Dell Inspiron Mini review roundup
By Nilay Patel 
posted September 4th 2008 7:23PM
posted September 4th 2008 7:23PM
Dell's Inspiron Mini 9 didn't waste any time going from its formal debut to hitting the review circuit today, and although its basic design didn't blow anyone away, it seems like an impressively put-together piece of kit for the price. Everyone laments the tiny keyboard, although it's apparently fine once you get used to it, but Notebook Review flat out says it won't cut it as a primary typing machine. PC Magazine says the 1.6GHz Atom and 1GB of RAM are enough for most tasks under XP, although multitasking is a chore; the Linux configurations seem similarly capable -- Laptop says the custom build of Ubuntu Remix is "smooth" and "sleek." The four-cell battery averaged around three and a half hours under both XP and Linux, which is decent, but several noticed that Dell hasn't made an extended battery available yet. We'd expect that to change soon, but overall it's a minor quibble -- could this be the netbook that finally makes you reach for your wallet?Read - Laptop (3.5 out of 5)
Read - Notebook Review ("...fabulous netbook... [but] only 'your new best friend' if you're willing to overlook a few flaws.")
Read - Washington Post ("... isn't perfect, but it does offer a terrific design and a good price.")
Read - PC Magazine (3 out of 5)
It sucks. Here's why:
1. Atom.
2. Not enough bezel; where you gonna hack all your GPS, fingerprint reader, and what-not in?
Honestly, Atom does suck (ARM's where it's at), but this baby's pretty sweet for the x86 realm.
Does it make me wish I hadn't already bought an Eee 701? No comment.
Are the Dell Inspiron 910 same as the mini 9? In that case whats this?
http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/ins910/en/sm/minicard.htm#wp1183058
Once you customize it to match Linux Eee PC 901 specs it gets into the same $500-ish price range (but eee is still better - 6-cell battery, 4 + 16 Gb instead of just 16 Gb SSD, upgradable to 2Gb RAM, 802.11 g/n instead of just g). Oh, and preliminary ship date for Ubuntu version comes up as October 10, unlike Eee which you can have now.
This is not an Eee killer. Actually it's not even interesting.
I think Dell has hit a home run with their Dell Inspiron Mini. I has a normal trackpad with the buttons on the bottom where you expect them, rather than on the side as on the Acer Aspire One. The battery life is good on the Dell (Though not as good as the eee pc 901). I like the fact that the Dell is running Ubuntu, and that it is very easy to go from using the Dell interface, to just switching to the normal Ubuntu Gnome interface. Plus, with the Dell, has easy access to add more RAM, and the Dell website allows you to custom configure your netbook as needed. The only drawback is that they don't currently offer a choice of battery, as I would like a netbook that can go 5-6 hours of real world (read wifi or BT on), rather than 2-3. However, Dell is my front runner in the netbook space, I'll just wait for a battery option before I purchase mine.
I'm surprised at how many people prefer a gigantic-yet-fragile HDD over a smaller-yet-durable SSD. In my experience, *no one* needs anything close to 120+GB of storage, unless they're stock-piling pirated videos. Also, HDDs on portable devices usually have a pretty short lifespan, since the moving parts in a HDD aren't receptive to a lot of jostling. I've owned 3 laptops in the past, and all three HDDs died within a year. Does anyone *seriously* expect to need more than 8GB for simple web-surfing?
Daaaymmnn thats a pretty nice machine but is it really better on Ubuntu than XP?