Dell Inspiron 9

Announcement today sometime...

Standard Edition - $349
E-Value Code 6F961-DNPCXW1
Intel Atom N270
Ubuntu 8.04
512Mb Memory
4Gb SSD
Dell Wireless (G)

Social Edition - $399
E-Value Code 6F961-DNPCXW2
Intel Atom N270
Ubuntu 8.04
512Mb Memory
8Gb SSD
Dell Wireless (G)
0.3 MP Webcam

XP Edition - $449 (regularly $494)
E-Value Code 6F961-DNPCXW3
Intel Atom N270
Windows XP Home SP3 (yes SP3)
1Gb Memory
8Gb SSD
Dell Wireless (G)
1.3 Mb Webcam

 

I guess we know now why the official specs took so long to come out. That's just sad...

 

Those specs are just sad for the price they are asking. The XP edition is $100 more expensive than the comparable AAO and you can't get a 120GB drive in it.

 

Looks like they can be found on Dell's website now. With the Acer One and the Lenovo soon to come, these seem like a pretty terrible deal. However, I'm sure they'll sell to people who don't know enough about any other options and happen to see the tiny dell.

 

Re: Dell Inspiron 9 - Fails

Dell utterly failed with this one - really. That price is WAY too high for a netbook with those specs - and with netbooks, low price is criterion #1. Here in Europe, the "Dell 9" will be about 369 euros - against about 399 dollars in the states. I guess the 'mismarketeers' at Dell failed to take into account that a euro is about 1,5 dollar atm. Or they just want to squeeze more ca$h out of European customers, but they'll find that this won't quite work with a netbook imho.

To be competitive - and I did have an interest in seeing more competition in the marketplace - this Dell would have had to be about 299 euros max with at least the same specs as the Acer. At this current pricing, and especially in Europe, it isn't anywhere near that. So currently: Acer also wins the second round with the One, as far as I'm concerned.

Guess I'm not the only one who had expected something more competitive; reading the comments at Engadget, Dell seems to just have made a lot of customers opt for Acer and ordering a One. :roll:

 

why would they not offer a sata 120GB or more HDD? i know the Acer also has the solid state drives but i could not make it on 16GB.

my phone has 16GB

 

I gotta tell you folks ... the dell is a lot prettier than the one. it also comes with ubuntu remix, which boots in 20 seconds. i don't think anyone's been able to replicate that boot time with aao. also, you can mod it real easy, which is a good thing for me as a beginner (speaking of which, they have a slot for wwan)

anywya, here are my thoughts

- get the 350 dollar version and upgrade it.

how much does it cost to get a decent ssd drive? you can upgrade it with dell to 16g for $75. that sounds reasonable, but i don't know the prices

how much it is it to get an internal 3g or wimax card?

how much for 2g of ram?


if you can add all those things for a total price of 500$ or under, i think it'd be worth it. the only thing is AAO would have a 6 cell instead of a 4 cell battery.

 

i opted for the dell mini 9 instead of AAO.

reasons:
it's completely silent, no fans, no moving parts
it's more compact
designed to work with ubuntu
better battery life (than the 3 cell AAO anyway)
looks better in my opinion
bluetooth
bigger SSD offering (16gb)
1gb of ram instead of 512, and i don't have to take the entire thing apart to upgrade it

the extra $100 to get the features above made it a no brainer for me

 

i just found out that the ssd is 85/25 read/write. anybody compare that to the AAO ssd or the AAO spinning drive?

 

i read a review somewhere earlier today while i was at work that said it's significantly better than the drive used in the AAO. cant find the link now. argh..

 

The Acer SSD is garbage. Most have the slower intel (some have a faster samsung -- may only be Canada), which was like 35/10 on my tests. The HDD is about 40/40 on the tests I did.

If the Dell is really 85/25 that is nice, because the SSD write speed on the one made XP bog down at times (which is why I bought the HDD instead now).

To me, though... $350 is the same price as Acer XP, where you get an XP license 1gb of ram, and a 120gb hard drive. The $450 Dell sounds nice (if SSD is that speed), but I'd rather save $100 and get the Acer, or spend $430 for the upcoming Lenovo. In addition, I'd still be worried about the Dell keyboard size until I see a review. The Acer keyboard is great, but I've heard the 9" EEE 901 is really hard to type on. The Dell would have to look just super super nice, in person (picture I think are not a great indication) for me to ever consider it.

 

before i respond here i want to mention that i am in no way flaming but simply stating my opinion to this post.

also i have no idea how anyone could use a pc that has only 16GB? my phone has 16GB and it is always full :lol:

prettier?

you can get ubuntu remix with a little googling without getting a dell

my acer boot times (using a stopwatch):

OSX = 44 seconds
XP = 31 seconds

love having both as my choice and i have the extra 10 to 20 seconds to spare

i havent seen anyone posting results of how it runs on the acer either but the fact that it is the same processor, available memory, and graphics card i would bet money it will be exactly the same.

i can guarantee you that the second you take a screw out of this thing to mod it or even if you just change the OS you will 100% void your warranty with dell. acer has yet to make a stance on the OS that i have read anywhere (they may have buy i havent seen it) or for that matter what happens if you take it apart.

they have a slot which some acer one models have as well but again if it isnt installed by dell say goodbye to your warranty.

you cant it will void your warranty. you will need to order it the way you want it. apples to apples (which doesnt exist since you can get an acer with 120GB HDD) the dell will be at least $100 more.

16GB start about $79 and up online

3G PCIe card start around $100 or a USB device starting for free with a 2 year agreement (dell or acer you are going to pay around $60/month for high speed in the US)
2GB ram start around $50. less if you are talking about 2GB on a single stick

i have a personally upgraded acer one (about $500 in it) with OSX and XP with 1.5GB ram and a 250GB 7,200RPM HDD (large HDD not even an option with the dell and my acer came with 120GB)

the acer is going to be available with the 6 cell very shortly if not already


anyway although i am not a dell fan it in no way alters my opinion here. after much research the dell has missed the price point as well as the options (HDD) that would make it comparable to the acer for me.

 

all good comments. thx. - well, except for the boot time...i don't want 10-20 seconds to spare. in fact, 20 seconds to boot is 17 seconds too long. with a netbook in the classroom, i'd like it to start under 5 seconds...but i guess we're not there yet.

don't care about the dell warranty - their customer service sucks anyway.

do they make hdd that fit mini-pci slots? (not sure that sentence made sense). really, what i'd like is the new samsung 128gb ssd that has like crazy read and write speed - but that costs more than the laptop itself - maybe in a year?

i'm not sure i could configure the netbook remix to be as user friendly as the one that comes pre-installed (especially since the ubuntu dude said they're really trying to work with OEMs for the remix and don't advise individuals to mess around with it).

 

i completely agree with you on the 128GB SSD. now were talking about something i can work with.

i require more than what SSD has to offer today for the price but i definitely look forward to moving in that direction when it is affordable.

 

i found the sandisk Vaulter, announced at CES, that's a ssd that fits a mini-pcie slot. but i can't find anywhere online...

 

here's the link to the drive in dell

http://www.stec-inc.com/product/pci.php

 

here are 4 PCIe drives.
i see that the sandisk was announced in Nov 2007 but i also could not find it for sale anywhere?

 

thanks....i guess the 75$ upgrade with dell is worth it for 16g (though I know I'm going to kick myself when 64g cost 50$ after Jan 09) - either way, that helps with the decision.

hey, i'm a big fletch fan

 

In the "get what you pay for" department, there are four very good reasons to stump up the extra cash for the Dell.

1. Fanless-ness. Initial reports are it runs pretty toasty, but silence is golden brown.

2. Fast SSD. Its the difference between borderline for Linpus only, and fully useable. 25/85 SSD should absolutely blow past any notebook HDD for most apps since the seek times are so much lower. The Acer SSD cannot remotely compete even with a HDD, though its perfectly ok on the tweaked Linpus.

3. A real OS (tm). Dell got together with Canonical to make Netbook Remix happen. You can be sure that's its going to be working, fully supporting all the Atom power savings, and as open and configurable as Ubuntu itself. No weird dependency errors on upgrading to Firefox 3... plus everyone and their dog are gonna be writing apps for it.

4. Relatively standard, accessible, upgradeable parts. We'll have to see if that really works out or not, but memory and SSD upgrades should be a snap ... frigging around with the radios may be trickier.

There is one enormous reason not to get the Dell:

1. That keyboard. I'm sure it would drive me bananas.

If Intel puts out a second generation SSD with the same pata connection as the one used in the One, that could save existing A110Ls from the scrapheap. I have my doubts that it will happen though, as the trend seems to be that all new SSDs are either SATA or mini-PCI.

If you are happy with the HDD, the Acer models give you XP, far more storage, and optionally better battery life for far less money. And a nice keyboard.

 

I have not heard of a 20 second boot time for the Mini 9. XP boots in over 30 seconds which is very similar to the HDD version of the one.

Seems like there is a lot of fuss with all the netbooks regarding SSD's. Other than them being noiseless with no moving parts I can't see why anyone would want One. They are prone to failure, not any/barely any faster than a standard HDD, use no less power/barely less power (depending on how they are used) than a standard HDD and you get very little storage for the price. I'll take the 160gb One. In a few years when the technology has been refined I might buy an SSD, but it is just not worth it right now.