Been brushing the idea of a
netbook off for months now? Let's see you ignore this. Hot on the heels of the
Inspiron Mini 10 going on sale, Dell has lowered the barrier to entry on its marginally smaller
Mini 9 to a rather amazing $199. For under two bills, you can now grab yourself an Obsidian Black 8.9-inch netbook with a 1.6GHz Atom CPU, WiFi, a 4-cell battery, GMA950 graphics, 512MB of RAM, a 4GB SSD and a copy of Ubuntu Linux. Of course, that price heads up a hundred bucks if you just can't live without Windows XP, but if there's ever been a time for learning how to deal within an open source environment, we'd say this is it. Good luck with that whole "resisting the temptation" thing.
[Via
technabob]
posted Feb 27th 2009 10:31AM
Well, of course this has to come literally 6 hours after I order a dell outlet Mini 9 with the 16 GB SSD for $230...
I guess I don't feel that bad about my deal.
Thats not bad considering the 16gb upgrade.
Try this instead Engadget:
http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?sduid=411606&t=1214201
$177.67 Brand New.
1. Follow link above
2. If you dont have ID, choose k-12 educator.
3. Follow link above to see $185 price
4. Add to cart to see discount price.
5. Choose "credit card" as payment type, then "Use dell preferred credit" link appears for another 4% off.
6. Use dell credit, then cart shows total of $177.67, Free shipping, tax of $14.65 if applicable.
Im tempted to get this, but i think will hold off until the mini 10 comes out with integrated tv tuner and GPS.
and if you don't mind lying about being an educator you can steal windows xp too. Oh yeah, and while you're at it just take a cup into 7-11 and fill it at the slurpee machine. They won't care, its the cup that costs money right??
I always used to take a cup into 7-11 when I drank lots of cola's. It's called a "refill" and it has its own price. They didn't actually care if you used a cup that didn't say 7-11 on it. Or maybe I'm thinking of Arco, but whatever. If Dell doesn't check ID or anything, then that's their own fault.
You don't want to lie about being a teacher... last time I did that to get a deal, Dell employees ransacked my house and took all my technology.
AND THEN REPLACED IT WITH THEIRS.
When exactly is Dell going to clock the fact that "currency conversion" does not just mean replacing a $ sign with a £ sign. $199 dollars is about £140 GBP at the moment. No prize for guessing what price Dell UK has the Mini 9 at...
Ever heard of VAT? Dell includes it on their co.uk site and does NOT include US sales tax on prices listed in the states. This makes up the bulk of the difference. the rest is probably made up with quantity of local demand and other business costs that add to the per unit price.
When exactly is sinaplenty going to clock the fact that "currency conversion" is not the only affecting prices in two different markets?
Am I really gonna start a maths argument here....of course I am! Fair point on the VAT but it only adds £20 to the US price...and I'm just not having it that £40 per unit is a fair representation of the fact that Dell's UK staff get a better company car allowance.
It seems pretty much everyone in Europe gets 'ripped off' - its just not Dell, and its just not this computer. Go read some camera forums and you will realize how this is not exactly isolated.
Did you consider shipping and transportation?
Since the majority of products coming out of China and shipping to the US, I would imagine it is dirt cheap to ship your products to the US. Now consider that they have to go a completely opposite route to reach Europe...
Perhaps it costs more to operate a business in the EU than the US? There are too many factors to get your panties in a twist over 40 pounds (sorry I don't know how to make a pound symbol, and don't care to look it up).
@ Dubb
Copy, Paste...
Unless you are using an iPhone.
FYI, from what I've read on the tubes, the Mini 9 is one of the easiest machines on which to install OSx86. All of the hardware apparently works perfectly. The only caveat is that you'll need to replace the drive with 16GB or larger. I'm holding off for dual-core netbooks, personally.
I'm holding off for a dual core VIA Nano with nvidia's ION tech.
it'll be wayyy better than Atom, and still be nice and cheap.
$200 to buy the device and a full one quarter of that to get a different color!?
Yea, what the hell? Krylon Fusion is like $10 at home depot!
I almost ordered one but resisted temptation.
Papa wants another 6GB of RAM for his desktop slightly more.
Well theres the mothers day gift.....
Resist the temptation. Trust me, your wrists will thank you. Who decided to move the comma key. That's all I want to know.
I'd pay $46 more and get this one from Sam's with 8GB and XP Home http://www.samsclub.com/shopping/navigate.do?dest=5&item=425662
I came to say this, plus you get your choice of 4 colors and free shipping.
which boots up faster?
the linux or the xp one? assuming they have same ram and cpu
512MB RAM and a 4GB SSD LOL, that 199$ is actually a wast of good money and thats getting rarder to come by these days..
Sorry but no, only yesterday the Asus's Eee was shown with 1GB RAM, and a 20GB SSD for about 150$ more which is a far better deal that this is.
Dell ran the same deal on this netbook during President's Day sale. I purchased one and im currently typing this response on one. I used my college discount, which ended up being 205$ shipped. the keyboard takes some getting used to and i upgraded the ram to 2GB. i love it! i use it for browsing and downloading tv torrernts. all my torrents get storeed on a flash.
What? The Eee is almost twice the price. It's not really much of a comparison if you're looking for a basic netbook
But... I already have a 14" notebook, a quad core desktop, two Vista Media Center boxes and a WM 6.1 phone.
Must resist...
Must resist!
good for you
Oddly enough, you resisted the urge to brag about your penis size as well.
I bought one yesterday and was PISSED to find that they had dropped the price. Luckily, my hate turned into love as I talked with a Dell sales rep via chat. I was within the cancellation period, so I did, and then I bought another one for $50 less >:D.
Left the RAM at 512. It is SO much cheaper to buy from newegg. The SSD @ 32 GB was worth it, though. And bluetooth! Total: $327!
I do not think Newegg sells a Mini 9-compatible SSD yet.
Resist, unless you've got the hands of a 10 year old. This is a spectacularly awesome little machine... with the absolutely worst keyboard utterly imaginable. I returned mine.
Can't wait until they introduce a new rev with an edge-to-edge keyboard- it still won't be great, but the extra inch wasted on bezel will (hopefully) push it over the edge into something that can be used regularly.
Got my email this morning for Employee Purchase Program and its going for $186.00.
INSPIRON™ MINI 9:
•Light and compact for your on-the-go life style
•Featuring 512MB memory* and 4GB* Solid State hard drive
•Dell™ wireless mini card included!
i can afford a full size laptop and am strong enough to carry it around. pass.
sorry, engadget, but dell sent me an email about this like two hours ago.
What's your point? Engadget is a gadget news consolidation site for the most part. The news they regurgitate is normally available days or hours before they: a) get the news and b) have a chance to generate the post.
Just wondering... Is a 1.6 GHz Atom faster than a 2.8 GHz Pentium 4?
Atom is more in-line with a Pentium III than anything of the P4 generation.
No way. An atom is faster then even a P4. You can run the lattest Photoshop easily on an atom, good luck running PS on a pentium 3.
I wish the base price would come down for us Canadians.
The base model is $250 in the US, and it's $370 in Canada.
I know the US dollar is worth more, but there shouldn't be /that/ much of a difference!
BestBuy Canada has the 8GB Windows XP version (white, no less) on sale this week for $299.
Great, thanks!
thanks to folks above i've resisted the temptation
I don't get the point of these things. I'll settle for the xps1330 i'm using
Not a bad deal but 512MB RAM is for phones. Plus I would want it with XP anyway and that's a whole $100 bucks more.
MUST HAVE!!!!
You can get an asus eee pc 8.9 for $200 at your local best buy with 1 gig ram (512 more then what the dell comes with)
Must wait for Apples Table Notebook... MUST WAIT!!!!!!!!
perhaps you didn't know. These are the same guts at the macbook. just a different processor. runs OS X flawlessly - even updates like a regular computer.
Sorry folks, the $199 price ended ($249 okus $50 instant savings) so it is back to $249 today..
@Swimatm - your question is not serious I hope. The Atoms perform a little better them a Pemtium III 1.0 GHz processor and slower than a Celeron 900 Mhz processor. The thing was designed for a MID, what do you expect?
http://laptoping.com/intel-atom-benchmark.html
I see buzzards flying around OLPC.
Anyone know if Ubuntu will easily sync up with a Canon EOS 450D (Digital Rebel XSi)? I was thinking about buying a handy netbook for when I'm traveling and want to quickly upload my photos.
http://www.ubuntuhcl.org/browse/product+canon-eos-450d?id=4689
1GB ram, XP, 8GB for $299
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=9150456&st=dell+mini+9&lp=1&type=product&cp=1&id=1218036213078
Bryan - The price is $199 after a $50 "instant savings", a price that is still current if you click the link in the post.
XP Home actually only adds $40 to the price, if you increase the RAM to 1GB ($25) and the flash to 8GB ($35). Upgrade to 2GB RAM for $75 and 64GB SSD for $150.
Bluetooth adds $20 and 1 1.3MP camera adds $25. 3-year in-home warranty (up from 1-year mail-in) adds $99.
My biggest negative is that the thing is only 1024x600. Though it is LED-lit.
That's so ninety.
Who sells computers w/o tattooed girls in this century?!
This is a great computer for people who need the VERY BASIC while on vacation (email, upload pictures, etc). I wouldn't use it everyday, but if all you need is something basic, this is perfect and at the right price. Also, they give you $5 off shipping.
Great ordered. Now I just need to know:
Which SSDs are compatible with the mini 9 and where can i get the cheapest one? Looking for at least 64.
I hope this is a good hackintosh
Runcore is the only 64GB SSD for the Mini 9. Google "mydigitaldiscount".
"Of course, that price heads up a hundred bucks if you just can't live without Windows XP"
I could live with Linux, but I couldn't live with 4 GB space and 512 MB RAM
CRAP, man, I just bought this three weeks ago for $100 more. Two edged swords, those constantly falling tech prices.
Can the SSD be replaced with a SATA hard drive after I receive it?
No. The Mini 9 uses a miniPCIe SSD, and it's smaller than the ones in other netbooks.
Bah....whatever. IF I wanted XP I would load the corp license I have of it...however at this point its all Windows 7.
Netbooks are weak... they are not selling well. Better to wait for Windows 7.