Dell Inspiron Mini 9 with Ubuntu Linux 8.04 Hardy Heron – a review
Netbooks have exploded in popularity over the last year, and Dell recently entered the market with its Inspiron Mini 9 and 12 lines. I picked up an Inspiron Mini 9 with Ubuntu Linux 8.04 on the Cyber Monday sale, and took a good look at it.
I got a Mini 9 with the following stats:
-Intel Atom N270 processor at 1.6 gigahertz
-512 megabytes of RAM
-8 gigabyte solid-state hard drive
The Mini 9 also comes with three USB ports, integrated 802.11g wireless, an Ethernet port, SD card reader, a VGA-out port, headphone and microphone jacks, and an 8.9 inch screen at 1024×600 resolution. An optional USB optical drive is available for additional cost. Overall, the hardware build is pretty solid, and seems more durable than many other netbook designs.
The first thing I noticed is how eerily quiet it is. With most computers, you soon become accustomed to the constant hum of the hard drive. The Mini 9 is quiet. All you hear is the faint hum of the processor fan, but otherwise it’s stone quiet. Of course, the solid-state drive is more resistant to physical shocks than a mechanical hard drive.
A common drawback of netbooks is the tiny keyboards; it’s extremely difficult to type full-speed on a netbook keyboard. The Mini 9 takes a slightly different approach. The letter keys are about 80% of full size, while the keys on the edges of the keyboard are much smaller. This allows for faster typing than many other netbook keyboards; I’m able to type at about 70 or 80% of my usual typing speed. Some of the keys are in odd places. The apostrophe is below the Enter key and next to the left arrow key, and whenever I need the apostrophe I invariably hit the Enter key. So it may take some time to adjust to the keyboard.
The Mini 9 comes with Ubuntu Notebook Remix edition:
The default desktop view comes with the Dell Application Launcher, which contains shortcuts to launch the most common applications. It’s also possible to switch over to “Classic Desktop”, which is the standard Ubuntu desktop. This is a marked improvement over many other Linux-based netbooks, which offer only the simplified launcher environment, and block the user from accessing more advanced features. With the Mini 9, you have access to a full-blown desktop Linux installation, along with Ubuntu’s extensive software repositories.
The Remix Edition and Dell seem to have done a good job of smoothing over some of Ubuntu 8.04’s rougher features. Wireless support, which has been notoriously flaky in Linux, works well on the Mini 9. It handles connecting to a LCD projector quite well, which is a constant issue in many Linux distributions, since X11 doesn’t always handle multiple displays properly.
Ubuntu Netbook Remix runs adequately on the hardware, and boots in under a minute. I usually have open OpenOffice.org Writer, Firefox, and Rhythmbox, and only experienced occasional bouts of lag. Fortunately, the Mini 9 is probably the most easily upgraded netbook that I’ve seen yet. The RAM is reached through a panel on the bottom of the netbook.
All in all, the Inspiron Mini 9 is a pretty solid netbook computer. The hardware is good, and Ubuntu Netbook Remix Edition has been tuned to run smoothly. Obviously, the Mini 9, like all netbooks, is not a suitable substitute for a main computer, and certain kinds of work simply require more powerful hardware and a larger monitor. But the Mini 9 essentially offers a complete laptop computer in a lightweight package, and would make a useful portable computer.
-JM