The Dell Inspiront Mini 9 Netbook is reviewed at PC Magazine. I've gotten my hands on a unit with 1 GByte system memory, 16 GByte solid state disk drive with Windows XP Home installed. The unit has been with me for about eight hours and I'm writing this post with it. The actual specifications are available from Dell, or from the PC Mag review, so here I will limit my comments to my impression of how it is to use.
The first impression is the size, as the PC Mag review says it has the same footprint as the ASUS EE PC but a much better screen. The keyboard is also small and has some odd shaped keys around the edges. A machine of this type is always going to be a compromise between ease of use and power vs size and weight. If you are looking for a light duty maching to surf, email blog or office tasks while on the road and you don'd have a lot of space or weight for a lap top the Mini 9 could be for you. Initially I thought I would never be able to touch type on the keyboard, I'm still making some mistakes but it isn't too bad, and I think after a few days I will be back up to my normal speed.
It is really a great package, I'm sitting on the couch, watching PVR with the Mini 9 on my lap and it isn't cooking my thighs. The screen is bright and very readable, there is no fan or disk noise and it isn't much heavier than some of the remote controlls I have for my entertainment system. When the lid is closed, or I just ignore it for too long, it takes some time to get prepared for standby. When I'm ready to go again it takes almost no time to come back up. This is one of the great things about having a solid state disk drive.
Battery life is quite good, the wall wart power charger is tiny compared to other laptops. It would have been very nice if Dell could have arranged to fold the power prongs into the unit like Sony has been doing for a long time. Recharging is very quick, so if you are travelling it may be worth while to pop in the charger for a five or ten minutes during a layover.
I ordered the unit with XP pre-loaded for two reasons: the shipping date was earlier, and I like to have my portable computers dual boot to Linux and Windows (preferably XP) for ultimate flexability. With the XP preload and Open Office installed I still have 10GBytes of disk space left for a Linux partition. I expect the low end versions with 512MBytes of system memory and 4GBytes of disk and Ubuntu pre-installed will be very good, and inexpensive tools for road warriers.
So far I really like it, and it is my favourite mobile computer at the moment.
4 comments:
Thank you sir for this review.
My trip sans computer to San Antonio convinced me I never want to do that again, but some trips require such light packing, carrying a full-size laptop would have been a real drag.
This little Dell sounds like just the ticket for me.
You tech-types knock me out...
Ubuntu?
I at least have SOME knowledge of what a gigabyte is, and I know Linux is another operating system. It's good to hear someone who knows this technology speak favorably about a machine I had real interest in.
Thanks again.
I hope to have more as I get into using it.
Linux is popular amongst many techies because being free and open it allows one to mold the operating system to one's own whims. Ubuntu aims at providing an easy to use, secure OS for laptops, desktops and servers. Other distributions may have similar or different aims and achieve them to a more or lesser degree.
Picking a Linux distribution cab be a lot like buying a car, they are all generally the same but vary widely in the details.
Ubuntu is a derivative of Debian. I disagree with some philosophical decisions made by Debian that resulted in a serious security issue. This has since been fixed.
That said Ubuntu is the most popular Linux distribution at the moment.
Are you going to try to get Dell's special version of Netbook Remix when you dual boot, or will you just go with the default Netbook Remix?
Brenton:
If I can find the Dell version I will. Reading I've done seems to indicate that a plain 8.04.1 Ubuntu installation works.
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