill Gates is expected to show off new approaches to the ultramobile PC (UMPC) format that is an attempt to straddle the PDA and Tablet PC categories.

Originally codenamed Origami, the first-generation UMPC format was criticised for high costs and poor usability, performance and battery life, but Microsoft and supporters still believe there is a place for a lightweight, mini-tablet unit that uses a pen as its primary means of input.

The hard-won Origami experience should mean that the new UMPCs are less likely to fold as quickly. New processors from Intel, AMD and VIA are designed to maintain performance but use less power, while the Windows Vista platform may offer a more attractive user interface and even performance improvements. Some users have already experimented with upgrades from Windows XP on Samsung, Asus and TabletKiosk units.

Efforts to optimise the form factor could also be helped by swapping hard drives for 32GB Flash memory cards that are just emerging from companies such as SanDisk. Samsung has previously said it plans a Flash-based successor to the Q1 and is sampling chips that can also be used to supplement RAM using Windows Vista’s ReadyBoost feature.

Both HTC and Tatung are expected to bridge the UMPC and Pocket PC formats by using Windows Mobile as the operating system in mini tablets. Other vendors are likely to offer keyboards to supplement pen input.

Although very slow-selling so far, UMPC models have a decent chance of success in vertical industries such as retail and healthcare for activities such as stocktaking and form-filling that require a sizeable screen with minimal weight and simple input. More broadly, some users see value in the devices as vehicles for note-taking and streaming media.

PC makers are also expected to show off notebooks featuring Windows SideShow, a feature that lets key data such as email and appointments be shown externally on a small display on notebook cases, remote controls or other auxiliary devices even if the notebook is switched off.