Will the Dell Mini Inspiron have a 8.9" screen, run Ubuntu or XP Home, and cost under $500?
That's what engadget seems to think.
We decided to do some measuring in photoshop to see if they are right about the screen size and here's what we came up with.
First we took a known distance: in this case the width of a type A female USB port (half an inch). We used that known distance to get the overall height of the ultra-portable: approx 6.6".
We then took a picture of the whole screen and transferred over our measuring rule adjusting it so that the measuring rule matched our known length.
From there it is easy to copy and rotate rules to find the horizontal and vertical dimensions of the screen: approx 5" x 7".
Who remembers their math classes?
"The sum of the areas of the two squares on the legs (a and b) equals the area of the square on the hypotenuse (c)"
In other words the diagonal length (aka screen size) of our screen is the square root of 5 squared plus 7 squared = sqrt (25 + 49) = sqrt(74) = 8.6"
A little of the screen is always hidden behind the bezel so we can be pretty sure the screen is 8.9 or 9": too big to be 7" and too small to be 10".
Does it come with Ubuntu and XP? well the keyboard has a windows key so we would assume that XP is an option (especially given Michael Dell's description of it being for "developing markets" to get around Microsoft's XP licensing requirements going forward). Dell isn't exactly renowned for supporting Linux but if their competitors are all offering Linux we can assume they will do as well.
Price under $500? Dell should be able to get cheaper unit pricing than MSI so an entry level mini inspiron should be possible for under $500 but we would hope to see a number of versions offered in the $450 - $900 price range depending on processor power, RAM, hard drive, operating system etc.
Update: full specs released, it's called the Dell E and it's just $299! Full Dell E Specs
With a screen this size, I'd have to run 800x600 to be able to see the text, etc.
1024x768 might be too small.
I assume that this is not a "widescreen", with some other possible screen resolution.
Could be, however.
I run Ubuntu 7.10 on a Toshiba Satellite 4015CDS, and am using 800x600 because of the 2 MB of Video RAM there.
The Dell Mini could be a hit with those wanting a more portable PC than the standard size Inspiron with the 15.4 screen.
I saw this advertised for the first time last night, price $579. To be fair, they were very clear that it was not meant to be or replace a PC, but to augment. It comes with XP, 1G of RAM, a 16G hard drive, MS Works, no optical drive but a USB connection for downloading whatever you put on the hard drive to a "regular" PC. I didn't catch the processor speed if they even mentioned it. I didn't catch its weight - presumably it's pretty light. I didn't get a good look at the keyboard.
I have to admit I was intrigued about it as a portable web device. IMO, the features and functions put it somewhere between smartphone and a PC/laptop.