Dell - Inspiron Mini Netbook with Intel® Atom™ Processor N270 - Alpine White

I already did a review of the version WITHOUT webcam, which is sold at a slightly higher price. The price of this netbook is the lowest on the market at this time (Feb-2-2009). I bought my netbook in December 08, I use it everyday to take notes, check mail and to sync de documents from my PDA and it has really exceeded my expectations, its light, silent (it does not use any fan inside to cool the CPU), but despite of what I just mentioned it does NOT get hot, and besides that its really fast (fastest loading windows xp than a brand new 2.1 turion X2 with 4 gigs of RAM loading vista). Battery life is another nice thing on this netbook, it can last like 4 hours with the wi-fi turned on and running the maximun screen brightness There are other 2 netbooks at home, one HP mini 2133 and one Acer AspireOne and this is the best of the three. The screen is not as glossy as the one on the HP mini 2133 and mini 1000, and, even if the keyboard is not as large as the one on the HP, it is still usable (it took me 15-20 mins of typing to get used to it and now im so used to it that it feels strange when I type on a larger keyboard), a nice touch is that the keyboard is way less noisy than the HP (great if you use it on a library). I have also compared this netbook with a HP mini 1000 and the HP mini 1000 is a fingerprint magnet! Comparing this netbook with the aspireone with a 120 GB hard drive I perfer this one despite the much smaller hard drive, it is better buildt (does not feels like a cheap toy like the acer), its also slighly faster, has better battery life and is completely silent. The only "con" of this netbook is the harddrive size.... to solve this you have 2 options... OPTION 1) buy a 8/16 GB SDHC and install your programs to it (yes, if you format it and change the properties of the card you can run programs from the SD card, I have installed office 2007 on it and it runs smoothly), for info about how to do it check this page http://wiki.eeeuser.com/xp_sdhc_mounted. OPTION 2) buy a portable external hard drive and store your files there (to run programs you will have to keep the drive plugged all the time instead of having the SD card inside the netbook). The hard drive size isnt really such a bad thing, and you have to consider that it is a SOLID STATE DRIVE, which doesnt get gamaged if you shake your computer, if it falls or if it exposed to constant movement or vibration. I deffinitely recommend this thing if you want to do some light work on it and you plan only to handle some office documents and check your email. If you want something more powerful such as gaming, or imaging/sound editing dont buy this... get a more powerfull laptop instead PS: I included the CNET.com review that is available on Cnet or in youtube.

I was tired of carrying my other notebook with me, especially while flying (taking 14" notebook in and out at security checkpoints is not only tiring: the larger the machine, the easier it is to drop it accidentally). This machine was easy on the eyes (I had a look at Asus, HP, MSI Wind netbooks in store), small, and light. I was initially concerned that 8GB SSD (solid state disk) will be too small, but I had spare 8GB Secure Digital flash card at home. It proved to be enough for basic tasks and I was even able to install quite a few pieces of software with lots of space left. The nice thing about Dells is that you can upgrade memory and disk yourself (if you know how to do it) without losing warranty. I immediately ordered 2GB RAM online for $25, and when it arrived installed it without problem, making this Dell fly with all applications, even OpenOffice, image editors and some games. Finally I decided to upgrade SSD: the max you can get right now is 64GB for $220 (Runcore), but 32GB can be found for $80. After upgrade I have plenty of space, and am now in the process of adding Ubuntu Linux partition to the Windows XP SSD. One warning for buyers: the keyboard layout may be a problem for touch-typist. There is no mention in manuals how to get to some keys, e.g. F11= Fn+Z, F12=Fn+X. To sum up: the computer is perfect for basic tasks out of the box, and real joy to play with if you want to do some upgrades.

I bought this Sunday right when the new ad came out. They sold out quickly so consider yourself lucky if you got one. I have way too many UMPCs and this one will be the one I use the most. The usability sets it a part from the others. The hard drive is a bit small but I bought a 32GB SDHC card from Amazon and fixed that problem. A Mogo Bluetooth USB adapter fixed the Bluetooth problem. It is truly a very nice laptop and I had just bought and returned the Acer One due to build issues (too many dead pixels and the mouse buttons were too flaky). I had given up on the netbook catagory all together but reluctantly tried the Dell Mini. It has brought me back to the Netbook camp! No let downs here. Bonus!! The Acer had a 3 cell battery which lasted about 2 hours. The Dell sports a 4 cell which passes the 3 hour mark! If you can find one, pick one up. You'll love it!!

This Dell Mini 9 is like a smaller version of my 1525 Inspirion. What I mean by that is the construction of materials that is used. It's not cheap like the other netbooks on the market. I've had the Dell Mini 9 for about a week now and had almost no problems with it. Beginning on the second day I had the mini, the system kept on saying I needed to download updates. I've done that and did that again upon shut down when it said downloading 1 of 1 updates. That message came up everyday for the next 5 days. However, I emailed Microsoft and they contacted me saying that may have been a result of a third party security software. I made the corrections as they recommended and now everything is fine. Wish it had more SSD memory because it only had just over 1 GB of storage before I installed the AVG antivirus. I uninstalled the McAfee that was already installed on the system. The amount of SSD storage left is fine because it should be used just for surfing the net and opening email. It could be used for light work but a regular laptop or desktop would be recommended. The key board is small. I'm use to typing with all my fingers but with this mini I'm just using two fingers. I don't carry a purse but it's small enough to be carried in a lot of purses.

This little Dell can do 90% of all my computing needs. Surf web, email, stream music or video, edit MS Office documents, and more! The flash hard drive is small but you can double the memory with a SDHC card for $20. The Dell representative at my best buy guaranteed me 2 hour battery life, but so far I've been seeing 5-6 hours while streaming music and web surfing. It's amazing. My biggest complaint is the lack of F11 key used to full screen internet explorer. With only a 9" screen, this is almost necessary, but you can still full screen through the menus.

This netbook is superb. It has a great battery life (barely made it through 2 movies), great size, and superb build quality. Some of the other reviews state that it doesn't have an F11 for going to fullscreen on webpages - it infact does.. it is the Fn Z key! Another thing I love is that it has NO FAN, making it 100% silent. I have had no overheating issues as it was designed to be fanless.. this is great! I also love one thing about it more than other emerging netbooks - it is very portable. 10" netbooks are getting very close to the size of a small notebook PC. These are made for portability, and 8.9" is perfect. The Acer One is the frame of a 10" netbook with an 8.9" screen making it once again a little on the large side for my tastes. The Dell Mini is great!

I purchased this laptop from Best Buy Outlets for a great price. I never watch DVDs or listen to music on my laptops so this was a logical, cost effective choice for me. The Dell Mini is a great size and super fast on the internet. I take online classes and this is great for essays, discussion boards and anything school related. The XP loads very quickly, under a minute for me. Mine came with a web cam, which was an unexpected but cool feature. I like that you can adjust the sensitivity of the touch pad, which was not a feature on my old laptop. My mother used this and loves it. I thought the screen would be too small but it is actually the perfect size.This is great if you want to surf the web, type reports or take notes. It doesn't come with a disc drive, which hasn't been a problem for me.

I bought this netbook over a month ago and it has been great!!!! I use it for school and I am very pleased that I do not have to charge it often, the battery life is over 4 hours using a wireless. I saw another review that it takes a long time to boot. Like any other computer, it comes with some trial application that load at start up boot so you have to disable them. I can tell that the person who complainted about boot time does not know anything about computers. If you go to run>msconfig>start up> and uncheck unnecessary applications, your computer is going to boot in less than a minute. In conclusion, feel lucky if you bought one from the store because apparently stores don't carry it anymore. Best netbook ever!! highly recommended