Dell's 11.6-inch Inspiron 11z thin-and-light now on sale for $399
By Darren Murph 
posted August 18th 2009 10:06AM
posted August 18th 2009 10:06AM
[Thanks, Joe]
posted August 18th 2009 10:06AM
powered by gdgt
A look back on popular stories from today in a specific year.
Now that we've thrown 'em off the trail, use the form below to get in touch with the people at Engadget. Please fill in all of the required fields because they're required.
Actually, high-resolution, quite a few games, and even Photoshop CS3 run pretty well on the Atom (especially the 1005). HD video and big games made after 2006 are just about the only things that are going to cause trouble.
I'd definitely go with the 1005 (upgrade to 2GB RAM), since if you were buying a computer to play games, you wouldn't buy an Inspiron 11z, either.
Bump the ram and battery; then trade in that integrated stuff for an Ion chipset and we can talk Dell. You could even raise the price by $100 and I wouldn't say anything. Until then...
i wonder if it had a full size keyboard, if it going to come in other colors soon, if we can slap more ram in the 11z ????? I just gave my mini dell 9 to my daughter. i need something new :-)
I think this laptop only has 1 slot for ram, therefor 2GB instead of 4GB are included.
Or at would make sense since 2GB of RAM is so cheap nowadays.
death to VGA and IE6 while I'm at it
Good:
Great overall design
Comfortable screen size and resolution
Decent overall specs
HDMI (that can easily be converted to DVI or VGA with adapters)
Bad:
Bad CPU (not THAT much better than the N280 and it consumes around 5 times more)
Small battery for a 11.6' screen laptop (only 3-cell)
Keyboard layout not that great (no PgUp\PgDn\Home\End on directional keys)
The 4500MHD graphics card is ok but there are way better options for that consumption range like the ION 9400M
Unfortunately it comes with Windows Vista SP1 by default, so you'll have to downgrade or upgrade later.
Anything you buy with Vista now will come with a 7 upgrade, A celeron 1.2 Ghz is about twice as fast as an Atom. It does suck that it uses 5x the power but if you need to do proper work on real apps then an Atom doesn't cut it. This is a cheap ass notebook you know.
It needs a 6 cell battery and the 1.4ghz CULV processor.
I don't know, this whole dilution in the notebook area of computing kinda worries me. I like the idea of lower power consumption and lighter weight notebooks. But the way they are taking this is designing some nice case but then slapping in old parts. The prices aren't terrible...but I'd expect something more than hacking together some older parts/architectures.
Its a new Celeron, based on C2D. Celerons have been around for a LONG time this is nothing new at all, Celeron will always be cut down versions of Intels top line chips of the time the name is meaningless, even the new cheap Pentiums are based on C2D.
Better that the Facebook/Twitter/MS Office using masses use a 5.5W SU3500 than a 44W Core 2 Duo.
If you buy a cheap Dell then you deserve what you get.
A cheap and perfectly capable small and light device with a little more oomph than an average netbook? Doesn't sound half-bad to me.
Enjoy your macbook. No need to crap on everyone else.
Does a generic USB DVD drive work with the BIOS of Dell's 'z' series laptops? Or is the External DVD sold by Dell the only option? (eg. 11z and 14z)
Well then explain how Acer managed to use an SU3500 with a 6 cell battery for only $50 more?
umm... cheap labor?
...didn't say otherwise Major4Play.
But the client will still get "Vista recovery discs" and not "Windows 7 recovery discs". That's was my point.
I'm also just guessing that any smart user would pick the the SU3500 seen on some new ACER laptops over the Celeron 723 since the laptops sell for similar price points, the consumption is only half (5.5W vs 10W) and the performance is at least around the same. (couldn't find enough tests regarding the maximum performance of these 2 CPUs tho so if someone does please enlighten us)
Regarding my tests on the N270 it ran Photoshop very well, and that is probably one of the more complicated programs you're gonna run with some frequency in a laptop without a graphics card with the same or better power than the 9400M.
i only like fast computers
this is not fast
This computer is not meant for you.
*lol @ those obscure shots to hide that THICK bottom bezel*
I really don't understand why companies just can't get it right. I've been waiting for the magic recipe for months and it has materialized. Asus, Acer, Samsung, Dell, HP, LG...etc.etc. keep releasing models with exactly the same specs. I mean I know MS XP req. were keeping the specs pretty standardized but with Win7 looming I was expecting for something more exciting.
Let me just spell it if anyone is listening..:
- 10-11" 1,366 x 768 LED-backlit
- Intel SU3500
- Nnidia Ion + HDMI out
- 6 cell battery
- 3lbs weight
- Sub $600 price
- No optical drive
- The rest, i.e. RAM, hard drive etc. really don't matter as long as they are upgradable - not even talking about webcam, wifi, card reader since these should be in any laptop/netbook
- Added bonus would be good styling, nice keyboard layout and as little bezel as possible
That's the recipe for me, and from the other comments I've been reading all these months it seems like a lot of people are looking for the same thing. So here you go companies, no need for expensive market research (if you actually do that sort of thing anymore).
Well Acer offers the ATI 3330 gpu on their larger(13in, 14in, and 15in) Timelines and there are some rumors they may offer it on their 11.6in model also.
@AI do you have a source for the rumor the 11" may see the ATI gpu? That would be fantastic if it did!
I agree the 1410 is almost ideal, and if it offered a discrete graphics solution I would be sold. Although not sure how the Intel/ATI one compares to the Ion platform in terms of power consumption, supposedly there are power savings in the Ion platform with regards to the chipset as well. I really don't understand why there isn't more adoption of it yet.
Could it be that companies are waiting for Win7 before they release new iterations or is Intel secretly pulling strings to sell their chipsets together with the processors....
can i throw osx on it? hehe
A glossy screen only?
Otherwise I still do look for the proper hackintosh / OSX86 device as long as there's no 12/13" matte MacBook again
Doesn't compare very well to the Acer 1810t with a slightly faster processor and legitimate 8 hours of battery life for only 50 USD more....
I can't find the Acer Aspire 1810t NOR the Acer 1410 available for sale in North America anywhere. And the pre-order pages for the 1410 seem to be over $100 cheaper, so I'm not sure why everybody is comparing the two as "$50 more for the 1410".
Can somebody post a link showing either one of these actually available anywhere?
The Acer's seem to have gigabit rather than 100Mbps Ethernet. Doesn't matter.
They have a bigger hard disk. Doesn't matter. I'll be putting in an SSD anyway.
They have 802.11n rather than just b/g like the Dell. Nice upgrade, mostly for the extra range.
They have a 6 cell battery available (if they were available).
The Acer's are 1.2 inches thick max where the Dell is just over an inch. So the Dell is cheaper.
The Dell has a worse keyboard layout and that stupid trackpad from the Mini 10. Probably livable though.
The Acer's have a better CPU. Both horsepower and battery.
So I still have my Dell Inspiron e1405, I upgraded the RAM to 4gb from 1gb. Runs pretty still. The only thing is that I paid almost $1200 for this laptop. I guess it was worth the money when it first came out. I already learned my lesson though. NEVER BUY ANYTHING FROM DELL! or atleast buy it upfront.
This would be nice to do a hackintosh on.
Why Celeron, Why only 3-cell battery ???
Can the hdd be easily upgraded to ssd with runcore? What is the interface? Is the ram soldered in? can it be upgraded to 4g?
Is the keyboard eq to the Samsung NC10 or better?
Does the screen has edge-to-edge glass like mini 10?