"What I'm much more excited about is Dell's Inspiron Mini 9
netbook (pictured above), the price of which has dropped to $249
for the basic Ubuntu Linux/512 MB RAM/8 GB solid-state drive
model.
"I had the pleasure of trying this very-small but quite usable
netbook at the San Fernando Valley Linux Users Group booth at the
recent SCALE 7x show, and I was quite impressed with it. I've seen
quite a few ultra-small netbooks over the past couple of years --
the Asus Eee PC, the Everex Cloudbook, the HP 2133 Mini-Note, and
this Dell is the best one I've encountered yet.
"The smallish keyboard, while not super comfortable, is
definitely usable, and unlike some other netbooks, the Dell Mini 9
doesn't run hot. It has a nice display and is fairly snappy with
Ubuntu GNU/Linux 8.04 (the long-term support edition I'm using on
the little girl's Gateway laptop and my extra Toshiba 1100-S101).
It handled multimedia well when I saw it, and the small size makes
it extremely convenient. It's easier to tuck it in a bag or
backpack and open it up at will."
