More details on Dell's summer-bound netbook

Although everyone and their first cousin twice-removed has dished out their own netbook at Computex, Dell's wee darling (it's still unnamed, officially) still has the attention of most. At a recent media briefing at Dell's HQ, APC Mag was able to get a little time with the unit and grill execs with a flurry of questions -- many of which weren't answered. Still, a few key tidbits did seep out, like the "due out by the end of this summer" thing and the omission of Fn keys on the keyboard. Wait, wha? You heard right -- Dell has decided to make the alpha keys roomier by nixing the line of Fn keys entirely, and while this definitely won't matter to some, it'll really get under the skin of others. On a more positive note, it was suggested that the little fellow would boast a VGA output and three USB ports, but outside of that, Round Rock is remaining mum.

[Via Liliputing]

[Matan @ Jun 5th 2008 11:05AM]

Bah, i dont like it. At all

[OneLove @ Jun 5th 2008 11:34AM]

"netbook"... I reject!

[Jon @ Jun 5th 2008 11:57AM]

Bah 2 you Negative Nancy

[Soddice @ Jun 5th 2008 11:06AM]

It looks so sweet, I'd love to have one. I'm just too cheap to spend a lot of money on a netbook. At least it'll have a nice port assortment, it seems.

[Jimmy Jones @ Jun 5th 2008 2:54PM]

If it looked like candy to you.........then similar machine from HP recently announced should be honey over candy ...

[ijyt @ Jun 5th 2008 11:06AM]

Mm, that's a pretty little number. On the wishlist it goes.

[jorvay @ Jun 5th 2008 11:07AM]

But I need function keys to function!

[tom @ Jun 5th 2008 11:59AM]

+1 (thumb down) for function key

Alt + F4 will be history =(

[Sean @ Jun 5th 2008 11:08AM]

i don't buy llǝp

[Flashpoint @ Jun 5th 2008 11:08AM]

Netbooks are good for parents who wanna get their kids integrated in technology - but don't have alot of money to spend - or, don't wanna risk giving their child a very expensive system as their first computer.

But, I think these should ONLY be used in Primary School and Middle School.

Kids in Primary school only need living books, kid pix, and the internet for access to STARFALL, or ACUITY services. 5th grade needs mostly WORD and POWERPOINT.

For High School, I could not buy one of these for my kid. The programs required for that level of school will eat up whatever Hard Drive and Memory they have - not to mention kids experimenting with video gaming.

And once lil' Johnny realizes he can download porn, I can already see a 1 TB drive being asked for as a Christmas present.

[ijyt @ Jun 5th 2008 11:15AM]

Last time I checked, the only thing I really used for my coursework in highschool was MS Word and Google, followed by a few text books.

[jon @ Jun 5th 2008 11:26AM]

I just graduated high school last week, and I never used my computer for more than word, powerpoint, google, and sometimes wikipedia.

high school was not hard at all and my 5 year old computer had no trouble handling the enormous stress of my schoolwork.

[kjb434 @ Jun 5th 2008 11:28AM]

Netbooks are getting increasingly popular in businesses where the user primarily needs to use MS office and work with general documents.

They aren't watching or burning movies and playing games.

Netbooks work well as cheap and efficient little business machines for use on the go.

[Craig Tucker @ Jun 5th 2008 11:33AM]

You forgot the most important app for primary school kids: Oregon Trail.

[RikF @ Jun 5th 2008 11:37AM]

So your argument is that they don't have enough memory and hard disk space for school (although businesses find them fine!) and then that they'll want a bigger hard disk for porn? So are you arguing that they should have the space for porn, or that you don't want to have to upgrade the hdd?!

And how much hard disk space do you think you need for word, powerpoint and a web browser? The Wind has 80GB....

[bolezhinkov @ Jun 5th 2008 11:44AM]

I got through university with a computer that wasnt nearly as powerful as most of these netbooks - big deal, man. unless you are in a fine arts program you have to use cs3 for or some audio engineering class these netbooks get the job done in style.

[Skullgrl @ Jun 5th 2008 1:07PM]

I am in highschool right now and Word, Powerpoint and internet are exactly what I need, I also need something lighter than my 5lbs laptop (with the fancy graphics card and vista I use for gaming and my various art programs) that I can take everywhere, connect to the network across the street because their tech. people are not smart enough to password protect it and type up all my notes (my family has a history of graph and motor disorders and dyslexia. And yet my dad is an engineer. Hm.). Which would make my life 10 million times easier.

[KEROLiUKAS @ Jun 5th 2008 11:14AM]

IDK, i think i would be ashamed to be seen in public with a dell notebook.

[Erik @ Jun 5th 2008 11:16AM]

I'm sorry you base your entire social attitude on what brand of notebook you have.

[KEROLiUKAS @ Jun 5th 2008 11:20AM]

No it's just that every expierence i had with Dell sucked, so i don't like the brand, that's why i'll probably go with the Wind. I had a customer bring in his dell to me, and the thing (a desktop pc) had no ps/2 ports for mouse or keyboard? wtf kind of a motherboard is that?

[Stabs @ Jun 5th 2008 11:37AM]

"I had a customer bring in his dell to me, and the thing (a desktop pc) had no ps/2 ports for mouse or keyboard? wtf kind of a motherboard is that?"

One that's not made in 1999? Hi it's 2008 now, we have USB peripherals.

[RikF @ Jun 5th 2008 11:37AM]

A modern one?

[KEROLiUKAS @ Jun 5th 2008 11:39AM]

So what? every decent motherboard has them, and i still use them for fixing computer as i dont want to disconnect my regular keyboard, and so i just use my old compaq.

[Abuzar @ Jun 5th 2008 11:55AM]

The Asus P5E only has one for Keybaord. As a general rule motherboards are moving away from legacy ports.

[Howard @ Jun 5th 2008 12:20PM]

I feel you, man. The other day I was trying to install a 14.4k modem in my cousin's Dell, but it didn't have any ISA slots! WTF?

[Skullgrl @ Jun 5th 2008 1:14PM]

I'm sorry your experiences with them have sucked. My family has a dell desktop from when Win95" was current and now it has XP on it, Explorer 7, Microsoft Office (home and student) '03 and is wireless. Its got a 20GB hard drive! Honestly its not fast but it works perfectly fine for average stuff. I find it impressive and kind of want to keep it around just to have as a sort of legacy (like my old dimension that runs XP and ran the Sims 2, no small feet on that computer, same with Photoshop Elements 2.0). Maybe its because of a difference in country - I live in Canada.

[angelicbeef @ Jun 5th 2008 11:21AM]

When did we decide on calling them netbooks?
Screw what Intel calls them, I like sub-notebook or umpc. Most people (non-nerds) just call them the "toy" laptop or small laptop.

when did people stop "surfing" the internet?

[jorvay @ Jun 5th 2008 11:38AM]

cheaptop?
budgetbook?

[ChuChu @ Jun 5th 2008 12:25PM]

You're fighting a battle that can't be won. Engadget seems determined to cram this term down our throats whether we like it or not. First they say "netbook = under 1kg, SSD based" then 2 articles later they are calling 12" laptops with SATA HDDs "netbooks".

Someone's been drinking the Intel koolaid.

[LondonConsultant @ Jun 5th 2008 1:35PM]

Sub-notebooks are for surfing the information superhighway, but netbooks are for mobilising our connected user experiences.

[Josh @ Jun 5th 2008 11:30AM]

gotta have those function keys, using a mouse is too taxing

[Magallanes @ Jun 5th 2008 11:33AM]

Big pencil ever!

[Chris @ Jun 5th 2008 11:33AM]

F5 and F6 are core to my web browsing. will they at least be accessible through a fn key modifier?

[KEROLiUKAS @ Jun 5th 2008 11:53AM]

FN key won't be there either.

[clowntease @ Jun 5th 2008 3:05PM]

F5 I can see, but try Alt + "d" to reach the address bar instead of F6. It's a wonderful thing, as your thumb slides to Alt from the space bar and "d" is already on the home row.

[holycow @ Jun 5th 2008 11:34AM]

why is the DELL sign upside down ? ...

[srue @ Jun 5th 2008 11:59AM]

That's a good question. Usually the logo is oriented so people can read it when the notebook is open and being used - a little extra advertising. Maybe Dell isn't as keen on advertising with this unit? Maybe they just screwed up the render? Who knows.

[icingdeath88 @ Jun 5th 2008 12:38PM]

True, it's upside down relative to the one on my m1210.

[Stabs @ Jun 5th 2008 11:39AM]

These are the Fn (Function keys) not the F keys above the number keys. F1, F2, F3, etc should still be there.

[KEROLiUKAS @ Jun 5th 2008 11:49AM]

" with no facility to call up the usual F1-F12 keys. “This was a trade off so the rest of the keys could be bigger”, Gruzen says".

I'm guessing this means no F1-12 either? No wonder Dell sucks.

[Striker @ Jun 5th 2008 12:36PM]

Since I'll be running Ubuntu on this, I can just assign an Alt+F4 keystroke. no big deal.

[Jon @ Jun 5th 2008 11:44AM]

Sub $500 and its mine , even just for a toy .. I am a desktop man so i wont touch a full sized notebook , but this is perfect for on the go

[bioadam @ Jun 5th 2008 11:56AM]

I'm in favor of eliminating all legacy keys. Who ever uses "Scroll Lock" or "Pause Break"? Personally, I think the OLPC 2.0 touch screen keyboard is the way of the future. Mechanical input is so 20th Century.

[KEROLiUKAS @ Jun 5th 2008 11:59AM]

how the hell do you touch type on a touchscreen? it's going to slow us down significantly because we would have to look at the scren the whole time. and F1-F12 are not legacy keys.

[gm76 @ Jun 5th 2008 12:14PM]

Dell is not doing it correctly. When removing legacy keys they should remove the oldest batch, like the alphabetical, numerical, backspace, enter, shift, space, and few others.

[Michael @ Jun 5th 2008 12:28PM]

wait a minute....how will i rename files without my precious F2 Key...and when i get lost in windows Call up help without my F1..AND HOW WILL I SEARCH FOR FILES WITHOUT F3!!!! AND AND AND....how will i enter alternative booting modes before windows loads!...bye bye safe mode!

[Phillip @ Jun 5th 2008 12:37PM]

This may not be that bad, why couldn't they just move the function keys to an alternate feature of the number keys (blue keys) just like many notebooks have for number pads?

[johnzilla @ Jun 5th 2008 12:45PM]

What the heck is a "netbook"? If this is a "netbook", does that mean people are going to starting using the term "netty" like they use "lappy", as in:

"d00d! i almost pulled the trigger on that netty!" ?

I hope not...that would be sad.

[Mile @ Jun 5th 2008 2:10PM]

Netty v Netbook....

Netty wins!

[Kaiser-Machead @ Jun 5th 2008 12:55PM]

Silly names like netbook are not perceived as silly for very long when it's officially released. People were up in arms about Powerbook and iBook suddenly becoming Macbook Pro and Macbook. People were pissed, they called it silly, they jeered and booed and hissed and whirred in their stupid little swivel chairs upset with Apple that they tarnished the name of the Mac laptop.

Now, they all sit there, whirring in their swivel chairs in Macrumors and Apple Insider going "I can't wait to get my quad core Macbook Pro!"

Netbook is not like HelloKittyFunkyHappySuperLaptop. It'll pass along and just be another name.