Dell gets official with Dell 500 laptop for emerging countries

Usually, when a product is officially announced, the veil of mystery surrounding it is lifted, but that's not the case with Dell's new Dell 500 laptop, which the company announced in India today in conjunction with the opening of a new factory in the country. As you may recall, we previously heard that Dell was all but set to introduce a new budget-priced 8.9-inch laptop, and it seems like this could well be it, although we don't have so much as a screen size on this new model to confirm that possibility just yet. Still, the Rs 24,500 price tag (just over $600) is at least in the same ballpark, and the choice of Windows XP Home or Ubuntu Linux only would seem to suggest some Atom-level hardware. Apart from that, the only details the company seems to have deemed fit to announce are an 8-in-1 card reader, some direct media playback buttons, and a "host of wireless access options." Leading us to suspect that it might not be the same 8.9-inch laptop, however, is the fact that this one is apparently intended specifically for emerging countries like India and China, which doesn't exactly match up with Michael Dell's comment that the company was readying an answer to HP's Mini-Note, though we suppose we'll just have to wait and see how things shake out.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 22nd 2008 1:31PM]

You can count on Dell not to name it anything fancy, what with all the EEs, Winds, Clouds and Mini-Notes flying around the place.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 22nd 2008 1:32PM]

I realize it may not compete with all or any of these.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 22nd 2008 1:46PM]

well the Eee has models 701 and 900, and Mininote is the 2133, so to name a machine a name and number can be confusing. I personally think this machine will be a 14 or 15.4 inch screen model, as these panels can be produced pretty cheaply.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 22nd 2008 1:50PM]

nope fellaz; this is not an eee-wind-o-mini note competitor. it's pretty standard vostro-lowcost-like 13.3 incher filled with outdated technology and limited config offerings [2gb ram max, celerons, ...]

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 22nd 2008 1:53PM]

@g0g0

What the hell are you talking about?

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 22nd 2008 1:34PM]

8-1 card readers = unnecessary thickness = doesn't belong in an Eee-wannabEee. So it can't be it.

[shithead Posted Apr 22nd 2008 4:07PM]

??

i have a card reader in my xps m1330 and it's still thin

[bob e Posted Apr 22nd 2008 1:38PM]

It will be difficult to top the HP Mini in looks and overall charm.

[Raul7 Posted Apr 22nd 2008 2:34PM]

now if they pull something off like they did recently with those black dells (not sure which ones but they looked damn cool) then there will be real competition :>

[Raul7 Posted Apr 22nd 2008 2:37PM]

now if they pull something off like they did recently with those black dells (not sure which ones but they looked damn cool) then there will be real competition :>

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 22nd 2008 3:17PM]

the never ending debate between form over function, hmm maybe I should check up on that fruit company.

[Raul7 Posted Apr 22nd 2008 5:52PM]

well tbh with u i sold my acer and bought a macbook just because i didnt like carrying the acer anywhere because it looked like a piece of crap...

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 22nd 2008 1:42PM]

Interesting how ECS already stole the m series dell look for the G10IL. now that dell is going to enter the market are they going to make it look like a mini m series as well?

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 22nd 2008 3:31PM]

Expect to see VIA not Intel and something that will compete more directly with the new HP Mini-note and not so much the EEE's and cloudbooks of the world.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 22nd 2008 3:33PM]

Why not open a factory here on the US instead of India, Dell?

Is it because of cheap labor?

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 22nd 2008 5:17PM]

Um. Let's see. Dell has factories in Texas, North Carolina, Ireland, Poland, China, Malaysia. Sometimes it makes sense to open factories near where the customers are. APJ is a giant growing market, so opening factories there helps keep prices down due to decreases in shipping and other costs.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 22nd 2008 5:15PM]

I think maybe you are missin' the point: Dell has a general policy of manufacturing its products close to its customers, implementing just-in-time (JIT) manufacturing, hence desktop PCs for US market are made in US, low cost notebooks for the Indian market are made in India, having said that, China and Malaysia make most of Dells notebooks, but that is a pretty competitive field where the margin is incresingly very slim, basic economics

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 23rd 2008 9:22PM]

Great Idea! Even I can tell my friends in India, "Hey, Why buy Dell and make America richer? Why not buy laptops only made by Indian brands?"

Same goes for Coca Cola, McDonalds, Starbucks, Microsoft (here's a big one!), Ford, Chevy, Calvin Klein and a thousand others.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 22nd 2008 5:31PM]

I just hope it at least has a 1024 x 768 resolution screen.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 23rd 2008 9:21AM]

Actually, it is an "old" news already... this model is released and now selling in China for around 1 month... Price started from 3,899 RMB. You may checked this website if you are interested... (Sorry, it is in Simplified Chinese)
http://www1.ap.dell.com/content/products/productdetails.aspx/emergnb_500?c=cn&cs=cnbsd1&l=zh&s=bsd&redirect=1

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 23rd 2008 7:12PM]

thanks Richard, just as i thought a 15.4" low cost lappy, for those curious thats about $559 for the base model (~280GBP) or $673 (~338GBP) for the 1Gb machine w DVD writer and XP Home

[(Unverified) Posted May 6th 2008 8:47AM]

Thanks for the China link. At least I could check out the New Vostro 1200.