Dell Mini Inspiron 12 isn't particularly Mini
Dell's Inspiron Mini 12 is coming, according to Laptop Mag, and it looks surprisingly similar (if less swanky) to Apple's MacBook Air. Joanna Stern writes:
I couldn’t put the Mini 12 through the usual hands-on paces, but I was able to form some early impressions of the unique “netbook.”At less than an inch thick (according to Dell its .92-inches at its thinnest point) and weighing 2.7 pounds, I couldn’t help but look at the Mini 12 and think of $1,500+ ultraportables like the MacBook Air and Voodoo Envy 133.The Inspiron Mini 12 was just about the same thickness as the Lenovo ThinkPad x200 I had brought to the meeting, and only a bit thicker than the .76-inch MacBook Air that one of the meeting attendees had on the table (see the photos in the gallery below). But that extra girth buys the Dell more ports - 3 USB, full-size VGA out, a 3-in-1 card reader, along with a mic and headphone jack.
The keyboard's larger than the Mini 9's, and it comes with a 12" screen.
The only problem is calling it a netbook. Stern puts the word in scare quotes once or twice in her piece, but otherwise plays it straight. So here's a little reminder: computers of this size, even at just $600, are named "laptops".
I fear we fall victim to marketing, here. Watch as those who established "netbook" as a fashionable category follow Asus in applying that branding to cheap, nasty notebooks, little different to the bog-standard Inspirons and Averatecs that have been available for under $500 for years.
Source [Laptop Mag]
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Less swanky? Compared to something that has black keys on a dull grey case? The Air looks like a computer abortion.
Does it have solid state storage or a traditional hard drive? With solid state I think it would fall somewhere in between laptop and netbook. I feel like boot time and battery life are important qualifiers for a netbook.
It's important to note that Dell quite deliberately avoids the use of the term "netbook" in favor of "connected device," which more accurately conveys the Inspiron Mini's intended position in the mobile computing continuum.
While that wasn't the intent, it's probably a good thing thing that the Insprion Mini 12 has "thrown into confusion the whole definition of the netbook," as Charlie Sorrel commented at Wired. The netbook-vs-laptop debate has become over-technical, component-based, and ultimately unhelpful because it doesn't contemplate how people actually choose and use mobile computing technology.
Link to original post at LaptopMag, if you please?
Sorry about that, MNEPTOK, fixed now.
These have traditional hard drives in 60 and 80 GB. I really can't see why people call this a netbook without being uncharitable about their assumed reactions to the "Mini" marketing.
I agree with your point, Jay at Dell, about how it's a good thing D isn't playing hard and fast with definitions. I'm not fond of "netbook," myself; particularly loathsome is the finely-hewn hierarchy of handheld PC branding faff, from HPC to CE2000 devices to UMPC to MID and so on, as mucha reflection of Microsoft's sales model than anything a consumer might understand or even care about.
Subnotebooks, we used to call them all!
Whatevs, yo, I've been dying for a good 12inch laptop, which after the ibooks got discontinued are only available on $2000 "ultraportables"
Seeing all these laptops that are 'small', 'portable', 'neuvo' - I based my paws at eBay and a compaq nc4010 appeared at my door.
Price and availability and albeit 2 years old, added with a new 120gb HD and external DVD writer - is still cheaper and puts those Asus jobbies to shame.